In this week’s mini-episode, I explore the utter joy of walking a golf course for the sake of a good walk. I’ve been out to Kearney Hill Golf Links in Lexington taking very amateur pictures of the course for a blog project.

What I’ve found while out there on the course, either alone or with my family, has been sublime. While I always nominally understood the concept of the The Old Course at St. Andrews being closed on Sunday and available as a public park space, I didn’t fully appreciate the notion until this weekend

The golf course, a Pete and P.B. Dye design, provided a much needed outlet to enjoy a break from the isolation of staying home recently. It became the nature walk and the playground that my children desperately needed. It became the place to think and escape and enjoy some exercise for me. It became to run with her tongue out, chasing the smells of rabbit trails and groundhog paths, for the dog.

I get it now.

I also understand how infeasible it is under the current business model to make a public golf course in the U.S. available to the community for a picnic every sunny Sunday afternoon. But I’m thinking now, thinking about how that magic could happen on a larger scale.