A long walk in these shoes

I am struck, or was struck, by the image of my stilettos- turned sideways and upwards- across the room, with their gold foot-bed glaring at me, as if to suggest that I should still be out, on my only night off, wearing them to fruition.

I wrote this on 2/11/07 after a brief night out, alone, having a glass of wine at a local bistro where I knew the bartender and most of the staff. I remember sitting alone in my apartment on the cold hardwood floor with my laptop, still wearing my chic outfit- minus the shoes. (I think I may have been smoking a cigarette out the window against my own house rules). I was lonely and slightly depressed, and by no coincidence in the mood to write.

Now, over a year later, I have to stop myself from smiling when I read this. How young- how immature, and how utterly selfish I sound.

From my perch on the couch, I can see a pair of chaco sandals, a muddied set of New Balances, a brand new pair of Ecco tennis shoes and my favorite Wicked Good Slippers (and yes, they are). In place of a hip sweater and designer jeans, I have chosen terry pants and a thermal shirt (please, do not call the fashion police- yet). My hair has not been washed in several days... so I switch off from my Boston Red Sox cap to a sage green bandanna- headband style. Needless to say I hope to accomplish that small task today.

A Testament to Motherhood

Yesterday, as I sat in my robe, warily listening to the baby monitor, I realized that my living room had become a testament to motherhood. The mess around me spoke volumes. Plastic fish that sing, teething toys that don't work, rattles, a boppy pillow, swing, rocking chair, play mat, burp pads and bibs... booties, hats and a laptop perched on top of American Baby magazine.

The battle between my type A personality and OCD tendencies against what I call 'Mommy Fatigue' raced back and forth in my head as I sat quietly in the chair, alone and still. Alone. And Still.

The next thing I knew, my eyelids where heavy and the baby monitor buzzed, bringing me to full attention. Without another thought toward my living room, I walked down the hall and smiled. "Hello little guy, you hungry?"

Near midnight of the following day, the fish and rattle lay near my laptop and a pile of clean clothes is piled on the couch. There is a blanket- no, two- on the rocker and the green monster that plays "Twinkle, Twinkle" sits eerily near my right shoulder.

Tomorrow, I vow to put away the basket of laundry that has been sitting on my bedroom floor since last week. Perhaps I should do my taxes as well...

A Salute to Single Moms

My friend Bonnie emailed this article from the Memphis Flyer, published the week of the final four championships. At its core is the truth that single women, no matter what their socio-economic status, can raise strong, successful men. And our Tigers are a perfect example. Thank you for sharing, Bonnie.

According to the National Center for Health Statistics, nearly 70 percent of African-American children are born out of wedlock. That does not necessarily mean that the fathers play no role in the children's lives, but often they wind up not doing so. According to the Memphis men's basketball media guide, four of the Tigers' six most prominent players (Antonio Anderson, Joey Dorsey, Derrick Rose and Shawn Taggart) have one parent, and it is a female.

Certainly this is not any of these players' faults. Nor is it the media's. However, how much more comfortable is it for a writer to sit down next to a complete stranger and ask him, for example, if he ever sat onstage while his uncle sang "Good Vibrations" than it is to approach another and ask, "I see you have three brothers. Are all of them from the same father?"

And when the player is black and the writer is white, as is so often the case, how tense might that moment be? Is the writer being callous if he asks the question? How lightly should a scribe tread when interviewing a player whose father is not listed in the program? And what if that absence or presence has much to do with how that athlete became the player or person he is.

(An aside: There was a Notre Dame football player of recent vintage who has the same surname and plays the same position as a former NFL player. And the two bear a resemblance to one another. The surname was not his mother's. No one, though, ever asked him if this was his father.)

And so, Tyler Hansbrough, North Carolina's mow-my-lawn-and-date-my-daughter three-time All-American, has been on the cover of Sports Illustrated twice this season. Hansbrough's dad is an orthopedic surgeon (a respectable career, quite) and when SI ran a feature on Psycho T last winter, Dr. Hansbrough was quoted at length.

Kevin Love, UCLA's freshman All-American who appeared on a regional cover of SI this week, has precocious old-school talent. He also has irresistible feature angles. His dad, Stan, played with the Washington Bullets and Los Angeles Lakers. His Uncle Mike played with Brian Wilson, among others. Rare is the feature writer who has been not succumbed to dropping a "Be true to your school" or "God only knows what they'd do without him" line when penning a feature on the All-American.

The media loves asking players such as Hansbrough and Love about their families. Maybe even more, we thrive on contacting those proud dads and asking for their most cherished memories of their golden children. It's the DeNiro principle of sportswriting: Meet the parents.

How to meet the parents, though, if you do not know who they are? And so, too often we media types, from beat writers to the talking heads at ESPN, gravitate toward those we find more accessible. More like us. In the process we foster the danger to which Martin Luther King, Jr., alluded.

For, if Tyler Hansbrough and Kevin Love (who, make no mistake, never courted this attention themselves) are All-Americans, then Derrick Rose and Joey Dorsey are the American dream. And before you decide to cheer for Kansas, even if it is subconsciously, because the Jayhawks have at least one all-American looking player who sees serious playing time (nevermind that he is in fact, Russian), it may be time to learn a little more about Rose and Dorsey.

Derrick Rose has three older brothers and no father. By the time he was in 7th grade, growing up in the drug- and gang-infested Englewood neighborhood on Chicago's south side, he could dunk. And the word about his prodigious talent was getting out.

Rose's brothers -- Dwayne, Reggie and Allan -- banded together to become that father figure. One of them almost always took him to school or picked him up. Attended his practices.

"When we were looking at high schools for Derrick," Dwayne told Sports Illustrated last fall, "we looked at how many gang areas he'd have to go through to get to school."

The Rose brothers decided on Simeon Career Academy, which is poignant. The school's gym is named after Ben Wilson, a former student who was rated the No. 1 prep basketball player in the nation entering his senior season. However, on Nov. 20, 1984, Wilson, who was by every account a straight arrow and well-liked student, was shot and killed on the eve of his first basketball game. The motive was purely jealousy.

At Simeon the tradition is that the team's best player wears Wilson's No. 25, which fit snugly on Rose. He led Simeon to back-to-back state titles, the first time a Chicago Public League school had ever done so. And when it came time for Rose, whose brothers prohibited him from speaking to the media (or most any other adult not in their family), to announce his college, he held a joint-press conference that included two teammates who were signing with the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.

"They deserve a press conference, too," said Rose.

Derrick Rose has five tattoos. He also had a 3.2 GPA in high school and a trio of older siblings (his mom, Brenda, oversaw his non-basketball development) who relished being their brother's keeper.

Joey Dorsey's father, Richard Griffin, parted ways with his mother, Charlene Dorsey, when he was still in the womb. Griffin and Dorsey occasionally saw one another for the first two years of Dorsey's life. Then, for 11 years, Griffin disappeared.

When Dorsey was 13, Charlene contacted one of his uncles and inquired as to whether Richard Griffin would like to meet his son. She was told that he would rather not.

"You can imagine what that did to my son," Charlene told the Memphis Commercial Appeal. "It crushed him. It crushed him."

In November of 2005, early in Dorsey's sophomore season at Memphis, Griffin contacted Charlene. He now lived on Long Island and was keeping track of his son's basketball exploits. Griffin asked Charlene if he might attend the preseason NIT at Madison Square Garden and see Dorsey for the first time since he was an infant. Memphis officials made the ticket arrangements ... and then Griffin failed to show.

No one in Joey Dorsey's family ever graduated from high school. By summer's end, if he keeps it real, Dorsey will graduate from college.

NCAA Championship and Mastitis

I was lucky that my baby went to sleep moments before the NCAA Championship game between MEMPHIS and Kansas. Aiden, Gram and I had all been looking forward to it... and G-Dad (Granddad, my dad) and Spanky (my brother) were in San Antonio, which gave us more impetus to watch the game. After the tip off, I settled in the recliner with a frozen baby washrag on my swollen, red breast. As titillating as the game was, I was distracted by the possibility that I may be fighting mastitis... and currently do not know the status of my health insurance. To take meds or not... thus the cold compress, massage and Tylenol approach.

This evening followed a long, harrowing day that leaves mommies achy and tired. My desire to enjoy a beer or two was overwhelmed by an increasing fatigue that can most likely be blamed on my son's early teething. Hence the wet washcloth in the freezer. (Which, after a painful cleaning at the dentist, I tried on my own gums and decided that it is definitely a natural pain reliever. Needless to say, this bizarre act had to be explained to my own mother who walked in the room as I was biting down on the washcloth).

It was a close game- and I was on the edge of my seat cheering on the Tigers- but my anxiety detracted from the excitement in San Antonio as I thought of Aiden's sudden nursing strike, a result of teething, that contributed to my breast pain. As preventable as mastitis can be, who has the time to pump, apply hot and cold compresses AND take several hot showers day? I mean- who is caring for this infant while moms do all that? Oh, wait- perhaps the father? The nannies (for the wealthy) or the grandmothers (for the lucky) which is thankfully my case today. As silly as it sounds, it is those moments- the goofy ones with a stiff frozen washrag on your boob- that make you miss your partner (or dream about a night nurse or full-time nanny).

and baby makes... two?

I did not go to college to become a single mom- or so I've come to joke. In fact, I had always tried to avoid the whole having-a-baby out of wedlock stereotype. It's bad enough I am a divorcee, but a single mom in the South is not something to brag about. To make matters even worse, my baby-daddy is a junkie. And that is not even the half of it- oh, yes dear readers, the plot thickens.

My baby's father is actually the former best friend of my ex-husband (are you still with me?). I shall refer to him from here on out as either The Relative or the Biological Fool, or simply the Fool, as 'biological father' denotes some level of intimacy that this man does not have with my child.

The Fool was in fact a groomsmen at my first wedding, and a longtime friend of my ex. Gradually, the Fool conned his way into my family, winning us over with his quick wit and charm. From the moment of my divorce, he was determined to weasel into my romantic graces. Out of what little respect I still held for my ex, I always deferred the Fool's advances. Based on what I knew of his sordid history, I also did not trust him. But I digress...

Once my ex-husband began dating my roommate, I was hurt and outraged. After they had been together more than a year (I even heard a rumor she moved in with him), the Fool advanced again and I thought, hell, turnabout is fair play. I am still waiting for a phone call from one of Jerry Springer's staff, although I am not sure who would attack who on camera. Given the opportunity, it would be a toss-up between my whorish former roommate or the lousy excuse of a man who shares my son's DNA.

I have to admit, it took some convincing, several beers and a love letter, when I finally said "maybe." Thus began a tentative romance with a man I knew to be dishonest, spoiled and egotistical to boot. Yet people change, right?

Looking back, my youthful optimism alludes me...in my defense, I worked sixty hours a week, lived alone with my cat and was, quite honestly, lonely. Okay, so I had not been laid in several months either but I swear that had nothing to do with it! I was tired of dating, sick of being alone and ready to have someone to share my life with, again. The possibility of exploring these emotions with someone who was already considered 'part of the family' was also tantalizing, and it felt safer, more secure than the average 'dates' I had for the past six months or so (ironically, all of these men were incredibly nice and respectable).

My surprise pregnancy can be blamed on one of two things: Rock Rabbit Savignon Blanc, Blue Moon and karaoke, or Man's Dislike of Condoms. My memory is fuzzy on this one... but my son's conception was in fact my greatest mistake- because I love him dearly and Aiden has enriched my life in ways that only a mother can comprehend.

Alas, my child awaits. Naps only last so long, yet they are a mother's blessing. To be continued...