The origins of Ms. Goshsquash runs long and deep. Not necessarily in linear terms but in the breadth and the depth of its existence certainly. The incarnation that everyone will soon experienc is not at all what I first discovered when my mother (pictured above) introduced her to me and my younger brother and cousins many summers ago. Back then whenever we would get a bit unruly my mother would threaten a phone call to Ms. Goshwash who would take us away and make us good, to get us in line. We’d be going haywire and she’d get quiet. “I’ll call her!” she’d say loudly, in a nonchalant manner and in more of a raised voiced than a yelled assertion. In her left hand the home telephone would seem glued to her ear, her right hand always cradled at the bottom - at the receiver. Hind sight is 20/20 and my memory now sees a playful woman holding in her laughter as best she could and with all her might. But back then hearing mama recite the stories she’d heard of Ms. Goshsquash personally my little brother and I, along with my cousins felt that this old woman was very much real. And so never failed to get us kids in line. This journey has been great, but what a story it will make!
