The next two of the dirty dozen are Joan Holmes, better known as Balzac Babe and Miriam Lencucha. Di met them when she first took up the game of golf. Why Joan wanted to hang out with them they were not sure, but today we are still very good friends and her and Miriam are very close. They were with Golfaroud up until a couple of years ago when Joan made the move to Linden. She initially commuted to play her golf, such dedication, but after a couple of years she found it tough. We really don’t have many pictures of the two of them, they both did a great job of remaining incognito but believe me there are stories to tell.
I will ever forget our first 9 hole round at a Heritage Pointe Golf Course, our Pro recommended we play prior to a ProAm that we were going into. We soon learned what a difficult track it was for beginner golfers but we had some great laughs hitting our worm burners, finding scrub and bushes every time. When we finally got some air Joan ended up in a rock wall of all places. Very determined to find and retrieve her ball Joan gracefully (NOT) scaled the wall and after some poking around did find it. We lost so many balls that day, but probably not as many as the day at Beaver Dam that Joan had us report at the end of our round.
Another memorable moment was a round at D’Arcy Ranch and number of years ago. Hole number 7, we call it the hole from hell for a couple of reasons. It is a tough Par 5 to play but it is also the hole Kristy broke Di’s ankle on. It took both Joan and Miriam to convince Di that she needed to go to the hospital vs into the clubhouse for a beer. We don’t think she wanted to accept that it was broken. Miriam drove Di’s car home and they were both a huge support following and never let Kristy or Di forget. They jokingly reminded us at a special birthday for Di when they presented her with a model of the hole from hell with the compete scene including grass and dirt from Balzac.
What comes to mind when we think of Miriam is the shoe thing, she does not put her golf shoes on until June when she can almost be sure they won’t get dirty. Oh and one more thing about Joan, if you couldn’t find your ball even though you were in the middle of the fairway, count on Joan to have driven on top of it.