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February/March, 2013 Senior Focus
She went from downtrodden to confident Senior Spotlight Someone We’d Like You to Meet …
By Teri Baker Joanne Davis absolutely insists on leading an interesting life. In the past 20 years, the Lynnwood woman, 73, has deliberately crammed a lot of hard work and just plain fun into her once miserable existence, taking every opportunity she can to learn and grow. She has gone through the Citizens Academy training at both the Lynnwood and Mukilteo police departments, soared 4,700 feet above the earth in a hot air balloon and entertained thousands. She is perhaps best known for her music. During the summers, she sings, plays guitar and tells stories at Open Mike Night at the Red Cup Café in Mukilteo. In December she was invited to perform at the Mukilteo Tree Lighting. When the days get a little longer, she’ll resume her weekly gig at the Cabin Tavern in Richmond Beach. Meanwhile, she performs every Sunday at various venues in Snohomish and north King Counties. And, she recently made a CD of songs and lyrics she has written. Performance isn’t Joanne’s only
art. She pursues writing with the Mukilteo Arts Guild and often regales friends with her poetry. She is also involved in charitable endeavors, including working with the Mukilteo Lions Club and participating in numerous walks, runs and dashes, and performing at various fundraising events. Life was not always so interesting for Joanne, who has mixed memories of her childhood. Born in Seattle to alcoholic parents, she and her younger brother saw little of their father, a tugboat skipper. Her mother never stood up for herself, and Joanne, following her example, was bullied in school. On the brighter side, the family lived directly across the street from the Playland amusement park. “We could see the roller coaster from our front porch,” Joanne says. “I worked three summers there.” Other happy memories involve music. When Joanne was nine, she inherited a piano from her grandmother. She says, “I took lessons for five years and learned in spite of myself.” When her mother brought home a 40-button accordion, Joanne learned to play that, too. Music was Joanne’s salvation at Edmonds High School, where she sang in the choir. The highlight of her teen years was seeing Elvis Presley in person. “The first time he swiveled himself on TV
on the Ed Sullivan Show, I was totally captivated,” says Joanne, whose apartment is filled with Elvis memorabilia. “I loved his voice and his generosity and I even perform some of his songs.” Joanne married right after graduation. “I learned to cook and keep house and did fine,” she says. “We had two daughters, and I worked part time off and on because I didn’t want to leave my girls with a babysitter. I also canned fruit, sewed all their clothes and did all the yard work.” When her husband brought home a $13 guitar, Joanne bought lesson books and taught herself to play. Music would again provide solace. After 19 years of marriage, her husband announced he had found another woman and walked out. He never paid a dime of child support for the girls, who were 11 and 12 when he left. Joanne got a job at Sears and was able to take over the payments on an old house in downtown Everett. Money was tight, and she had to give up the house after a couple of years. To survive, she worked in a machine shop checking tools in and out and keeping track of time cards. A few years later, her children grown, she met her second husband. “I had low esteem, was terribly naïve and hated the person I was,” she muses. “He was much
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older, and I thought he would provide stability.” She couldn’t have been more wrong. He moved her to a farm in Oak Harbor, where for several years she took care of his embittered aunt, an amputee, until her death. “My husband was extremely abusive,” Joanne says. “I was only allowed to leave to go grocery shopping for two hours on Friday morning. I lived like a prisoner. When he threatened my life, I felt not only afraid, but as if I had no value.” Joanne managed to have one friend, a woman who guessed what was happening and told her that if she needed to get out, she could come to her. Joanne’s self esteem was so low, she dared not believe she could escape. That changed July 24, 1992, the day her husband nearly killed her. “All that fear for all those years turned to rage,” she says. “I went against everything I had learned or lived with, and I fought back. It was like someone took over and a new person came out of me.” Stunned, her drunken husband screamed curses, ordered her to leave and stumbled into the bedroom. Joanne piled her records, books, musical instruments and what few clothes she had into a van, withdrew the pittance she had in the bank and fled to her friend’s house, where she stayed for four fearful months. “I was hungry, but too nervous to eat,” she recalls. “I couldn’t sleep. I was afraid he would come after me.” Desperate, Joanne, who knew nothing about shelters then, caught a ferry, came to Everett and checked into a motel, where she worked as a maid. She rented
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