I was a junior in high school when The Big Lebowski was released in theaters. It promptly flopped, but developed a cult following that was in full swing by the time I was in college. The 2000s were a boom time for White Russian hangovers, Pendleton sweaters, and young people taking up bowling—mostly ironically.
And, until recently, that was the last time I’d been to a bowling alley. Then, in August, my wife and I were invited to go bowling with some good friends. We realized we’d never actually bowled together—and we’ve been married for 17 years.
The truth is, even when I was among the young hipsters who took up bowling, shooting pool, and drinking PBR in dive bars like we were the subject of Pulp’s “Common People,” I had a checkered personal history with bowling. That’s because my parents were serious about it.
What country clubs were to the parents of my friends who grew up in the suburbs of Charlotte and Raleigh, bowling alleys were in the blue-collar military towns where my family was stationed. My mom and dad owned their own bowling shoes. They were part of bowling leagues. And they brought the kids with them.
I was never very good at bowling. But I spent a lot of time at the lanes as a kid. And here’s what I remember: Dim lights. Bad beer. Worse food. A permanent cloud of cigarette smoke that made everything smell like an ashtray and turned a young asthmatic kid like me three shades of green.
“Are you any good at bowling?” my wife asked before our first game together.
“God no,” I said. “But screw it, let’s have fun.”
Then I threw three strikes in a row. Which I don’t think I’d ever done in my entire life.
My wife joked that she was turned on by this secret, largely useless talent.
Then I started really trying to do it right. At which point I tanked, barely breaking 100 in each of three games.
“Screw it, let’s have fun” is always the right answer in situations like this. All thoughts that come after that are your enemy.
Turns out that’s the way to look at the modern bowling alley altogether. I’m not talking about places like Bourbon Bowl in downtown Greensboro. That’s a craft cocktail bar where you can get a charcuterie board or a poke bowl that also happens to have six regulation bowling lanes. Of course, the food and drinks are going to be good there.
I’m talking about AMF All Star Lanes—the very old-school alley to which my college friends and I would drive down Spring Garden Street from UNCG. It’s now a bright, fun, modern, and family-friendly place with better food and drinks than some local restaurants. No cigarette or stale beer stench these days. No White Russians either. But there is a staggering array of rainbow-colored “signature cocktails,” including neon, fish-bowl-sized “Dunk Tank” drinks served with several straws for sharing. They go down like the Hi-C Ecto Coolers of my early 90s bowling youth.
Order a basket of garlic butter and parmesan fries and chicken wings in a sweet Thai chili glaze. A sentence that would have gotten me laughed out of the bowling alleys of my youth. You’ll be very pleasantly surprised.
If you, like me, have been holding the sins of bowling alleys past against the modern iteration, I’ve got news for you. That no longer reflects reality.
That’s just, like, your opinion, man.
