I'm Not Gonna Lie Read Online Free PDF Page B

hit a lemon on the button, it squirts. Guess you’d call that the sweet spot. Sometimes—rarely—I’d get some lift, and a lemon would fly over the fence and fall into our neighbor’s yard. I knew I hit a good shot if I bounced a lemon off my neighbor’s dog. The dog would howl and then charge up to the fence and bark at the top of his lungs like Cujo, angry as hell. It was great, because my grandmother would start yelling at the neighbor, “Tell your dog to shut up! I need my rest!”
    Most of the time, though, I’d whack a lemon, slice it open, and lemon juice would just squirt out. I guess that’s where the expression “turning lemons into lemonade” comes from—a ten-year-old Mexican-American kid hitting lemons with a rusty old golf club in the backyard. I’ll tell you this: When I got older and started playing golf for real with actual golf balls, shooting at pins and greens instead of at my neighbor’s yard, I discovered that a golf ball was a lot easier to hit than a squishy lemon.
    That afternoon, as I walked up the eighteenth fairway, I started thinking about my life and turning fifty and about all the things I wanted to do before I died. I’d accomplished a lot in my fifty years. I’d spent an evening at the White House, dining with the president of the United States. I’d become friends with some of my idols from show business and sports. I’d succeeded in my chosen career, achieved a little fame and a fair amount of money, which I’ve happily shared with others and unhappily with my ex-wife. I’d survived a serious health scare and set up a foundation to help fight kidney disease. I felt blessed. I’d been granted almost all my wishes. I once read about a guy who asked a wise man, “What do you do when your dreams come true?” The wise man said, “Keep dreaming.”
    I paused near the lip of the eighteenth green and a crazy thought came into my head, something I wanted to do more than anything else. A personal quest. I decided that I would play every one of the top hundred golf courses in the world.
    You have to consider any list with a hundred items on it a huge challenge. Especially for me, because it involved literally traveling the world. I love to travel, but I was a late starter. When I was a kid, my grandparents never took me anywhere. We hardly left the house. Well, that’s not fair. I did go to a few places. I went to:
    The front yard.
    The backyard.
    School.
    Kmart.
    The liquor store.
    I might’ve missed a couple places. Let me think. Well, Jack in the Box, but that doesn’t count, because we didn’t get out of the car.
    No. We did not go places. We didn’t go to the beach. We didn’t go to the movies. We didn’t go to restaurants.
    So I dreamed. I dreamed I went to Disneyland and Dodger Stadium and the Forum. I imagined myself at magnificent white beaches in Hawaii and striding down the windswept fairways of historic golf courses in Scotland.
    Now, here comes the weird part.
    I didn’t picture my face in those places.
    I pictured my feet.
    Yes, my feet.
    Especially as I got older and I imagined myself stepping onto those famous golf courses, I saw my
feet
stepping down onto the first tee at Augusta National. I watched my
feet
walking down the fairways at Pebble Beach and Spyglass Hill, the waves of the Pacific crashing below. I said to myself, “One day, my feet are gonna be there.”
    Feet. Feet matter. Feet are significant.
    Think about it.
    When you play golf, hitting a good shot depends on how you move your hips, how you shift your weight, and—very important—where you place your feet. Your stance. You have to adjust the position of your feet every time you hit a different club.
    Your feet are your foundation. Your anchors. Your feet ground you. Literally. It’s not just me; I’m not the only one who feels this way about feet. Feet are part of