a story about bowling

I bowled a 289 game last night. It's not a big deal in the grand scheme of things, but to me it meant a lot. My ball was really working, and as the strikes piled up on the scoresheet, I told myself that there was no reason why I couldn't shoot a 300 game. Of course, the 10th frame tested my nerves, but I told myself to stay controlled and not speed things. If there is anything that has plagued my game over the years, it is that I usually get to the line a split second before I am supposed to. It means my timing is off and I rush my arm through and don't get the natural extension and lift on the ball that drives it to the pocket.

In any event, my 10th ball of the game was a good one, hooking into the pocket and knocking all the pins down. My nerves on the throw were amped up, so I didn't lift the ball like I had in the previous nine frames, but still the ball was good enough to do its job.

Then with my 11th shot, I noticed how everyone on the lanes surrounding me was watching. I tried to block that out of my mind as I lined up for my shot. I told myself to be in control and I started my approach. I was only two shots away from a 300. I could do this, I told myself. But I noticed that my legs seemed a bit stiff, which I attributed to nerves. My timing was still solid, but my body's tension disallowed full extension. The result was that I didn't lift the ball like I did previously in the game. The ball crossed over my mark and started breaking for the pocket. When I had first released it, I thought immediately that it would be a weak ball, but then when I saw it going for the pocket, I told myself that yes, a 300 game was possible.

The ball smashed into the pocket, but because I didn't have proper lift, there was no drive to the ball. Instead, it deflected around the 5 pin---that's the one directly in the center behind the 1 pin---and suddenly my dream was over. A friend who I told this story to this morning said that the 5 pin standing there by itself was like the bowling gods giving me the finger. But I can't blame anyone but myself, because the fact is that I just didn't lift the ball on my throw.

One guy on my team, who has bowled a handful of 300 games, commented afterward that if I'd never thrown a perfect game before---which I hadn't---then I needed this game to prepare me for the next time I put a string of strikes together to get me to the 10th frame.

Perhaps I am just writing this post for posterity, so that someday a grandchild of mine can find it on the Web and realize that his grandpa almost shot a 300 one time. Or, perhaps, in the next couple weeks, I'll be writing in a blog that the 289 game had prepared me for the 300 that I just shot, as my teammate had said.

By the way, my other games for the night were 185 and 225. Add everything up and it's a 699 series. That's just one pin away from a 700 series, which I have never shot. So, with fingers crossed, here's hoping that I get to post another blog item soon about climbing that peak, too.