It wasn’t everyone, but one could say more than plenty, to make you feel unwelcome. And that’s a strange thing to feel in your hometown. I loved to golf. I got a starter set of clubs from my mom for my birthday. The two drivers had heads of turquoise blue. When I practiced driving from our back yard into Hugo’s field, using the sliced and abandoned balls my mom found in the rough of the local golf club, I felt powerful. A streak of blue seemed to follow the damaged ball, the damaged ball that was still able to fly after a crack from the sweet spot of my inexpensive, but priceless, golf clubs.

Under a certain age in the summertime, you didn’t have to be a member to play. My mom would drop me off and I would golf all day. I didn’t know it until I was grouped with the vacationing members, but I was in the wrong shoes. The wrong clothes. I only knew it because they told me. I had a choice to cry, or swing harder. I often did both.

We all tanned quickly under the summer sun. We hadn’t been taught about sunscreen. There were so many things we hadn’t been taught — like how to get along with others who weren’t in your group. Like how to welcome members who weren’t really members at all. But don’t feel sorry for me. That’s not the point. I outdrove every one of those girls because I could go home to a mother who loved me — a mother who “teed me up” behind the garage, and whooped and hollered, arms raised to the sky, as I cracked the imperfect balls into the field. No membership required.

I suppose you could think that I was so afraid of belonging that I never joined anything. That’s not true at all. I don’t have membership cards or passes. But I do join in every day. I step outside the door and I am a part of it all. Here and everywhere. With an open heart, an open field. I belong. I keep swinging!