| What's this? Wandering eyes and a quick peek at forbidden fruit in sports. Whoda thunk?
In baseball, yes. In hockey, yes. In basketball, yes. In football, yes. In lawn bowling, yes.
Lawn bowling you say? Darn tootin'. Been that way for years, too, according to a few local veterans of this extremely social game.
Marriages have become strained, husbands questioning wives and wives questioning husbands. All over something as simple as a name.
The great bard once asked "What's in a name?" For the uninitiated lawn bowler, a heck of a lot. A few hours of talk about getting on "Jack" or finding "Kitty" certainly could raise eyebrows. With women chasing "Jack" and men chasing "Kitty," one can see where problems may arise.
Players of the bowls refer to the white ball, which is the target, like the button in curling, as the jack. And some would call it the kitty, or say the kitty's chasing jack.
"The story goes that when the men bowled, the women were wondering who this kitty was they were chasing and they went down to see," chuckles Margaret Hughes, who sits on the executive with the Calgary Lawn Bowling Club. "And vice versa for the women and jack."
Adds club president Bernard Harleman: "The bantering is always going on. If you throw the wrong bias and instead of going to the jack you go onto another green you hear 'did you see a girl on the other green?' It can happen to anyone."
OK, OK, it's not the torrid kind of debauchery littering pro sports or the afternoon and evening programing of today's electric Roman Coliseum, otherwise called a TV, but it adds a bit of dust to the white outfits still worn for tournaments or serious competition. (Like tennis and cricket, however, bowlers have eased up on the starch and allow more than one colour of dress for some matches.)
And for those who believe the bowls is for older folks, guess again. Alberta's lone representative on a national team is a 20-year-old from Edmonton. Age and experience (or is that treachery?) often overcome youth and enthusiasm in this game that's far more difficult, and much more enjoyable, than many can imagine.
In its essence, bowls is a combination of curling, chess and mini-golf. It's similar to curling in that to score, you or your team has to have the bowl, or bowls, closest to the jack. In a game of fours – triples, pairs and singles are also played – the team members are called by the same names: lead, second, third and a skip, who directs the other players on where to throw and how hard to throw. Games are also divided into a pre-determined number of ends.
Like chess, tons of strategy is included. For instance, do you cover the jack and put your other bowls in behind, or out front? Or, do you knock the jack into the ditch at the back of the green and play the rest of the end there? And because the jack can be moved around the green, a team's plan of attack can change with each throw.
It also resembles mini-golf in that you have to anticipate how much curl you need on the bowl to get close to the jack. Unlike a golf ball, though, a bowl is not round. It is sort of flat and weighted on one side, which allows bowlers to curl the bowl several feet laterally. Like five-pin bowling, lawn bowlers have to wear spiffy flat-soled shoes so they don't trample the one-eighth inch grass too badly.
If you've given up on other forms of activity due to awkwardness, injury or physical impairment, Harleman suggests you give lawn bowling a try. "If you think you can do nothing, come and do this. There is a lot of enjoyment in it whether you are young or old." Who knows, maybe chasing Jack or Kitty will become your passion. |
