The CaddyShack #18 - Shaking Hands
A new written series coming to an end, by Pat's Ten Pence.
During the compilation of these extracts, I had many, many anecdotes to sift through. I wrote pretty much every day in summer, if not writing then we sat and shared hundreds of stories in Whit’s bar, or back on the course, or in a variety of settings. I was always on the look-out for fun stories from the other caddies. In the end, I used mostly my own experiences. In all cases, I changed the golfer’s names from each actual story, just in case any of them ever come across this book!
Acknowledgements
I utilised the input of several other Cabot caddies last summer. A particular shoutout to fellow golf sickos Ethan Collins, John Garron, Kyle Duggan (who cannot let go, guy’s got 3 seasons in him) and the rest of the Cabot grinders, you know who you are, for their constant waves of fun stories to share. I am lucky to have experienced a summer with them. Between myself, John, Kyle and Ethan, in a week we’d walk 200 miles, meet a whole array of new people from all over the world, play a couple of rounds, watch a few hours of professional golf, recycle a crate of beers and then talk about the job for a couple more hours, and probably slept the rest.
We considered a podcast because the unique nature of this job deserves one. In any case, the Caddyshack extracts should help to paint a picture of what you can do for work - even for a short time - that doesn’t exactly fit a normal job description. If nothing else, it’s been fun to document the experience, and I’m now connected (in a weird, negligible way) to caddies at Pebble Beach, dairy farmers from Florida, architects from Asia, engineers from New England, tech guys from Texas and everywhere in between.
I hope golfers read these and proceed to reserve a tee time at Cabot Cape Breton. You might find a gap in 2026. I hope future guests read this and start to get excited about the caddie they might meet. I hope other caddies resonate with the content of these extracts, and I hope that other readers can use this book as inspiration to make some stories of their own.
Five Lessons Learned:
1) You can make or break the experience – the golf is the main draw to the place, the restaurant and accommodation enhance the world-class nature of everything Cabot touches. I tried to remember that some people will save up for a long time to come here, and they’ll certainly be expecting good service!
2) “There are no stupid ideas”
I often changed the conversation from golf to careers. If you play it right, you can use the job as a chance to simply talk to people. I learned that successful people all have different pathways. Some stayed in school, some tried a load of industries, some failed businesses before finally succeeding – there is no one blueprint to do well in life. Most people say to enjoy your youth, trust what you’re good at, and don’t close opportunities down without giving them a go.
3) The general advice was to live with some direction, but have fun and don’t settle.
The successful guys were still working, or at least earning, through their sixties and seventies, they’d made it their mission to play golf all over the world but also to keep the mind sharp. They were usually very much still firing on all cylinders and also fiercely competitive. Golf is a great sport for that – the intricate nature of the Cabot golf courses definitely helps keep the grey matter ticking over!
4) First impressions last
You have to convince your golfer of your caddie capability, while being wildly professional, articulate, intelligent – and possessing the ability to front up and sometimes push back against a high-profile client. The way you go about doing this is excellent practise for future work, especially resolving these problems on the fly, face to face.
5) Enjoy the view!
Not many people can call it work, taking in breathtaking views and spending time with people who are all on vacation. It’s a special circumstance, don’t take it for granted.
Having just celebrated my 25th birthday, I’m glad to have rounded out the back nine and look forward to the next thing. I’m also glad this current level of simultaneous wisdom and naivety.
Talk soon,
Pat
Loved this 🥰