Wednesday, October 12, 2005

Did I Act Like That?

I just got back from bowling and I witnessed something that got me to wondering. This is an all ladies league and most of us are married ranging from 23 to 65 yrs old. About half way through the night 4 guys walk through the door and have a seat at the bar. Immediately I noticed about half of the teams suddenly had something to laugh about, loud & uproaring. I assumed they were being catty and had made some kind of remark about these guys to make them laugh. But it continued and got louder. As I looked around I noticed some of the woman whom had been sitting normally in their chairs seemed to be now posing as if on a model shoot and they were talking in a more animated fashion. Normally you hear teams cheering each other on, "Good Job!" or "You can get it!" instead I was hearing "Whooo Baby!", "Shake it girl!". I also noted women who usually have a pretty standard bowling position when starting out all of a sudden were sticking their butts out more. So I got to analysing my self. Was I standing different? Was I sitting different? Does the presence of men change how I act? The only thing I felt differently about was my bowling performance. I wanted to show them what a good bowler I was. It didn't work. Before they arrived I bowled a 221. They showed up at the beginning of the second game and I ended up bowling a 130. So before the 3rd game I went in the bathroom and had a conversation with myself. Basically I looked in the mirror and told myself get your shit together girl and focus on the game! I ended up with a 165 my last game. So I proved to myself that even though I wasn't talking louder and laughing more or shaking my goods on the approach, I was indeed acting different. Afterwards I was the last person there besides the bartender and pin chaser and these guys. Sometime during the night these fellows were told I was the boss and they started up a conversation. I asked them how it felt to walk into a bar and see so many women. The one guy said, "I thought I died and went to heaven! When we walked in you all went silent and I felt like a piece of meat walking in. It was great!". They all seemed pretty cocky and I suppose it was a great ego boost for them, but I had to resist the urge to point out to them all the women went on home and they were all alone. Anyway I guess its just human nature to start preening when the opposite sex is in the vicinity. I learned even though at 40, married and a mother I'm not above fluffing my feathers either. Gack! I'm still a girl!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

That's not unlike how I walk onto a job site and they all fall silent. Either because I'm the only woman around or they're doing something wrong! I find that I'm more aware of reactions (both theirs and mine) when I'm single - when I was dating Cowboy, I was happily oblivious most of the time.