There are those days when we’re in vintage golf-speak, gushing about how we love our turf firm and fast, or how it’s best when professionals face set-ups that are cold, hard, demanding. Clearly, tough love is a concept we embrace when it comes to competitive golf.
Then, of course, there are those feel-good stories which cross our paths elsewhere in golf and are sprinkled with soft hearts and caring souls. For sure, gentle humanity is easily saluted.
This week, we choose the latter. It’s a story of a young man, Marcus Narcisse, with a passion for golf, and some very special people who have gone deep into their hearts to help him spread his goodness on the game. It would be lovely to say it has been an easy ride for Marcus, but the truth is, “his resiliency, his perseverance and how he has gotten this far is the crux of his story,” said Joan Stein.
To return to the 2022 U.S. Open at The Country Club in Brookline, Mass., is the starting point here, for that is where the story first intersected at Narcisse, a volunteer that week through with the Lee Elder Internship Program; and Stein, whose consulting firm is a leader in making sure ADA compliance is up to standards and has been working U.S. Opens since 2007; and a TCC member, Mike Curtin of Westwood, Mass., who volunteered to chair the committee that worked with Stein and would make the experience as easy and as enjoyable as possible for those with disabilities.
In her 34 years as an ADA consultant, Stein said she has “used humor to humanize the issue” and her message has always been to the point. “When you have a disability, life isn’t over, it’s different.”
With Mike Curtin, Stein had a chairperson who was the real deal. “An angel,” she called him, and so the experience at TCC was most favorable. Marcus Narcisse was a big part of that week because his story hit home with Stein and Curtin.
“I don’t like the word ‘disability,’ ” Marcus said that summer when his story first was introduced to readers of Power Fades. He didn’t view his autism in that light. Instead, Marcus explained that “My brain works very well; slowly, but it works. I’m still a loving person.”
Stein knew of Marcus’ story, how the young man had graduated from East Stroudsburg State and worked at Shawnee CC in Delaware, Penn., because he loved golf so much. “Never, ever does he let things stand in his way,” said Stein, “and I think that’s what connected him to Mike.”
Indeed, Mike Curtin’s investment in Marcus’ story wasn’t written off once the 2022 U.S. Open ended. It’s not his style. Instead, he remained in contact with Marcus and maintained a vigilant commitment to the young man’s passion to stay involved in golf.
That he describes his experience at The Country Club in 2022 as “life-changing” and how a year later things were “fantastic” gives measurement to the depths to which the world tumbled so unfortunately for Marcus Narcisse. Sometime in late 2023, he woke up one morning and felt “a numbness in my legs, tingling in my toes.
“It was weird,” said Marcus.
It also ignited a series of tests and weeks of mystery until it was determined that he had Guillain-Barré Syndrome, a non-contagious, autoimmune disorder. Those with GBS experience muscle weakness, tingling, and paralysis. Sadly, Marcus Narcisse could check all three boxes.
“I was paralyzed from the waist down,” said Marcus, who was told he got the disease through a respiratory infection.
For large parts of 2023, ’24, and ’25 the young man’s world has been spent in hospitals, rehabs, and nursing homes. The passion that percolated within – “I want to find spaces to help give adaptive golfers a voice,” he said – still existed but more importantly were the forces that he had harbored all of his life, thanks to his late mother, Marie.
“My faith and my support system got me through.”
That system is comprised of his godmother, a fraternity of hometown friends from Orange, N.J., and his “angel” from that week at The Country Club – Mike Curtin.
When he volunteered at the 2022 U.S. Open at The Country Club, Marcus Narcisse made friends with many, including Rickie Fowler.
With uncanny care and due diligence, Curtin kept in touch with Marcus and felt heartache at all the issues the kept piling up for the young man. As if the GBS wasn’t enough of an issue, Curtin discovered that social security had stopping payments to Marcus. Paralysis on top of autism on top of red-tape and government bureaucracy . . . it all felt so unfair to Curtin, who quietly and humbly accepted a role as advocate for Marcus Narcisse.
One of the first calls Curtin made was to Stein and you could joke that the band was back together, but in truth, these cases stir emotional flames within this ADA dynamo. “It’s not just what I do, it’s what I am,” said Stein.
Deeply caring about her work, Stein might be found inspecting a parking lot at a shopping mall to make sure it is ADA compliant or she could be heard speaking to a convention of builders. But it’s the annual work she has done for the USGA since 2007 (save for 2020 when the championships were held without spectators) that most pleases her.
“My passions are one, the world of accessibility, and two, golf,” said the Pittsburgh resident. She is especially pleased that those two loves come together not only in making U.S. Opens ADA compliant but also for the USGA’s commitment to the Adaptive Open, held annually since 2022.
But in another lifetime, Stein worked in two careers – as a social worker and helping those with development issues get onto social security. Curtin’s call to Stein, explaining Marcus’ nightmare, hit a nerve. It also produced action, because after navigating a sea of paperwork, Stein eventually helped get Marcus Narcisse’s social security benefits flowing.
“It’s been a journey, said Marcus, who has made great strides in his rehabilitation. “Mike and Joan have been so important to me.”
What keeps the story on a positive roll is yet another quality piece of golf – the soft and caring hearts within the Met Golf Association. Specifically, Ryan Kayton, manager of the group’s adaptive golf program.
The MGA is committed to its program that serves children with autism, intellectual disabilities, and adaptive golf opportunities for adults. “Fun, great casual clinics,” said Helen Farrelly, director of communications.
Marcus has had conversations with Kayton about possible opportunities to help with these clinics, which touches on his dream. “If I’m able to help a golfer get better, that’s great,” said Marcus. “But my hope is to be able to bring some hope to golfers with disabilities.
“I want to let them know your voice matters.”
He should probably also tell them that there are people in golf who do care about them, too. Marcus can offer testimony.
