Dreaming of Lucky Shots

I dreamt I was playing golf in the snow at a friend’s wedding. We were in the rugged mountains of north Wales with piles of bare rock instead of sand traps. I realized these were unusual conditions and asked my friend to take a picture of me making a put. I felt bad asking him to take a photo of me since it was his wedding, but he was happy to oblige. But when he took the photo, he took it looking back at the lodge where the reception was being held rather than against the picturesque rocks. I decided not to say anything.

My first shot was quite poor but my second shot was superb and landed me near what appeared to be the hole. I asked my friends where the hole was. They didn’t know either but said that I should since I was the one making up this game of snow golf. We decided it must be the small furrow nearby. For some reason, I got to pick my ball up and drop it wherever I wanted. It seemed unfair to put it too close to the cup, but I put it close enough that I had a reasonable shot through the uneven snow.

My friends were amazed at how skillful I was in my playing of snow=golf. I explained to them that I was sometimes very, very lucky, but that the luck came and went with such frequency that I never made bets on my playing.

Once, in real life, I was invited to participate in a rodeo in Costa Rica. Really. I mean, I was already there at a resort and it was after the real cowboys had put on the real show, but still, I was invited. The resort was in the rain forest and had been a cattle ranch in a previous incarnation. I was there with a mindfulness program while there the other group was practicing some wild kind of horseback riding and sensuality. I never quite figured out what they were doing, but they loved to ride horses fast and I got into the action to ride with them a few times.

When I asked their leader (a self-styled sensualist who never seemed to wear a shirt) how to ride, he said to feel my energy sinking down through the horse’s hoof’s into the ground and to call on the body-wisdom of my ancestors who rode bareback across the great plains—to trust that the horse and I were part of the same knowing. With that one riding lesson, I began galloping across open fields and even taking small jumps with the others. And, sometimes indeed, I did feel the energy of the horse and the earth and the wind as part of me.

At the end of the week, the local cowboys put on a small rodeo for the forty of us at the resort. These guys grew up on horses and were as comfortable riding as I am sitting on the couch writing these words. One of the contests at the end was to gallop across the arena at full speed and spear a small brass ring (about size of a quarter) from where it was clipped to a wire running across the ring. They tried it several times to no avail and then asked if any audience members wanted to try.

My enthusiasm got the better of my judgment and I went down into the ring with a few other guests. I waited while a couple others mounted up tried unsuccessfully to get the ring. Then it was my turn. The horses, by this time, were quite excited. All the racing around and the excitement of the riders was absorbed by these amazing creatures who love to run. The horse was practically prancing as I mounted. It was willing to wait for only a moment and then took off across the dirt ring.

I remember thinking ‘I hope I don’t fall off’ – mostly because I didn’t want to embarrass myself in front of everyone, but thinking back, serious injury would have been much worse. I held my small stick up in the general direction of the ring so as not to appear as fearful or out of my league as I really was. When the horse stopped on the other side of the arena, I found, to my amazement, the ring was on the small stick in my hand. Everyone cheered and hooted at my demonstration of skill. I proudly took it over to the owner of the resort and he gave me a couple bills that he was handing out to the cowboys for their antics.

At breakfast the next day, several people were quite impressed and attributed my success to a combination of horsemanship and Zen. I maintained, and still do, that it was all luck.