Handling Life’s Curveballs

It was a sunny spring day in 1968 in Louisville, Kentucky. My Mom and I had made the hour drive from our house in Kentucky, to the S&H Green Stamp store. Mom handed the clerk a stack of books filled with stamps that she had earned and saved from shopping at the Winn-Dixie grocery store. She told the man behind the counter, “I’ll take the catcher’s mitt.” The clerk looked at me and asked, “Is that mitt for the young fella? He looks a little skinny to be a catcher.” Mom said, “No, that catcher’s mitt is for me, he’s going to be my left-handed pitcher.” And they exchanged stamps for the mitt.

My Dad had died suddenly the year before. As an 8 year old, my world had been shaken. I never knew of anyone who had died. And the idea a parent could die was not a concept I had ever thought of. Since I was 6 or so, I had enjoyed playing catch in the backyard with my Dad when he got home from work. With his death, the game of catch abruptly stopped – a huge void for me.

With an older brother and sister who were away at college, my Mom was simply not going to allow me to not have a partner with whom to play catch. She jumped in to fill the void. My Dad’s beat up, tattered left-handed first baseman’s mitt with a rag in the inside wasn’t going to work for Mom, so she saved her stamps with an eye on that catcher’s mitt.

Once she had that mitt, the games of catch began again. Having been the only girl with four brothers, she was fearless. She hit it with gusto. Playing catch together lasted until I was about 11 and started throwing pretty hard and experimenting with curve balls and throwing sidearm. Fortunately, we had moved to suburban Chicago, where I could ride my bike to the park where our Little League games were played and there were plenty of catch partners. So when I was 11 and she was 51, we were both glad to see her retire that catcher’s mitt. It had served its purpose. And my Mom had gotten me over the baseball hump. I could now fly on my own.

Her support clearly didn’t end with hanging up the catcher’s mitt. From a baseball standpoint, she was my greatest fan. I can’t accurately guess the number of hours she sat on those uncomfortable stands watching Little League, Pony League, Babe Ruth, High School, Summer League, and traveling All Star games. And when I played in college and our team played anywhere close to Chicago at Illinois, Notre Dame, Indiana State, Eastern Illinois, University of Illinois-Chicago and other schools, she would always travel to see us play.

My Mom was truly my hero. Helen Bolton. She didn’t have it so easy. She was widowed at 48 with two children in college and me. She moved us to Chicago to take care of her aging parents. She went to work as a legal secretary to support us. She cared for her elderly mother and other relatives. And she was an incredible woman. I cannot remember her ever complaining. She was a leader. She was so kind and wise. Always inviting people to the house for dinner that were alone. Giving people who didn’t have rides, rides back and forth from church. She cared deeply for others. While she didn’t’ have a lot of free time, she volunteered for Red Cross and the United Way. She served on the Board of Directors of the United Way for Chicago in the ‘70s – how many legal secretaries served on Boards at that time? A life master bridge player. An excellent golfer who had her first hole-in-one at age 70. And she sure loved her kids and her grandkids. My greatest teacher. She died 19 years ago. I miss her every day.

When I tell the catcher’s mitt story, I can’t tell it without getting choked up. I am crying as I write it now! My Mom was a great mother; a great woman. I can only hope my kids feel that I’m the kind of parent my Mom was to me. While she helped me learn how to pitch, what she really did was help me learn how to handle life’s curveballs. That’s what Moms do. Happy Mother’s Day, Mom!

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