Window To Your World

Maple Grove’s country store became low-rent housing, as did Shirley’s Market. (Ted Escobar). By Ted Escobar LIBERTY — Before the world went high-speed and high-tech, the Yakima Valley was dotted with country stores. It seemed that there was one at each corner. Many were the centers of the communities in which they stood. “I used to ride my bike to those when I was a kid,” recalled Norm Childress, the recently sworn in new Yakima County Commissioner. There were several country stores on the way to White Swan, on the Fort Road and W. Wapato Road, and in between. There was, and still is Kyle’s Corner, now called Wheeler’s Corner, west of Wapato. Others included Hoyt’s Market, Thyers Corner, Clark’s Corner, Lindsey’s Lockers and Chapel’s Corner. Going to the Lower Valley, there was Leighty’s Market, Kellog’s Corner and Del’s, which still operates today. There was the Satus Store on the way to Mabton. And there were others that older Valley residents may rememb...

By Ted Escobar I was disappointed in my dog Sheba. Right when I needed her to be her normal self, she wimped out on me. Now before any of you PETA types get all worked up and write nasty letters, let me assure you that Sheba and I had a loving relationship. Problem is she loved me too much sometimes. I had to skirt around her to feed her because the first thing she wanted to do was wrestle. If I didn’t wrestle, she stood on her hind feet and tried to knock me down. And if she couldn’t get me that way, she wrapped her front paws around my ankles and tried to trip me. As a last resort, she clamped onto my shoe with her mouth and went for the takedown. So now you're probably wondering what's wrong with me. Everybody wants that kind of dog. Well what's wrong with me was that I've aged, illnesses had limited my strength and mobility. On top of all that, I'd shrunk to about 5-2, while Sheba was nearing 5-0 and growing. It was best to find her a new home whi...

By Ted Escobar With the score 20-0 halfway through first quarter one Friday a few years ago, I was near the Royal 30-yard line on the Charles Wright Academy sideline when CWA Athletic Director Bill White started moving toward me. We had spoken Monday morning when I asked him to send me a picture of the Harriers' quarterback. “You must be Ted,” he said as we shook hands. We chatted briefly and stepped back to watch the game. The next time I was near Bill, the score was 41-0 at the top of the second quarter. He had a sad look on his face, understandably. His team's players' shoulders were drooping. Their heads were down. Don't worry Bill, I said. This will be over at halftime. “Can't he take his starters out now?” Bill asked. I really felt sorry for mild-mannered Bill and his boys. To travel all the way from Tacoma just to run into this. And to start the game weak-legged from a cross state drive. Blame the WIAA. It decided to take some entries away from...

By Ted Escobar After Christmas a few years ago, I tried to work the Monday after Christmas and was not very successful. While my brain kept saying "work," the rest of me kept saying "Why? I like Christmas mode better." I did better on Tuesday but, still, I struggled to shake the relaxed Christmas feeling. Usually I work during holiday periods. This time, I did maybe a little. Mostly, I sat in my easy chair a lot, watched football a lot and visited on Facebook a lot. And I watched movies. Saturday I started writing stories for the next issue of the paper. So, naturally, Friday night I had nightmares of an Internet that would not deliver information from my sources, sources I couldn't find or information that was sent but lost. I'm okay now. The toughest thing to do was to think of a column to write about the latest Christmas-New Year's experience. It was fun. I visited with siblings, cousins, nephews, nieces and grandchildren from all over th...

By Ted Escobar I've been around law enforcement a lot because of my work. I wasn't doing business on a Saturday a few years go, but I encountered more police than ever before. I was in Spokane from about 10:30-1:30 to visit the Apple Store with my son Teddy to deal with a computer breakdown earlier in the week. The problems were resolved in about half an hour, the Apple people were the nicest, and the fixes didn't cost nearly what I thought they would. Merrily, Teddy and I stopped at a Wendy's drive-up for lunch for his family and both of us. Right after we ordered, there was a pop-pop-pop sound you couldn't mistake. Teddy and I looked forward quickly to see cops across the street involved in a shooting at a gas station. Stop, I said. Don't move any closer. You don't know which way the bullets are going to fly. “It's over,” Teddy said. “The guy they were after is down.” In short order, there was a convention of cop cars and cops at the Cen...

I have no idea how long this will last, but so far, Jenny, Teddy and I are having fun with this new website. Pat is having fun observing us. Jenny and I are right here, in good old Washington State. Teddy has strayed. He is in Florida, where he lives, or Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, where he works, depends on the week. The latest message from Teddy: “Your website is poppin’, 9 visits from China.” See, I told you the Mandarin subtitles would work, I responded. Just before that, I was telling Teddy I did not like the name I had chosen — Every Person is a Story — for my online magazine. “How about: Old Man Ramblings, ” he suggested. That’s too… well not really attention-grabbing, I said. “Well then, how about, Tedescobar.com: Clues to Pablo’s Fortune. You can write clues into your stories. That’ll keep ‘em coming back” That will grab attention, but I am not really looking for an audience made up of the mob, the FBI and DEA, not to mention Robert Mueller. “Look dad,” Teddy sai...

By Ted Escobar I woke up at 1 a.m. one morning last fall, and that’s not unusual for me. Except I woke up thinking about my new car. New for me anyway. It’s a 2002 Honda Odyssey mini van my son Grover found in Spokane. He called about 8:30 the previous night to tell me about it. Grover has become a good horse trader over the years. I was a little concerned about the car’s age and mileage, but I ran pretty well when I was 16. And cars go 350,000 miles nowadays. Nearly all my auto purchases have been gambles. I bought new cars in 1975 and 1978, and neither panned out better than my used-car gambles. “All the maintenance has been done at the Honda dealer, and they kept the records,” Grover said. “And it’s in real good shape.” The sellers wanted $2,800. Sounded good to me if I could still get 150,000 miles out of of it. Grover called again. “Look at your email,” he said. He had sent side, front and interior views of the car. I enlarged them all and didn’t spot a blemish. “...