Let's Bowling (or How to Abuse Italics)

Several years ago, in that other lifetime when I could luxuriously dawdle in a San Francisco stationery store, staring at one piece of letterhead for seeming hours without wondering where my kid had got off to because I didn't yet have a kid that could get off to, I found this cute, mistranslated stationery. It depicted, with delicate drawing, a family of baby blue bowling pins--mama, papa, and a couple of baby pins--with the invitation, "Let's bowling!" And I wondered, in that luxury of time and thought, what would one do with such a activity-specific invitation, on such cutesy paper. Without finding an answer, I promptly bought it, without weighing that purchase against the 5T pants I needed to buy or the college fund I should be contributing to or the bottle of fruit-flavored water I just dropped two bucks for (because it tastes like juice, yet isn't juice, and that small distinguishing factor will save me and my already thin hairline from the repercussions of a not-so-small-and-ineffectual sugar crash.)

To this very day, I have not written a single note, letter, tiny morsel of thought on that paper. But I think about it a lot. Especially when we go bowling, which we--Bear, Finn, me, and some very special friends--did last night.

I don't pretend to be a good bowler. Nope. Stop. Reverse. Scratch that. I do pretend to be a good bowler. In fact, I'm a great theoretical bowler and pool player. It's a ball, a trajectory, some english, and set of balls that either drop off a ledge or into a pocket. It's all physics and if put in a vacuum or among my Mii, I would rock the ball vs. ball-collective show. Rock. It. Out. Of Town. I'm saying. I am saying!

But, alas, we don't live in a vacuum, and those big balls (they are so very heavy and ponderous!) slip and slide and too often find comfort in the gutters.

But Bear rocks it out.

He has his own ball.

(And I will surround that admission with some white space so you may linger on the full implications of what it means to own your very own bowling ball.)

Bear consistently kicks my ass, which is why, when we played last night, I didn't play against him. Because theoretical Sarah tends to share strategy when she bowls, even, yes, even when she's sporting a 54 at frame 8. I still dare to coach. And some people don't show the appropriate amount of gratitude for my unsolicited wisdom.

So I played with the Supreme Overlord of Bowling (name withheld), who not only owns his own ball, but also his own shoes and vintage bowling shirt. Which he wore. To bowling.

His level of character development and just sheer competence so clearly surpasses mine that he shuts me up and down. You can't feel bad losing to someone so obviously superior. (Well, actually I can.) My other opponent: half of a Finn and half of his three-year-0ld friend. The split the other spot. Finn would bowl first. His friend cleaned it up.

Let's pause at this point to again reiterate how much I understand about bowling, a fact which may not translate into my execution, a fact which a third of my opponents clearly could not claim, as evidenced by the variety of their technique. Push the ball. Kick the ball. Nudge the ball. Butt the ball. And sometimes not even in the direction of the pins.

Let's also take this time to underscore that I did not use bumper guards, unlike some people.

Let's just understand those things as we look at last night's final board:

Supreme Overload of Bowling: 147
Sarah: 54
Finn/Friend: 62