I should warn you that I might get a little emotional on today’s column because I’m pretty sure that for the last time in my life I was forced to dye my hair a shocking shade of pink.
That foggy-eyed moment took place on Monday morning at Bridges Golf Course about 25 miles southwest of Winnipeg, where I was once again caddy at the Pink Ribbon Ladies Golf Classic for Hope, the largest women-only golf tournament in the province.
Doug Speir’s caddies at the Pink Ribbon Ladies Golf Classic for Hope on Monday with (from left) Karen Russell, Michelle Greenwood, Dorothy Gauer and Joan Walton – The Twisted Sisters.
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Doug Speir’s caddies at the Pink Ribbon Ladies Golf Classic for Hope on Monday with (from left) Karen Russell, Michelle Greenwood, Dorothy Gauer and Joan Walton – The Twisted Sisters.
This is the tournament where each of the 32 four-women teams is assigned a hairy person of my gender as a caddy who suits every mood brings cold drinks but does so in a golf shirt that shocking pink circus clowns would refuse to do. to wear one on the grounds that it was beneath their dignity.
It was the 12th year I was caddy for a group of seasoned golfers known as The Twisted Sisters, a can of spray-on hair color to turn my sandy locks into a stunning shade of “Lynx Pink”.
When I got to the court, tournament organizer Cathy Lantz seemed a little disappointed that my hair wasn’t already the color of chewing gum. “You should have made your hair pink again,” Cathy sighed as she eyed my frizzy head.
However, a smile spread across her face as I explained that The Twisted Sisters would douse me in the pink hair dye as soon as we were on the course, and she beamed as she explained that the Pink Ribbon would be Ladies Golf Classic Celebrating 25th anniversary.
Be amazed, because over the past 25 years this women-only event has raised a remarkable $ 1.1 million for CancerCare Manitoba’s Breast and Gyne Cancer Center of Hope.
“It’s a very big deal,” Cathy said after going virtual in the first year of the pandemic, to be able to host another in-person event again. She noted that the Breast Cancer Center for Hope expanded to include gynecological cancer support about five years ago.
“They’re all women’s cancers, if you want to put it that way,” she told me. “It’s (the money) for programming and support services across Manitoba for women on the move. You get a diagnosis, and then what? You have your CancerCare representative that you work with, your oncologist. But you also need support If you want to read more, we have a lending library. You also want support with nurses and support with survivors. We connect you, we connect zoom calls. You can talk to a survivor and say, “I feel this Guys “. Of frustrations. How did you fight your way through?” ”
You won’t be surprised to hear that this tournament is always a sea of pink, with players, caddies and organizers dressed in everything from bright pink shirts and pink hats and pink wigs to full pink ensembles, including pink gauze Ballerina tutus.
Tragically, the day before the tournament, I found that I could no longer squeeze into my fluorescent skin-tight spandex golf shirt because I might have gained a few pounds during the lockdown. Fortunately, my wife agreed to visit what she calls “The Big Man Store” and cough $ 70 for an even bigger pink shirt.
On the course, which looked like a mutated pink popsicle with spindly legs, I felt seriously nostalgic because my group, The Twisted Sisters, hung up their golf shoes in 2018 but decided to come out of retirement around the age of 25 – to celebrate the fundraiser’s anniversary.
“Because it’s the 25th anniversary, I thought we had to get out because I was one of a group of people who were there almost at the beginning,” explained Dorothy Gauer, 82, as we saw ours towards the end of the day Golf carts huddled.
Dorothy is something of a local legend – a longtime volunteer at the tournament and the Breast Cancer Center for Hope, she was also the first manager and founder of Chemo Savvy, a local dragon boat racing team made up of breast cancer survivors.
Doug Speirs | Elevate
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“My sister Joan, 81, and I still play golf. We try to play golf twice a week. We just thought we’d like another kick in the can, and we thought the 25th anniversary was the perfect time to do that. And we knew we wouldn’t if you weren’t our caddy. Because you are the best caddy in the whole world and you have been our caddy since the first year that we participated in the golf tournament as The Twisted Sisters. ”
OK, I apologize for smuggling this selfish quote about my caddy skills into today’s column, but I couldn’t help but because over the years these spirited golfers have become friends, not just once a year golf partners.
The make-up of the Twisted Sisters – Dorothy, sister Joan Walton, daughter Karen Russell, and girlfriend Michelle Greenwood – has changed over the years, but they have always been champions for a good cause and tons of fun to chat with.
They taught me how to relax on a golf course and how to get injured in amusing ways. I say this because one of the four, Karen, managed to throw her hip out while demonstrating the goofy walking style of the competitors in the 50 km race at the Tokyo Olympics.
I promised that when they got the band back together I would put caddy back on for them, mainly because that (bad) can of pink hair dye is still at least half full.
Doug Speirs
columnist
Doug has almost every job at the newspaper – reporter, city editor, night editor, tour guide, hand model – and his coworkers are confident that at some point he will find something he’s good at.
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