I was always impressed when my boyhood Catholic pal Joe LeDoux would say "Hail Mary, full of grace" whenever he did something that filled him with shame. Just one line uttered and the error was dismissed.

I never questioned if there was more to his prayer. It was none of my business, obviously private and probably Catholic. We had a typical Depression childhood, playing touch football in the street or kick the can or spying on teenagers lip-rassling in the rose garden at nearby Peninsula Park.

Joe was not the only Catholic boy I met, since we moved a lot. I went to Woodlawn Elementary, and he went to Holy Redeemer. I didn't even know what a redeemer was.

I discovered later that Joe was guided by a lot of things he learned from nuns. All I had was Proverbs. I got them mainly from Mom's lexicon, a lot from her Holy Bible. She had a saying for just about every situation. Proverbs are meant to help us learn from others' mistakes, and I have not always practiced what they preached.

Mom's homilies hung around in our brains. Here are a few I heard most, often at dinner:
"The lord helps those who help themselves.”   
“Accept yours, but leave some for your little sister."
"Pick on somebody your own size.  But not your little sister."
"Idle hands are the devil's workshop. Satan finds mischief for idle hands to do."
"There is no such word as ‘can't.’" She was wrong on that one. I looked it up.
"Better is a dinner of herbs where love is, than a stalled ox with hatred therein." We never had an ox in our house, but I did see some down at the slaughterhouse on Columbia slough. At least my big brother Russell said that's what they were.
"Many fail on the brink of success. Try again."

Back in the late 60s, our editor in White Center, Jeanne Sweeney, suggested I ask a local restaurant hostess for a date. The mother of my five sons had passed away a few months before. I agreed to try and strolled over from my office.

My great sales talk was rejected. I slunk back to work. I told Sweeney, then went to hide in my office. A few minutes later, she poked her head in and said, "Go ask again."

I suddenly remembered Mom's adage. So again I trudged from my office over to the Epicure, found Elsbeth, and asked for a date once again. I felt like an idiot, but that time it worked.

44 years later, I still grope for words to live by when I'm faced with tough decisions.
Maybe I never had a Hail Mary to fall back on.  But we had a wise Mom.

Jerry Robinson, our publisher is now 91 years old, and a great grandfather many times over. You can reach him at robinson.jerry@comcast.net