Soap Operas are not the only item “stay at home mothers” enjoy. I know of three who can provide evidence of this statement: Margaret Gannon, Rose Parcher, and one of my best friend’s mothers. She wished to remain anonymous, but I am only going to say she resides in Walla Walla. I believe that is the reason she requested to remain anonymous. All three of them love the game of baseball.
Let’s just refer to the latter of this simple list as “The Walla Walla Sweetheart”. She holds season tickets to a baseball team in Walla Walla, known as the Walla Walla Sweets. She never misses a Sweet game and additionally doesn’t miss a Seattle Mariner game. (that’s when I question her sanity, even though I’ve never had the pleasure of meeting her) This is a woman who doesn’t swear even after watching the Mariners make fools of themselves, or observing the Walla Walla Sweets get demolished by the Crab Creek Minors. She simply says, “oh fishy doo hooks”. Apparently, according to my friend, that is her nicest and most lovable form of cursing. She has used this phrase so long, it is now being considered to be placed in the infamous Webster’s Swearing Dictionary.
On to Rose Parcher: This is a completely different form of human. Rose is teetering on the age of, and this is just a guess, one hundred and seventy seven. Just like her children, Vic and Tim, she is tough as nails. She is also as fun as a feather. I watched baseball with Rose because we both enjoyed the games, and her spaghetti is absolutely worthy of a prize. She also was fun because she used colorful words I wasn’t used to hearing from a woman, or man, or sailor of that age. I was confused at the time because I always want to rate things in order of importance. Her use of the English Language was colorfully fascinating, (she didn’t use words or phrases such as, “fishy doo hooks” when she was pissed. Let’s just leave it at that. Rose’s knowledge of baseball was baffling, but her spaghetti was a very close first second or third to my enthusiasm for baseball. We always had a good time betting on pennant winners, eating great food, and tossing some really nice F bombs.
Margaret Gannon: Because this is my dear mother, I do have to save the best for last. As the last of thirteen children, and at an age too young for school, I was all alone with my mom at home. Most of my siblings were in school, fishing in Alaska or working at a lumber mill. Yet still, it was necessary for me to play catch with someone. Mom was my only option.
Asking her to play a game of catch with her was extremely cute. Reluctantly, mom always complied. She is an amazingly talented woman. Witnessing her artwork, I knew she was very impressive with her left hand, but when we went to the backyard to play catch, she honestly didn’t know if she was right or left handed. By the way, she is ambidextrous. I was young enough to not know what that word meant, but when she asked me what hand she should use for throwing, I replied, “I don’t know, how about the one you write with”. She was fabulous. I then knew I didn’t require playing catch with a father or a brother or sister who just wasn’t and couldn’t be around.
My sister, Teresa, and I spoke the other day. She remembers convincing our mother to stay home from school in 1973, the year I was born, to watch the baseball playoffs. Mom understood the importance of witnessing us watching something making all of us so happy. Dad probably would have said “no”, but since he would leave for work before the other children would have to go to school, mom wanted to watch the game with people who loved the game.
When the team she was rooting for would lose, she would whip out profanity. “Darn it”. Then, she’d make lunch and dinner for the whole gang. The gang would then go out and play baseball.