wait for it

The last time the I went bowling, I was with a bunch of golf course superintendents that were rained out from their planned golf outing.  There was competition, there was heckling, there was a pitchers of beer and somehow there ended up being 4 grown adults smooshed into the back of a sedan with a poor sober pregnant friend driving.  It was the kind of fun that only happens once in a while.  It was not bowling with a group of 4 year olds.

This was the kind of fun where A. stops half way through and says, "Thanks, for doing this, Mom." melt.my.heart.

However, it was also the kind of organized chaos that is more chaos than organized yet somehow everyone makes it home safely.  The bowling alley near our old house apparently does birthday parties every Saturday afternoon from 2:30-4:30.  That means that up to 20 birthday parties are going on at one time.  There were cakes for 4 year old girls and even a 37 year old man.  At any given moment, there were 15 people singing happy birthday and hoping their kid would blow out the candle before starting a fire and a stampede of bowling shoes running out of the building.  Then, there was the random group of twenty something year old men.  I don't know how they ended up next to us but they were obviously trying to have the kind of fun that occurred on my last bowling trip.  Not the 4 year old birthday fun.  

Look at this bowling ball throwing form.  It's a thing of beauty.  She would do a wind up, stop half way through to replace the hands because 6 lbs is a lot for a 4.5 year old girl, readjust, wind up, throw, and dismount with hands in the air.  The majority of the time, the ball started slowly down the alley.

 When I say slowly, I mean s.l.o.w.l.y.

 Notice how the ball is 3/4 of the way down the alley and A.'s friend was able to come up and join her and they both could squat on the floor to watch.

Second toss, another little party friend had time to run up, A. had time to get comfortable.  

 Oh wait, it has progressed about 3 more feet and yet another girl had time to come up to sit and watch. It could be painful except that they were so happy.

I don't know if you noticed before, but I said, "the majority of the time, the ball started slowly down the alley."  Yes, there was one time where the ball totally missed our alley and went 2 alleys over to where 1 of the twenty something group had set his beer down and was poised to bowl.  A. went screaming after her ball, tripped over the guys feet and slid about 1/4 of the way down his alley before retrieving her ball and quietly returning with a very serious face to our alley.  The guy was stunned into silence at the 4 year old hurling herself after the ball; I was laughing so hard that I almost fell over; the birthday girl's grandmother was mortified and ducked behind the computer; the other twenty somethings were heckling; and the remainder of the party goers were just grateful that it wasn't their kid.  I was expecting a reaction from A. perhaps embarrassment.  Nope, she came running back with the birthday girl asking for the next time it was her turn.    

Happy Birthday, C.  I hope you had as much fun as A. did... perhaps more fun than the twenty somethings or the 37 year old man with a birthday cake at the bowling alley.