Most of you will want to slam me for this one. Go ahead. I can take it. I know that many of my opinions are as archaic as the bundling board and for that I do not apologize.
Tournament golfer, Hunter Mahan, was leading through 36 holes in the Canadian Open and was the odds-on-favorite until a phone call came that his wife had gone into labor. He walked off the course to be there for the birth and waved good-by to a potential million bucks. He later thanked his sponsers for appreciating what is important in life.
OK, just what is important in life? I'm sure it's different for each person and varies with generational mores. Is not being at the birth going to do irreparable harm to the little duffer? Would perhaps winning a cool mill. be a nice little nest for the college fund?
If I had been Mrs. Mahan, I would have screamed at my husband to get out of here and do his thing or at least go down to the pub and get drunk with the guys. What woman needs a guy in the way when she is gearing up for a job that has to be done alone. He already had his say in the reason she is in this situation. Enough. What's he going to do, help her push? Oh perhaps they will hand him the scissors and tell him where to cut the cord. Big Deal.
Now it's all share your wealth or so the citizens (oops can't say that word anymore) have been brainwashed to do because of all the POOR people in the US. Show me, a child of the great depression, one poor person in the US. I know poor and what you would show me wouldn't even come close, especially what with all the government hand-outs.
So, am I placing money over fatherly love? No, I'm saying that using your god-given talents and providing money for your family IS fatherly love. When this child is grown and looks at the parents still being married, he/she will understand the real meaning of family love.
I hadn't heard the story. It's heartwarming that he left for sure. Not sure how I side, I guess either way is fine with me. Stay on the course or leave to go to the hospital room if that's something you feel like you don't want to miss.
ReplyDeleteI'm easy on this one. :) I must say, however, that I'm surprised he left.
Rosey
DeleteYou are very fair and not to judge either way,
My feeling about this is that if they guy left because he really wanted to be there and not because he thought that it looked good in terms of P.R.... well, that is his choice. That may be the only baby his wife has and he wants to be a part of the experience. I don't begrudge him that. If he decided that he would rather have stayed on the course and won the game, I wouldn't have begrudged him that, either. As you say, putting a million toward the health and welfare of your family isn't peanuts.
ReplyDeleteRobin
DeleteSome very fine reasoning, as you always do. You have good insight into situations.
A million bucks
ReplyDeletePfft could buy the baby tons of rubber ducks
I can see wanting to see it being born
But I suppose you could re-enact with corn
Still a million bucks I'd have to go for
As it could let you spend time with the kid forever more
Pat
ReplyDeleteFor one who's young I do agree
Your soul is old so as I see
Who views the birth may live a lie
Look at Tiger, it makes one cry
Babies don't care who's at the birth
Just get them out for what it's worth
The test of father love is in motion
Will he still be here in 20 years with devotion?
I would like to add that many people think that providing food and education is enough to raise kids. I disagree. Kids need their parents' time. Many are raised in front of the television set and then they wonder what went wrong with them.
ReplyDeleteJulis
DeleteI do so agree with you. Raising kids is a delicate balance. Parents can show love just by "being there." That early bonding with a child by both parents gives them a feeling of security.
Typo.... I mean Julia...... sorry.
DeleteManzanita, I respect the golfers and other sports personalities who have left their job/team to be there for the birth of their child. However, I could go either way on it. I probably would never have teed it up at the Canadian Open if there was even a chance of the birth taking place. He could have been there for the birth, come to Akron and played in the WGC event this week and then gone to play the PGA next week. You are right about one thing...this is the time of year golfers can set up their future. With the FedEx Cup events coming up and a potential $10 million payday...that would buy a lot of diapers!!!
ReplyDeleteChuck
DeleteYour opinion is valued and it's interesting to see it from a man's perspective. I take it you are a golfer and follow the golf news now. I used to play a lot of golf and I had promised myself this was the year I would return but all my moving took up too much time. I hope to at least hit some practice balls this month.
Thanks for the input.
I am with you 100%. There are only 2 good reasons for him tohave done what he did.
ReplyDelete1. If he knew his wife would never forgive him and never let him forget it if he miussed the birth.
2. If the news rattled him so badly that he knew he would completely blow his lead. However, this hardly counts since he would surely have ended up- winning
SOME serious money.
It would make a more impressive story for his child if he could tell them that he sacrificed the chance to be at their birth so he could bring home a million bucks for them to enjoy. Good parenting is not one single effing act.......this was just an act of sheer stupidity.
Lo
DeleteI love your last sentence.... "Good parenting is not one single act"........ For sure. When I look back, I've made so many mistakes in parenting, although at the time they seemed like the right thing to do. And as my Grandma always said, the proof is in the pudding and my puddings all turned out to be decent, honest, trustworthy, respectful people and are now great parents themselves. I guess we just do the best we can and things turn out pretty good.
I do believe that with the present generation, it is expected that fathers attend the birth of their kids. I wonder if Tiger did and then why isn't he living with them today???????
Thanks for your insightful opinion.
Perhaps they'd arranged it beforehand, with her saying I'd really like you to be there. I'm wondering how close the game was to finishing, would he have had time to win and still attend the birth? Does he already have enough money that another million wouldn't matter? Or he figured what the heck, I'll win the next one. Maybe they were hoping she wouldn't go into labor until the next day or the next week. My personal opinion is he should have played on and won. my hubby wasn't there for any of his children's births and it didn't seem to worry the kids one bit. Not one of them decided to hang in there until daddy came back to the hospital.
ReplyDeleteRiver
DeleteHahahaha I get your point of the kids not waiting for daddy to arrive before they appear. Ouch I think my husband was at the birth of only one of the kids and that was because the baby arrived the minute we got to the hospital. That was also in Morocco and we had to drive a long distance to the air force hospital.
You raise some interesting questions and as always, you put some down-to-earth facts out for consideration. Thanks for the great comment.
From what I understand, she was 3 weeks early, so maybe he was always planning to be there!
ReplyDeleteFishducky
DeleteGood point. I'd guess he was planning to be there, too. The father in attendance seems to be part of the birthing experience now.
OK... tough one. I asked the man next to me who ended up delivering our son in the elevator. He says the guy should have finished the game. He agrees with you. Me? I have to think about this some more. A MILLION dollars, you say?
ReplyDeleteKay
DeleteYou delivered in the elevator? WOW.... I bet that was an experience. With my 2nd one I made it to the cart and still had my street clothes on... you must have too. It's smart of us to get it over quickly, don't you think? Ha
It was not for certain that he would have won, but he was leading and had the best chance according to the way he was playing. So... who is to say? I just hope he's still there with his family in 20 years and not another Tiger.
This is a grand question for fence sitters like me. Of course there was no guarantee he would have won the tournament and I am sure it was as much a decision for himself as for her. Too many business men as well as athletes put the dollar before the family. Nice to see it the other way around. That baby won't know it now, but it will be a treasured fact in later years. So I respect the guy putting family before the dollar. He has all ready won over 2 million this year alone. Guess I am sliding off the fence totally to his side.
ReplyDeletePatti
DeleteA million isn't that big of a deal these days. I'm sure he wouldn't miss the money. Isn't there some kind of rule if you won a certain tournament, you don't have to qualify on the next? I can't recall exactly.
I think the media and everyone thinks he did the right fatherly thing.
Maybe he's earned so much money from playing that he doesn't need a puny payout like that.
ReplyDeleteRosalind
DeleteI think you are right. A million doesn't buy much in today's economy.
I had my two babies without any comments or a instructions from the beer fairy also he would have fainted or felt sick and i pretty sure that would have turned him off sex for some time, so I say he should have stayed and won the million dollars, they could have made a video and he could have enjoyed it at his leisure.
ReplyDeleteMerle.......................
Merle
DeleteA video is a great idea. A lot of people do that anyway. I think the beer fairy did the right thing. This seems to be a generational thing. I always preferred to be almost alone when I had babies. People in the room made me nervous and my husband was the last person I'd want in the room. His part was naming the boys and I named the girls.
Thanks for the comment.
Take the million
ReplyDeleteHoly ghose
DeleteAs in, take the money and run? Haha It's considered a bad thing to want money these days.
Of course I'm going to go against the grain here and disagree with most of your commenters...
ReplyDeleteThere's a lot of kids who would give a million dollars to have their Dad's in their life at all, even if it was only for their birth. I am one of those, so maybe I just take this subject too seriously. Maybe because you knew that you could trust that your husband would be there for the kids when it mattered, then you are far more comfortable with Dad missing the beginning part.
Still I think that what this story says about what we value most is very touching and worthwhile in today's world. I would have been so proud to have had a Dad that valued me over any amount of money. And yet thinking back to my quite impoverished start I know that sometimes a kick start of a million dollars would be tempting for sure.
It's a tough call all around, but I do doubt this guy really needs the money so I think he made the right call.
Jasmine
DeleteI think all the different opinions are most interesting and our viewpoints seem to stem from the environment we were raised in. You always seem to be able to see different sides of a situation, even those outside of your own experience. Often our lives are controlled by our search for acceptance and sometimes we just chase a fantasy.
Most people agree with your thinking and I knew I was the one against the grain..... not you. It's all very interesting, the things that shape and mold us into the adults we become.
Thanks Jasmine, for the valued comment.
What I would do in the same situation is what is right for me, and I'd thank everyone else to mind their own damn business. So the best I can do to weigh in to this 'debate' is to respect other people's right to make their own choices as I would wish them to respect mine!
ReplyDeleteRed,
DeleteI agree with you that what we do with our lives should be our business. Our decisions belong to us. BUT (and there's a big but) when an athlete crosses that line into being a celebrity and has signed up with sponsors he is paid the big bucks for his athletic performance. Sponsors want winners who acquire fans who will purchase the sponsor's product. With celeb status, an athlete signs away a lot of his privacy. That was why Mahan thanked his sponsors for understanding what was important in his life.
I would imagine, an athlete's signing for the endorsements is kind of like selling their soul.
My husband owned a baseball team and our kitchen was often the meeting-over-coffee place for star players who were disgruntled with what the media released. My husband always used a cliche...."Name of the game."
We don't know the whole Hunter Mahon story. There may have been problems during the pregnancy and then the early birth could have had complications. I think the baby weighed about 5 lbs.
ReplyDeletePlaying that particular game or being at the birth of your firstborn? Choosing one over the other says a lot about the man.
Susan
ReplyDeleteYou are sooo right. Time will tell what kind of a man he is.
Hahhahaha.... You tell em Manzi!! My Hubs father was hunting when my Hubs was born. He came to the hospital said hello and left again. I think it is still a sore subject in that home.
ReplyDeleteTerry,
DeleteHahaha..That's a good one. I'm surprised that your mother-in-law really cared because back then women mostly delivered their own babies. In fact I do remember sending my husband out and telling him to return after the baby was born. Remember I go back over 80 years and I guess I retain those values. Rarely was a doctor used when a baby was born in our area. The birthing room was just for the women because they knew what they were doing. Even as a tiny, tiny girl, I remember I could go in the birthing room because I was female and it prepared me for what I would experience some day. My grandmother helped with many a birth and I always went along. As I got older, I was often handed the bloody baby and had to clean it up. Totally different times.
WOW
DeleteBig, big space. How did that happen????
I tend to agree with you. Thinking of what all that money will mean places it really in perspective. I was listening to a radio station debating this very thing on a trip to Virginia Beach last week. The knee jerk reaction was, "Of COURSE he should be there for his wife!" Then, as the discussion got into more detail, the question became, "Are there SOME instances when you WOULDN'T go?" In other words, if you were playing in the Super Bowl, would you go? Or the the 7th game of the World Series and you were the team's very best player? Or if you're some schmuck who is a bench-warmer in the Super Bowl? Or if you're Tiger Woods and a millionaire, anyway? Orrrr, if you RARELY are the leader of a golf tournament and are looking at a million dollar payday? In that case, my wife would scream at me to go get the money for the family. She'd lie to our child that I was there. Like most things in life, things are often more complicated than they at first appear. It's a moot point for me, anyway. You won't see me winning any sports tournament. And if Mrs. Penwasser was to be pregnant, it would be of a biblical nature.
ReplyDeleteI like your reasoning. But of course you realize my values are old-fashioned. What's the big deal about the father being there for a child's birth and then he and the mother divorce and the child rarely sees it's father. (But, he was THERE when the kid was born) LOL
DeleteI suppose Tiger was there for his kids birth. That sure makes him a great father.
By the way, I like Mrs Penwasser.
If it were me, I'd rather my husband finish the game before coming to the hospital. Win, lose, or draw, he should have his opportunity. It's kinda nice that golfer chose to be with his wife, but I wonder if he might harbor resentment somewhere down the line for missing his shot at the big bucks. In the big picture, his presence at the hospital is just one day out of their lives, but that money could make things better for them for a whole lot of days.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, I don't know anything about his wife's health and expectations for the birth. If she's healthy, and the birth was expected to be routine, he could have served his family better by staying on the golf course.
Susan
ReplyDeleteYou bring out an interesting point that I had thought about too, that he may resent it down the line. He does have sponsors and at the time he just walked away, he probably didn't know how they would feel about him backing out. Sponsors bring in the really big bucks. Thanks for your ideas. I guess this post has been whipped enough, like a dead horse (not really, but as the saying goes).... time to write a new post, huh? Damn Sam, I've had so little free time this summer. I hope you've had some of those good ole lazy days of summer.
Yeah, especially if that kid turns out to be a brat. (Not like OUR kids!)
DeleteTheoretically, I can enjoy a lazy day whenever I'd like, regardless of season, but I'd usually rather be doing something. (If sitting in front of my computer for hours on ends qualifies as "doing something"...)
Manzanita, thank you for your comment on my blog today. I haven't read anything by Lawrence. I just liked that poem I shared.
ReplyDeleteThanks for your visit.
Julia
DeleteFor one book that I've read of his was "Lady Chatterly's Lover." That was written 2 years before I was born and contained explicit sexual suggestions and that was a shocker at the time. I read it when I was quite young. He had a rather complicated life, I do know that about him. I guess I know a little about him but not much. Ha
Hi Manzanita .. there are too many variables - was it their first child? Was the birth going to be easy ... how long had she been in labour ... and did they need the money ..
ReplyDeleteInteresting .. and had husband and wife made a pact beforehand that he would be with her regardless ..
I can't pass comment not having had children .. but interesting story -cheers Hilary
Hilary
DeleteThanks for the input and I better get busy and write a new post as this is beginning to get old news. That is the trouble when one writes of current things. Better to write of history, huh?