I knew it was going to lead to trouble.

Or at least, to hassles.

Nothing in life is free. So when the wife asked if I wanted to join her and her friend in their "Wellness Challenge", I knew enough to say 'no'.

Eldest son and his girlfriend did not.

So, this weekend their "team" gets started. Basically, how to get fit by having fun. Or, more accurately, how to spend time having fun. Not a bad thing, mind you, but the fitness they're hoping for isn't going to come from weekely activities.

Like bowling.

We haven't been bowling for years. Things have changed.

First and foremost... no smoke. We know the proprietor, and first thing she and her husband did was ban all smoking. Don't think they have a liquor license, either.

You'd think they'd be empty. But no, the place was hoppin'. Full of...

Teenagers.

Who'd have thought?

Loud teenagers, yes. And all punked and ganged up. But polite, and friendly. (And yeah, we knew a few.)

Bowling to head-banging rock is a different experience. Certainly not the bowling atmosphere we grew up with. But hey, I'll take ear-aching rock over cigarette smoke any day.

But the black-light lanes and pins was a real new experience.

The glowing pins were cool,

but unless you had one of the balls that tended to glow in UV

it was kinda hard to keep track. You see nothing, and then all of a sudden a black sphere shows up in front of the pins

and whammo!

Or, more often, a few thunks.

Picking up spares was harder, too.

We had more than a few gutter balls. But the seats were as I remember them from our childhood.

And the sounds! Ohhh, the sounds of such wonderful memories.

There were a few strikes, too. My first came as I stepped up, held the ball in prayerful position, and asked...

Okay, Mom. Remind me how to do this.

And she was there. "Take three steps, and just three. Bend down to release on the third, and send your ball right over the diamond just to the right of the center mark."

Really. It's not like she was there.

She was there.

It was a perfect strike.

I had several others that night. None of them alone. It was good it was too dark to see in there, else others may have seen my smiling face after each perfect ball. And misunderstood.

I wasn't bowling good...

I was bowling with my Mom.

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