A Tale of Two Shirts

This past weekend, my husband Shawn and I went to the FedEx Kinkos Classic tournament in Austin. It was a real treat for him - my friend Jenn's parents got us the tickets, including entry into the VIP lounge on the 16th hole. Not too shabby. According to Jenn, her dad is basically the mayor of Lakeway, or at least it seems that way based on his popularity among the retired set. Shawn happily tagged along with Jenn's dad all day to watch numerous holes. During this adventure, he confirmed that, in fact, everyone knows Jenn's dad.

While Shawn and Jenn's dad were out gallivanting, Jenn and I decided to hit the gift shop. I wanted to buy Shawn a souvie for his birthday (today!!). Jenn thought she would buy a shirt too for her boyfriend. She decided against it when she saw the hefty price tag. But then the sales clerk revealed a special deal: buy a shirt on a hanger and get a folded pique shirt for only $10. What a bargain!! I had already selected one of the hanging shirts (a pretty blue number), so I told Jenn that she could pick out a $10 shirt for her boyfriend. We spent a long time debating the color. Would it be orange, or green, or yellow? (her boyfriend is drawn to bright hues). After the debate, we finally selected blue. The salesclerk bagged them for me, and we headed back to our home base: the VIP lounge.

While we spent a great deal of the day going our separate ways, at one point, all five of us (Jenn, Jenn's mom and dad, and Shawn and me) managed to be in the same place at the same time at the 16th hole. We sat and watched the current foursome tee off, and Shawn revealed to me that one of his favorites was in this foursome: one Ben Crenshaw.

Well, soon Shawn and Jenn's dad were on their merry way again, and Jenn and I walked around some more with Jenn's mom. We walked past the 16th hole and along the 17th. Finally, we got to the 18th hole, where a foursome was just finishing up. As they walked off the hole, people were lined up getting autographs. And this is where we realized - this was Ben Crenshaw's foursome!! Well, I knew what I had to do - I had to get that autograph! Only problem was that I had nothing good to sign. A lot of people had hats and gloves and balls. I had none of these. I really thought about going back to the shop and picking up a hat, but alas, I just didn't think I had the time. I started to panic. I couldn't miss out on this grand opportunity. So I decided it had to be done: I had to have Ben sign the shirt I bought. I pulled it out of the bag, and I positioned it on a program for easy signing. And sure enough, Ben came through and signed my shirt. I even got extra interaction with him because I had to pull the shirt taut while he signed. I was so thrilled with myself. It was the perfect gift!!

It was only when I walked away from the line with a big old grin on my face that I looked at the tag: XL. For some reason, I thought I had bought Shawn a Large.

"Yeah, I wondered about that," said Jenn. "That was Tom's shirt."

Whoops! Not anymore!