IT'S HARD enough to understand how we can lose someone so early in life. It's even harder when that someone stood out in a crowd and effortlessly effected change in the world. Why do the great ones, the truly superhuman, leave us before using every bit of their limitless talent and enthusiasm?
Professional athletes, constantly in the spotlight, have a unique opportunity to be role models. But it is rare to see these lucky men and women taking advantage of that chance and using their talents and influence outside of their sport. One man did just that with enthusiasm, devotion and integrity. Now that man is gone.
Professional golfer Payne Stewart died Monday in a tragic plane crash in South Dakota, and with that loss, the world of professional golf -- and professional athletics in general -- has lost one of the greatest sportsmen it ever had.
Sure, fans and athletes alike will miss his antics on the course, his fierce yet composed competitive nature, and his throwback style of dress. But Stewart's struggles in life and with the game should be remembered and looked at as a lesson in making life work to your advantage, one hole at a time.
Learning to shoot a perfect free throw is difficult, but perfecting a golf swing almost seems like it has to be related to some kind of genetic predisposition. For those like Stewart, with the remarkable ability to make the impossible seem simple, the mental stress starts from the first moment on the course and fails to cease until the golfer's dying day.
Stewart was no exception. He failed to make the cut in the Disney Classic, the last tournament in which he played. He was on his way to the next when he died. This setback, however, was nowhere near as devastating as some of his past struggles.
Stewart's career suffered an eight-year drought from 1991-99, during which he won only one tournament. But leave the Tour he did not. He continued to play, decked out in knickers, tam-o'-shanter hat and, many times, the colors of the tournament city's professional sports teams. For eight long years he watched new, younger players take the trophies, titles and prize money that once had been so easy for him to win. He watched the game of golf reaching a new, more youthful crowd, but even at 42, Stewart was as fired up about each hole as a rookie at his first tournament.
His enthusiasm and love and respect for the game came full circle when, in June, he won his second U.S. Open with a 15-foot putt to win. He was then named to the Ryder Cup team that won in international competition and set records for the largest comeback victory in Ryder Cup history.
His career seemed to pick up right where it had left off, but much had changed Stewart during his down years. Most of all, he learned to keep his life in perspective. When he was on the course, he was a golfer. When at home he was a father and a husband. It seemed that he knew exactly how to give to each part of his busy life the amount of attention it truly deserved.
Perhaps he learned to do that by looking more closely at the game that he so loved. Golf can be one of the most poignant metaphors for life. Ask any athlete and they probably will talk for hours about how their game describes life perfectly. But golf outlines the manner in which life should be lived -- with etiquette, patience and dignified competitive spirit.
Golf teaches a person to examine and deal with each endeavor as it comes, while looking ahead to the next move. It stresses patience at all times, because, over an 18-hole course, your score, attitude or the weather can change for the better at any time.
I've learned a lot about life from watching Stewart's career, with its highs and lows. I've learned to stay patient if that big test didn't quite go my way, wipe the slate clean, and focus my attention on acing the next one. The hardest lesson to understand is that college is just one hole on the course. If everything doesn't go well here, we all pretty much have the whole back nine of life to turn things around.
Throughout his career, Payne Stewart showed us that life can feel like a constantly stormy day at Pebble Beach. But as the world of golf mourns his death, we can't help but realize that, if you work for it, there's a hole-in-one along the way for everyone.
(Erin Perucci is a Cavalier Daily associate editor.)
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