I went bowling with my mom once.

It was 10 o’clock on a Saturday night in the middle of September.

I think this was the first time we’d went bowling in about 9 years, but

Life just got so fast paced.

The days got shorter, my heart beat got slower, my eyes got older, and

There was too much going on for bowling alleys and cheap barbecue Wings and happiness.

Until that night.

That night when we stepped outside of the car, the sky was

Grey and the moon was white and full  and blown and

I’d thought I walked into Casablanca, so I looked down

to see if my hands were still in colour.

I felt myself fall into the grey of that night, backwards and eyes closed,

And wondered when my grey would come.

I felt so much older that night.

When I looked at my dusty reflection in the alley’s window

I thought to myself long and hard,

“Here’s looking at you, kid.”

I am not very good at bowling.

I can’t ever figure out how to hold the ball, so it sits comfortably in my Hand but still leaves when I need it to go.

My grip is either too loose,

So the ball flies into the gutter like the disappointment I knew it would be,

Or--or

My grip is too tight,

So the ball sits like a heavyweight on the center of my palm, and I don’t want to let go.

I don’t want to let go.

I’m scared to let go.

I’m scared of life getting faster paced, and slower, and older, and I’m seventeen years old.

I’m scared that the next time I go bowling, it’ll be too look at my reflection In an older, dustier, window.

Maybe the building won’t even be a bowling alley then,

Maybe it’ll be a building long forgotten, covered in vines and dust and age.

I’m not scared of the future,

I’m scared of myself.

I don’t know what I’ll become.

I don’t know what’ll happen to me, who I’ll touch, who I’ll hurt, who I’ll break

Who I’ll love.

But there in the background,

There catching up with the buzzing in my head,

My mom’s behind me yelling at me to hurry up,

To just let go already.

Mom I--

Just let go.

But I'm not ready to--

Anna.

But how will I know when to --

Go.

So I loosen my grip

The ball sinks from my hand straight toward the center.

Then like most things, it changes its fickle mind and slides a bit to the left.

Eight pins fall over.

I lean on the window on the way home and look at that Casablanca sky,

“Of all the gin joints in all the towns…”

And I think about the fact that I will continue to grow no matter how I hold that ball,

And one day I will be someone else’s Rick Blaine because I

Can let go I,

Am ok.

My reflection will change again tomorrow and even after.

“Here’s looking at you, kid.”