The late Jim Murray of the Los Angeles Times, whose canvas was frequently the US Masters, once noted that golf is not all Ben Hogan, Sam Snead, Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods.

He was right. More right than he knew. Golf is nothing to do those things. I know this because I have golfed. Twice in 12 months. Forgive me father. I know not what I do.

Golf is not all Millionaires' Row, it is losing good cash on the front nine, a double or quits on the back nine and your dignity over the whole 18. Golf is not about birdie-birdie-eagle, birdie par. These are just words, just rumours. Like foreplay, the free lunch and job satisfaction. Golf is keeping the perhole score in single figures and cheating as much as possible to make up for the lack of physical contact.

Golf is not about making the cut. Golf is about making it out onto the course in a pair of jeans and T-shirt. You will not master it, but neither will you be its slave.

Golf is not about sponsors pleading with you to enter and your locker being lined with appearance cash. Golf is about journalist societies putting the arm on posh courses to get a free game. Yes golf is ethics.

Golf is not about the hushed gallery in the cathedral of pines and the air-cutting swoosh of your first drive. That's just done with animation and special effects. Golf is about the divot going further than the ball, golf is about the greenkeeper in his tractor keeping the engine idling just beside you as you take your shot. Golf is about hearing his snort above the engine noise when you whiffle it. Golf is about burying his body.

Golf is not about an orthodox grip, a sweet arc trajectory and follow-through smoother than a Cary Grant line. Golf is about hurley grips and hoping to keep one foot on the ground and being allowed to tee off without loss of a shot.

GOLF IS not about the tyranny of purity. Golf is about finding your own way to the ball. There is no such thing as a lovely swing. You hit it like an axe murderer? Fair play. You hit it.

Golf is not putts that slide home on greens as smooth as plate glass. Golf is deciding to putt from five yards off the green because the blade of your wedge is in the greenkeeper's skull.

Golf is seeing the putt from five yards off the green skip off a tuft of grass and across the green and into the far bunker. Golf is bad language. Lots of it.

Golf is not elegant. Golf is trickier than catching a greased pig on ice. Less fun, too.

Golf is not all scratch players and Pringles. Golf is fundamentally unfair. Golf is an unfair handicap system. Why not arrive at handicaps by dividing the age you started playing at by your annual income.

Golf is not about the two good shots per round which allegedly keep you coming back. The law of averages is about that.

Golf is about fear of snakes and using a compass to get back to the short grass and overcoming the fear of drowning when you go looking for your last decent ball.

Golf is not about being in the zone. Golf is about being in the plus fours. Golf is about being in a quandary. Golf is about seeing your playing partners as dots on the horizon. Where is the zone?

Golf is not a game where you get money only for what you accomplish. That's TV golf. Real golf is where the breadth and ambition of your approach to the dog-leg left is rewarded with laughter and scorn.

Golf is undemocratic. Forget about women being locked outside the gates. They should have more sense than to be rattling them.

Golf is about growing up taking hand-eye co-ordination for granted and then being humiliated by a four-eyed computer nerd in a sweater who never got fresh air before he was 30.

GOLF IS not relaxing. Golf is the short-cut to inadequacy. Golf is lonely. Golf is socially unacceptable. Golf is destabilising.

Golf is not about Big Bertha. Not unless Big Bertha is the woman whose head I hit in the Superquinn carpark. Golf is about big hernia. Big score. Big Hook. Big Divot. Big Mistake.

Golf is not David Leadbetter. Golf is the guy behind you shouting helpfully just as you are about to scud bomb the local peat bog: "Clench your buttocks and keep the head down." Who does he think he is, the president?

Golf is not just about lifestyles of the rich and famous, but being one or other helps.

Golf is not always staying at the home of a rich friend at a tournament, golf is a Motel 6. A Marriott. Golf has been known to be sleeping in your car.

Golf is not Big Berthas. It's plumbing the remnant barrel for an unrusted set.

Golf is not about companionship, comradeliness or good buddies. Golf is a poorer friend than drink is. Golf friends are no friends at all. No game should force you to cheat on your friends. Golf does.

Golf is not about fairway-splitting drives. Golf is not about fairways as such. Fairways are usually narrower than a Portadown resident's mind-set. Greens are about the size of your friend's bald spot. Golf is not a game.

Golf is not shirts with alligators on them. Golf is water hazards with alligators in them.

Golf is not broom-handle putters. Golf is debris. Golf is looking stupid without the broomhandle putter. Golf is what other people do on weekends and you do early in the morning for privacy's sake.

Golf is not The Masters. The Masters is better than golf. The Masters is just a TV programme.