He watched me sleep last night; he never turned from my bed. Since plopping down at my desk, I haven’t escaped his Grinch eyes and expressionless grin.

Truth is, I’ve never felt safer in my life. How could I not when the Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld, is on 24-hour watch?

Well, maybe not Rumsfeld himself, but it’s a nice depiction of him on a bowling pin – my prize for competing in Friday night’s Take Down the Pin Heads Bowling Tournament at the Erie Boulevard Bowling Center. The event was sponsored by the Syracuse University College Democrats, but two members of the conservative Bush Team were able to save two pins from the liberals.

Ten pins were given to the top five finishers as well as each member on the winning team. Each bore an image of a conservative American leader. In addition to Rum Dum, there was Coulter (Ann), O’Liely (Bill O’Reilly), Condi (Rice), Bushie (President Bush), Dicky (Cheney), Rover (Karl Rove), Rushie (Rush Limbaugh) and The Governator (Arnold Schwarzenegger).

I must admit, when College Democrats president Sam Eschenbrenner approached my conservative roommate and Daily Orange columnist, Drew Bland, and me about entering a team in their first ever bowling tournament, I was hesitant. I’d seen how conservatives were treated on campus and I was sure I was walking into a no-win situation. Nonetheless, I hadn’t bowled in two years and it sounded like fun.

So the four of us – Bland, Daily Orange Asst. Copy Editor Rob Anthes, Daily Orange Asst. Feature Editor Erin Hendricks and myself – banded together to represent the minority party on campus. Drew donned his Bush-Cheney ’04 T-shirt and I put on my Curt Schilling shirt (he campaigned for Bush after the Red Sox won the World Series, booyah!). It was the closest thing I had to conservative propaganda.

When we arrived, we were greeted by Emily Pechacek, the Dems’ executive director. Instead of typical Bush ‘who’s your daddy’ jokes, Pechacek reached out to me by explaining her role with the Democrats.

‘I’m (Eschenbrenner’s) Karl Rove,’ she said.

Gotcha.

As I grabbed my size nine rental shoes, the other College Democrats echoed Pechacek’s attitude. This night on April Fool’s Day was about bowling and friendly competition, nothing more.

That was never clearer than when other team members began entering their nicknames into the alley’s automated scoring system. Among the nicknames were Ltd. Govt. (Drew, duh!), Trentonstyl, The Boss, Spotted Owl, Grenade and Bossgirl.

Needless to say, there was no Jerome Bettis among us. I observed only two people who actually knew the proper way to curve their throws, and only those two broke a score of 150 in a game.

But the points didn’t matter.

‘It’s all for fun,’ said Andres Gallego, a sophomore aerospace engineering major. ‘This is just a break from studying.’

Gallego was part of the winning team, which included Proton (Gallego), Spike (junior communications design major, Sarah Moskaitis), Cleopatra (sophomore accounting major, Mayadeh Sousou) and the star of the competition, The Sheriff (Onondaga Community College sophomore Tim Lawton).

Lawton broke 200 in each of his three games with ease. He alone would’ve been a challenge for some teams. The Sheriff bowls semi-professionally and competes in three leagues each week. And Lawton said he’s bowled a perfect game of 300 ‘several times.’

‘(The American Bowling Congress) only sends you one ring for a perfect game each year,’ Lawton said.

I got the impression he had enough rings to cover at least one hand.

Among the shining faces at the Erie Boulevard Bowling Center on Friday was Gary Morris, a candidate for Onondaga County Legislator (the College Democrats and myself have officially endorsed him), and the most animated one of all, Cyndee.

A member of the Lounge Lizards bowling team that competes every week, Cyndee was down on lane four, and she was the life of the party. As Michael Jackson blared ‘Thriller’ throughout the alley, Cyndee danced on down to where my team was sitting.

‘Who won?’ she asked to no one in particular.

‘Everyone wins when you bowl,’ one young democrat answered.

Well, maybe not Cyndee. But after my night with the College Democrats, I am sure no team lost.

Published on April 3, 2005 at 12:00 pm