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Author Topic: can you give some advice  (Read 926 times)

GOD

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can you give some advice
« on: January 27, 2004, 11:00:22 PM »
Since my husband spends most of his free time on here maybe you can help me.  To give you a little background bowling is his only recreation and he is pretty good at it.  At least he used to be.  The problem is he is almost 60.  Not exactly a spring chicken anymore and isn’t as good as he used to be.  We both love to travel and for the past 15 years after he retired from the army we have went someplace everytime he had a weekend off from work.  This year though he told me his last tournament is the ABC in Reno.  I sure he serious since he has already given away or sold most of his bowling balls.  He says its just because he cant compete anymore.  Maybe some of you older bowlers can help me convince him winning doesn’t really matter.  He has spent his whole life taking care of me and the kids I fell its his turn now.  Personally I like the idea of him walking in the door after work and telling me to pack some bags were going to Vegas or Kansas City and places like that.  Thank you.

 

livespive

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Re: can you give some advice
« Reply #1 on: January 28, 2004, 02:30:40 PM »
I am not an older bowler, but here goes...

I have a guy on my team that is 75 (I am 31).
He loves to bowl but sometimes he feels as if he
is holding the team back by not having as many big games.

"Old bowlers never die, they just don't score as often"

Anyway, I asked him if he wanted to be my partner for City
Doubles.  He was so happy, just the fact that he was being thought
of was good enough for him.  He didn't care if we cashed he just
wanted to bowl.  We ended up finishing 5th which made it even better
for him.

If you have done a lot of bowling and traveling I would say that he loves the sport.  In meeting a lot of people he has found that there are people that bowl for the pure enjoyment of it.  

Tell him to enjoy bowling, for the bowling, not the winning.


--------------------
Eric T. Spivey, P.E.
 Visionary Test Staff Member

Edited on 1/28/2004 3:35 PM

MSC2471

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Re: can you give some advice
« Reply #2 on: January 29, 2004, 12:26:42 AM »
I concur that you need to tell him that bowling is in his blood, and that it doesn't matter what the scores are, as long as he enjoys the sport he should continue to do it. My father is turning 69 next week and still enjoys bowling in our Tuesday night league that he runs as secretary/treasurer, plus enjoys bowling an occasional association/state run tournament when given the chance. Sure his average is in the 170's compared to his 190 days 20 years ago, but I think he likes the sport as much if not more than he did when he was bowling 5 nights a week. I try to keep him up to date on the latest equipment and help him with his game where I can, and he does the same for me...

Matt

GOD

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Re: can you give some advice
« Reply #3 on: January 29, 2004, 03:38:08 PM »
Well the wife showed me this post.  As usual though she is a little confused. Im not giving up bowling, just tournaments.  It is just time to face reality.  I make 1 or 2 bad shots a game.  Knees will give out, shoulder will hurt, back might spasm, whatever.  In any case I can't count on this old body to hold up anymore.  I still average around the 220 mark but as you guys know that just doesn't cut it anymore.

I still have my leagues and can occasionally put three good games together which is good enough for me.

Someone mentioned bowling the senior leagues.  I sub for them occasionally but just can't see bowling them regularly.  The senior shots are almost like no-tap.  I average 229 on one league, 240 on another.  Other than the companionship, they just aren't any fun.

After having another talk with the little woman, we are still going to travel every chance we get.  She was just afraid we were going to stay home all the time.