A First Lady's First Impressions -- Mona Lee Locke Is Adjusting To Life As A Governor's Wife

There they were: the president praising her husband in his state of the union speech; the president and her husband singing harmonies on some old Elvis tune; gussied up, dancing in the White House.

Finally, under the covers in the Lincoln Bedroom, she asks: "Can you believe we're here?"

They took menus from their White House breakfast and pictures of them on the lawn. They bought a pair of Executive Residence robes.

But what the new governor and first lady really remember about their Washington, D.C., trip, she says now, is that "big piece of advice" offered by Vice President Al Gore:

"Don't take the one-day Lamaze class. You gotta really take the longer course. This is the only opportunity a father is going to have to be involved in the birth."

Mona Lee Locke tells the story and laughs in that way she's been laughing since she came to the public's attention last year.

She has neatly bobbed and banged hair, a big smile, cheeks like plump dumplings.

"I have gained 35 pounds," whispers the 8 1/2-months-pregnant first-time mom-to-be. "I don't fit into anything anymore. I'd dress in sweats if only they'd fit!"

Her role as first lady will be "anything she wants it to be," although for the time being, she will focus on being a mom. The baby is due March 28. (She prays that it won't be April Fools' Day).

Inside the mansion

The sofa is American Empire. The mirror Chippendale. The windows fashioned after Monticello. And look here: Harry Truman's signature in the guest registry.

It is Wednesday, Tour Day at the Governor's Mansion. Hostesses herd clusters of adults from room to room. There is oohing and ahhing at the dainty French porcelain, the shiny silver champagne fountain and tureen, the hefty buffet with the big claw feet, the 11 crystal chandeliers and the two end tables (out of only 50 in the world).

"It's a good thing I really like people," Locke says about adjusting to her first lady responsibilities, one of them being relinquishing the full use of her new three-story, 26-room home once a week.

It is midday and the public tours have stopped for an hour. She arrives in the Family Living Room in zip-up sweater and cotton leggings, with her two pre-Gary companions: cats Gatsby and Maya. She plops on the couch.

"I like this room a lot."

Locke will often greet guests here. The room is cozier than the other museum-ish public rooms. It is the one public room that can be decorated with first family mementos, and already there is some "Mona stuff": a photo of the couple in front of the presidential helicopter, the cradle the Legislature gave them when Gary was sworn in.

"We have some big wedding photos that are framed that might hang nicely on the walls," she says. Maybe some black-and-white photographs Gary picked up once at auction.

Her priority is transforming what used to be Mary Lowry's office, a room across from the master bedroom upstairs, into the nursery. On a vacation in Hawaii, Gary spotted a motorized stuffed bunny and giddily snatched it up. So they passed on Beatrix Potter and Winnie-the-Pooh and went for a bear-and-bunny theme.

Gone are the days when Locke, a former KING-TV reporter, did the animal stories her friends tease her about and the live shots at all hours in windstorms and near swollen rivers. She doesn't miss that at all.

She does miss her TV news buddies though, and sometimes, when a press pool buzzes about her husband and she happens to be there, she wants to go over and chat with a friend.

Some of her closest female friends are TV reporters. And as the wife of this country's first Chinese-American governor, she has made herself accessible to many media requests, although she says she is always surprised "why anyone wants to talk to me."

She charms interviewers.

During a recent TV appearance, she smiled and chatted about nursery wallpaper and White House pictures. To a woman who said how wonderful she looks pregnant, Locke said, "You should be with me at night."

She said she is honored to be considered a role model. Yes, maybe she'd like a bilingual nanny; no, she and Gary hadn't yet picked out a school.

She answered each question enthusiastically and thoughtfully. Throughout the show, she later said, all she kept thinking was "Dead air. Dead air."

Parental role models

Locke's own role models are her parents: Larry and Celia Lee, who emigrated from China and met in California. He went from deliveryman in a stock brokerage to running his own business. They raised three children. They have been married for 36 years.

Mona grew up in the Bay Area, the middle child and only daughter. As Lee family lore tells it, she was nameless until her parents heard Nat King Cole croon "Mona Lisa."

Mona was a good girl, her mother says. Never gave her any trouble. Always did her homework before she watched TV. Always friendly, too.

"One time, she came home and she said, `Mom, I found out if you smile at people, they'll smile back,' " her mother says.

The Lee family did not talk current affairs at the dinner table, which is what probably inspired Locke to go into the news business. "It would give me an opportunity to ask questions, to learn and to meet people."

She was expected all along to go to college. She wanted to attend Brown University in Rhode Island, but her parents said she had to stay near home.

So she chose the University of California at Berkeley and lived on campus, even though her parents would pick her up every Friday and take her home for the weekend.

At Berkeley, she studied English and shied away from politics. She wrote for the campus newspaper, reported, anchored and produced for the radio station, sang and danced in musicals and, yes, was a cheerleader.

She admits this, groaning, then quickly adds that being a cheerleader for Berkeley isn't at all like being a cheerleader at, say, UCLA.

Her mother expected her to marry and settle down after graduation. But Locke instead moved to Los Angeles to work as a movie studio tour guide "just for fun."

Then, deciding to become a TV reporter, she applied to graduate school at Northwestern University near Chicago. Once she was accepted, she told her parents she was moving away.

When she finished the program, Locke drove across country. One rental car, three suits, five states and 10 days of delivering resume tapes paid off. She was hired in Green Bay, Wis.

"Lots of snow. Lots of cows."

Mom as matchmaker

Celia Lee had Chinese friends with sons who always wanted to meet Mona. "She had plenty of admirers," said Celia, who often played matchmaker.

Locke was always gracious. She accepted a first date. It was the invitation for a second that made her cringe.

After nearly two years in Green Bay, she moved to Seattle in February 1992. She had been here just two weeks when a fellow TV reporter offered to introduce her to this local single guy:

His name is Gary Locke. Head of the Appropriations Committee. A state representative.

A politician? she thought. She was not thrilled. "I was thinking, `OK. One dinner. Whatever. Get it over with,' " she says now, laughing.

He was easygoing, though, and they talked well and became good friends. He took her camping for the first time. "We loved to hike. Actually, he liked to hike. I much rather prefer being on top of the hill and going down."

She didn't think much that he was 14 years older. She turned 32 this week.

What she did spend a lot of time trying to figure out was what motivated him to run for public office. It wasn't ego, she says; it's really because he cares about making a difference. "I could admire that."

Gary was elected King County executive in November 1993.

They were friends for about a year before things turned romantic, before he wound up declaring his love and proposing to her via an airplane banner, a rose, a Tiffany & Co. necklace and a glass of champagne.

She leans over and lowers her voice.

"I said, `No.' "

She laughs.

"I said, `Yes!' Are you kidding me?"

They were married in October 1994. They balanced two careers until he decided to run for governor and she, never really aspiring to be a network anchor, said it was a good time to quit her job and join his campaign.

"It was exciting not to have a future that was all mapped out. We had the confidence that no matter what, we were going to get through it."

She wanted him to run, she says, because she knew it was his big dream. Her big dream? "I've always pursued what I loved doing: moving, reporting. My feeling was, when I got to Seattle - a large market - I was satisfied."

Better understanding

He has given her a new appreciation for politics. She has made him more easygoing.

She has helped him better understand the media. "When I read a story, I tell him sometimes that that's probably the angle I would have taken."

She tried - but failed - to manage his hair. "It's very stiff. Uncontrollable. No matter what everyone says, it won't stay!"

Her life, now, is too new for any sort of routine. Before the campaign, she used to play racquetball and take aerobics at the Seattle Club. If this were football season, she'd look out for televised San Francisco 49er games. She used to like "ER" and newsmagazine shows, but there isn't time for much of that.

She still reads: "When You're Expecting"-type books, novels and murder mysteries. She buys the mysteries for Gary to get his mind off work. He ends up not reading them, so she does.

After the baby is born, she says she would like to work on issues she really cares about. Like education, perhaps.

How to balance the two - politics and family - is something Hillary Rodham Clinton said she would advise her on.

Call me, that first lady told her, when the two met in Washington earlier this month. This first lady says she plans to do just that.