When I first told Danielle Marshman Williamson that I thought we should have a golf tournament to raise money for our Out of the Darkness walk, she looked at me like I was crazy.
That was more than six months ago, when we first sat down to discuss how Team Chenango was going to raise enough money participate in the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention’s 18-mile dusk ‘til dawn walk to raise money for depression and suicide awareness and prevention.
Danielle walked last year in Boston, and this year a whole crew of us will be walking with her from June 4 to 5 in New York City. There’s a catch, though. In order for us all to walk, we have to raise at least $10,000. Hence our little brainstorming session.
In the end, I talked our dear team captain around to my way of thinking and Team Chenango’s inaugural Out of the Darkness Golf Tournament was born.
Neither of us had ever planned a charity golf event before, so the process required a lot of hand holding. Thankfully, the lovely Cara Bradley from Blue Stone Golf Course in Oxford was more than up for the task.
There was also a bit of arm twisting – not to mention begging, badgering and cajoling – as we, um, encouraged everyone we knew (and some we didn’t) to support our cause.
Our initial goal was to sign up 20 teams and secure 20 hole sponsors. I’m thrilled to report that we blew those numbers out of the water. Despite the fact, I might add, that we did everything wrong.
You see, we talked about the tournament for months, but it took us awhile to actually pull the trigger. So we got a late start promoting the whole thing. We never even got around to sending out sponsor letters. But somehow, we pulled it off.
Oh, the sign ups were slow at first, with teams and sponsors dribbling in. But as the event approached, we were fielding more and more phone calls and emails from people who wanted to get involved. Text messages were flying between Danielle, Cara and myself as we scrambled to keep each other up to date.
By mid-week prior to the tournament, we’d already blown by our original goal. 25 teams had registered and I was busy calling our goodie bag sponsors asking for more, well goodies. But then Mother Nature decided to rain on our parade. Literally.
On Thursday, as we assessed the damage and flooding from our third round of thunderstorms in as many days, I started worrying about whether or not we’d even be able to have the tournament. Now the text messages I was exchanging weren’t with Cara, but her brother Chad, the course superintendent.
