MyTurn
by JIM DUCIBELLA
‘I’m just a golfer’
A rare neurological condition can’t keep VSGA member Bob Jordan away
from the game he loves
40
But fate, or some divine power if you will,
has a way of changing the plans of even the
strongest willed person.
Jordan says that one day his brothers
Paul and Doug told him that they wanted
to play golf and invited him to join them,
ostensibly to ride and watch. He wouldn’t
have done it, but for some reason—he
knows not why—he had visited Brambleton
Golf Club in Ashburn and saw that they had
a SoloRider golf cart. That’s a one-seat car
with a 350-degree swivel seat that lifts the
driver into the address position.
His brothers no longer play the game.
Jordan now owns his own SoloRider and
used it last year to play about 140 rounds.
Eight years ago he started swinging with
only his right hand because he lacks core
strength and needs his left hand to steady
himself. Lord knows it hasn’t slowed him
down any. Playing by himself, he gets
through 18 holes in an average of slightly
more than two hours.
“In a lot of ways I’m a better player now
than I was then because I don’t hit the ball
as far,” he said. “It used to be I could hit it
far, a long distance, but good luck finding
it sometimes. Now I’m in play, just not as
far down the fairway. And my short game
is better.”
A member of the VSGA’s eClub Alex-
andria, Jordan has developed a deeper
relationship with Brambleton, serving
as the club’s volunteer coordinator. In
typical droll humor, he says he got the job
because somebody [at a meeting] said,
‘Yeah, he’d be good at it. Everybody else
stood up and I was the only one that didn’t
stand up, so…”
In case you wondered, the self-taught
Jordan scored a hole-in-one five years
ago at Brambleton. He’d like to say he
saw it, but he was looking into the sun on
the 125-yard hole. His playing partners,
having already moved past the forward
V IR GINIA G OLFER | M AR CH/ A PRIL 2018
Bob Jordan, who lost the use of his legs more than
two decades ago, golfs using a SoloRider golf cart
and even made a hole-in-one five years ago at
Brambleton.
tee box and towards the green, offered
play-by-play.
“Looks good … Looks real good … My
God, it’s going in!”
Jordan asked why he was called for this
article, saying, “I’m just a golfer.”
Told that his story was inspirational and
that not everyone in his situation would
want to discuss what happened and its
impact, you could practically hear him
shrugging his shoulders.
“Well, you’ve got to keep getting up, no
matter what,” he replied. “Don’t you?”
That’s as good a bit of life advice as you’ll
ever hear.
vsga.org
I
magine going to bed one night
a 35-year-old, robust, athletic
father and less than 24 hours
later being told by doctors that
life as you know it would never be
the same again.
Bob Jordan doesn’t have to imagine it.
He lived it, and continues to live it.
March 17 marks the most horrifying of
21st anniversaries for Jordan, who lives in
Fairfax. He woke up with a high fever and
could barely walk. Embroiled in a divorce
and custody battle, he drove himself and
his 3-year-old daughter to a hospital.
There, he suffered a seizure.
He hasn’t walked since.
“Transverse Myelitis,” was the doctors’
final diagnosis. It is defined as a neuro-
logical condition produced by abnormal
inflammation in the spinal cord. Con-
sequently, nerve impu lses are blocked.
Jordan says that even after two decades
there are places in his spine where he has
no feeling.
Rare? You bet. Just 5 people in a million
suffer from it.
No one knows for sure what caused it.
One doctor told Jordan that stress could
have been a contributing factor. The way
Jordan describes his life at the time sounds
like the makings of a bad country song.
“I like to say I married the w rong
woman,” he began. “The cat ran away and
the dog died. I was working a job I really
didn’t like. So stress? Yeah.”
Jordan played a lot of golf—and to a sin-
gle-digit handicap—before the Transverse
Myelitis, walking, always walking, play-
ing through groups of slowpokes riding
in carts.
Despite his physical limitations, he plays
a lot of golf now—and to a 14 handicap. After
the diagnosis he made up his mind that he’d
never play again because he’d never be able
to play to the same level as before.