What I got instead was a full list of tournament rules read to us on the first tee, real prize money on the line, and a caddie whose entire job was to record our scores and offer us exactly zero help. He was instructed not to carry our bags, give us any tips, or even measure a yardage. Cutthroat! (Although some might find this to be very cool, considering there were thousands of dollars on the line and this is about as close to a professional round as most of us amateurs might ever get.)

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They also told me to start with “Cardio Tennis B,” not “A,” since “A” is where things get feral. Great advice, except the club’s app doesn’t clearly label each cardio tennis session with either “A” or “B” designations. It just said, “Saturday morning, mixed.” So I accidentally signed up for the feral one which, in golf terms, is a little like showing up for a casual scramble and discovering it’s actually the Friday scratch game.

I found myself playing tennis with twenty-ish people, all of whom were very good. Balls were coming at me with actual heat, and the choreography I couldn’t quite understand came so naturally to them: start right,…

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Jeff and I went in May, with our two boys—Jones (6) and Walker (4). I’d been keeping an eye on this destination since 2024, when a “crazy” reversible nine-holer called Crossroads opened and Rob Collins (a friend and a person who makes golf courses do unexpected things) started posting about it. But it was Coore-Crenshaw’s brand-new Anson Point that pulled us to this corner of South Carolina. When Palmetto Bluff’s marketing team reached out as asked if I’d be down to visit with my family, the answer was a quick and resounding yes.

If you’ve been considering your own trip, here’s how ours went.

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Here’s the thing: you might. The only real “trick” to playing private clubs, even the most exclusive among them? Know a member.

That’s it. That’s the whole secret. I’ve played some incredible places over the years, and every single one of them came through a person, a relationship, a genuine connection. There’s no secret “hack,” no workaround.

But, and this is important, you can never let a member feel like that’s the only reason you’re hanging out with them. The invite has to be a byproduct of a genuine friendship, not the point of it. We’re social creatures who literally need relationships to survive. Be curious about the people in your life. Be genuinely interested in who they are. From that, beautiful things will come your way.

And when an invite to an exclusive club comes around? Don’t blow it!

The etiquette of being a great …

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This is not an opinion.

And after spending too many hours wondering why too many people seem too nonchalant about the topic of sun safety, I’ve settled on this: we live in a world built for instant gratification, and skincare (I’m talking about real skincare, the kind that actually does something) doesn’t reward you today. It rewards you in ten years. The sunscreen you wear today won’t help you look younger. There’s no quick before-and-after, no dopamine hit. Just...nothing happens. And if anything, SPF is annoying to apply, annoying to wear, and annoying to wash off.

But here’s the thing: the routine you build now is the skin you’ll have later. It’s a lot like compounding interest, except the currency is collagen and the account is your skin. The earlier you start, the bigger the payoff, but it’s never too late to open the account.

Quick context on why I feel qualified to bring this up. My twin sister is a board…

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It came in the form of a scorecard peppered with dots.

I got knocked into the consolation bracket of a tournament (I played almost too well in the stroke play portion of the tournament, then got seeded in a flight that I just couldn’t keep up with!), and the consolation match was played against par. Not against another person, just against the course itself. Because I carry a 5.9 handicap index, the committee handed me a card that was dotted up, then told me I was playing against net par. Anything worse than net par simply meant I lost against the hole—pick up and move on.

Let me tell you, I felt so light setting up to that first tee shot. Just knowing that a blowup hole wasn’t coming for me, because it literally could not, felt so freeing. And I played way more confidently—why lay up when anything worse than par all gets counted the same; why leave a putt short when the next one’s…

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Been there. Am there. Every single year.

This is my fifth time playing in the one tournament I actually take seriously. The one where handicaps are irrelevant and every single stroke counts and the field is really good. And every year, right around now, I find myself wishing I’d have spent more time practicing and feeling more comfortable with my swing.

Here’s what I know won’t change between now and Thursday: my swing is what it is. My short game is at the level I’ve gotten it to, which is not the level I wish I’d gotten it to. The hours I didn’t spend on the practice green are gone. The reps that didn’t happen aren’t going to materialize.

And yet.

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Think about it: a round of golf takes at least four hours, most of which is under the higher-UV-index hours between 10am and 3pm. Hats help, popped collars help, applying (and reapplying) SPF helps. But if you’re a golfer, your skin will likely age more quickly than someone who spends less time under the brightest sun.

I’m not trying to scare you or tell you to play less. Not a chance! I’m here to say that there are things you can do off the course to help slow the aging process.

My sister (fun fact: we’re identical twins!) is a board-certified dermatologist, we both competed on the inaugural women’s golf team at the University of Virginia, and we’re both still very much playing 20+ years later. Which means we’ve spent a truly unreasonable percentage of our adult lives outside, and she has spent a …

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I went to Augusta with the Greyson Clothiers crew, who were celebrating the season’s first major with a limited-edition capsule collection and a sneaker collab with Saucony. Our goal was to help patrons “own the mornings” at Augusta, with partners like AG1 and Hyperice, a small motion against the fact that Masters week, for most brands, becomes an arms race of evening parties and open bars.

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—OR—

Would you rather play a far less exclusive track with three of your best friends in three hours?

Go ahead, be honest.

Your gut probably says Augusta, right? Of course it does, it’s Augusta.

When I posed this question at home, my husband didn’t even hesitate. “I’d play Augusta,” he said, immediately. Then he looked at me like I was an alien.

His take is simple: you always have golf in common, he couldn’t possibly dislike someone that much, and worst case, he’d just stay in his own little bubble and enjoy the course.

Honestly? Fair. And yet…take a longer second to really think about the hypothetical question. Because I’ve spent way too much time obsessing over it.

I’d take the less exclusive track with three besties in under three hours ten times out of ten. And that’s coming from someone who has never played A…

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If you’re still into it and excited to read after my little winter disappearance, thank you. You’re a real one and I appreciate you.

Part of that hiatus was life. Kids who brought home the flu, an unprecedented ice storm, a new puppy, the general chaos that seems to define adulthood.

But if I’m being honest, the biggest part of it was this: I felt a little uninspired.

You see, February is my ugly month, and it’s undoubtedly the hardest month to be a golfer.

By the time February rolls around, the charm of winter has completely worn off. December had the holidays. January had the promise of a fresh start. But February? It’s gray, it’s cold, and it’s just a little mean.

It’s the month where the rhythm of the golf season still feels far away. The clubs are still standing in the corner, both way too clean and way too dusty. You scroll past go…

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They share the same word, and they aren’t even cousins.

Performance marketing is about response. Brand marketing is about impact.

One asks: Did it work? The other asks: Did it mean anything?

And at some point somewhat recently, we started acting like the first question is the only one that matters. I get why. Performance marketing is super measurable. It’s tidy. It gives you charts, dashboards, and confidence. You can point to numbers and say, “See? This is working.”

Brand marketing is slower and harder to quantify. It asks you to commit to a point of view before you know if it will convert.

But here’s something I’ve noticed, and while I can’t prove it to be true, it’s a strong gut feeling: bra…

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And tucked inside one of those photo albums are pictures of me and my twin sister holding golf clubs in comically awkward ways. The early days. Terrible outfits, poor technique, huge smiles.

Seeing them helped me remember how unlikely it was for us to find this sport.

Golf, of all things.

My mom was born and raised in Havana, Cuba. When she was twelve years old, she came to the United States alone, no parents, no siblings, very tiny safety net, as part of the exodus of children later known as the Peter Pans. She spent years bouncing between foster homes, and she put herself through college by working during the day and taking night classes. She built a life from sheer grit and will.

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Right now, I get to be part of the very beginning of Candyroot Lodge, a public, multi-course golf destination taking shape in the Carolina Sandhills. And I’ve been having a ton of fun watching it come together.

When I joined the Candyroot team as fractional CMO three months ago, it was an untouched piece of land—1,250 continuous acres, which is almost unheard of in this part of the country. In this region of the Carolinas, land is typically owned in smaller parcels, often held by families for generations. Assembling something of this scale, without fragmentation, almost never happens.

Before this, I’d mostly worked with rebrands or renovations of courses that’d already existed. I’d only been involved with…

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Okay, without further ado: let’s get to it!

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In the 90s, we chased toughness. The measure of a great course was how well you survived it. We bragged about playing courses that tipped out at 7,200+ yards and obsessed over rankings of America’s Toughest Courses. One of that decade’s most prolific architects, Pete Dye, even said, “The ardent golfer would play Mount Everest if somebody put a flagstick on top.”

Golf was something to be conquered.

Now? It’s becoming increasingly more about the hang.

A friend recently texted our group chat while on a trip to Tree Farm:

“I officially have a new favorite golf ‘experience.’ Tree Farm. It is the chillest golf experience I’ve ever seen. We showed up at 4pm and were not planning to play but we went out as an eightsome. 90’s hip hop blasting on the range and ‘clubhouse.’ The ‘clubhouse’ has more o…

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It took time to find this rhythm. The early months were a blur. I said yes to too many small projects and I didn’t establish enough boundaries. But I’ve learned what kind of work fuels me and what kind drains me. That’s been the real lesson of solopreneurship: not just building a business, but designing a rhythm that actually works for the life I want.

Right now, I have two steady retainer clients that take about 60 hours a month. I recently kicked off a rebrand for a resort course that plans to go private after a renovation—work that could carry well into 2026. I’m also wrapping a year-long rebrand for…

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He said he’d recently teed it up at a course where the greens had holes cut, but no flagsticks in them. It was a maintenance thing, apparently. Which meant that on every approach shot, he couldn’t see the hole location. He couldn’t hunt down a tucked flagstick. He couldn’t give in to the temptation of a sucker pin. He had no choice but to aim for the middle of the green.

And wouldn’t you know it, he shot the lowest round of his life. I can’t remember what his actual score was, but I do remember it was under par.

When I told my husband this story, he smiled and said, That’s so funny, someone just told me the same thing. A totally different golfer, totally different course, same outcome: no flags, no distractions,…

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Today, we’re heading to central Wisconsin to explore Sand Valley, a destination built on sand dunes where golf and nature meet in an incredibly imaginative way. I've been to Sand Valley four times now, and just spent three days and three nights here with three girlfriends.

Here are 9 takeaways you can keep in mind if you're ever considering (or preparing for!) a trip:

1. A Golfer’s Playground
Sand Valley isn’t just a resort with a couple of courses, it’s a choose-your-own-adventure. Five public layouts (plus the private Lido) give you everything from sweeping, full-length courses to quirky short loops. Every round feels different, and that variety is the secret to why I always want/need to stay for days.

2. Courses That Have Their Own Identity
Few d…

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Our handicaps ranged from scratch to beginner, and you know what? It didn’t matter one bit. We played together seamlessly. Because building a crew for a golf trip is less about ability and more about compatibility.

Golf trips don’t need complicated formulas. What they do need is chemistry. For me, four people is the sweet spot. A group of eight can work, and it might even be more popular than four, but it’s my hard max. So what actually makes a foursome (or eightsome) click? For us, it boiled down to a few simp…

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