PALO ALTO, Calif. » Michelle Wie did not go to Stanford to play golf, at least not the game that brought her worldwide fame as a teenager.
"One time, me and a couple of guys played campus golf," said Wie, sitting in a coffee house on campus after her longest day of classes. "You hit tennis balls with a golf club. You start at the frats and end at the fountain, so that's like one hole. We hit cars, we hit some bikers. Just goofy things that you don't usually do."
These are the goofy times she wouldn't trade for anything.
Moments like tailgating at the Fiesta Bowl before Stanford played Oklahoma State. Sitting — mostly standing, actually — in the student section behind the bench at Cardinal basketball games. Spending all day roasting a pig before a Super Bowl party. Catching up with friends at the Coho Cafe, where cartoon figures of famous alumni are painted on the walls.
There's a caricature of Fed chairman Ben Bernanke, and even one of Tiger Woods, who won an NCAA title at Stanford. Wie's face is not among them. She's a student, just like everyone else.
And she appears to be loving life more than ever.
"My life has progressed in various ways than I thought it was going to," said Wie, who laughs easily these days. "I'm more rooted in what I'm doing. I guess that's called growing up."
For much of her teenage years, all Wie heard was that she was going about life the wrong way. She was playing too much golf, way too early. She was playing against the men. She turned pro as a junior in high school.
Turns out she knew what she was doing all along.
No comments:
Post a Comment