Babies: Masters of Networking

by

Posted:

I don’t know what I want my son to do for a living. People, “…bet he’s hoopin’ as soon as he can dribble” but why would I force him to do that? He seems athletic but maybe y’all can chime in as to whether or not 15-month olds demonstrate anomalous athleticism this early. Right about now, as I write this, I want him to…sleep for like another two hours. I’m watchin’ this monitor and… uhhhhh…noooooo…wait…ok he’s back down. I can keep writing. He and I went to a men’s bible gathering thing this morning but they didn’t have child care so we bounced and went to Mimi’s for breakfast. He had the oatmeal, milk and wooden dinosaurs with a side of crayola. I had the banana pancakes.

I don’t know what I want my son to do for a living. The world keeps changing, updating as often as iOS you know? So now we live in a “Gig Economy,” a fancy term for HUSTLEDOM. The rule of the streets has become credible: Get in where you fit in. It’s the nomadic heritage of our ancestors following herds and water for survival. So Langston will, maybe, find his way into that nebulous one day. And of course there will still be pro sports and pro everything else.

But I don’t know what I want my son to do for a living. Strangers come up to me and say, “What a well behaved baby; he’s so content and even keeled.” But I’m like, I was content and it got me overlooked and ignored. It caused me to be prey. Uh oh! I like content but where’s the line and how do I help my son negotiate it so that he is neither a brute nor doormat? He was at a mommy and me class with his grandmother and legend has it that another child saw him playing with a toy that he himself wanted. So the boy took it from Langston and Langston responded by finding more toys like that one to take to the assailant so he could play with more of them. Hmmm!

I don’t know what I want my son to do for a living but I “sho nuff” want him to be a lot of things. And I guess I don’t want him to be a “this” or a “that.” More, I want him to be true. Much of what he is right now is plenty good. He smiles, laughs, farts and poops with regularity, hugs, kisses, observes, points to obscure things I can’t see, eats well, sings, dances, sucks from a straw, brings me a grip of books to read to him and chases the dog. He also listens when it’s time to pray instead of talking to much during prayer like I do. Are these not the rudiments of a fully alive human? Is there anything in that list which merits deletion? What would many forlorn adults give to have even three of these listed items in their natural disposition/routine/experience?

Seems like the key to “gigging” ones way through a new workplace reality is housed somewhere among the day-in-the-life of Langston stuff. It’s not what you know it’s who you know they say. But How do we come to know the ones who decide to hire or refer? We don’t all have a reserve of connections that make networking fluid. Some of us are out here with our listening, relational, intellectual, compassionate soft skills making it safe for gatekeepers to engage us. Sure maybe it’s who you know and what you know that opens a door. But before that, I think I’ll chalk up a win for babies worldwide showing us the HOW of meeting people and arresting their attention in meaningful non-parasitic ways.

Realness. Vulnerability. Affection. Humor. Fullness of Life. That’s my son. No one who actually met him ever hated him. If he could talk he’d be a gold mind runnin’ weekend seminars. And there is the handicap of him being a baby, greatest distraction ever. But still… It’s not what you know or who you know that determines whether or not we thrive and live fulfilled callings. It’s learning how to know people worth knowing as well as learning 2015-08-30 18.34.29how to be known authentically.

Makes me wonder what people thought I should be…

Crickets

by

Posted:

That’s the sound in the quiet that let’s you know it’s quiet. And it’s the metaphorical sound people bring attention to when we are silent in times of crisis. I stopped writing this for a second just to stalk my Facebook news feed. What did I see? Top 10 dunks from a guy who used to play in the NBA, a post about the apparent dearth of organic baby food (specifically peas), anniversaries and birthday shout outs. Can I just say that none of these are bad. They are great and Facebook along with other social media wouldn’t be what they are without this very human aspect of life sharing.

But if there’s a shadow side to this moon, it is the way in which sensitive discourse is conducted in the social media sphere, namely as it pertains to race and politics. The congenial camaraderie indulged by millions is interrupted the minute we realize my work associate actually possesses some pretty divergent views from mine. Somehow it seems like the Facebook flagship has produced a false sense of inch-deep social comfort in which we can like, post and share so long as none of it breeches my presumptions about the world.

The death of Michael Brown was classically divisive. A teenage African-American male of questionable character is shot and killed by local law enforcement. It was a conflagration from the start composed of all of the usual combustibles… Race, Authority & Possible Abuse thereof and Media opportunism. During the waning months of 2014, I watched FB chatter as people launched their flaming arrows masquerading as arguments into a night sky of disoriented discourse. Rather than exchanging ideas, people angrily sketched out circumventions that only told part of the story. People “unfriended” people, which is not so different from actually taking your ball and going home after day of play gone rancid.

I may have even been expunged from a friend list or two. For the record, I ain’t “unfriended” anybody over the controversial issues of 2014. It’s good to listen and even better to figure out how to communicate about significant issues with those who stand across the diameter from us. There are crickets chirping in social media as we avoid the hard shit. But we actually do well to silence the crickets with a noise that features a willingness to listen and understand. Listening doesn’t mean forfeiture of convictions. It just means we’re interested in hearing all perspectives and not defining society by a love for surface relationships. Historically, figures like Martin Luther King Jr., Aung San Suuu Kyi, Mohandas Gandhi and the like thrived in the difficult exchanging of ideas. They were resolute in purpose but also skilled in listening so that they might understand the complexity of transformation in a country like the United States of America. Leaders and their mobilized contingents know that life is neither easy nor devoid of hard conversations.

Crickets are notoriously disturbing when talking humans should be drowning them out. I’m sure there were crickets chirping when Jesus engaged a woman at a well who, during his time, was taboo for lifestyle and racial reasons. By moving past the societal norms of social interaction, he changed a life permanently and communicated an unconditional, unparalleled love.

Here’s to a 2015 chock full of frustrating dialogues and meaningful communication across divides. Here’s to not punking out on the chance to have conversations like never before. Oh…and here’s to talking to people you love about hard stuff and comforting those who need it.

NO RIGHT ON RED

by

Posted:

I knew I was going to be late to work this morning. I invoked the snooze sleep theft device because I had showered the night prior and needed only to select my day’s wardrobe from a mountain range of clean clothes that fills the canyon between my side of the bed and the west wall of the bedroom. Man I ain’t gonn’ lie. I don’t fold clothes. I step over them. I had been up with my son during the night and managed only that pseudo sleep as I gingerly rested in contorted positions trying not to wake that dude. But don’t trip. My clothes still wouldn’t have been folded even if my son slept all night. After feeling sorry for myself though, I rose.

I eventually ironed my clothes, dressed and headed to Martin Luther King High School, Home of the Wolves. Same ritual most days but today there was an accident on the 210 that slowed me up so I was utterly behind schedule and after realizing that I would be tardy, I radioed for help. I called our dear school secretary and asked if she could have someone cover my first period for 10-15 minutes until I arrived. She was down so I drove with a modicum of peace and no extreme urgency. That is, until I exited the freeway at Central.

It’s one of those “No right on Red” lights which behooves us and tempts us all at once. But I learned my lesson long ago about rolling those dice. Fat tickets do that to you when you send that check to the powers that be. But there was a driver behind me this morning who was anxious to turn. He stared, glared and darted onto my left flank to make the turn around me. I rolled down the window and mouthed, “No right on red man. Don’t do it.” I wasn’t being noble. I was being, well you know… I mean I think I was more obsessed with being right and by-the-book than saving a stranger some cash on a possible moving violation. At any rate, he looked at me trying to admonish and forewarn. With a scowl and no verbal reaction, he turned the corner despite the  red and was at another red light within seconds. I pulled up next to him. He still didn’t wanna chat. I guess sometimes you just wanna make that right on red no matter what the sign says. Who am I to suggest otherwise?

Can a Man Nurture?

by

Posted:

Somehow I got sucked into an internal mental scrimmage on the subject of male nurturing. I asked myself something I’ve never thought of prior to my son’s birth this past summer. I said to myself, “Self, do you think a man can or should be nurturing?” See I’ve noticed in 9 weeks that I’m drawn to my son like nothing I’ve ever experienced. I find myself laughing when he cries noticing the furrowed brow he already has imprinted on his forehead. I try to get in the pathway of his  breath because his mouth is so small and his yawns are majestic. I’m amazed by the strength of his legs as he starts a tantrum and kicks me in the lower abs where I need attention anyway. His bottom lip pokes out like mine and when he’s in a tirade, his arms become almost robotic in a slow speed wind that evokes such sympathy. I hold him and fight back the thoughts of the threats that will face him in a strangely inauthentic society that loves nobility but champions treachery by-and-large.

Me and the L ButtaPeople say they wanna gobble him up…weird! But I know what they mean. If they want to devour my son in that adorable baby non-cannibalistic fashion, multiply my sentiments by 1,000. So I haven’t worked out or hooped (played basketball) much in at least four weeks. It’s not that I don’t want to either. I’d just rather be home in the evenings. I like kissin’ my son and asking a 9-week old who can’t speak, “Does him have kisses for daddy?” I change diapers and it’s not nearly as bad as I thought it would be. Dont’ get me wrong; it’s a foulness all it’s own but I actually enjoy gettin’ him clean. And then with his weird sleep pattern, I grab him somewhere between midnight and 2 a.m. and we camp out in the front room. He sleeps on the “Boppy” pillow and I lay next to him to keep him from rolling off the bed onto the floor.

So can a man nurture? I ask because I think I can. But masculine initiation once preached to me another gospel. Men don’t nurture. They acquire, destroy, commandeer. Men, according to the old models, have an uncanny ability to treat a woman with the same regard as they would a whore while prizing the offspring he helped produce. Can a man speak life, be affectionate, be self-effacing before the most important audience he’ll ever captivate? It’s at least worthy of inquest I would think. See my inclination toward my son screams nurture even though his mother is very capable of maternal nurturing. She feeds him in that “exclusive” way that only she can, rushes to his aid, bathes him by herself at times. But Is there such a thing as nurturing that comes from the male? Can a male be defined less by his aged avarice and ego and more by a willingness to truly serve the needs of his wife and children? Why is it that the men I’ve known have largely exhibited non-nurturing behaviors? Why is this form of masculine induction par for the course, especially given that I doubt I am an anomaly? Men can nurture but they’ve been given an out. Nurturing is not expected from men…well at least not by the ones contributing to the archetype of a man who disengages from his children from about 0-3. Men may be able to nurture but they’re not at the parent conferences at the schools where I’ve taught. They don’t email. Kids don’t have photos of themselves and their dads on their notebooks. Men aren’t supposed to nurture and yet they are completely capable, right? And altogether my Lit and Composition students said, “That’s some damned situational irony Mr. C.”

Boomerang Life

by

Posted:

MangoSowing and Reaping, Golden Rule, Karma, etc. are the motivations we use for giving. We live for the law of the boomerang. But my neighbor’s gardener knocked on the door and asked my wife if he could buy some Mangos off our Mango tree. She told them, “NO!” with emphasis and proceeded, “You can have some Mangos but you don’t need to pay us.” Here comes the boomerang… The young gardener said, “Well let us mow your lawn and we’ll come back and tend to these dead Birds of Paradise.” So they mowed it and this morning they came back and the barter was on again. And truthfully, I wasn’t even trippin’ about the Mangos but I appreciated that kindness seems to beget kindness even in 2014.

Truth is a bastard.

by

Posted:

If Submission to Truth means giving yourself to proven, indisputable principles that often inconvenience you but lead to victory, then what is its opposite? The opposite of any submission is rebellion, revolt and outright refusal. So the antonym of submitting to truth is telling it to screw off.

Sometimes I ask people if they’d turn in a family member who had murdered someone undeserving. (I usually have to qualify the statement because people usually assume a family member would only murder someone who had it coming.) But invariably there’s a pause and with teens, a certain “plead-the-fifth” kind of silence. The scenario is uncomfortable for most of us. And we may define family differently but if you insert said “family” member into the equation, it undoubtedly arouses a dilemma.

That’s why truth is hard though. It requires a trade-off almost always. It demands decisiveness, positioning on one side of an argument. It alienates. It irritates. It presents risks that don’t guarantee you’ll have what you desire. It forces you to respond to your own temptations when they urge you, “Cheat.” “Don’t ask your cousin about her sexuality.” “Don’t tell your kids no and risk them hating you.” “Don’t ask your kids, spouse, friend, etc. for forgiveness. You know they ain’t gonna give it.”

I think we assume that truth is brutal and intentionally bent on destruction. We would never say that though. But maybe we only feel that way because of how candid it is. Truth is blunt and will ask what no one else will. “You gon ignore that breast lump?” “You plannin’ on gettin’ help with that ____________ problem?””How’d that divorce really feel?”

Truth doesn’t pretend at all and doesn’t need to create a false reality. It doesn’t fear falling out of good graces. Truth doesn’t even make promises of reward. Truth just IS. And the more blatant the truth, the more obvious it is that we have to submit. We are trapped in a sense. But along the way, and very early in life, we start struggling with intangible truths…things like honesty, fidelity, discipline and loyalty. See, truth was negligent. It is as if it didn’t account for facades and the deception of self and others. Truth knew that people couldn’t live without hope, integrity, tenacity and such. But it allowed us to think that we could skirt those issues and make the world think we had developed those traits. And so protecting the criminal family member or cheating to win often doesn’t offer consequences as immediate as say…revolting against the law of gravity with a leap from a freeway overpass.

Truth would seem to demand submission in some areas and not in others. What’s the deal?

The deal is that things aren’t always what they seem. Truth is truth because it’s consistent whether we’re talking about the tangible fact that humans can’t breathe under water or the intangible reality that people fake it everyday to look like they’re better than the next man. I guess Truth just has a chivalrous side. Must we always be forced to not jump to our deaths by ignoring good advice, forced to not become drunk with pride and forced to admit that racial and socioeconomic discrimination persists? Truth is a trip. Truth is what it is, as if to say, “I ain’t gotta say no mo’. I’m truth damn it.” And to that statement I say, “True!”

Invitation?

by

Posted:

IMG_1765You ever been good at something you didn’t wanna be good at? The easiest analogy is the NFL Tight End a la Tony Gonzales, dunking touchdown footballs over a goal post. You remember him playing hoop at Cal right? Then there’s Steve Nash with real soccer skills or even Mike J  1993-1995 with his deluded attempts at Major League Baseball. The last one was a stretch as I don’t think Mike for one second preferred baseball to destroying the New York Knicks and the NBA at large for nearly all of the 1990s.

Let me let you into my world though for a moment. Taking your own medicine is platitudinous but all too true. If you know my story you know I didn’t play nearly as much basketball as i wanted to during “my day.” (a pause…) I sat the bench pursuing a game I wanted to be renowned in playing. Then when I got the minutes I wanted, I was played out of position and pined after a guard slot. So I chased one then time ran out on me and I got married and shut basketball down. (Marriage is super dope btw!) But I started this 6ixth Man thing expecting to offer interior character preparation for athletes, any athletes. But I discovered a problem.

Most high school athletes aren’t committed to training and therefore too undisciplined to develop their inner core. So I shifted the focus to a focus group I’ve always wanted to impact, elite basketball players. But the struggle is real right so a bruh gotta eat and to make eating a reality I teach English at Martin Luther King High School. With whatever energy remains on weekends and evenings, I consider whether or not I’m good at the thing I’m NOT doing. What I’m currently NOT doing is effectively working with one elite basketball team. I was blessed to spend some time last summer with the coaching staff of the Oregon State Women’s basketball team who had one of their best seasons since the mid ’90s. But I was merely a fly on the wall as the Beavs killed this past season. They’re coached by some quality people and led by some phenomenal young players. So I’d hardly say I made an impact on their program. I haven’t yet truly offered the self-awareness that has taken me a lifetime to mine from a life dominated by a desperate allegiance to hoop.

Ph.D. studies begin at Gonzaga for me in June, my first son is set to arrive in about two months, and when the head coach at the high school where I teach resigned last week I felt somehow duped like I couldn’t take that job without some incredible loss to family and 6ixth Man research. So now what?

See I’m good at talking to kids, being real, slowing down the thought processes of adolescents but haven’t found a way to have the same success or even a sliver of similar access to elite athletes. In fact, truth be told, I can’t even get grown men to listen to me in recreational leagues when we’re smashin’ teams by 50. Could it be that the thing I wanna be good at isn’t my thing at all…at least not yet? For now I’m just trying to learn how to play my game even if it’s one less glamorous than the one I intended to play. Maybe I should quote dem kids and learn how to say, TFTI (Thanks for the invitation).