Wednesday, April 18, 2012

What is fatherhood?

All it took was a text to make me erupt in laughter. My editor told me the wife of Antonio Cromartie, a professional football player for the New York Jets, is expecting twins later this year.
When I recovered from my fit of laughter, I responded: “that means he has a soccer team and a super sub.”

That makes 12 children with eight women for the condom-averse cornerback. The news, if one can call it that, meant the last time Cromartie wore a Trojan was back when he played football at Lincoln High School in Tallahassee.

Earlier in the week, my colleagues and I picked on the fertile football player. But after the laughter and sophomoric jokes subsided, I was left wondering how a man can a man sustain $24,500 in monthly child support payments. A part of me pitied this man’s estranged children, which are in Florida, Georgia, California, North Carolina, New Jersey and Texas.

By now, most of us know more than six in 10 black children in this country are born out of wedlock. There is a glut of information out there about the impact of fatherlessness and children born out of wedlock.

But, because someone is a father, or even in their child’s life, doesn’t make them a good father.

So what does?

Friday, April 13, 2012

What happens when you step out the way?

Not too long ago I was messing around on Twitter when I read a message that immediately grabbed my attention.

“Often we expect God to come to us like thunder, when He's actually being quietly persistent.”
Roy S. Johnson, a former editor at Sports Illustrated and a well-known sports journalist, shared the knowledge with me, and his 2,600 followers.

The message came at the same time I was thanking God for removing me from a toxic situation a year ago. Because the Lord, and anyone else who listened to me, knew I was miserable last April.

My frustration was so apparent my mom reminded me, without prompting, to never lose my gratitude. The next day, my dad implored me not to lose my temper at the office, even if it appeared warranted.

I dreaded going to work, money was tight, I didn’t have a permanent living situation and I wrecked the front end of my car trying to be two places at once for an employer that wanted to get rid of me — and eventually did.

During that dark period, I asked God for a few things, things that will remain between us.

Nearly a year later each one of those prayers was answered. Just like Johnson preached, of course in fewer than 140 characters, it was not a single thunderous action that led me to write a testimonial essay.

Not too many people can say they found another job by the time they figured out how to apply for unemployment. Through His grace, I am one.

Last month The Wall Street Journal reported the average unemployed American has been out of work for 40 weeks. Within 40 days of my layoff I had already accepted another job, a position that included a pay raise.

My steps have been ordered and I’m not ashamed to admit it.

When I announced my layoff to my family and friends in the middle of a sunny Friday morning last year there was a paragraph I wrote in more hope than anything else.

“Each and every one of my friends who used to work at the Democrat has found themselves happier after they have left that office. That is not at all a coincidence and I am confident I will be the next to join in that procession.”

At the time I wrote it, hope was all I had. Now, I have thanksgiving that the statement was indeed true.

Laughs and liveliness,

-Wb

Monday, April 9, 2012

What do tennis and Dr. Suess have in common?

I recently wore a white Florida A&M T-shirt and basketball shorts to work. Incredulously enough, I also played tennis for two hours on the clock in such casual attire.
There is a story, and the pursuit of another, behind the outfit.

Journalism may not make me a monetarily rich man, but I certainly provides for a wealth of experiences. Money might provide for flexibility. However, even that runs out, no matter how fortunate and flexible we are.

My fiancĂ© suggests leaving newspapers for magazine writing and other longer forms of journalism. Other family members have suggested that I switch to broadcasting where there is more money, and relatively more job security. However, I just can’t get rid of the sense of pride at seeing my name in the newspaper most days.

I still hold onto the ideal William A. White expressed nearly a century ago when discussion the fate of rural newspapers, “…Yet we who read them read in their lines the sweet, intimate story of life."

That story White notes is why I took to the tennis court.

There is a 90-year old gentleman in town that is quite the tennis player. He recently won a four-hour-ten-minute match to win a competition in his age group.

Rather than just talk to him and write a story for the newspaper, we played a set. The gentleman retired before I was born so of course it was not a fair contest, but he certainly made it compelling with the placement of his drop shots and other ground strokes.

Virtually all my friends with undergraduate degrees make more money than me. Then again, none of them have the luxury of waking up at 10 a.m., get paid to go to sporting events and remain in a profession they truly enjoy?

That’s part of the reason I bought Dr. Suess’ book Oh, the Places You’ll Go last year.

It was a Friday afternoon and I was a bit homesick.I remember it was a Friday because I was in no rush to get to work that day, and that only occurred on nights I was covering a high school football game in the capital of the sport—Texas.

In the half decade since college I have sometimes forgotten that I have brains in my head and feet in my shoes. I had the ability to steer myself in any direction that I choose. I’m on my own “and you know what you know. And you are the guy who’ll decide where to go.”

They have included dark corners of municipal buildings, the dining room tables of family members and the front seat of my reliable Kia. The night Barack Obama won the presidency I sat in a suite at Doak Campbell Stadium writing the finishing touches on student reaction to the historic election.

It was proof that “out there things can happen and frequently do to people as brainy and footsy as you.”

The lobby of a police station served as an office. So did a tiny library in Carrabelle, Florida on my 24th birthday. Between morsels of fried chicken that was not nearly as good as the conversation I ran into the mother, uncle and cousins of someone I interviewed an hour earlier.

“Except when you don’t. Because, sometimes, you won’t.” Certainly it is true, the bang-ups and hang-ups can happen to you.

They happened to me. And it forced me to chase my dream in a town foreign to me.

But, the only things friendlier than the Texas strangers are their restaurants.

Whataburger locations throughout South Texas opened their doors so I could write somewhere besides under a dim car light.  One even took the time to share the history of the stores and how the original Whataburger was just a 25 minute drive south in Corpus Christi.

Then there was the time I wrote a story from a bed and breakfast in Johannesburg just so I could have an international date line on a story. The story was reported stateside, but I waited until I landed in South Africa to send it just because I could.

That experience, just like being a professional tennis player, even for just two hours is proof that I just might succeed. Even if my success rate is only 98 and ¾ percent guaranteed.