Good Bye To My Don Goodshort

We need to talk about Don Goodshort. Not his real name, obviously. But that’s the name he chose for himself. And he’s leaving.

Don Goodshort is a machine. A glorious, beeping, totally obsolete machine. He’s a vintage golf ball dispenser from the 1970s.

For decades, he sat in the corner of a dusty pro shop. His job? To hand you a bucket of range balls for a quarter. He did it with zero personality and perfect mechanical precision.

The shop is renovating. They’re getting a slick, touch-screen kiosk. The new guy will accept credit cards and whisper pleasantries. Don doesn’t whisper. He grinds.

Why do we care? Because Don was weird. He had a chrome face that looked like a grumpy robot toaster. When you fed him a coin, he would shudder, clank, and vomit out a single ball with a sound like a dying harmonica.

That sound was pure joy. It was the sound of unreliable magic. You never knew if you’d get two balls, a jam, or just a sad metallic sigh.

Here’s the quirky fact: Don had a secret habit. Every eleventh ball, he’d spit it out with a little extra spin. It was a glitch. The owner never fixed it. He called it Don’s “signature serve.”

People started playing games around it. “Did you get a Don-spin ball?” was a genuine conversation starter. It created a small, ridiculous community. All because of a faulty spring.

Don also hated dimes. If you slipped a dime in by mistake, he would lock up for exactly four minutes. No amount of banging helped. You just had to wait and apologize to him.

Short Friendship Goodbye Quotes 100+ Farewell Messages For Friend

The new machine? It takes dimes. It takes nickels. It takes your soul via Apple Pay. It’s efficient, polite, and totally lifeless.

This isn’t just nostalgia for old junk. It’s sadness for a friend with character. Don had a bad attitude. He was loud, slow, and occasionally rude. He was perfect.

Think about the last time a vending machine made you laugh. A modern one won’t. They are sleek black monoliths of silence. They don’t grunt. They don’t have moods.

Don had moods. On humid days, he was sluggish. You could hear him mumbling to himself inside. “Hrrrngh…” he’d hum, before reluctantly coughing up a ball.

The official goodbye party is this Saturday. Yes, a party for a machine. The owner bought a sheet cake. It’s frosted to look like a green golf ball. That’s the level of commitment we’re talking about.

Someone is printing a eulogy on a scorecard. It will be read aloud. I assume there will be tears. Maybe a golf clap, but that feels too weak. He deserves a standing ovation.

Where will Don go? The owner says “retirement to a collector.” That’s code for “a guy’s garage where he’ll be ignored.” But I prefer to think he’s off to a secret club of old machines.

Saying Goodbye To A Friend Moving Away

Imagine that club. A parking meter, a payphone, and Don. They talk about the good old days. The payphone complains about all the quarters. Don just grumbles about dimes.

This is fun to talk about because it’s absurd. We are emotionally investing in a lump of chrome and springs. But that’s the point. We connect to anything that feels real. Don was real.

He didn’t try to be nice. He didn’t have a cute screen. He was a machine with a personality disorder. And we loved him for it.

So goodbye, Don Goodshort. You shorted many people on golf balls. You jammed at the worst moments. You terrified children with your screeches.

But you were never boring. You were a cranky, wonderful, one-of-a-kind companion. The new kiosk will never spin a ball. It will never make us wait four minutes just for being a dime.

It will never be you. And that’s the funny, sad, beautiful truth. We’ll miss the grumpy robot toaster.

Now, who’s got a quarter for one last bucket? Don’s waiting. And he’s getting impatient.