Biography

James Mahoney was born June 3 A.D. 1985 in Evanston, Illinois. He has lived in the same house in Kankakee all his life, excluding his time at the University of Illinois. Not much is known about his early childhood except that his mother would sing to him in the rocking chair and read him poems such as

James James
Morrison Morrison
Weatherby George Dupree
Took great
Care of his Mother,
Though he was only three.
. . . .

He was also fascinated by the painting of Mallard ducks that hung on the living room wall, noting how it seemed some ducks’ nostrils were not nostrils at all, but rather eyes.

With his older brother Patrick and their eldest sister Kathleen, he would spin in circles or otherwise dance to the soundtrack of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. Ghost in the graveyard was a favorite summer twilight game until his Dad sprained his ankle leaping the rock wall. In bitter cold football season, he would play on his Dad’s football team in the living room. Roughhousing with Dad and Pat was a particularly favorite activity, until it was banned when Pat passed out. He remembers the feel of his Dad’s beard, which he shaved off some years ago.

Micro Machines and Legos delighted him, as well as the swing-set and the turtle sandbox which Gavin once flooded. His favorite toy of all time was a green plastic tractor, which was a present on his fourth birthday. He raced it to a possible fourth-place finish in an area three-wheeler race against many three-wheelers of more traditional design. Only recently has it been given away, as he put it to good use well into his older years, racing it along with the scooter around the basement with his brother and cousins.

He generally resisted schoolwork, but always did well. The Hardy Boys became his favorite literary fellows, though frequent trips to the Kankakee Public Library found him bringing home Curious George books, books about baseball, Isaac Asimov books, books about space travel, baseball card books, and, when he was older, computer books. He read National Review at a young age, cutting short his youth with concern about politics. Now he knows better than to worry his mind with, as his sister might say, “partisan rhetoric,” and his favorite book is Paddle-to-the-Sea.

When he reached the right age, the Jaycees’ Little League began to occupy his summers. He was eventually drafted from the Minor League to the Pepsi Little League team, having been sent down to the minors just before his first game on the Hardees’ roster. After rocky stints in the outfield and at third base, which included a centerfield error that brought deserved ruin upon the perfect game of a teammate whom his Dad described as “a real piece of work,” he became Pepsi’s catcher. This was mostly because he was the only player on his team to wear a cup for the game one night.

His earlier baseball career had taken the form of front-yard whiffle ball games and tee-ball. In tee-ball, he used a very old baseball mitt his Dad loaned him and once got in trouble for throwing it into the air (and letting it drop to the ground) in celebration like his teammates did. Once he forgot to change into the yellow t-ball t-shirt for a game and wore instead a nice yellow polo shirt with a lizard emblem on it. His coach told him, much to James’s surprise and confusion, “Your mom’s gonna kill you!”

You might say that this young man has been through a lot, seeing as he already has crowns on his two front teeth, the final repair to dental injuries sustained in a bicycling accident thirteen years ago involving a parked truck’s bumper and the sidewalk. Nevertheless, he tries to live each day with his head up and his heart alert to what the Good Lord is giving him.