Chocolate Truffles for the Human Spirit #3

This short story was published as part of Tellables' July 2019 Box of Chocolates stories centered on miracles, or as I spin it, questioning miracles. Box of Chocolates is an Alexa skill you can install to sample monthly short stories narrated by digital, story-telling chocolatiers . If you have an Alexa device, I recommend you give the Box of Chocolates skill a try.

And if you like the idea of writing delicious, super-short stories (100-400 words) by all means check out the Tellables website for story submission guidelines. 

One Stroke Wonder

My father was the son of a confectioner trained in Germany. Indeed, I was inspired to pursue my career in chocolate craft by my grandfather in spirit and my mother in practice. Still, it was my father who inspired me to be a joyful human being. He was a hands down sports nut and even though I was a bit more artsy fartsy we would watch occasional Eagles and Phillies games together. He would whoop and roar like no tomorrow at each touchdown and run scored for the home team. Yet it was when we played a round of golf that we really bonded as father and son.

The golf outing I remember most vividly was a Spring morning at a nine hole golf course called Woody's just outside Philadelphia. We were celebrating my dad's seventieth birthday with our typical one dollar per hole bet. My dad and I may have been just a couple of hackers, but we took very seriously that potential nine dollar windfall. I was up three dollars when the miracle shot occurred.

The miracle drive happened on hole number eight. It was a gorgeous two hundred yard hole blending nature and landscaping. A sparkling pond jutted halfway across the fairway and the tee itself was elevated, providing a fine view of the rolling hillside. It was on this hole my dad would hit a hole-in-one. Having lost sight of his drive in the sun, we combed through the rough and sand traps for his ball for what seemed like an hour. Pulling my head from a bush I heard my dad guffawing at having found his ball in the hole itself. I stood mouth gaping as he danced like a medicine man around a campfire exclaiming "hole-in-one" like a true believer. We would toast that "miracle hole-in-one" over post golf beers for years to come.

Today, once again, it's my dad's birthday and I stand at that very same hole, hole number eight. With stealth that I've possessed since youth I had snuck onto the course from the adjacent neighborhood, having lost my desire to actually play the game once Dad had passed. Still, for the past seven years it's been my personal ritual to come out at dawn to the miracle green at Woody's. With a grin and a chuckle, I drop a ball into the hole, and remember my father's joyous dancing. Odds are good that today someone else will have a miracle shot at hole number eight.