It was late in the afternoon and we were approaching the 18th hole of the Grand Canyon Industrial Golf course when Guillermo Louis Alejandro Marquesas-Expando approached the tee and set up to take his shot on this 975 yard par 3 hole. The sun was setting quickly and we had a small bet on who make it to the green at all, par not withstanding.

Guillermo or Ed as we called him, was the director of our Spanish division of The Institute. He had been selected for his experience, intelligence and primarily because he spoke Spanish reasonably well and worked cheap. Due to some unresolved legal difficulties with the Spanish government he was unable to find employment elsewhere, something to do with unexplained expenditures of funds allocated for public works or something. It was hard to understand him sometimes when he got nervous. But we chose to look at his largest contribution instead, which was his ability to speak Spanish. Many of our previous directors had not had this advantage and it caused no end of difficulties with the locals. It’s hard to get things done when you’re yelling firmly directing your research people in Polish or Vietnamese and they only speak Castilian. Things began to run smoothly after we acquired Mr. Marquesas-Expando and proper research began to stream out of the former Francisco Franco School for Wayward Spaniards that is now known as El Instituto. We felt lucky to have him.

Ed completed his set up, took a few practice swings and then leaned into it getting a good solid hit that unfortunately took a severe slice to the left and into the rough. This was a tough break because as you can see above the rough was really rough. We had been playing by strict rules and the rule was you played the ball from where it lay or lose a stroke. Since our little bet was if Ed won he went home first class, but if he lost he went home in a crate down in steerage. Ed chose to play the ball where it was.

That was back in December of 2009 and as of now we haven’t heard from Ed. Every once in a while we get a report of some one hearing a faint shout of “Fore!” echoing up out of the canyon but that could just be the wind. Every year since we go back and play a round in memory of Ed or Guillermo Louis Alejandro Marquesas-Expando as he liked to be called. Some of us, well I guess it’s only me, believe that one day we’ll see that shiny white Titleist with his name engraved on it, come sailing up over the edge of the rough to land on the green. So far it hasn’t. It’s a nice outing anyway.