From a Party to Professional

Today is a windy Sunday.  The signature smell of the Fish Bowl is still present, but this time mixed with the smell of dirt, probably a product of the wind.  In terms of the establishment very little has changed.  The spider web is up, still in pieces, framing the bar window, the rest of the decorations are the same, and the staff, consisting of mostly young girls, continue to ignore everyone, gossiping amongst themselves.  The music has changed; it is louder and made up of mostly rap tunes.

I am here earlier than I was last week.  There is a party happing.  The middle three lanes have been taken up by a large crowd of people ranging in appearance from 70 down to three years of age.  They are celebrating a party, with boxes of wrapped presents filling the bar that runs parallel of the shoe counter.  They are in the middle three lanes, the rest of the alley is empty.  The left corner of the bar on which the presents are located had pizza and a sandwich platter, which did not appear to come from the Fish Bowl, the right had two liter bottles of soda and plastic cups.  I assume it was a birthday party for a young boy, based on the wrapping paper, but I couldn’t be sure who the birthday boy was, or even if it was a birthday.  There were no cone hats, nor a cake.

The lanes where everyone was gathered had rails preventing gutter balls.

There were no children at the arcade, all of them were playing alongside the adults.  They were loud, moving, jumping and dancing, like the kids that were in the arcade last week.  One child put the bowling ball over his head with no fear of hurting himself.  No one noted the horseplay, except for when one girl attempted to go twice in a row.  When she threated to go again an adult grabbed her, picked her up, yelled at her, and sat her facing away from the rest of the group.

During the party and festivities there was one patron who sat away from the group; green shorts.  He was sitting with his head cradled in his arms as he watched a TV screen above his head.  The screen was showing a football game today.  Last week it had the news.  Green Shorts eventually got up, appearing annoyed with the group he left his table and sat at the table next to us, watching a different screen with the same game.  He began combing his comb-over with a foldable brush he had in his pocket.  He then received a call, paced annoyed, went to the billiards room, exited back into the bowling ally caring a bag he previously didn’t have.  After that Green Shorts walked across the alley to the bar, and disappeared through the bar doors.  He did not return.

As Green Shorts was busy doing his rounds, lanes 21-28 (which included the lane where he was originally sitting) suddenly lit up, announcing that there was a practice session in progress.  During that time a group of three people, a woman in her late thirties with a heavy Asian accent and a cannery yellow sweater, and two men, one her age, another in his sixties (all ages estimated based on appearance).  They arrived caring small suitcases that resembled duffle bags.  They took lanes 21 and 23, placing their bags on the floor.  Cannery sweater went immediately and bought a fountain drink from the food kiosk.  It was served in a large Styrofoam cup.  The younger man took out of the bags two bowling balls, one (his) had a tiger stripe pattern, and the other looked like mahogany wood.  He placed them at his lane, then went back to his seat and took out two slender silver bags (I later learned they had his bowling shoes) and a towel.  He left them on the table and left.

By now the music changed to mostly pop tunes. 

Others started coming in, first an old lady, appearing to be in her seventies.  She came in, with the same type of suitcase, her suitcase had the Cowboy’s team logo on it.  She then went to the staff shoe counter, and on her own, entered the staff area, grabbed a stack of papers and began distributing through lanes 21-28.  Another group arrived, a couple in white shirts.  They took the lane next to the woman, and the man began to speak with her, addressing her by name.  She mistook him for someone else, and he felt offended.  They spoke of the score cards (papers on the tables), of hair, and of the weather. 

Again the music changed to classic rock.  It also grew much softer than before.

The lady of the couple had in her bag two green plastic folders with papers that resembled the papers the old lady had placed on the tables.  Like the lady before she simply went behind the counter and put them there, ignoring the staff, who were both ignoring her and a patron trying to speak with them. 

Another man, in a red polo shirt, came in and used the table I was sitting at to place his things as he put on his thumb a large Band-Aid and two smaller purple thick pieces of tape.  He ignored me completely.   More and more people came in, carrying the same type of bags, as I left they began changing their shoes.