Eat! White! Leather!

I played volleyball in my junior high and into part of my high school years, and I had a fan club. And that fan club had just one member: Mom.

Mom came to nearly every volleyball game I ever played. Her devotion to watching me play was tireless. For in-season games, she trekked all over the Twin Cities to neighboring towns at least one night of every week. And for the off-season games, she often would travel with our team for weekend tournaments to glorious places like Iowa City, or sometimes even Chicago!

She and a couple other moms joined us for a weekend tournament in some mid-western city that escapes me. I was probably 15 - so at the height of my eye-rolling teenagerness. Mom had spotted a t-shirt that said: "Eat! White! Leather!" with an image of a zooming volleyball on it...and she thought that was awesome.

So, when our team played, she took it upon herself to be the team cheerleader. Her one cheer?

"EAT! WHITE! LEATHER!"

Whenever it seemed appropriate, Mom shouted it out with everything she had...

"EAT! WHITE! LEATHER!"

My teammate just served the ball and scored our team a point...

"EAT! WHITE! LEATHER!"

I blocked the opposing team's hit...

"EAT! WHITE! LEATHER!"

It got to a point where I was getting those "your Mom is weird" looks from my teammates.

"EAT! WHITE! LEATHER!"

But she was so tireless and passionate about it, it went from weird to funny...

"EAT! WHITE! LEATHER!"

...it was even more funny after she started losing her voice from yelling so much...

"EAT! WHITE! LEATHER!"

...but even losing her voice didn't stop her.

"EAT! WHITE! LEATHER!"
"EAT! WHITE! LEATHER!"
"LOVE! YOU! MOM!"
"EAT! WHITE! LEATHER!"