Readers Who Write

Mother-in-laws.

We have all heard the jokes, and some of us even shudder at the mere mention of the name — but I am not one of them. For the last 49 years, I was the lucky recipient of one of the gems of the mother-in-law society. (If one of those societies just happens to exist?)

MeMe, as she has been called since she became a grandmother, recently passed away suddenly at the age of 83. It happened unexpectedly, and was a blow to her family and to all who knew her. Jerria, as was her given name, was a friend to all and at 83 she still worked faithfully at the Shady Cove Market.

From the beginning, Jerria treated me well, and must have recognized that I was worthy of courting her daughter as I was invited on family fishing trips, Thanksgiving celebrations, devoured plenty of their food, and ultimately was accepted into the family as a member. We had a lot in common. A love of fishing, the Oregon Ducks, camping, animals, working their ranch, and the occasional belt of booze! The one thing we did not share a common interest in was gambling. MeMe cured me of that interest long ago when I came to realize that some people just have that luck, and others don’t.

I am of the latter.

MeMe was the luckiest person I knew. She would win raffles, drawings, lottery scratch-offs, and always came back from any gaming casino with some extra spending money. Then she would promptly help fund her granddaughter’s mad money with a little something. It was really uncanny how she was always the one to win.

I was “lucky” enough to learn to not even attempt to gamble over 35 years ago while returning home from a Thanksgiving family fishing trip. Scooting along Highway 395 on the eastern side of the Sierras, MeMe had decided we should all stop for a quick break at the first casino across the Nevada border. Topaz Lake Casino was, and is, a pretty little gambling outpost right on the border with California. A good lunch spot, and a place to also feed the one armed bandits (yes, back then they had handles), that were more than happy to take your money.

As MeMe, sat down to feed the slots, I took a machine right next to her. Within five minutes her machine lit up, and MeMe was $70 richer. Inspired with hope, I continued to play four quarters at a time as I awaited my big pay day. Ten minutes later, MeMe’s machine lit up again! She scored another modest payoff that was now making me a bit jealous and somewhat determined. Being young and without a lot of discretionary income to … ahem …invest, I had limited my spending to $30 — which was gone within 15 minutes of feeding my machine.

“Well, looks like I’m done,” I said, as MeMe looked over at me.

“Oh, here let me put some in for you,” she offered as I was still leaning on the machine.

Four quarters later, and one quick pull of the handle by MeMe, and my machine lit up and bells went off. Another $250 payout and the machine’s handle wasn’t even cool from my grip! I stood there aghast and maybe a little angry but joked that $30 dollars of that is mine! MeMe of course offered me my money and then some to continue playing, but there was no way I was going to accept.

A fella has his pride.

Well, that was it, I decided that very day that some people have it, and some people don’t. It would be more time efficient for me to just roll down my window and throw out a twenty dollar bill, rather than suffer the indignity of slowly and painfully losing my hard earned cash. Winning and luck was up to MeMe.

Oddly and sadly, we were in the same Eastern Sierra location on a fishing trip when we received the news of Jerria’s passing. Devastated, and with heavy hearts, we packed up and hurried back home. The path home was once again on Highway 395, and as we grieved and reminisced while somberly making our way back to Oregon, we passed Topaz Lake Casino. There was only one thing to do … I rolled down my window and tossed out a $20 dollar bill.

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So you say you want to write?

Go for it.

Send us 500 or so words of scintillating copy. Make it funny. Make it poignant. Make it count. Make it any way you want.

Just don’t cuss. Don’t be boring. And have a point.

If we like it, we’ll run it.

Email submissions to community@rv-times.com. Put “Readers Who Write” in the subject line, and tell us the city where you live.