The charm, and delusion, of this place is that time stands still, or at least pretends to for a week. The Masters is a precious keepsake, taken out each April and checked for yellowing. Nothing is supposed to change. Surely not in a place where the guardian magnolia trees were planted in Robert E. Lee's middle years. But we all know differently, and this Masters has come to remind us, even as it romances us in its familiar ways.
Time moves on.
Palmer has come here to play 46 times, but this is his first as a widower. He lost Winnie during the winter, and when the subject came up at his press conference, he could only lean back in his chair and fight the tears and shake his head, no. No words to say. Nicklaus is back after a year's Augusta hiatus because of a hip replacement. He is still the oldest man ever to win the Masters, and the sobering statistic is that it he did it 14 years ago.