Gumball Game

Winner defined: Not me.

Normally I am not what you would call the definition of a winner, in the sense that I have been playing the lotto for 40 years and I still have nothing to show for it.

If I were to walk into a casino with $20.00, it would be gone in 20 pulls of the one-armed bandit. I’m not addicted to gambling but I still have this fantasy that one day, maybe I could win just once.

All my life I have sought after that one thing that I was good enough at to be considered a winner. In sports, I was never a starter. I was always the bencher. The guy in the middle of the pack, the average guy. In music, I was creative but average. Now, I am getting along in years, and I am starting to realize that if I don’t become a winner at something soon, my time will be up. Of course, there is still the possibility of me becoming a champion wheelchair racer at the senior center.

I can hear the murmuring now, “Isn’t that Marty Mitchell the champion wheelchair racer? I hear that last week he easily beat out two 89-year-old women in the dining room dessert sprint. I wonder if he gives autographs?” Oh yeah, that would be great.

I know that you might say that I am forgetting the less glamorous events in life which I have won at. I mean, I consider it a win if I wash a load of clothes and the spin cycle doesn’t shake the machine out into the center of the laundry room. Or the fact that my name has been drawn 10 times for jury duty when some people have never been asked. Or how about the many times I have crossed the border into Canada and the guards have made me pull over and go into the building so they can do a random search of my car. I mean, some folks never get that privilege.  I can tell that other travelers must be envious by the way they honk and yell, “sucker” out their open car windows. Pure jealousy.

I will take a win, big or small, wherever I can get it and I just happened to remember a little event we called the Gumball Game.

The year was 1973. Big Scoop was a locally owned ice cream shop in my town of Bellingham. They served cones, banana splits, shakes, and sundaes as well as burgers and fries. They even made an ice cream pig-trough called the Gourmet’s Extravaganza which was a large bowl piled high with ice cream scoops and running with chocolate, hot fudge, and butterscotch sauces covered in nuts. This was impossible for one person to eat and usually required a team to finish it. At the time, if one person could finish it completely, he got it free. Many high school and college age boys tried, but few could keep all that ice cream down. More than once a worthy challenger could be found retching in the parking lot.

When it first opened, I was interviewed at the Big Scoop for my first high school job, but I soon found out that all employees must be winners. I held this against my wife Cheryl since they eagerly hired her. She was, though, the first to spill a tray of tulip glasses filled with ice cream down the front of a gentleman in his Sunday, or sundae, suit.

Yes, Big Scoop was a popular place to meet after church on Sunday evenings and after school as a place to take your dates. The red and white color scheme on the exterior seemed to draw the crowds to this novelty eatery. But what about the Gumball Game?

As you entered the main doors of Big Scoop, there was one of the Ford, penny Gumball dispensers. It was filled with multi-colored, round gumballs. Each Gumball had a flavor matching the specific color.

Sitting at a booth one evening after church with my friends Sandi, Margaret, and Rex, we were finishing off banana splits when I noticed the gumball dispenser. Immediately, a competition came to my mind.

“How many pennies do you have?” I asked the group. Ten were produced.

“Ok, here is the game. That gumball machine is full of multiple-colored balls. We each pick a color. With these ten pennies, if your color drops out, you have to put it in your mouth and chew it.”

We left the table and gathered around the gumball dispenser. One at a time, the ten colored balls dropped out. Whoever chose that color had to chew it. It seemed that we all had at least one. A new competition had been created. From then on, we went to the Big Scoop not only for ice cream, but to play the gumball game. This was, after all, the closest thing that Bellingham had to slot machines at the time.

“Next week we are going to have the World Championship Gumball Games Competition,” I announced. “Invite whoever will come, and to play you have to have at least ten pennies.”

The next week came, and that Sunday evening we met at the Big Scoop gumball machine. Inside the glass bowl were the colors: blue, green, red, black, white, pink, purple, yellow, and orange. There were five of us and in our combined collection, 50 pennies.

“Okay, everyone picks their first color,” I instructed. Black, yellow, purple, and white were chosen. I chose blue.

“Pick again,” I said.

One of the girls picked pink but the other two abstained from a second color.

“That doesn’t seem very adventuresome,” I mocked. “Okay Rex, you and I are going to have to pick to use up the rest of the colors. One of us is going to have to pick two colors.”

Rex chose yellow and passed on the second which left me with orange and green. I couldn’t help but notice a smirk on Rex’s face.

The first ten pennies went by painlessly. Each of the contestants were chewing at least one or two gumballs in their mouth. During the second round of ten pennies, I had four gumballs in my mouth.

During the third round, I began to realize that there was an inordinate amount of orange, green, and blue gumballs in the container. It was getting harder to chew my eight gumballs.

By round four, the rest of the contestants, especially the girls who had only chosen one color, noticed that I was changing color. It could have been from swallowing the thick syrup off the gumball shells, or merely the sight of the multi-colors which I was now unable to keep behind my lips and was dripping down my chin.

The last round, round five. The curious patrons of Big Scoop and the manager were now gathered around the gumball machine. It was obvious who had the most gumballs in their mouth. My mouth was so full, and my jaw hurt so much, I could barely crush each ball I was forcing past my lips.

Then, suddenly it became like a casino game of Craps. The room, realizing they wanted to take me down, started chanting, “Blue! Orange! Green!” and blast it all, one of those colors would drop. Each time they would cheer like they had some magical ability to call out the colored ball. Finally, with three pennies to go, I was done. 26 gumballs in my mouth. Going out into the parking lot, I spit the gum wad into a garbage can as did the rest of my group.

It was then that one of the restaurant patrons came out and asked me, “Who won, the person who had the most gumballs or the person with the fewest?”

Well, Cripes! I never thought about that; but let’s just say it was me. I won!

I won at the Gumball Game 50 years ago and nothing since, but I did buy a Ford look-alike gumball dispenser 30 years ago which I filled with gumballs. I also have a bag of pennies. Every time the grandkids come over, I give them ten pennies each and I say, “Let’s go into the study and I’ll challenge you to the Gumball Game.”

To which I hear, “No thanks grandpa. Cavities.”

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