The Day A Butterfly Paid A Visit

I didn’t break 80 that day. But I did feel accompanied. Remembered.

Golf is a solitary game even when you’re playing in a group. There’s a rhythm to it—walk, swing, reflect, repeat—that invites introspection as much as competition. It’s a pursuit I’ve always appreciated for how it mirrors life: unpredictable, humbling, and occasionally touched by moments so strange or beautiful that they stick with you forever.

This is a story about one of those moments.

I was playing as a single that day, paired up with another solo golfer—an older gentleman with an easy stride and sun-worn features. He introduced himself simply: “Dennis.” He wore an old Titleist cap and had the air of someone who played the game not to conquer it, but to coexist with it.

We exchanged pleasantries as we walked down the first fairway. Nothing remarkable about the encounter, really. But there was a sliver of curiosity in hearing his name. My father’s name was Dennis too. Not exactly an uncommon name, but not one I hear very often anymore. I smiled quietly to myself. A small coincidence. Nothing more.

As we made our way through the front nine, conversation drifted toward past hobbies. My playing partner mentioned he had once been an avid skin diver. The way he said it—casually, as though talking about mowing the lawn—made me do a double take. “My dad was a skin diver too,” I said, smiling a bit. “And his name was Dennis, just like yours.”

He gave me a polite nod. “Huh. Small world,” he said. Then he returned to surveying his next shot, seemingly unmoved by the connection. It wasn’t that I expected him to find it profound—but I’ll admit, I felt a little let down by his indifference. It felt like a neat bit of cosmic symmetry worth a second thought. But maybe that’s just me.

We walked on.

As I pushed my trolley up the gentle incline to the tenth tee, a flicker of movement caught my eye.

A butterfly—jet black with a touch of gold, impossibly delicate—fluttered by and, without hesitation, landed softly on my hand.

I stopped walking, surprised by its boldness. I watched it for a moment, half expecting it to dart away. But it didn’t. It just sat there, wings pulsing lightly in the sunlight.

Then it did something even more peculiar.

As I set my bag down and prepared to hit my shot, the butterfly gently lifted off my hand and glided to the top of my golf clubs. I stood still, not wanting to scare it off. I chose a club, lifted it from my bag and hit my shot—one of my better ones, as it happened—and when I returned my club to the bag, there it was, still perched atop my irons as if it had been waiting.

I chuckled and shook my head. “Look at this guy,” I said to Dennis. He glanced over, gave a half-smile, and went back to walking towards his next shot.

We continued our round, and the butterfly continued its ritual: every time I stepped away to take a shot, it would settle on my clubs. When I returned, it would flutter back to my hand, riding with me down the fairway like a tiny, silent caddie. This went on for several more holes, the better part of thirty minutes all said and done.

I don’t know what it was about that moment. Maybe it was the coincidence of Dennis. Or the fact that both this man and my father shared not just a name, but a long-ago passion for exploring the depths of the sea. Or maybe it was the strange persistence of that butterfly, sticking with me through shot after shot as if it had something to say. Maybe all of it together turned the ordinary into something quietly extraordinary.

There’s an old belief—found in different cultures around the world—that butterflies are messengers. That they carry the spirits of loved ones, or reminders from another realm.

I’m not someone who leans too hard into mystical interpretations.

But I’m also not so closed off as to ignore what feels like more than coincidence.

My father passed away several years ago. He had a way of offering advice without making it feel like advice. More like nudges. “Keep the faith. Don't quit. Do what you have to do.” When he dove into something—whether it was a book, a hobby, or the ocean—it was with total immersion. Skin diving was a young man's pursuit for my dad, but it stuck with me because it captured how he approached life. Headfirst and curious.

And here I was, walking alongside a stranger named Dennis, a former skin diver, while a butterfly—a symbol of transformation—chose to walk with me hole after hole.

On the fifteenth tee, I paused to select a club. The butterfly floated over to the top of the bag as it had done before. I hit a solid shot, felt that satisfying thump of a well-struck ball, and turned to return the club.

The butterfly was gone.

I stood there for a moment, scanning the bag, my hand, the sky. But it had disappeared as quietly as it had arrived. No flutter, no fanfare—just gone. Like a breeze that changes direction without notice.

I finished the round, still thinking about it.

Was it a sign? A coincidence? A projection of emotion onto a random act of nature?

Maybe.

Or maybe it was just a moment meant for me. Not to decipher, but to feel.

Sometimes we look for messages from the past in grand gestures—in dreams, in songs on the radio, in uncanny meetings. But maybe they come in quieter forms. A name spoken casually. A shared hobby from a different lifetime. A butterfly landing on your hand in the middle of a golf course, and refusing to leave until it has made its point.

I didn’t tell Dennis much more. Some things, you just keep for yourself.

But I did smile, later that night, when I thought about how my dad would’ve reacted. He would’ve laughed. Shaken his head. “Of all the things I could come back as,” he would’ve said. “A butterfly on a golf course? You’d better be breaking 80, then.”

I didn’t break 80 that day. But I did feel accompanied. Remembered.

And sometimes, that’s enough.