Monthly Archives: January 2020

18. The Ultimate Tiger Fan

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18.  THE ULTIMATE TIGER FAN

Daddy and his brother Steve loved baseball.  After high school, they played for the Ionia team.  Steve was the pitcher, Daddy was the catcher.  When Daddy and I played catch in the driveway, I used his big catcher’s mitt and mask.

Daddy took me to see a Detroit Tigers game when I was little.  I only remember that Rudy York was the player Daddy pointed out.  Before we got TV, he always listened to the games on the radio.  He sat on the settle with his eyes closed, apparently asleep, but never missed a play.  Mom used to say she hoped the Tigers were not playing the day of her funeral. 

As a surprise, Mom sent a post card to Ernie Harwell, the legendary Tiger announcer of the day, that Bob Hicks, a fan in Ionia, was celebrating his 80th birthday by listening to the game.  Ernie read it on the air, July 8th, and we all yelled “Surprise!”

17. Daddy the Game Player

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17.  Daddy the Game Player

Daddy taught me to play checkers when I was young.  He always beat me.  I found a book in my mail order catalogs, “How to Win at Checkers,” which explained the perfect game. When I started beating him, Daddy quit, and we moved on to chess.  When I started beating him at chess, we moved on to cribbage.  Daddy always won at card games, but I enjoyed playing with him.  We played our last game of cribbage when he was 90, the last time I saw him.

The family game was “Pedro”, which was a game something like Bridge, where the players bid based on their perceived ability to take “tricks”.  Daddy usually paired with Mom, and I with my sister Jan.  Daddy was the best player and most aggressive bidder, Mom was the most timid, and Jan and I were cautious, but could hold our own after I got into my teens.

Pedro was also the game used at the local Grange Hall for card parties.  After I was old enough, we used to go to compete.  Daddy was a frequent winner.  Daddy was the game player.

16. The Red Tomato Caper

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16.  The Red Tomato Caper

What am I doing crawling on my hands and knees in the dirt in the middle of the night?  I was following Daddy, with Mom behind me as we snuck into our neighbors garden sometime after midnight.  I hoped their dog didn’t discover us – he was a big dog and I knew he slept outdoors.

Early in the spring, Daddy and I had visited the Yonans who had the apple orchard just south of us.  Narsai Yonan always had a big garden, and Daddy wanted to see what he had planted early.  Narsai was showing us his tomato plants which were growing nicely.  “I’ll have a ripe tomato by the Fourth of July,” he announced proudly.

Daddy countered, “Really?  I’ll bet you five dollars you don’t have one ripe by the 4th.”  Narsai accepted the bet.

So here we were, crawling in Yonan’s garden the night of July 3rd, looking for a tomato!  There were lots of big green tomatoes, and none were ripe, which was exactly what Daddy wanted.  While I held the flashlight, Mom painted a big green tomato a bright red with her nail polish.  Mission accomplished – we went home.

The next day we went down and called on Narsai.  Daddy said, “we came to see who won the tomato bet.”  There were no ripe tomatoes in the garden south of the house.  Finally, Narsai led us to the place where he spotted the red tomato, and picked it.  Daddy, with a straight face declared, “Well Narse, it looks like you win the bet,  and handed him five dollars.”  Narsai looked a little bewildered, but played along with the joke and took the money.  We went home, laughing all the way.

Daddy was a fun loving guy, and always came up with good things to laugh about.