Molly Hutchins 1959-2010

Friday Letter #165

Brother Man spotted me in the dairy aisle of the downtown Safeway and came over to greet us.

Floggin Molly's New Low Rider 3/13/2010 1st Ride - WOO HOO
photo by Christine Johnson

We had become acquainted with Brother Man over several years. We would be working in the church flower gardens and he would ride by on a bicycle, sometimes stopping to visit.

Brother Man is a descendant of indigenous people, one tribe or another, but he doesn’t talk about it. He’s bandy legged from daily bicycling; he doesn’t drive.

Brother Man has graying black hair tied back with a rubber band in a pony tail. There’s scarcely a whisker on his pockmarked face, his nose has the classic Red Cloud or Geronimo bend and bump. What’s left of his teeth would appear to cause him pain.

Perhaps because we are friendly and outgoing and we speak to people on the street and in the grocery store, characters like Brother Man recognize us and often want to talk a little.

Brother Man asked, “Tommy, are you all right? You don’t look like you feel too good.”

I hadn’t realized that anything showed on my face. I blurted out, “Our friend Molly died on Monday, a motorcycle-pickup crash in Cheyenne.”

Brother Man looked me in the eyes and said, “I saw that on the news. She was your friend?” Then his eyes clouded over; he looked down and to his left, no longer able to meet my gaze.

It seemed to me that my report had deeply saddened him. He turned, wordlessly, and left the store without buying anything. I saw him later, bicycling past the church.

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Molly was a widow. Her husband Bill “Hutch” Hutchins died of a heart attack a year and a half ago. Molly was riding her Harley-Davidson, the first motorcycle she ever owned, although she had ridden with Hutch on a variety of Harleys.

She died when some dickhead (the kindest word I can think of for him) turned left in front of her in an intersection.

When Brother Man confronted me in the grocery, I was still in shock. For that matter, I am in shock at this moment.

Hutch died of a heart attack after a full recovery from hepatitis. He won but he lost. The chemo used to fight the hepatitis weakened his heart. He was too young.  We wrote about Hutch just last year.  (Click on the previous sentence to see the story.)


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Molly was 50. I remember well her stubborn attitude about death. Some years ago, a young woman drowned in a fast-flowing river near Glendo during a big biker party. Molly reported this, then laughed and said, “I told her not to go bobbing for boulders.”

Molly dearly loved her daughter Allison, her step-daughter Samantha, and her stepson Billy. Billy was killed in a hunting incident; he and Hutch are buried in a gritty cemetery atop a perpetually windy hill in Hanna Wyoming. Molly was in the habit of making pilgrimages to visit those graves.

When she returned from one of those trips she laughed and said, “Why didn’t somebody tell me the wind blows in Hanna.”

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We met Hutch and Molly in the late 1980s when they volunteered to help with the Linda Holt Memorial Run. Linda was murdered in 1987, and a “run” is one thing bikers do to deal with extreme grief and sorrow.

Linda’s horrific death tugged at the enormous hearts of Hutch and Molly, as it still does for us.

When they lived in Kersey, Molly worked at the Holiday Inn downtown in Greeley. When Allison was born, the fact was announced on both sides of the marquee outside the hotel. Molly had that kind of effect on people.

Hutch didn’t drink. Never saw him take a drink. At a party, he would say to Molly with mock irritation, “Woman! Get me a drink.” In an equally mocking way, Molly would pretend to hurry to attend to his needs, bringing a Coke.

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We invited Molly to our wedding anniversary party shortly after Hutch died. She came. But she asked me, “Why am I here?”

This summer, we invited Molly to come to church with us. She came. All the way from Cheyenne, driving Allison’s beat-up car because something wasn’t working on her own vehicle.



July 19, 2009 photo by Jaye Blair

After Mass, Molly came up to the front of the church where I was visiting with a friend. When she approached, I put my left arm around her waist.
Her flesh was warm, solid. Full of life. That day, once again, Molly promised to introduce me sometime to the hyper-realist painter James Bama. Bama was a neighbor of Molly’s family in Cody. I might still meet Mr. Bama, one day. I fantasize he and I will gossip about Hutch and Molly.

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A pair of riding chaps that belonged to Hutch are still here in the leather shop. Molly had asked me to make saddlebags from the garment – no small order.

I talked with Allison just a little bit. She said I should go ahead with the project. “That’s what she wanted,” the young woman said. “That’s what she wanted.”

Laura and I sometimes offered the “grand prize” for the Linda Holt run, and one year we awarded custom tailored leather vest and chaps. Molly won.

One time I overheard Molly responding to someone who was complaining about some real or imagined hardship. Molly said, “Hey, this isn’t the Good Ship Lollipop you know.”

I also heard her express a plan. She said, “When I get to Heaven and I see Hutch again, I’m going to tell him, ‘You butt.’”

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Word of the week: Mourning. It’s from Middle English, mournen, akin to the Gothic maurnan, to be anxious. Mourning is the action or feeling of one who mourns, specifically the expression of grief at someone’s death.