An open letter to Tiger Woods
On the occasion of his sixth missed Masters tournament, Golf Digest editorial director Max Adler writes a letter to Tiger Woods from Augusta National
Dear Tiger, I am not trying to be glib writing you an open letter. On the occasion of missing your sixth Masters tournament and fourth Champions dinner, not even you would deny how your presence, inseparable from your absences, has defined the space of Augusta National for one week every April across 30 years. You have been like the weather.
Galleries swell and shift according to your path and patterns; comments and predictions about your status become a form of salutation on the grounds. This sleepy southern city is just the eye, of course. Hundreds of millions across the world track you so closely this time of year.
It was a nice morning here. The faint grumble of workers making last preparations under diesel floodlights as well as the waning moon our astronauts circled yesterday. As an early practicer, you know how the blackness fades to green in the first natural light and reveals the turf totally pristine but for a few sets of tire tracks cutting the dew (you know they’d erase them if they could).
The first patrons set out briskly shouldering their folding chairs then washed up one and down ten and eighteen like a wave broken in so many directions. Up by the clubhouse lawn and on the veranda, waiters in white jackets with silver coffee urns darted among ladies and gentlemen as the sun slowly gained strength through the branches of the giant live oak. Do you miss walking under ‘The Tree’?