Tales From my Bowling Alley Days

The Good, The Interesting, The Bad, and The Lessons!

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✶ Memories Of My Overall Employment ✶

✰ It was a cold night in November of 2019 when I was working as a cashier at the Manchester Home Depot. I checked out a middle aged gentleman who chatted with me kindly (I learned later he was Bob).

• He asked: "are you looking for a job?"
• I said: "maybe...?"
• He asked me how much I made.
• $11.50.
• He asked: if you could make $13 an hour, would you come work for me?
• I said "...Maybe...?"
• He gave me his card, and told me to swing by the bowling alley after work. 
• "ok".

I wasn't going to do it. Truly, I wasn't. But, rather impulsively, I decided to drive over. I thought to myself: "if I don't see this Bob guy immediately, I will leave". There he was at the front. He took me to the bar area for an "interview" (He basically just asked me to work for him). I started working in the evenings, part time for $13 an hour.

✰ My first night, Bob bought me an entire pizza to welcome me, and I ate the whole thing in one sitting! Everyone was shocked cause I was S K I N N Y at the time. Little did they know I ate like that all the time! 

A picture from the time period

✰ My boss Bob was a big fan of teasing. When he found out I was homeschooled, he would tease me about it (nicely, it was all in good fun). My first night, he was teasing me about being homeschooled, and that I was "sheltered". Later that evening, I made an office reference and he didn't know what I was talking about. So I sassed him: "Who's sheltered NOW"? It made all the other managers go "OooooohhhHHH!"

✰ They let me clean out and organize their closets and storage areas. I didn't mind, cause I liked to! 

✰ After I met Cody and we got engaged, sometimes he would wait outside in the car for 8 hours, waiting for me to get off work so we could drive home together. Incidentally, my boss Bob told me he and his wife used to do that too. He said it's all part of being in love! 

✰ One night, Bob went a little too far with his teasing (accidentally)! Every night, he would set the closing alarms (which had a 90 second timer for everyone to leave and the doors to be secured) before I was fully ready with all my belongings (phone, keys, water bottle, etc.), and it was his way of teasing me cause I had to scramble to gather my things in time.
I was fine with this joke UNTIL: One night he did it, and I accidentally left my phone. Unfortunately, I didn't realize until I was in my car and everyone else had driven away!!

I could not contact my boss.
I could not call my mommy.
I didn't even work the next day.

The next time I worked, I said... "Bob, we are done with that joke". He never did it again.

✰ I was one of, if not THE most efficient people at the front desk. Not only was I really fast with the buttons, but I was also really good at explaining the pricing. As a result, customers were much less confused, which I always felt proud of.

✰ I got to write my own schedule and they just kinda let me (Bob was pretty chill if you haven't noticed). My Full Time job was Home Depot. So Bob let me schedule myself based on my availability. I guess he trusted me cause I didn't abuse this... I was pretty faithful and consistent. 

✰ About two years into my employment, I was encouraged to apply for a salaried position as an assistant general manger. I interviewed with the district manager as well as Bob. Apparently the interview went well, because Bob told me the DM said "that was one of the best interviews he'd ever conducted". I ended up turning down their offer in favor of pursuing my goals at Home Depot. 

A picture from the time period

✶ I Learned All About Bowling! ✶

✰ Maybe as no surprise, while working at the bowling alley for 3 years, I learned a lot about bowling technicalities and culture. Did you know that the lanes are oiled with this giant machine, and some patterns are harder to bowl on? The hard patterns they apply for the pro leagues. For everyone else, they apply the "easy" pattern.

✰ During my employment, I started bowling a lot myself, since employees received discounted games.

✰ Occasionally, I was allowed to go in "the back" behind the lanes and watch the pinsetters. Sometimes when the alley would close, I would walk between the lanes and look at all the pinsetters up close. I felt pretty cool being able to!

✰ While working, I was grateful for my employee discount, because I learned that bowling can be EXPENSIVE. During my employment, at most they were $19, PER GAME, PER PERSON! PLUS SHOE RENTALS!! Weekdays, they had specials (thankfully). The moral of the story is - DON'T GO DURING PRIME BOWLING HOURS.  Unless you're like, rich or something, don't let me tell you how to live your life. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

✰ If you know about bowling, you know about leagues. Leagues were fun and you came to know the same people every week. It was a pretty cool community and culture. It felt like the bowlers and employees were all a big family as one.
When I was a kid, I thought that getting 2 or even 3 strikes in a row is dang near impossible. But at this job, I learned that a perfect 300 game is fairly common amongst the pro leagues!
I also learned that there are basically three different types of leagues - a "serious" professional league, and the "just for fun" leagues, or "special" leagues, where people with disabilities would play. 

Bible study before my shift one day!

✶ Working the Holidays ✶

✰ Whenever the week between Christmas and New Years came around, I would take vacation at Home Depot so I could work extra long hours at the bowling alley. I did this cause it was fun, I got extra money, AND I liked to help Bob out, because it's the busiest bowling week of the year!
I would usually be given free food all week too! Choosing my own hours, I would typically work over 8 hours a day during that busy week. Back then, I had seemingly endless stamina, so the long hours were more fun than tiring. 

✰ On Christmas Day, 2019, I worked in order to avoid family drama. A guy who liked me at the time came to visit me on Christmas day and brought me a book as a present, and I thought that was really sweet. 

 My husband Cody during the time period

✶ Bartending (My Favorite!) ✶

✰ One day, Bob asked me if I wanted to cover some bar shifts, since they were short handed. It sounded fun, so I said "yes". On my "training night" let me make my $13 an hour base pay on top of tips. I ended up making $400 just in tips my first night ... on a THURSDAY! All the customers were so nice that night about me being new! 

✰ I only had one or two times where I had to deal with someone drinking too much. Both times, I talked to Bob. This one dude kept ordering drink after drink, at one point I was serving him some water and he was trying to order another drink - I straight up interrupted and said a straight-faced, deadpan "no"! His friends got a kick out of that response. 

✰ Once, a woman and her family came to the bar. They were celebrating with drinks and bowling because she had just beat cancer. With Bob's approval, I surprised her with a fun, fruity alcoholic drink to congratulate her! She loved it. 

My room during the time period

✶ The "Questionable" Stuff... ✶

✰ I never got a raise in my entire employment. I made $13 ever. To be fair to Bob, he tried to get me one. It was the District Manager who continuously turned it down. Saying "I didn't work enough hours per week".... which didn't make sense because even a part timer should get a raise after minimum a year of employment. 

✰ For a while, we had a new manager working with us. He was creepy and kept flirting with me, even though he had a girlfriend. I eventually had to report him for touching my butt "by accident" (he didn't last long. He had it coming for lots of reasons).

✰ Every night,  the very inappropriate "What Do You Mean" music video by Justin Bieber would come on the lane screens at 9pm (The company's intention was that they wanted their centers to be more adult-focused starting at 9pm onward. Problem was, a lot of times kids were still present even during the late hours). Employees had the capability to change the song or pick a song in our software twice per hour, as enforced by corporate. Every night I worked, as soon as the music video came one, I would rush change it to "Comfortably Numb" by Pink Floyd instead. Always that song, every time. 9pm, each shift. It ain't much, but it's honest work (meme reference).

✰ During my time working at the bowling center, I got myself in trouble by flirting too hard with too many people who flirted with me. I had never been taught about male and female attraction, sex drive, dating, or really any part of dealing with men in the wild. So when guys were giving me attention, and I LIKED IT, I foolishly reacted positively by reciprocating, not realizing that by reacting this way, I was sending a message that I was "DTF", as they say.
I had to learn this the hard way. I did not know how to speak up for myself and say "no". Thankfully, now I know better.

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A hike I took during the time period.

I really enjoyed my time at the bowling alley. I look back on it with fondness. I learned a lot of lessons during my time. I think it's safe to say that I was a very different person by the end of my employment, and I like to think that my coworkers noticed, and hopefully gave the glory to GOD. My life definitely revolved around GOD a lot more by the end of it! 

I ended up quitting because I reached the point where I didn't need the job anymore, and my life had changed so drastically (for the better) that I didn't want to spend all my spare time at a job just because I had nothing better to do. I was with Cody at the time and we didn't need that much extra finances, so I went back to doing only Home Depot full time, and no extra part time job. 

✰  That's All, Friends! ✰ 

~ Amaris // ☆