Here’s the ideal way to experience the final round of the Masters, short of having a spot at Amen Corner: You’ve just eaten Sunday lunch. Something a little heavy. Fried chicken, say, with potato salad. You open up the blinds in the living room, just a hair—enough to let a little drowsy sunlight peek through. You pour yourself a finger or two of bourbon, on the rocks or neat, no matter. Today is about you.
Next, you prostrate yourself on the couch, at such an angle that—and this is important—the sun is slightly hitting your eyes, you’ve got a clear view of CBS on the big screen, and your bourbon is within easy reach. Your last active movement is to text your friend who actually does follow golf year-round, “Happy Masters Day!!! Who ya pulling for?? golfer emoji, flag-in-hole emoji, bourbon emoji.”
Now relax. Sink into the cushions. Let the absolutely completely real birdsong of Augusta National mingle with the cardinals and wrens calling outside your window panes. Your eyes begin to droop as Jim Nantz’s dulcet tones guide you from tee to tee. Don’t panic. The roar of the crowd when something exciting happens will rouse you as needed. And then suddenly you, who can only nap when you’re sick, find yourself in the middle of the best siesta of the year.
At least, this has been my routine for the last decade or so, a set of steps that developed organically, as if God simply intended it. I say that because, as I would come to find out, the Masters Nap (no trademark pending, as far as I can tell) is no secret, and has been covered widely by those who have also fallen into the beauty of the moment as naturally as gravity pulls a golf ball back down the slope on the “Flowering Crab Apple” hole.
This year, however, those of us who practice this sacred tradition “like no other” are running up against another one: Easter. Clearly, whoever sets the church’s calendar is not a Southerner. Yes, Easter dinners of hams and lambs and deviled eggs are a terrific recipe for what my husband’s uncle calls “a sinking spell.” But how many of us will then be shuffled outside to hide eggs three billion times for the small fry? Will that really be over by the 2:00 p.m. start time?
Then, relief: My mother calls to tell me my brother and sister-in-law have another family obligation on Easter Sunday, and we decide to move up our own dyeing and hiding to Saturday. Might I suggest you do the same?
