The key to golf is to relax, and I'm about as relaxed as that time an ER nurse tried to administer my first (and last) ever suppository after an ill-conceived bender on Spaghettios and Pay Days.

Settling into my stance, I survey the ants doing a conga line across the tips of my grandma's white golf shoes while the smell of self-administered nectar lotion overpowers my own nostrils.

Lifting into my backswing, I am acutely aware of the shoulder blade fat that is rarely a hindrance for anyone until it squeezes itself together and makes it impossible to do things like reach into the back seat of a car without unbuckling one's seat belt.

Pulling back down, I somehow manage to both hack and scoop at the ball, resulting in a short drive, deep divot and litany of excuses to the blond, tan, 6'2" 30-year-old male golf pro appraising me with the same detached amusement one might exhibit at a zoo animal.

Which rebegs the question: WHY am I here? Why is a 26-year-old creature of habit with zero patience and coordination taking golf lessons? Besides being a clichéd element of my ongoing Self Improvement Campaign:

• The country club is running a five-lesson special.
• My grandma is footing the bill for said special.
• Said grandma also is trying to set me up with her golf pro, a fact intimated both to me and the GP.

So while most people get to learn and teach golf in a no-pressure environment, the awkwardness of the world's already most unnatural sport increases exponentially when 1) both parties know its financier is hoping the return on her investment will be great-grandchildren and 2) only one party knows she is composing an article in secret.

But by expanding my horizon instead of merely driving off into it with the group's only golf cart and cooler of beer, I am hoping to come out of this better understanding why golf can make or break one's day, self-esteem, marriage and/or business deal.

Lesson 1

Thirty minutes before my lesson, I paw through my parents' garage to extricate their two sets of clubs: one newer man's set in a navy cloth bag, the other an ancient woman's set in a tattered brown leather bag marked auction #826. Picking at the lot sticker, I consider eBaying it as the First Wilson Clubs Ever Made.

I have no idea which set is less ridiculous, so I throw them both in the trunk of my car and go inside to change into what I think is appropriately comfortable and fashionable for a beginning golfer: black tank top, blue jeans, flip-flops, bracelet, watch and cheapie drugstore sunglasses, then a quick rubdown with aforementioned lotion in the very likely event GP has to stand directly behind me to subdue my flailing arms.

I skip downstairs and announce to Mom that I am en route to my first official golf lesson. She immediately offers warm words of encouragement: “Your grandma and I were laughing about that earlier today—you can't take instruction at ALL! Plus it's golf. Golf never gets easier.”

I mull over Mom's motivational speech during the five-minute drive to the club and snap out of my reverie when I try to park and end up dodging a kamikaze golf cart driver who apparently has the right of way. I park, collect myself, check for any noticeable facial debris in the rearview, then head into the pro shop, leaving the clubs in the trunk to avoid any premature physical exertion or embarrassment.

GP is already there and knows exactly who I am, probably from my age, outfit and complete disorientation amid racks of overpriced golf apparel. He also knows because my grandma had, unbeknownst to me, arrived 10 minutes earlier to donate spare golf shoes and a few women's clubs to my hopeless cause, so now I am forced to forego Reefs in favor of ankle socks and close-toed footwear. I compensate by applying lip gloss while GP is out getting the cart in hopes it will catch and reflect enough sunlight to blind him and any judgmental onlookers.

Feeling as ready as a beginner in turn-of-the-century shoes possibly can, I walk onto the back deck overlooking the course. While most golf enthusiasts surely would savor the view of this sprawling green paradise, panic bubbles at the back of my brain: “You don't belong here. This is a Bob Ross painting. Happy trees, happy bushes, happy people—get out now before you injure someone.” The only thing stopping me from spinning on my heel and hitting up the nearest Happy Hour is GP awaiting my stairway descent.

Securing myself and canvas purse into the passenger seat, we don't even make it 15 yards before GP brakes upon spotting a giant snapping turtle on the practice putting green; a most fitting metaphor for my current situation—slow, pissed and totally out of my element. As we head onward and arrive at our semi-sequestered practice area of the driving range, GP points out my grandma who is, conveniently, only two greens into her own game and thus not far from watching mine.

Before we begin, GP inquires about any previous golf experience. I am up front with him about being a Taurus, as astrology is surely something all instructors take into account when deciding how best to handle their pupils. I admit to patronizing driving ranges occasionally to blow off steam by naming each ball after someone or something I don't like, and even more rarely going putt-putting, which typically involves foot-stomping and mini-tantrums.

[Here is the part where I could try to talk about what you do with irons, drivers, woods, wedges and hybrids, as well as the stance you should take for each, but these are completely out of my element—please reference “Golf 101” for immediate or later edification.]

So at the lesson's conclusion, I am babbling about MCL and early bird specials as GP draws up my To Do List/Cheat Sheet on the back of a score card, including a rendering of my Ideal Stance, which comes out looking eerily similar to a stick figure version of that chick who crawls around on The Ring. He drops me off at my car, and I swear up and down I will practice my stance diligently before next week's lesson.

Lesson 2

I did not practice before this lesson. Unless you count the three seconds I spent in front of my full-length mirror trying to gauge exactly how ridiculous both my incorrect and ideal stances are.

But I am adorned slightly better today in knock-off Dolce & Gabbana sunglasses, grey bleach-spattered Gap pants, polka dot Nike tank top and what would have been flip-flops, had the GP not cobbled his way into fixing the scrunched tongue of my grandma's shoe. I know what he is seeing: a less attractive and affluent Paris Hilton, confirmed by his gentle suggestion that my grandma also finance new golf apparel.

Having originally felt good about my wardrobe selection, I had come in feeling confident and was busy looking around for another hidden turtle-type allegory when I am introduced to Nat, a reporter covering a Day in the Life of a Golf Pro, thus ending abruptly my search for irony.

Fortunately the photographer has already been dismissed for the day, but I still tread carefully. To deflect my true agenda and total incompetence, I make nice with the reporter, who admits he does not actually play the sport. In what I believe to be an inspired reference, I smile broadly and say “Obviously you're not a golfer*,” to which I get no apparent recognition, merely a scrunched brow.

Just when I think it can't get any more excruciating than trying to mentally file article material, not look like a jackass in front of the GP and think about my swing, now I have a befuddled newspaper reporter standing 15 feet behind my ass while my tank top keeps riding up my back. So I've got that going for me, which is nice.*

Today the focus is on 'monkey arms,' 'sweeping the tee,' keeping my left arm straight, pulling through with my left, remaining open when I turn, and not laughing whenever GP says “wood,” “grass” or any sentence where I can add a “that's what she said.”

At the end of my lesson, the reporter tries to interview me about why I'm there. Unwilling to be outdone on my own story, I quickly give him some song and dance about how I am in the non-profit sector and a lot of potential donors are developed on the golf course.

In other news, I discover tee times are staggered at eight-minute intervals and that the number of good-looking males per golfer capita is insane.

Lesson 3

Golf is totally unnatural and masochistic. The more I think about my stance, the worse I get—concentrating on one thing means neglecting another, so I always screw up, just in a different way. And it's not fair that I have to use a different alignment, distance, swing and club for each shot! Who on earth can remember all the intricacies of such a complex and overrated game?

At least this is what I am professing to the GP when he asks if I practiced since our last lesson. I also throw in something about still having a slight hangover and unsettled stomach from last night's martinis and Bang Bang shrimp. The reason I am babbling semi-uncontrollably is because he had called the Friday prior to invite me to a tennis tournament (I had to decline), so now I am doing my best to monopolize the conversation to avoid having a repeat incident.

Today we are practicing chip shots and putting, which means he has to stand closer. With one foot aimed uphill and the other supporting my backswing, I do a short chop with the club and watch the ball roll well past the hole and onto the opposite side of the rough.

“So what are you doing September 19th” GP asks casually.

“Camping,” I say, equally casual, setting my ball with the lines aimed idiot-proof toward the hole so I don't prematurely lift my eyes to see where the shot is going.

“How about October 15th,” he tries.

“A cruise,” I say, hyper-focusing on my pendulum motion back then forward. “Why? What events do you have planned?” staring intently at the next ball in my practice clump.

“I'm just trying to figure out what night you're not washing your hair so I can ask you out,” he says—an undodgeable bullet. And a shock, since I was hoping to put the kibosh on such an invite by having come dressed like a lesbian camp counselor in dual braids, my great aunt's khaki shants (short-pants) and light blue “On Target” bulls-eye archery polo from Goodwill.

While a date would be phenomenal for this story and my grandma, I prop myself up with the club and explain that, while I would have loved to, he is literally one week too late. “To be a complete cliché, I just got back together with my ex-boyfriend. As fun as I think you are, I really don't think it will fly with him if I say 'Don't mind me—I just want to hang out with the tall, blond, good-looking golf pro that my grandma wants me to date.'”

This clearing of the air automatically puts us on more comfortable footing, allowing me to focus completely on my golf game and guarantee I can continue taking lessons from him, as he is an undyingly patient and forgiving instructor.

Lesson 4

Due to a blown-out tire and unfortunate incident with waxing strips that had left a rash of pubescent Braille across my upper lip, there is a three-week gap between my previous lesson and this one.

GP's assistant smirks hello as I bounce into the pro shop in a Dr. Pepper shirt and stained cargos, at which point I suspect I am a running joke. Whether it's because of me, my golf game or the anal-retentiveness displayed a few weeks ago when I had been the first person ever to copyedit and correct their “Complementary Beverage Station” sign, I'm not entirely sure.

GP breezes in shortly after, inquiring the whereabouts of my 'On Target' polo. He has just finished kicking off Wednesday's “Hump Day” league, which is code for 50 billion men taking over the course. Because it has been so seemingly long since our last lesson, we review basics of the irons and driver.

If you remember nothing else, remember this: PRACTICE, PRACTICE, PRACTICE. If you don't practice each swing immediately after you've learned it, you WILL forget and WILL regress. My 'skills' regress even further than when I started my first lesson. I whiff three times, take four chunks out of the ground and somehow manage to hit the ball into the tipped basket four feet to the right of the tee.

And about the tee—apparently it is total bush league to put the ball on the tee once it is already in the ground. Assuming they use one at all, seasoned golfers only “tee up” on the first drive and insert it like one would a feminine hygiene product, cupping the tee and ball together to inject them simultaneously into the ground.

Another way to identify a beginner is if she or he is barefoot on the golf course wearing a sweat-speckled Dr. Pepper t-shirt. As the 'sport of gentlemen,' collared shirts and wingtip golf shoes used to be required. Most clubs have loosened restrictions, but some still require their members maintain the tradition. Basic attire truly is key—you shouldn't have any unnecessary distractions, accessories, itchy tags, uncomfortable clothing, short tops, thick material or anything else that requires constant readjustment and self-consciousness. When you are going to spend the day walking around, bending over, sweating and swinging, you have to focus 100 percent on your game.

But despite the unseasonable warmth and frustration of this lesson, an odd thing happens a few days later when it cools off a bit: I am driving home with the windows down and think "today would be a great day for golf." A sphincter says what? I never think that about things I'm not good at, which is when I realize: I don't have to be good. Unlike most sports, golf is all about the individual—you only have to take the game as seriously as you take yourself. If your goal is not to excel so much as have a general idea what you're doing, it can be extremely fun—the golf carts, beer coolers, UV rays and exercise are just a bonus.

Lesson 5

This was supposed to be the course walk-through when I find out how the whole game works after having gotten the hang of driving, chipping and putting. Due to an early winter that still hasn't stopped, the lesson never happened - that leaves the most crucial element of this topic unexperienced and therefore unwritten. Which is where Hickey comes in.

Hickey worked the sports desk at our college newspaper, but more importantly he was an Evans Scholar: a student accepted into an expenses-paid fraternity because of his academic achievements and knack for schmoozing while caddying for rich folks at a private country club near Chicago. With seven years experience as a caddy under his belt and three years as a professional sports writer currently occupying his belt, he is the ideal candidate to fill you in on the basics of a round of golf in such a way that will keep you awake and snickering. His 101 on rules, key terms, situational clubs, etiquette and amateur moves supplement this mostly uninformative narrative, and vice versa.

Pierce open a Capri Sun and enjoy.