When life hands you a gutter ball ...

Last Saturday I attended the opening ceremonies of the Idaho State Women’s Bowling Tournament, hosted by the Coeur d’Alene Bowling Association at Sunset Bowling Center.

Along with representatives from Coeur d’Alene (Dan English), Hayden (Roger Saterfiel), and Rathdrum (Vic Holmes) we each gave a few words of welcome and participated in the ribbon cutting to open the tournament.

Then 9-year-old Rosy Gallegos, a two-year veteran of the sport, and Chris Pappas, life member of the Coeur d’Alene Association, State Director at Large and member of the Idaho Bowling Hall of Fame, stepped up to roll the first balls to officially begin the tournament.

At the countdown, with all eyes upon them, the pair lofted their bowling balls and aimed for the pins ... which is when Chris’ ball slipped from her hand and landed with a thud. She recovered quickly and pushed her ball down the lane where it promptly met up with the gutter. Meanwhile in the next lane Rosie’s ball took out several pins.

It was such a fun moment, not because of Chris’ misfortune but because of how much humor she herself found in the situation.

The moral of the story is that we’ve all spent so much energy with the seriousness of life this past year, finding some joyfulness and laughter and positivity is a tonic. Welcome and good luck to all of the bowlers in the tournament that continues through April 18!

These columns are archived by month and year in my files so when I "save file as" and rename with the current date and year I see what I was writing about exactly a year ago. From the last column of March 2020 aka Diary of a Shut-In, Week 3 comes this nugget: I predict that the iconic memories of COVID-19 in 2020 will be rolls of toilet paper and Tiger King.

Admittedly I’d forgotten about the collective binge watching of the forgettable Tiger King during the first weeks of COVID lock-down. But the hoarding of toilet paper proved iconic to 2020. I’ve yet to understand the "why" of hoarding toilet paper at that particular point and time.

Coeur d’Alene High School’s Class of 1970 canceled their 50th reunion early in 2020 and now it’s happily rescheduled for July 30-31, aptly renamed our 50+1 reunion. Bonus is that we’re joining with CHS Class of ‘71, marking their half century, for the Friday night mixer and Saturday afternoon lake cruise.

2021 will be the season of reunions and celebrations, re-living the glory days of decades past all enhanced by celebrating coming out on the other side of the year that was 2020.

Happy last day of March birthdays to Priscilla Baker, Annika Baltzell, Chris Jones, Joey Nowoj, Patrick Reagan, Shirley Christie, Crystal LaFountain, David Holloway and Chris Clayton. April Fools birthdays to Ed Frazey, Keri Schwenke, Kim Haddock, Candi Applegate, Chris Thompson and Payton Peugh (Sweet 16!).

Friday Jonathan Owens, Judi Jackson, Dallan Pope, Taylor Huber, Kathy Willy, Beth Barclay, Nell Gordon and Lee Periman are blowing out the birthday candles. Liz Montgomery, Doreen Porter, Cameron Dominquez and Cindy Jordan celebrate on April 3. Chrissy Wortman, Laura Keck (18!), Marshall Meeks, Nancy Gurno, Keith Hanlon, Duffy Taylor, Ann Fox, Nicholas Kane, Pappy Butler and Toni Hackwith celebrate on Easter Sunday.

On Monday Sharon Stevenson, Terri McTavish, Dan Powers, Sharon Wagner, Kelli Hawkins, John Negaard, Jamie Dallas and Gail Osterson blow out the candles. Bruce Hough, Caitlin Hodl and Tyler Bush take another trip around the sun on Tuesday.

Kerri Rankin Thoreson is a member of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists and the former publisher of the Post Falls Tribune. Main Street appears every Wednesday in The Press and Kerri can be contacted on Facebook or via email mainstreet@cdapress.com. Follow her on Twitter @kerrithoreson.