Mom

My mom grew up as a tomboy in an era when opportunities for girls to participate in athletics were still few and far between. She is the second oldest of eight children (Seven girls, one boy) and grew up in a house with one bathroom. She was always fast and in her childhood says she was even faster than the boys. (Even when she was an adult I have a memory of her winning her age group back when they would have foot races on the 4th of July).

I remember her telling me about getting in a fight as a child against a much larger boy. The other kids formed a circle around them and they were in the middle to fight. She immediately punched the boy right in the nose and that was the end of the fight.

I would guess my mom's competitiveness comes through her dad. My Grandpa Nalder played college football for the U (where he played defensive tackle at 5'8", 175 lbs and his nickname was Killer Nalder). Ping-pong is the sport I remember competing with my mom the most in and if you were going to win, you were going to have to earn it. In the basement where the ping-pong table was, there was a spot where the ceiling dropped a little lower and that edge was covered with little divots from people slamming their paddles. I guess my mom passed on some of that competitiveness. (My dad always said we got our smarts and our athleticism from my mom. I guess we got our sense of humor from my dad, some more than others).

Another example of my mom's competitiveness was her sliding into second while playing co-ed softball when she was eight months pregnant with my brother Alan. (Perhaps not so coincidentally, Alan is probably the most competitive of my siblings).

I'm not sure which of my brothers was playing at the time, but there was a particular baseball game where some calls weren't going our way and my mom was letting the ump hear about it. (I don't condone this behavior). The ump became fed up and yelled at my mom, asking her if she thought she could do better. Now I've seen that interaction happen before with other umps and other vocal parents, and usually the parent maybe grumbles a few more words under their breath but ultimately backs down. But that's not what happened with my mom. "Yeah, I do!" she replied and she came down and started umpiring the game. The first batter after my mom took the field, there were runners on first and second and the batter popped it up in the infield. Without hesitation, she called the batter out and said that the runners could advance at their own risk. Her first play, she had to call an "infield fly rule," and she nailed it.

On one occasion as an adult, I had yelled at (and chased after) a neighborhood kid after my boys kept coming home crying after run-ins with him. Shortly thereafter, I received a note on my porch from the boys' mother criticizing my actions and basically calling me a jerk (which was probably fair). I was incensed. This lady's kid caused all kinds of problems in the neighborhood and she was blaming me. My instinct was to double down and reply with a nasty note, and point out all this woman's flaws as a mother. But I called my mom. She wisely counseled me that criticizing her as a mother was a fight I wouldn't win and suggested that instead of replying with an angry letter, that I call her and calmly try to come to an understanding. I didn't want to do that. But I did. And we did come to an understanding and a friendship was preserved.

My mom has dealt with some adversity in her life. She came from a family of eight and my dad from a family of ten and neither of my grandmothers ever suffered a miscarriage. (My mom would always tell men she dated that she wanted ten kids, which usually scared them off, until she told that to my dad and he responded, "I was hoping for twelve." (They settled for seven)). But after my mom and dad were married in 1973, she suffered two miscarriages before I was born (three years later in 1976). She would talk about how hard those first few Mother's Day were for her.

When I was seven or eight, my mom lost the tip of her middle finger in an accident with a lawnmower. She's always had a good sense of humor about it and laughed good-naturedly at my dad's jokes about getting a discount on a manicure or being able to count in fractions.

When I was 14 or 15, my dad made some mistakes and got into some legal trouble. The case worked its way through the legal system and a couple of years later, just before I turned 17, my dad was sentenced to a year in federal prison. My mom hadn't known anything about the illegal activity and as I look back on it now, could have easily decided this wasn't her problem and parted ways with my dad. I don't think that thought ever entered her mind. She stood by him through everything. And then my dad went to prison and she was left alone with seven children, from age 17 down to 2. I think about how much of a collaboration it is between Jeanell and I just to get our lone remaining school-aged child where she needs to be and can't imagine how my mom managed that, let alone the financial and other considerations. She did have support and help from friends and family. People from the community we didn't even know well stepped in a paid some of my brothers' sports fees.

But my mom shouldered the bulk of that burden, and did so admirably.

She would take us on trips to visit my dad (he was at Nellis Air Force Base, near Las Vegas) and would drive us all down in our big blue van (the Komfort Koach). That van had a peaked roof and on one of these trips (taken on New Year's Eve 1993) we inadvertently pulled into the underground parking at Circus Circus and the top of the van was scraping on the ceiling of the parking garage. I don't remember the details but we were able to get back out and into the oversize parking. The eight of us spent the night in a single hotel room watching Seinfeld reruns and went to see my dad the following day.

I'll be forever grateful to my mom for holding our family together in a way that when my dad returned, we were able to recover some normalcy rather than letting it be something that would drastically alter the course of the remainder of our lives.

My mom was challenged again a few years ago with the unexpected death of her husband of 48 years (he passed away just two weeks after their 48th anniversary). That has been a difficult adjustment as she and my dad spent almost all of their time together. But she continues to press forward and bless the lives of her family and those around her.

My mom has always been an example of service. One of my favorite examples of this was when she and her good friend Liz Tripp took it upon themselves to help some kids in the neighborhood for whom English was a second language learn to read. Every week, these kids would come to their houses and my mom would give of her time helping them to learn to read.

As I sat down to write this, I found that I had a hard time recalling a lot of distinct memories between me and my mom. On further reflection, I think that is because she has always been a constant in my life. She's always been there, loving and supporting me, helping me to become the man I am today.

I love you Mom. Happy Mother's Day!

My all-time favorite picture of my mom