Lisa Browder

I tell seniors to get out and do something . . . anything. I tell them how silly it is to stay at home just because it’s hard to think about doing something new, to face an unknown. There are dozens of reasons to stay put. Indeed, I encountered one of the stupidest but, oddly, most effective ones recently: What if someone laughs at me?

But then I thought: Who cares? I’m not likely to ever see that person again anyway.

So I plucked up my courage and signed up for an archery class.

And then the what ifs set in. What if I were the only adult in a class full of kids? Side note: The website features a photo of a child under the sign-up for the adults. What if I didn’t have enough arm strength to pull back all the way? What if every shot completely missed the target?

Only one way to find out.

Adventures Archery is a warehouse- style building. It’s packed with every little thing you could possibly want for an archery career. I skipped that part.

It was nice to see that my class consisted of five adult females. It was also nice that the children, all of whom seemed to have skills that could drill a center hole in a dollar bill pinned to the back wall, didn’t pay any attention to us at all.

They didn’t even laugh at my furrowed brow as I concentrated on the convoluted list of instructions:

• Don’t grip the bow
• Knuckles at a 45 degree angle
• Fingers don’t need to touch the bow
• All the pressure comes from the thumb pad
• Use the first 3 fingers of the right hand to pull the string back
• Pull straight back until both arms are in a straight line
• Line up your fingers with the corner of your mouth
• Make sure you can see the back of the arrow at the corner of your glasses
• Shut your left eye and focus down the arrow to the target
• With as little movement as possible, release the 3 fingers

Whew! I imagined I’d be lucky to get 3 or 4 things right but as it turns out, I wasn’t half bad. Yes, I had a few stray missiles bouncing off the back wall but overall, I did fairly well.

In a previous post, I described my adventure at axe throwing. If I had to choose between the two, I’d go with axe throwing. It had fewer instructions to muddle through and lots of fun games you could play with a partner or a group. That said, I did enjoy the archery class and think it’s worth your time.

• 2210 US-301 #200, Tampa, Florida
• 813-664-8700
• http://www.adventuresarchery.com
• Mon – Thurs 10:00 AM – 8:00 PM / Fri & Sat 10:00 AM – 6:00 PM / Sun Noon – 5:00 PM
• $30 for adults
• Free parking
• Wheelchair accessible