Patricia Sandler

Off Course

I walk often, and when I walk I tend to think. One of my routes takes me around a golf course where for some time I’ve noticed various golf balls that have been hit outside the fence, only to lay there day after day. I started to wonder how much those seemingly disposable objects cost, which led me to ponder the nature of the imbalance between what we in this society feel free to dispose of vs. what the relative cost of those objects might buy in a more underdeveloped country or underserved community. The golf course is really only a convenient stand in for any number of other things I suppose I could have chosen. I for instance buy a large coffee from Peet’s approximately 4 times a week ($9.00), when I could easily make it at home for a lot less. So I claim no moral high ground here. As I looked into the approximate cost of each golf ball I found, and then looked for relative value in other areas, I learned an immense amount about some issues I was not so versed in. The whole project has become a treasure hunt of sorts, both searching for the golf balls all around the city, and researching issues throughout the world. In the course of the hunt, I have sustained a scraped knee, a scraped bumper and many miles on my pedometer. It has also stimulated my thinking in many ways. As I climbed down a ravine the other day on the side of a country club, I remembered that in the past, I used to ponder where I might sleep if I were homeless, and the ravine was one of the places I had imagined would be relatively safe and hidden. I sometimes see homeless individuals doing just that. I try not to look away.