It’s a sunny summer day. You’ve been hitting the “lab” — the driving range — all winter, slowly improving your game. You’re with your buddy, and the first two holes have gone well — you’re just one over par. Who knows? Maybe today’s the day to break 90!

Arnold Palmer in hand, you drive up to the tee box on hole three, only to see two other carts parked, waiting for the guys ahead to clear the fairway. The foursome sees you and your buddy: “You guys can play through. We’re going to take a while!” They laugh as they attempt to be congenial and brotherly on the links. Cigar smoke and John Mellencamp fill the awkward silence. 

Deep down, everyone involved knows that’s the most feared laugh and phrase in the mediocre golfer’s dictionary: “play through.” 

“No. No, no, no, no, no, no. You go ahead. You’re fine. We’ll wait. We’ll wait all day for you to tee off. There’s no one behind us, and we like it that way.” That’s what you want to say. But, of course, you don’t. They’ve made an offer you can’t refuse. 

“Oh.” You and your buddy look at each other, fear bubbling in your subtle gaze. “Um … yeah, sure. Thanks!”

Now, you’ve got a foursome parked off to the side of the cart path in their little golf carts, looking ahead and pretending they’re not side-eyeing your practice swings.

You have trouble putting your glove on — the wrinkled one with a hole in the thumb, you found by the cart corral a few weeks back. You gulp and hike up the slight incline on the tee box. You pull the Martini tee and mud-covered Noodle ball out of your pocket and head to the back tees, because that’s where you’ve been playing from the whole round, duh. 

One of the guys from the foursome turns the JBL volume down one notch at a time. You take a quick look at your buddy, who’s laughing his butt off but also on the verge of making a crotch stain on his khaki-colored pants.

Ha, you guys came in polos and pants, as if a pair of I-don’t-even-know-my-handicap golfers needs to follow the PGA dress code.

In a deep voice, you look at the foursome and ask, “What’s it playin’ today, about 320?”

They turn as if they weren’t paying attention, “Yeah, just about. With the wind at your back, though, maybe more like 310.”

Oh, yeah, sure. That changes everything. You turn to your friend and suggest maybe clubbing down to your three wood because of this 10-yard difference. After a productive conversation, though, you stick with “Big Bertha” — the used driver you found on Facebook Marketplace.

But, of course, you have to wait for the guys ahead to clear the green. Because you usually drive the green on this hole, duh.

There are two very distinct possibilities here: a 99% chance you slice it off onto hole two and doink that landscape worker on the head and bounce down the cart path, or a 1% chance you hit the drive of your life and stripe it down the middle of the fairway.

You can either expose the facade you’ve been putting up for years regarding your golfing abilities or keep the dream alive for one more Masters season. 

But here’s the thing: Whatever happens, it doesn’t matter. 

If you hit a 310-yard line drive that rolls to five feet from the pin, you’ll have a great look for birdie, which you’ll probably miss, and get a couple of hoorahs from the foursome. Maybe they’ll even ask if you’re a scratch golfer. 

If you hit your usual “strong fade” — a classic right-handed slice — you’ll be the usual 175 yards through the trees, over the bunker and around the tee box sign on hole two that you’ve hit from so many times before. The foursome will probably hold in their judgmental laughter and say, “Have a good round.”

Suppose you do end up yelling “Fore!” and rustle a few oak branches with your drive. Here’s a veteran piece of advice: Watch the foursome of guys behind you take their tee shots when you’re off the green after three-putting for a triple bogey.

In all likelihood, they’ll be slicing and hooking it all over the place. And if one of them does almost hit your cart with a 320-yard bomb, it was probably the drive of their life, too.

Either way, you got up in front of people who can judge you from the pretend platform they don’t really stand on and gave it a whack. You swung.

In the 2006 film “Little Miss Sunshine,” a young girl participating in a beauty contest is repeatedly told by her father that there are two types of people in life: winners and losers. When she tells her grandpa that she doesn’t want to be a loser, the grandpa responds, “You know what a loser is? A real loser is somebody that’s so afraid of not winning, they don’t even try.”

According to psychologist Dana Harron, “People judge others to avoid reckoning with (their own) potential feelings of inferiority and shame.” Whether on the golf course, in school or at your job, realize this: Every person you think may judge you on your failures or successes in life is just as — if not more — scared and unsure of themselves as you are. 

The most important thing is to take advantage of opportunities to “play through” and give your Noodle ball a whack. Don’t listen to the giggling gaggle of soft-rock-listening cigar smokers masquerading as something superior to you. Whether you stripe it or slice it is irrelevant.

As John Mellencamp sings, “Life goes on.”

So next time you’re on the course, literally or figuratively, hum “I’m Alright” by Kenny Loggins in your head, channel your inner Ty Webb and swing for the green. 

Maybe, if you’re feeling extra confident, you can quote John Daly and ask the foursome, “Where’s the first tee, and what’s the course record?” 

However you go about it, give your dreams in life a whack. After all, you only get 18 holes. 

Alex is a freshman in Business.

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