Perspective from the 19^th Hole is the title I chose for my personal blog, which is meant to give me an outlet for one of my favorite crafts – writing – plus to use an image from my favorite sport, golf.  Out of college, my first job was as a reporter for the Daily Astorian in Astoria, Oregon, and I went on from there to practice writing in all my professional positions, including as press secretary in Washington, D.C. for a Democrat Congressman from Oregon (Les AuCoin), as an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, as press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and as a private sector lobbyist.  This blog also allows me to link another favorite pastime – politics and the art of developing public policy – to what I write.  I could have called this blog “Middle Ground,” for that is what I long for in both politics and golf.  The middle ground is often where the best public policy decisions lie.  And it is where you want to be on a golf course.

Note:  I publish this blog again because, as always, the book, ‘A Season in Dornoch,” draws me to the game I love – golf.

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When my wife bought me a copy of the 25^th anniversary edition of a great book – “A Season in Dornoch” – I knew what would happen.

For about the 25^th time, I would read the book again.

That’s what this book does to me – it lures me to re-discover golf in the home of golf, Scotland.  And, there, one of the best courses is Royal Dornoch (see below). 

Here is the on-line summary for the anniversary edition:

“The town of Dornoch, Scotland, lies at nearly the same latitude as Juneau, Alaska.  Though the town is bit too small and remote to host a British Open, it has hardly diminished Royal Dornoch’s mystique or renown.

“In an influential piece for The New Yorker in 1964, Herbert Warren Wind wrote, ‘It is the most natural course in the world. No golfer has completed his education until he or she has played and studied Royal Dornoch.’

“The author of ‘A Season in Dornoch,’ Rubenstein, spent a summer in Dornoch to re-discover the natural charms of the game he loves.  But, in the Scottish highlands, he also found a people shaped by the harshness of the land and the difficulty of drawing a living from it and still haunted by a historic wrong inflicted on their ancestors nearly two centuries before.

“Rubenstein met many people of great thoughtfulness and spirit, eager to share their worldviews, their life stories, and a wee dram or two.  He came to understand how the game of golf reflects the values, character, and history of the people who brought it into the world.

“’A Season in Dornoch’ is both the story of one man’s immersion in the game of golf and an exploration of the world from which it emerged.

“Part travelogue, part portraiture, part good old-fashioned tale of matches played and friendships made, it takes us on an unforgettable journey to a marvelous, moody, mystical place.”

As for the “wee dram,” I am not a lover of whisky.  But, after a cold day on a course in Scotland (where you don’t ask if it’s windy and raining, you just go play golf), a wee dram does its job – it warms you up quickly.

So it is that I read the book again here, in La Quinta, California, where I sit far from the Scotland’s highlands which do beckon me back, even if just in my mind.

I also rue the day several years ago when sickness required my wife and me to cancel a month-long stay in the town of Dornoch, which we had booked for a couple reasons – (a) the general lure of the place, in part due to my wife’s heritage because her parents emigrated to the U.S. from Scotland, and (b) my desire to return to a place we had visited two times previously, but only for a day or two each time.

Still, on those first trips, I got to play one of the best golf courses in the world, Royal Dornoch, which has earned its “royal” name, as well as received high plaudits from such pro golfers such as Tom Watson and Ben Crenshaw.

For this blog, I rely on the words of an introduction to “A Season in Dornoch” written by another acclaimed golf writer, Stephen Proctor.

His words below capture the lure of golf in Scotland, golf in the small town of Dornoch, golf in the words of Rubenstein, and golf in terms of aspirations for me as I consider the basic draw of the game I love without, for example, always having to keep score.

Thus, Proctor writes:

• “Rubenstein was an excellent golfer, a man who knew intimately the agony and ecstasy golfers experience during a round.”

• “Even as they were coming to grips with the region’s history of turmoil, Rubenstein and his wife, Nell, (who accompanied him on his four-month sojourn in Dornoch which produced his book) found themselves succumbing to the charms that have drawn so many to Dornoch.  They slowed down, let go of the urgency that drove life back in Toronto, and took time to savor the beauty of the landscape all around them; from the hills resplendent in purple heather to the golden sands of Dornoch beach.”

• “…often, Rubenstein found himself doing the things that made him love golf in the first place.  Playing alone at sunrise or sunset.  Playing by feel and sight, rather than by yardages.  Playing the ball on the ground, rather than through the air.  Playing beside the sea, in rain or wind, often with a half set.”

• In one game against a long-time pro golfer friend, “Rubenstein played with a half-set slung over his shoulder, never bothering to keep score.  Discussion with the pro along the way focused on the history of the game, the strategy of the holes, tricks for crafting certain shots, and the beauty of the setting in which the two found themselves.  Golf as it was meant to be played:  For the purse joy of it.”

So, if you want to read Rubenstein’s great words about golf, get his book.  It will have the potential to do what it did for Rubenstein 25 years ago in the Scottish highlands – renew his love for the game itself.

And, it has done the same for me.

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Footnote:  As I re-publish this blog in early 2026, I have ‘A Season in Dornoch” in a prominent place on my bookshelf here in La Quinta, California.