Many Augustans open their homes to Masters guests. This year we took a baby step in that direction by renting out two rooms to college students who have internships at the National. These are students from the University of South Carolina enrolled in a course called "Golf Events," (a course which sounds much more fun than Macroeconomics, Money and Banking, Government Regulation of Industry, and most of the other classes I took back in the day). One of their course requirements is to spend spring break working the tournament. We have four very nice young men staying with us.Hospitality for me means two things.
First, I clean with a vengeance. I sort and scrub and declutter with enthusiasm and vigor. Conveniently, the senior class yard sale coincided with my cleaning spree. A full truckload of Dolin castoffs-- a soccer goal and a few board games, a pedestal sink and some old furniture --
went out the door in support of a good cause.
Hard deadlines are my friends. Oh, yes they are! I return items that have been sitting on top of the washing machine for six months. Hand me downs headed to the neighbors actually go to the neighbors. I wash windows I've been meaning to get to. In short, good has been done here. The kids' rooms look amazing.
But Hospitality seems to invited a second, less welcome guest: broken stuff. I suspect that houses being houses things just break, but these things are much more noticeable when you have guests. Paying guests take it up a notch. On Saturday the AC began pumping out hot air. On Sunday the refrigerator started leaking. On Monday the toads started, well, um, making an awful lot of noise. (We have a small, ornamental pond that attracts the occasional toad except for about 48 hours per year when it attracts dozens of toads who are extremely loud because they're, well, happy. Note to the toads: You're not welcome Masters week!)We called the HVAC guy. We put a towel under the fridge. I sent Ainsley out into the yard to catch the toads.
It's all good.
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