y name is Christian Cohen. My father is a blond Bible Belt Jew, my mother a black Baptist from Bensonhurst. I am an atheist. Not a good atheist, not even a practicing one—I make a furtive sign of the cross during airplane turbulence, and pray after routine physicals until the tests come back negative. I skipped work today like I do every Yom Kippur, to breakfast on bacon then spend the day playing, not atoning, though I can't ditch the inkling that there will be hell to pay.

Now it's raining, god damn it. I hate electrical storms, lightning prying like a police searchlight, thunder exploding like the wrath of some vengeful deity primitive people invented. I have no fear, of course—except of losing my ten A.M. tee-time. It's my dog that's whining, cowering under the bed. Not me.

"Be quiet! It's only a little rain, just a little noise."

He must fear the sharpness in my voice, the obvious confidence he wishes he had, for the whimpering increases.

"Shut up!" I yell. "It's not like it lasts forever!"

Before long the last rumble fades. The sun pierces the clouds like those Technicolor rays when Charlton Heston was Moses. My hound emerges hang-dog, chastened by his cowardice, ready to fetch a stick, ready for anything. I smile, caution myself about drinking too much coffee. Nerves . . . nerves, that's all.

My feet will get soaked but I will play golf today, the way I was supposed to, the way it was planned. Maybe it was predestined, from the first second of time. Reminding myself to keep my head down, keep my eye on the ball, I curse my fate that I don't believe in predestination.