That’s Wet! a Golf blog in West Palm Beach Florida

Golf is a hard game. That’s why we need rules to distract us!

I’m on vacation this week here right at home in beautiful South Florida - golf paradise as far as we’re concerned.

I’m about to partake in round two of golf for the week with my beautiful partner in life and golf - Shannon. Along with us are Shannon’s Dad, Pat, and her Uncle Sam. This isn’t just any foursome - we’ve got family golfing power here.

As usual, my golf game leaves much to be desired, so before playing today I wanted to dive right back into the shallow end of the water hazard with a little review of The original 13 rules of Golf, fist published in 1744. I’ll take it one rule at a time because I don’t want any of us to get hurt.

Rule number 6

“If your balls be found anywhere touching one another you are to lift the first ball till you play the last.”

Marvin Gaye told us ‘please don’t masturbate’ in the closing lines of his most famous song, Sexual Healing, which only goes to show you that Golf was originally a game of white men so concerned with their balls, that they had to apply rules of procedure and etiquette in order to allow an average golfer to beat his balls around the course with his ol’ hickory shaft. Is it really any wonder why one of the original golf balls, a feathery, looked like this?

Feathery, hairy, it’s all the same to me sitting here 263 years later. Of course, some things never change. Men still love to play with their balls and we’re still trying to swing a stiff shaft, even if our bodies can’t hit it like we used to.