home

I’m an unapologetic bandwagoner. I love winners, I root for champions, always have. My favorite sports teams are the Terry Bradshaw Steelers, Joe Montana 49’rs, Tom Brady Patriots, Dr. J 76’rs, Magic Johnson Lakers, MJ Bulls. People who are part of dynasty building, larger than life, confident, cocky, defiant, relishing the big stage and the bigger moments, these are the people I cheer for. My youthful infatuation with Muhammed Ali was no different. From the basement of my WASP childhood home I turned on the 19″ B&W television, adjusted the tin foil on the rabbit ears until the reception was adequate, and watched with fascination as this upstart African American lit up the screen. As if I was trying to learn the latest dance craze, I memorized and imitated the choreography of Ali’s dance around the ring while flicking the jab relentlessly to helpless opponents, culminating with the Ali shuffle.

My middle brother Mark is 4 years older than I, and it was he who turned me on to Ali. On fight nights, he and I would stay up listening to the radio call, wild with anticipation, hanging on to every word from Howard Cosell, villainizing every opponent, dancing with joy with each victory, sitting in stunned disbelief at the rare defeat. When the big fights were not played live over the radio, we would have to wait for the morning paper to give us the fight news. Mark would cut out the story and put the clipping in an old shoebox. Eventually, Mark gifted those clippings to me when we were still kids, and I reverently taped each story to my scrapbook for safe keeping.

Today I went up into the attic and pulled down the dusty storage container that holds my childhood memories – old record albums, school trophies, one framed picture, and a faded scrapbook. I hadn’t opened the book in years and many of the pages were worn and stuck together. I flipped through the pages with the care of a wide-eyed scholar opening an ancient manuscript. Below is a sampling of the classics.

I closed the scrapbook and pulled out that vintage picture frame… It had been displayed proudly in my bedroom until I moved out of my parent’s house and got married.

IMG_4107_new

I stare at the picture and wonder what it was about this man, this picture, that so captured my imagination. What made me frame and hold on to this moment in history? It didn’t take me long to figure out that this is who I have always wanted to be – confident, outspoken, fearless, big dreamer, man of conviction, heart of a champion, soul of a servant, maybe misunderstood and even hated for political and religious stances, but nonetheless loved and admired worldwide.

It may be an esoteric reach, but in a moment of clarity I see myself as the champ in this picture… and I see myself as the helplessly vulnerable man on the mat. There are glimpses of who I was created to be, and then what I allow myself to become. Flashes of courage met by self doubt, instances of bravery that succumb to unintended cowardice. Prophetically I see a time when I too look down on that lesser me and with the same look of defiance, dare that person to ever get up again.

The framed picture and the scrapbook are safely tucked away on the attic shelf now, but my thoughts linger. Once again Ali has emerged to challenge me, inspire me, provoke me, to be the very best me.

“Impossible is just a big word thrown around by small men who find it easier to live in the world they’ve been given than to explore the power they have to change it. Impossible is not a fact. It’s an opinion. Impossible is not a declaration. It’s a dare. Impossible is potential. Impossible is temporary. Impossible is nothing.”

― Muhammad Ali

In his novel You Can’t Go Home Again, Thomas Wolfe wrote:

“You can’t go back home to your family, back home to your childhood … back home to a young man’s dreams of glory and of fame … back home to places in the country, back home to the old forms and systems of things which once seemed everlasting but which are changing all the time – back home to the escapes of Time and Memory.”

I left my hometown of Lynchburg, Virginia, 20 years ago this July. My wife and I packed up our 6 and 4 year old daughters and all of our worldly possessions and moved to North Carolina, never looking back. Though less than a 3 hour drive, we rarely made it back to the Commonwealth, beyond the annual pilgrimage at Thanksgiving and Christmas. We were busy with homework, and soccer, and cheerleading; church on Sunday – no time for the commute north.

Today I found myself back in my hometown of Lynchburg. I made the journey alone, driving on stretches of road that I could close my eyes and navigate. My destination was Lynchburg General Hospital. The patient was my mom. She has been sick for sometime with a non-functioning gall bladder, exacerbated by Addison’s Disease. Thankfully the surgery went well.

I left the hospital with the plan to make an immediate return to North Carolina but reflective thoughts of the experience with mom made me detour. I drove streets that 20 years prior had been so familiar but now seemed vague. Unchanged landmarks intertwined with the “new and improved”.

I drove past the Baptist church I was raised in and recalled “walking the aisle” at the age of 5 and being baptized at age 6. Attached to the church was the pre-school that I attended, and where my mom taught 3 and 4 years olds as a labor of love for nearly 30 years.

I drove on to the first house that Jackie and I purchased together. Jackie’s mom worked tirelessly on it before we were married and made sure it was move-in-ready when we returned from our honeymoon. My oldest daughter’s nursery was in that small second bedroom, and my beloved dog Roscoe is buried at the tree line on the edge of the property.

I kept driving till I reached the second home we lived in as a young family. My younger daughter got the benefit of a nicer nursery, and somewhere there is an old video of her taking her first steps on wobbly legs while singing some indiscernible tune. The old shed that I kept my stuff in was still there, and the bushes I planted were mature. The patch of earth that I could never get grass to grow on was still bare, and that made me smile.

I had one last stop, to make the journey complete… I stood in front of the brick rancher where I lived from age 4 till I was married at age 20. Memories of climbing trees, shooting hoops in the driveway, camping out in the backyard, all flashed before my eyes. When it was finally time to downsize, Mom and Dad sold the home place to my big brother. It’s great that the house is still in the family, but like those vaguely familiar roads, the structure is the same, but the feeling is different.

I reflected back to a poignant moment earlier that morning in the hospital recovery room… mom had just been settled in, and her kids in turn greeted her with a relieved kiss. Dad waited patiently, but soon gravitated to her side and simply put his hand on her cheek and held it there. It was a moment etched in my mind and I was instantly gripped by this incredible image of love that I felt and knew so well. Dad’s heavy sigh seemed an attempt to exhale out all of the anxiety that he had been holding in. In that simple gesture there was a felt current of connection between them – a shared gaze, a lifetime of commitment. My throat clenched as I realized that this was my inheritance, I had been shown how to love deeply.

I backed out of the driveway and pointed my Jeep toward North Carolina. My incredible wife of nearly 30 years, and my two amazing daughters were there. Weddings will take place and my grandkids will be born there. There, is where I want to be… but remnants of me remain scattered in the place – I called home.