The power animals matter. You may forget about them, but they are here for you. Atleast today, one was watching over me. Today was supposed to be a Reclaim My Day situation. Last weekend during my vacation I dreamed up the idea to go to Carrabba ‘s and the arcade nearby. I have been to the restaurant chain countless time when I near one of their locations. However, this would be a first visit to Tilted 10. Tilted 10 is similar to Dave and Buster’s. It has less cache, but offers air hockey and pinball. We will get back to them later.
Typically when I have reclaimed my birthday it has went well. I have had to do this a few times over the years as my health has become less reliable. With the Scorpio Sun and Gemini Moon, it seemed closer to my birthday energies than last Wednesday. My time at Carrabba’s went poorly. if I told you all of the things that went wrong this post would be quite long and it would seem unbelievable. The short version of this fiasco is that I wanted my entrée without wine in the sauce ( the menu never mentions wine as an ingredient ) . They come up with a solution but bring me the wrong protein. And the protein seemed undercooked. So they bring me the correct protein and one of the cutlets was so tough that I could not chew it. This was after waiting a very long time for my food. I had dreamed of this meal for months. I am not kidding here! I am a foodie and good food makes me happy. My cooking is fair at best so going to restaurants is what I prefer. The problem is I have many dietary restrictions. I can have alcohol but not when I am taking certain medications. It also bothered me that those in recovery may eat at this restaurant and consume alcohol without their informed consent. This really angers me. You might be surprised to know that even the manager seemed unconcerned about this fact.
While in the bathroom I noticed my diamond post earring was missing from my ear. I was resigned to the loss as I have lost it before. Yet it did materialize on the bathroom floor without the earring back. I felt some relief and headed to the mall. I was pleased that the arcade was easy to find. What a loud place with many young kids and infants! I saw they have party areas, so maybe that explains some of the odd demographics. Tilted 10 has bowling, skee ball, golf, a taco restaurant and two floors. There were only six or seven pinball machines but that was enough. I did not recognize the names, nor could I initially know how one pays to play. I still don’t know how much each game costs because you purchase a card that converts to points. The atmosphere was crazy loud and crowded. It was not cool, like my arcade in the 1970s, but was I still cool now? Was I ever cool ? Don’t bother to answer, This is just the buzz in my brain. At one point I moved with the music and sounds and retrieved a memory of how I felt entering the arcade of my youth. Me and my friends felt like we owned the place. We were regulars and it was small enough to have regulars. I have not played in ten years so it was awkward initially. I found a small place in Philly with a couple machines in 2014. It is far away so I had not returned since. Arcades are a dying breed in the US, just like large bookstores and drive in movie theaters. I had thought playing again would be a great birthday present to me. Pinball always brought me joy and joy has been elusive lately.
I noticed stools in front of each machine and some players were sitting on them. What is this? I asked and moved the stool away. This is not how it is done. I started with an Aerosmith model. There were 3 machines featuring bands : Aerosmith, Rush, and The Foo Fighters. The machines play their songs along with all the standard sounds. I was overstimulated very quickly. And yet, the act of playing calmed me down. Rather quickly my sense memory kicked in and I remembered how to play. I did not know how many balls to a game of how high a score is needed to win. But the familiar momentum came into being. My fingers and wrists knew how to control the flippers and I let out some of my pent up energy by playing more aggressively. I was back in the wonderful present moment and it was great. I did not care about winning , but wondered if I would win. Rather, I was caught up in the art of maneuvering the silver ball ( or balls ) to keep the game going. After I tired of Aerosmith, I played a a few other machines. I went over to the Rush machine . The machine said it was in competitive mode. I never heard of this and wondered if I should play this machine with that setting. I decided ” Why not! ” as I had nothing to prove. Besides, back in the day people would come over just to watch me play. I became really good and even won a local contest at my local bowling alley. Wouldn’t you know, I started to do quite well. The colors and lights and sounds accelerated. It was exhilarating! I was in the zone. I cannot recall the last time I was in any zone except the twilight variety. I did not win with a high score but I won 2 free games in a row by matching. My inner teen was thrilled. At some point I stopped and looked at the top of the machine. There it was, a turquoise owl. Then I knew. Owl was waiting for me. It is going to be okay, after all. To quote Aerosmith, I was back in the saddle again.
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