When I started high school wrestling, it was with a lot of promise. I’d had a successful junior high campaign and I’d wrestled a lot more than the average kid. However, for me, I had to pretty much wrestle alone. My mother had her issues and couldn’t go to my wrestling matches, so I was somewhat orphaned. Over the first year, I gravitated toward the best wrestlers in the league, I was going to be like them. One of those wrestlers had a family who went to every meet, and when we wrestled his school at our gym, they came.
During my sophomore year, I made it to the state finals, and the state tournament was held at that wrestler’s school, although he’d graduated, he had a little brother, a freshman, I’d come to know. Because our league was represented in the state finals, and because wrestling is one of those sports were you root for kids you know, I gained a following from the parents of wrestlers in our league, I gained the parents of that wrestler as a friend of mine.
Those parents were parents to wrestlers from Tumwater high school and I would come to know them well over the four years of high school, always there cheering for me. Mr. and Mrs. Parrish, and the kids of that household, became my friends. Anyone who knew Mrs. Parrish, recognized her voice in the stands, a giddy sound, filled with hope and excitement.
Because of my relationship with their son Mark and their daughter Colleen, I would meet up with her in more than sports and long after high school was over. I saw Mrs. Parrish when Mark and I wrestled a few times in our twenties, and then again over the last few years when she vacationed down in Palm Springs, and to the very end, she never lost that exuberance in her voice.
I was saddened and shocked at the brevity of her illness and how quickly she passed. I can’t help but draw back to my days as a kid, living out the youth of my life, recalling not just her but myriad memories of a time I can’t get back, and with it, the loss of a wonderful time. Mrs. Parrish made my journey a better one, a parent from another school who treated me as one of her own. I would see Mr. and Mrs. Parrish at every regional and state tournament until my high school days ended. I often sat with them during our tournaments. I’d been to their home, even trusted to take their daughter out. In all, they treated me fairly, and with it, made me feel as though I belonged.
May you rest in peace Mrs. Parrish.