A Father First: How My Life Became Bigger Than Basketball (16 page)

With time served, my mother was at Dwight for under two years and released in 1995. Behind the walls, sober, she had begun to find a little peace of mind, a sense of self-forgiveness and self-love that had been missing. That was because, as she would say, “The one thing that I got in prison was that God did talk to me.” Out in the world though, Mom lost that connection and her sense of purpose. She put it this way: “I got out thinking—what am I gonna do now? Tragil wasn’t in Chicago. Your dad had custody of you. Wanting to be a mother was all I knew. I wanted to start over and do it right. But it was too late. So I went and found churches, looking for the feeling that I had behind the walls.”

Fairly soon after getting out, Mom paid a visit to the old neighborhood, both to visit Grandma and to attend the church down the block. Although she heard a small voice warning her to be careful, on the way back to where she was staying, she stopped off at the stretch of the block where she used to hang. Fatefully, she wound up running into the same guy who’d been beating up on her all those years. Mom admitted, “My life went right back to the same abuse and pain that it had been before. He was the same nut. Maybe worse. And I went right back on the dope.”

After unsuccessful attempts to kick her habit, Mom decided to try one more time, around her birthday in November 1995. To wean herself off dope without becoming violently ill, she bought enough to “get my sick off” and was going to sell the rest for money to live. But after completing the transaction, she was arrested. The charges were such that Mom was kept out of county jail but had to turn herself in when the time came for sentencing. With delays and heavy backlog in the courts, that left her out on the streets until the following summer, when she anticipated being sent back to Dwight.

During the interim, Mom fell into the depths of despair. Still using. Still feeling that the big
F
of failure was controlling her life, feeling that she had failed us. Of course, this wasn’t being reported to me as it was happening. The only news I heard from Dad—which came toward the end of eighth grade—was that he had been to see her.

She was doing all right, Dad said with a shrug, which was not very encouraging. When I asked where Mom was staying and how to go visit her, Dad predicted, “You’ll see her soon.”

Careful not to get my hopes up, he didn’t tell me that he had gotten a ticket for her to attend my graduation plus a ticket for my sister Deanna to join her.

In later years Dad recalled doing that but said it wasn’t a big deal. “I mean, that was your mother. She deserved to be there.” (And Deanna had paid the fees for my diploma, when Dad didn’t have the money.)

But to Mom it was a big deal. Not only was she able to surprise me that afternoon by showing up before the ceremony—looking very thin yet bright-eyed—but she also presented me with a watch she had bought and passed me a handful of singles to put in my pocket. All that must have cost her everything she had at that time.

“I love it! You didn’t have to . . . ,” I tried to tell her, just after she flagged me down as my friends and I, in our caps and gowns, made our way into the auditorium where the ceremony would take place.

“Yes, I did,” she insisted, making sure I put on the watch and held up my wrist for her to see. Mom stood there admiring her choice, nodding in approval at the suburban setting of the school—even though it must have seemed like we’d landed in Oz. She now probably understood why Dad and Bessie had felt that we’d get a better education and be in safer classrooms by avoiding Robbins schools—even though my stepsiblings and I were a definite minority here.

There was a pained expression in my mother’s eyes that pained
me
to see. I figured she was hurting for the time we had missed together but was unaware, as she would later admit, that she felt awkward and out of place, ashamed that she hadn’t been there on a daily basis.

I wanted to reassure her but didn’t have the words. All I could do was reach up and hug her. Almost shyly, Mom turned to Deanna and said, “Isn’t he the most handsome thing?”

We both stood for another moment, not saying anything. Then it was time for me to go catch up with friends and take my place in the auditorium. We hugged again quickly and she said we’d see each other after the ceremony. As I turned to go, she asked suddenly, “You want me to walk you in there?” No sooner had my mother spoken those words than she broke out in a big smile, obviously aware she was talking to a much younger boy than I was by then.

“Naw, Mom, I’m all right.”

As I bolted and ran toward the auditorium, I knew she would stand and watch until I vanished from sight. Sure enough she did, as she would recall years later, telling me also, “That was when it dawned on me my baby grew up.”

1
A
.
M
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M
ARCH
16

A
T
HOME
IN
M
IAMI

I’M STANDING AT THE DOORWAY, CHECKING IN ON THE TWO boys asleep in their beds. Still thinking about this question of teaching toughness. This is no small challenge for me or for most fathers, I have to say.

Maybe this is one of those parental responsibilities that has to become an overtime kind of thing. Certainly it has to begin with striving to be the example of tough—in terms of teaching that it’s possible to overcome anything. With Zaire and Zion, I want to be able to talk about little difficulties they can overcome, as well as bigger things. Those need to be ongoing conversations, too.

But thankfully we’ll have time for those conversations and also for the next item on my daddy agenda: having fun!

Chapter
Five

Hoopin’

O
N
THE
R
OAD

M
ARCH
29–30, 2011

C
LEVELAND
, O
HIO

W
ASHINGTON
, D.C.

“H
OW WAS YOUR DAY?”

As a parent, I love that question. It gives permission for everyone in the family to share feelings—like taking a snapshot of the moment. With my kids, I always want to know how the school day went or how a playdate was enjoyed.

Oh yeah, in the Wade household we are big on setting up playdates.

There are a few reasons for that. First of all, I believe that relationships are central to happiness and success. In terms of career building blocks, I’ve learned as an adult that
who
you know is often more important than
what
you know. Also, experiencing joy is no doubt a great human endeavor.

Whenever we have our “How was your day?” talks, I’m always interested to know something that was learned or some new aspect of fun that was experienced. Or, if the day had disappointments, grades were bad, lessons were challenging, or problems got in the way of playing well with others, I want to know about that, too.

During the first weeks of our new life together, I established the lasting priority of having a daily check-in—either after school on the days when I picked the kids up or at dinner together. Honestly, this was as important for my adjustment process to full-time single-dad status as it was for Zaire and Zion. I needed to really pay attention to how they were feeling as well as doing.

Zion, initially, hadn’t slept well and had cried about missing his mom. My message to him was just to let him cry and be there for him. Tragil also stayed close to the boys, continuing as loving aunt and pitching in as nanny during the transition. I had already reached out to Brenda Larson, the nanny the boys adored and whom I’d hired to care for them whenever I was in Chicago. I’d interviewed many candidates but she was the one the boys immediately loved, especially Zion. The blessing for us was that Brenda had agreed to move to Miami to take care of the boys full time and would arrive before summer.

Zaire’s issues were tougher. Since he never wanted to feel or say anything negative about his mom, he seemed to have almost a sense of guilt about allowing himself to be happy. So we had work to do on that. He had been so overly drawn into the divorce drama that I knew we should continue to seek the resources of therapy together, both for Zaire and me with him.

In the meantime, what appeared to be working was just keeping the conversation going. In the mornings at breakfast, we could talk about what was on our agenda for the day and then continue in the car on to other subjects. Because I happened to be one of the few dads doing drop-offs at the elementary school and at preschool, first walking the boys to their classrooms and then staying to chat with some of the other parents (all females) doing the same, I soon earned a new nickname: Mr. Mom.

Maybe not as catchy as Flash, but just as meaningful.

Game-wise the month of March was at first a light travel month, thankfully. However, by the end of the month, the Heat’s schedule had us on the road for four away games. That meant my boys and I planned to have our “How was your day?” conversations via Skype. The rest of the time we could text, call, and e-mail, too. But we like the video chats. Though it’s never the same as being together in person, being able to see and hear each other through our computers does make the time go faster and easier.

After all of our traumatic separations earlier on, waking up in a hotel room without the sound of their voices nearby is a shock. Less than a day away from home, after returning from the shoot-around at the arena, I log into my Skype account early, unable to wait for our check-in.

Right on time, Zaire’s face lights up the screen. Zion tries to squeeze in, bringing his face up closer to the camera. Not much is going on, Zaire says. Zion shrugs as well, saying, “Nothing new.” We go over the daily schedule, which includes their regular check-in with their mom. Then, before we sign off, they wish me well for the game. We say good-bye as we always do with a group “I love you!” and promise to talk the next day.

About twenty-four hours later, during our check in on Wednesday, Zaire has lots of news for me. School is very hard, he says. “Way too much homework. I mean, I never had to work this hard in Chicago!” As it turns out, this is leading up to the explanation about how he didn’t do an assignment. We’ll take a closer look at that later. On an up note, he reports having lots of fun entertaining some friends from school at the house.

Before Zion answers my question about how his day was, he squints his eyes and again comes in very close to the screen. Like he’s trying to read my mood. So true to his Gemini astrological sign, Zion can go hot or cold. When he is happy and having fun, no one is happier. When he is down, he doesn’t want to be cheered up or babied.

The fact that Zion isn’t even four yet is something even I keep forgetting. As a case in point, when I ask again if he had a good day at his preschool, he gives me a look like that is a silly question—then goes on to tell me about someone having a birthday in class and having a cake and party favors. How was that? “Fun!”

Prodded by his brother, Zion innocently asks me how I am. The two then squeeze their little faces onto the screen to check out my reaction and to offer cheerful smiles.

The truth is that the Heat’s loss the previous night to the Cleveland Cavaliers was rough. I’ve trained myself over the years not to linger too long on victories or losses but to learn from them and move on. As I’ve told the boys, the test is always to look at mistakes, see where there is room for improvement, and to be able to ask, “Did I give my all?” Then gear up for the next game. Because win or lose, there’s always going to be a next game.

The Cleveland game wasn’t the first time the Heat had been back to play on LeBron’s home turf during this first year after his coming to Miami. We expected the cool welcome—to say the least—although not perhaps the extreme level of anger expressed by the crowd. Not as intense as when we’d been there in December, however, when we won by eighteen points. This time, though, we let the noise get to our heads and lost by twelve.

What made the loss tough for me was the expectation I put on myself to deliver for the team, to set an example for how to stay calm in the midst of a storm. That was something that I should have been able to do, I felt. But given the wrath of the crowd, the loss might have been the best thing for us in the end, to give the city a win.