Spare Me

Have you ever wanted something so much in your life that it just wounded you mercilessly every time you failed? When I was eleven years old I was asked by a friend to be a substitute on his Saturday morning bowling league. It sounded like fun and I loved bowling so I accepted. Little did I know then the thirty year odyssey I was about to start.

Whether bowling takes athletic ability or not is up for debate but since I had none anyway it was a mute point, however it does take skill. I started out using house bowling balls and at some point inherited my father’s hard rubber ball and shoes from the sixties. It was coal black, the finger holes and shoes were too big and the bag was hard plastic. No one ever mentioned to me that I could have the finger holes plugged and redrilled.

I used this ball throughout the rest of the Saturday morning leagues over the next several years with marginal improvement. But in the back of my head I also dreamed that I could have the ability to go pro one day. It’s not like it was baseball or football or something totally unobtainable like that, I mean it was bowling for Pete’s sake. Then I went to high school.

I was a counselor at the town day camp the summer before my freshman year. Lone and behold the man who ran the camp happened to also be the bowling coach at the high school, George Moran. I proudly told him my average was a 111 and, with a straight face, he told me that his bowlers generally had higher averages than that. I had quite the wake up call when I attended my first practice and every other team member scored 180 or above. These were teenagers, how dare they be so good.

Suddenly my goals had changed but I was not discouraged. Now I just had to try and catch up, still using my archaic ball while the rest of the team had equipment from that decade. Mr. Moran gave guidance and encouragement which helped me climb to a 155 average by graduation day. Alas though that was barley enough to obtain backup status. Technically I was on the team but I never bowled accept in practice.

I did not let this deter my bowling fate however! My dream was still alive, I was still young I would fool… um I mean tell myself. I went to work for a bank and joined their league at a bowling center where a buddy of mine, Eric, worked. He coached me a bit and gave me one of his old balls which fit me better than my dads. I became much more consistent and my average began to rise. I seemed to reach a plateau around 166 and couldn’t break past it but I kept rolling along.

Soon after I won $250.00 in a contest at work and was able to purchase a new ball, bag and shoes. Now I was set. Call the pro tour because I’ll be there in just a few weeks. My new ball gleamed under the fluorescent light like a golden orb ready for battle, one I would not win. Oh my new gear did bestow on me higher pin counts in the 178 range but life did not have my dreams in its plans.

These past two months I’ve been bowling with my two boys in a junior/adult league. It was the first time I have been involved in organized bowling for seven years due to unforeseen circumstances. Again with a hand-me-down ball I went full tilt with my pro career dream still looking over my shoulder; even it was the senior tour eventually. To my surprise if you don’t pick up a bowling ball for eight years it tends to do unexpected things such as dive right for the gutter or perform miraculous feats to leave splits. My body also doesn’t follow orders as it did in the past and joint pain appears where there was none before.

It’s hard for people to understand why it means so much to me. It was something that may not have been totally out of grasp, something that with the proper time and effort I felt I may have been able to do so that I could be above average. This past summer teenagers and younger were out bowling me again and the pins continued to tease me by almost falling down.

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Spare Me