LITTLE ROCK — Crickets fiddle, frogs croak, bugs strafe the outdoor lights and the din of laughter and “yee-haws” carry across hundreds of mowed acres in the humid July evening.
It’s that time again. The raucous Berryville Couples Tournament is in full swing at the Carroll County Country Club. The swallows in golf shoes have returned to Capistrano.
As I’ve come to report each July from this hilly nine-hole layout with a smallish clubhouse, the couples have come from all over Northwest Arkansas and even parts of Missouri for a three-day swatfest like no other.
Some of you may recall the big red barn on the left side of the first fairway that protects the downhill, par-4 green from all who pull or hook their tee shots. Well, Laurie and I discovered more than once that it is, indeed, a real barn. Thankfully, she did manage during one round to send her 9 iron soaring high above the massive oaks and the metal barn roof to drop on the green. Tiger in his pre-scandal era couldn’t have struck it better.
As with all such gatherings, we look for a lot of folks and friends who we wouldn’t ordinarily see during the year. Willie Newman of the Fayetteville Police Department and his wife Stephanie showed up this year just five months after the birth of their second son, Levi.
Good-natured Willie gained a measure of notoriety at previous tournaments for displaying an uncanny skill for chair dancing during the rousing Saturday night banquet and Karaoke festivities. No, not that kind of chair dancing. Willie was trying to perfect the finer technique of balancing in a chair on the dance floor while continuing to boogie to the music.
Two years ago, the chair collapsed. He survived. Last year, another chair held up through an entire set. This year, Willie kept both feet on the ground. Maturity, it is said, can have a sedating effect.
But I’d be remiss if I didn’t say that Stephanie wound up with a knot the size of an egg on her head after Willie slammed their golf cart into a tree while backing up on a fairway. Golfcart backing is not the same as chair dancing, I suppose, but rather a dubious skill of its own.
There were the familiar cast of golfing couples: Tim and Mary Lewallen, Dennis and Linda Kearby, Tommy and Jo Ann Tice, Mr. and Mrs. Bubba, Junior and the Beavers. In all, more than 100 people came for the long weekend.
Conversations by evening and day flashed from children to grandkids to politics to the economy to foods we’ve known and loved. The laughter and guffaws continued on Friday and Saturday evenings on the covered patio and inside the clubhouse.
The menu is fixed. Most who come prefer the thick, grilled, boneless pork chops and baked potatoes served from ice chests beside the pool table. The table is covered with a board and draped in white. It displays homemade green bean casseroles, salads and other forms of authentic and distinguished Ozark food.
Jerry King of Berryville and I decided to throw caution to the wind and wrap our chop in a paper napkin and chow down by hand. Hey, this is the Berryville Couples Tournament. It was sorta like eating Fudgesicles, only they were porksicles.
The excitement this year for Barry and Karen Tice of Huntsville had more to do with leather than food. Barry’s wallet containing nearly $700had fallen from his golf cart on Friday afternoon. After an extensive search, he decided to put aside panic and calmly retrace his steps alone. Sure enough, he drove to a spot at the farthest reaches of the course and there it lay with the greenbacks still inside. It must have felt like he’d just won more than $600.
Out on the par-36 course, playing in six-somes means balls can come flying from over hills and through trees from virtually any direction. During our first year Laurie caught a Titleist 3 squarely in her chest as we were motoring down the eighth fairway. She never knew what hit her, but like Levi’s mom she survived, and now it’s all become more tournament lore as the years pass.
I call Cindy George of the Berryville club the attentive mother hen of this event. Without her constantly checking on cart keys, fees, side games and schedules, all this hoopla just wouldn’t whoop. Cindy is constantly finishing up the unfinished business, then hopping into a golf cart at the last possible second and even playing herself.
On our final day, we played with Kay and Elbert Smith of Missouri. Kay teed off on a par-4 hole and we watched her ball bounce into the trees, leap about five feet into the air and land in the hollowed-out trunk of a large old oak. It could have been an Easter egg perched into there looking out at us.
Later, Laurie smacked a drive that out-rolled everyone else by 20 yards. Elbert marched over with a scowl and said he was demanding a steroid test when we finished. That kind of humor and sarcasm kinda explains the tone of this gathering.
The only real disappointment for several couples this year was not being allowed to drive the carts they’d rented from the club to their rooms at the Fairway Inn beside the course and keep them overnight.
Another late July in “Barville.” -
Mike Masterson is opinion editor of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette’s Northwest edition.
Editorial, Pages 11 on 07/27/2010