It’s about two young people, and the reason it means something to me is that I’ve met the young woman. She went to high school with my daughter. They weren’t especially good friends, but they are the same age, very much alike in background, education, geography, and what you might call economic prospects.

Then this young woman met a young man and her life changed.

It’s a sad story, it’s a happy story, a story that for all I know is playing itself out over and over again across this country. I guess you would call it a tale of courage and determination, of fate and luck. (Be sure to click on the link to view the photographs.)

Read it and I promise you’ll think differently about many things in this country, not least your view of  “Millennials” or “Gen Y” or whatever label these 20-somethings carry.

I’ve said for a long time that I can’t wait for my children’s generation to take the reins, to really get involved and govern and try to cast the world in their view.

This is just one more example of why I am hopeful about the future.

Please pass this story on. And let me know what you think.

Anyway, you might enjoy looking at some very pretty women. If not, I’m sure you can find the current standings for the first round of the Who The Hell Cares Open somewhere else.

By the way, that’s Mrs. David Toms, with her husband, from Sports Illustrated a few years ago. Spoiler Alert:  This photo, sans David, is in the BleacherReport report, which only goes to prove that someone in their office is more accomplished with iPhoto than I am.

If so, I invite you to read a post about bad things that happen at good resorts, which I’ve written on another site. Please read it and feel free to comment, adding your thoughts on any egregious examples of bad behavior I may have missed.

And maybe we’ll cross paths somewhere down the road–playing golf or luxuriating, if we’re lucky.

Thanks. Jim

Two golf stories in two of our most important newspapers today.

The front page of the New York Times reports on Caracas Country Club in the capital of Venezuela, a nearly hundred-year-old club that faces increasing pressures from the government of Hugo Chavez. Rumors are the club (above) will be nationalized and the land turned into housing for the poor. This isn’t the first time the club has faced possible extinction, but anything smacking of Capitalism faces a dim future in now-Socialist Venezuela.

Closer to home–and far more prosaic–John Paul Newport takes a look back at the golf news of 2010 and some likely scenarios for 2011. Hardly the most interesting or exciting article I’ve read today, probably because JP limits his view to the pros, who are hardly the most interesting or exciting ingredients in the stew that is 21st-century golf. Of course, Tiger’s woes were the big story last year and his “return,” however it plays out, will likely be top of mind at least in early 2011.

Too bad this is what we cared about and will care about. It says a lot about the state of the game.

So as one of golf’s major manufacturers puts it, “just do it.”

Downtown Conwy

On the beach in Conwy harbor

From the 3rd fairway of Nefyn & District looking to the 4th hole

From the 12th green at Nefyn & District looking down on the beach and Ty Coch pub

With beach paths bisecting so many courses, more of these signs are needed. Not that they are heeded…

After the flat front nine at Porthmadog, crossing the street and seeing this from the 10th tee was a revelation.

Walking through Portmeirion, where eclectic British buildings were collected to be saved, sometimes felt a bit like strolling through EPCOT.

Harlech Castle dominates everything around it, and is always in view while playing Royal St. David’s.

As at Porthmadog, the back nine at Royal St. David’s is very different from the front nine. It’s all classic links, but for a few holes, like this one, the 15th, it looks exactly the way you want it to look.

Not only are the views remarkable from Cardigan Golf Club (this is from the 11th, which is the highest point on the course), but it’s the only course I can think of where there are two bells–the other is on the 9th hole–to alert golfers on the tee that it’s okay to hit.

St. Davids City is a straightforward nine-holer that is a real links with incredible views. Here is one direction…

…and here is another.

St. Davids Cathedral in St. Davids City. I took this picture, I swear, which proves that Wales weather can be perfect.

Okay, I’m not sure what to say about this other than on my very first day I drove inland and went to Betws-y-coed because I’d heard it’s in the hills in Snowdonia National Park and very cute. I considered coming back a few dates later for the races but, luckily, had other plans.

It’s a rainy day in Harlech, along the Welsh coast, and I’m supposed to be teeing off at the venerable Royal St. David’s Golf Club at this very moment. Luckily, it’s quiet–there’s a boys’ championship in a few minutes, but two ladies gave it up and a foursome at 8:20 played six holes, came in soaking wet, and left. The forecast is for a nice afternoon, so golf will wait.

Till then, it’s impossible not to ponder the amazing world we live in. The 20-minute drive this morning through tiny villages and along still smaller, windy roads lined by walls of local slate was eerie as it poured down rain. It’s easy to imagine life here 50, 100, maybe even 1,000 years ago, looking through the windshield wipers onto fields and rocky mountains, sheep grazing and plants bending in the breeze, lakes refilling and smoke coming from stone huts.

In the clubhouse at St. David’s are photographs of play through the years, lanky men in jackets, ties, wide caps, and plus-fours, some in spats or gaiters, attacking the ball. Mustaches and pipes, faces as craggy as the landscape, women in wide skirts. There are 100-year-old letters on the wall, photos of royalty (before he abdicated, Edward used to play here while Wallis Simpson puttered around Portmeirion, the architectural stewpot where I stayed the last two nights), notes from club meetings circa 1896, drivers, mashies, and putters that were used before my grandfathers were born. It is one of the reasons I love golf, the rich and colorful history, the fact that it is much more than just the playing. At places like this, the years compress and the dead are alive.

Overlooking the club and the town is Harlech Castle (above), which is 800 years old, a square block of dark stone mined nearby, an imposing fortress. I saw it yesterday from across the bay: Standing at the highest point of Porthmadog Golf Club, the black form was barely visible on the horizon. Now turn 90 degrees, my host said: Due West was Criccieth Castle, another of Edward I’s “Iron Ring” meant to keep the locals quiet in the late 13th century, neither the first nor last time the Welsh rebelled for recognition if not independence. The history of Wales is in the guidebooks, but it is also in the faces in the photos as well as the tough-as-nails locals I pass in the post office and the newsagents.

While preparing for this trip I got it in my head that Wales is where Ireland was about 30 years ago: Barely on America’s radar as a place to visit, even less so as a place to play golf. The books say Wales fared worse than Ireland and Scotland in achieving rights and freedoms from Britain’s Parliament, perhaps because it is so much closer. Nationalism has long been a cause here, and is still, or maybe again. One hears Welsh spoken everywhere: There are a few Welsh-language radio stations, a Welsh TV network, and it is being taught in the schools. Old battles are still being fought here as they are everywhere else around the world.

A world in which I can sit in my bungalow on club grounds, where I’ll spend the night, logged into their wireless server, waiting for the rain to stop, hoping to play a silly game that’s not as old as the castles but is as interwoven into local culture as the pubs. Golf has taken me around the world, but no trip is richer or more redolent than one to the UK where it all began. And Wales, haunting in today’s rain, childishly giddy in yesterday’s sunshine, is something special, a last frontier waiting to be discovered and struggling not to change.

Follow my golf journey through Wales at www.visitwales.com/jimfrank