05 June 2011

balls

I go bowling approximately once every five years, which is to say that I think I last went during law school.

"What is a good score?" asked R., the Kiwi in the group.

"300 is a perfect score," I told him, "if you get all the pins down every time, but I am thrilled with anything over 70."

And I would have been thrilled with a 70, too, especially after bowling a 36 on the first game.

After that dismal showing, I began to remember something, vaguely, about needing a heavier ball. I upgraded from my measly 8 pound ball to a 10 and then a 12 and finally a 14, until of the six guys and three women, I was using the heaviest ball. Somehow I need the heft. I just sort of toss the lighter ball all over the lane, but a heavier ball has enough inertia of its own to roll slowly down the middle of the lane. This bowling alley shows your speed as well as your score, and mine was consistently lowest, but my scores went up with the heavier ball, to an 86, and then a 73.

I was happy.

(Side note: a group of 30-somethings should not be allowed to do any activity involving balls. The innuendo is far too easy.)

...

I left church early today to go to a martial arts seminar, but I did that thing where you think you know where something is and then when you get there the something that is in the place you thought you would find the something you need is not the right something, and then you drive around for a while looking for the right something but 1. you do not find the right something, and 2. the class you wanted to take has already long started.

So instead I went back to a coffee shop and sat outside until I remembered that I was right by church and people from church were probably going to drive by and wonder why I wasn't at the class I said I was going to be at when I was chatting at the pre-church breakfast.

And just at that moment, someone from church drove by.

I retreated home, and added some milk to my bizarrely chocolately mocha to tone it down. (If it's too chocolately for me, there is probably scarcely a person in the world who can handle the chocolatiness.)

...

The sky is occasionally blue again, here, and I feel homesick. Blue sky does that to me, because in the blue sky I can see the jet trails and I know that somewhere up there are people who are going somewhere, while I'm stuck here.

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