There was a smile on her face as the items moved her way on the conveyer belt at the register. Flowers. Red wine. A card with an envelope.

“Anniversary?” she asked.

Dead giveaways, for sure. Being the middle of June, a hotbed for anniversaries, it surely added to the trail of bread crumbs and the woman’s friendly smile only confirmed that my embrace of a wedding anniversary was proper and fulfilling. They are to be celebrated, indeed.

Which provides a segue into a thought that tickles my fascination constantly, but especially in mid-June when the annual Summer Solstice arrives. With the passions involved in anniversaries converging at a time when warm twilights offer extended playing windows, it seems fitting to use this time of year to smile and remember where, when, and how you fell in love with golf.

Perhaps use the Summer Solstice as an anniversary to salute your falling in love with golf?

Which is not to suggest, mind you, that Jamie Kennedy should bring red wine and flowers to that piece of heaven called the Kids Course at North Berwick in East Lothian, Scotland. But there is no mistaking his eternal gratitude for how the course shaped his life.

“We summered in North Berwick and I would play the course from sun-up to sun-down,” said Kennedy, a masterful observer of the game who is the Director of Digital Content for Golf Digest. “It honed a love for the game and an emphasis on fun and touch that has stayed with me in every round I’ve played.”

For Bruce Chalas, the women’s golf coach at Boston University and a quality amateur back in his playing days, there is a memory of a man named Fred Gray and “the grass flying in the air” as he drove a gang mower at a golf course in Millis, Mass., Glen Ellen CC, that is no longer with us.

“I was 11 years old,” he said of that time more than 60 years ago. “The day I met pro Charlie Sheppard, I saw his MacGregor golf bag with his name on the bag. That day, I said to myself, ‘I’m all in.’ ”

Chalas pursued his dream as a player to win state championships and earn his way into the 1980 U.S. Open. He once stuck his thumb out to get a ride to a local golf course in Florida and wound up getting a private lesson from the gentleman who picked him up. A legend by the name of Byron Nelson.

Chills and goosebumps accompany that story and if you’ve ever been to North Berwick and have experienced the original Redan or a wild Biarritz and stood in awe of that flagstick on No. 13 you will know how special it must be for Jamie Kennedy to have played as a kid in that environment.

Ah, who among the many of us who cherish golf and concede its mystical pull don’t feel a kinship with Chalas and with Kennedy? Likely none of us can express our love for the game quite like the late and truly wondrous John Updike, so let us treasure a sampling of the words he left us.

“To see one’s ball gallop 200 and more yards down the fairway . . . is to join one’s soul with the vastness that, contemplated from another angle, intimidates the spirit and makes one feel small.”

On the morning after an Open Championship, a quiet walk around the local village brought a number of sights to my attention, including this sign. It couldn't mirror my sentiments any more succinctly.

Savor the words, for they speak to how golf is so intoxicating on many levels. As a caddie, for instance, Jim Horvath learned to “appreciate the beauty of the game, including its marvelous camaraderie and competition within a foursome.” But to this man whose golf world has always revolved around the power of magnificent municipal courses (Dennis Pines and Dennis Highlands on Cape Cod) and the desire to serve in volunteer capacities with Mass Golf, the moment he fell in love with the game will sound familiar.

“It was probably the year I turned 14 which is when I finally hit a few really good golf shots,” said Horvath. “It was that wonderful sensation that moves from the hands, through the arms and to the brain that one feels when a golf ball is hit on the absolute sweet spot that really got me hooked.”

Your love of golf can play out in many ways. While playing the game is a common thread – some competitively, most others recreationally – there exists in many golfers a desire to teach and coach, a la Chalas. To pursue golf for employment and carve out your own beautiful niche of travel and clever insight is Kennedy’s forte. And for those, such as Horvath, who nurtured a passion for competition but now devotes endless hours officiating and filling volunteer opportunities, it is proof that indeed the game becomes embedded in your soul.

Then there are those who can lay claim to twice falling in love with golf.

“The first time was from afar,” said Emily Chorba, who grew up in a family that did not include any golfers. But one summer she worked at Bald Peak Colony CC on Lake Winnipesaukee in New Hampshire and was blessed with a bedroom window that would open up a new world.

“(There was) an enchanting view of the first fairway down to the green,” said Chorba. “I never played golf there but walked the course daily and fell in love with the fresh tranquil environment. I decided I had to take up golf.”

When opportunity knocked a few years later, Chorba recalled her promise to “take up golf” and she played in a work tournament with her husband. Chorba fell in love with the game again, this time emphatically.

“I loved the satisfaction of striking the ball well, the team strategy, handicap equity, and sense of community the game offered.”

That Chorba has used her to love of golf to enrich the game and shine a much-deserved spotlight on an unheralded legend is a testament to her character. As a board member and historian at Pasatiempo in Santa Cruz, Calif., Chorba was part of a movement to get Marion Hollins inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame and she continues to be a wonderful ambassador for this Alister MacKenzie course north of Pebble Beach.

And to think, it was the view from a bedroom window that helped plant the seeds to Chorba’s love of golf.

Such is how serendipity so often comes into play when searching for that spark that ignited a love affair. Indeed, that trip to North Berwick was intended as a family holiday, not as a push toward a career path, yet look at the marvelous way it has all unfolded for Jamie Kennedy.

“The reason I fell in love with golf is simple,” he said. “It’s one course. A course that adults cannot play, unless they are playing with a kid. Without that course, I wouldn’t be the golf lover I am today.”

So great, golf. Somtimes difficult to play, always easy to love.

"Power Fades" will not publish next week. We'll return July 10.