As I See It

AS I SEE IT

By

Thom Gossom JR.

Can we reconnect?

“We can never go backward to the ‘Good old days,” Betty told me. A quiet, deep thinker, Betty was on a roll,
enjoying the conversation. Intellectual curiosity she called it.

“Intellectual curiosity,” I quizzed.

“Being curious about things beyond the obvious, the surface, the partisan, the ideology, the labels, and the chatter on the daily talk shows.”

Our conversation started innocently enough in a Walden Bookstore in Pensacola, Florida. My scheduled book signing that day attempted to compete with the Southeastern Conference championship football game between The University of Florida and The University of Alabama.  The book signing and I were losing badly.

A rush of customers had come in early, but the mall and bookstore emptied as game time neared. Betty, a polite, courteous employee, 12 years my junior worried that I was lonely. We struck up a conversation. Initially, we tiptoed around small talk. Then we ventured into thoughtful talk, then current events and inevitably the “where did you grow up” talk which led to the “how good the good old days were,” talk.

“Were the good old days really that good for us all?” she questioned.

“Yes and no,” I concluded. “Individually what was a good time period for one was not necessarily so for the other.”

She nodded.  We climbed to higher, more common ground. We extracted what was good about our respective “good old days” and found the commonalities.

Betty, an enlightened thinker didn’t base her responses on ideology, politics or where she’d grown up, (in Ohio) or where she now lived, (Pensacola, Florida). Her opinions were based on research, intelligence, reasoning, and her overall experiences. She reasoned the good old days were more about how we treated each other, being neighborly rather than a distant next-door neighbor.

In our mutual “good old days,” we remembered the division between children, teenagers, young adults, adults, and seniors and how those divisions made stronger, more intact loving families. We remembered skills handed down to us by our parents, grandparents and neighbors. Skills that today still give us a feeling of accomplishment and self-worth. We discussed life philosophies such as working, saving and planning over time for our pleasures. No instant fixes. We discussed words like respect, integrity and dignity and how they were applied to those who earned them regardless of social position and not applied to politicians, slimy businessmen and women and/or criminals who abuse the privilege while trying to prove his/her innocence. We talked about having time to listen and being tolerant of others. Respecting others point of view.

Betty explained that all these things were the reason she worked in a bookstore. “Not for the money. Interesting people come in everyday,” she said. “I get to learn. I meet people like you and enjoy it so much.”

Betty had me thinking, but also a few others.

We had drawn a crowd of bookstore employees and a couple of non-football loving customers. The conversation was the hit of the now almost empty mall.

Then Betty threw it out there. “Maybe we can reconnect.”

How?

Betty started, “We need to remove or diminish distractions to our daily lives.”

“Distractions,” the blond twenty something year old, Amy asked?

“Yes,” Betty responded. “Anything that keeps us from reaching our potential in our daily relationships. Anything that we rely on other than ourselves, and those we relate to.”

“Technology,” Amy squinted her face together.

“Yes,” Betty answered, “Any technology that helps us do things faster but builds boundaries around our persona, like a privacy fence built to keep everyone out. We have to use technology as a tool. It cannot substitute for feelings, emotion, and understanding. How many times have you worried that an e-mail could be misunderstood because the emotion could be misinterpreted?”

A couple of customers quietly reached and turned their cell phones off. Betty smiled. In our 24/7 all-accessible phone, e-mail, text message, twitter world, Betty had scored a small victory. Our communication was enhanced by our ability to listen, to look into each other’s eyes, understand and respond with intelligence. “Just like in the good ole days,” I thought.

Can we reconnect? It was Betty’s question again.

Can intelligence, thinking, reasoning, reading, processing information and forming a reasoned opinion reconnect us amidst all the noise and chatter of talking heads, red state, and blue state divisions, hidden resentments toward those that are different.

Yes, we can. We agreed. How? With enthusiasm the suggestions started to flow from what was now a small crowd.

“Turn off the gadgets for a while, whether once a day, once a week, once in a blue moon. Try going gadget free for a day.”

“Rely solely on yourself for your relationship with yourself and others.”

“Refuse to communicate and be informed through intermediaries. That means give up the emotional media loud mouth that instead of inspiring you to think tells you what to think.’

“Give the ‘gotcha television journalism’ a break. It’s not about you anyway it’s about the pretty reporter, every hair in place, who breaks the story.”

“Embrace something or somebody that is different. We spend so much time with others like ourselves, until those that are different, become ‘those people.’ Don’t approach others with a ‘missionary’ mentality. The ‘different’ people may not need saving. Instead, learn from them, their life, what makes them interesting? What is it about the differences that make you see them differently?”

“Embrace someone’s viewpoint that is different from yours. You may learn something.”

“Remove some of the boundaries. Get out of your car. Ride a bike, or take a good walk. You’ll see the same houses and neighbors differently.”

“Renew hope.”

What a great signing! When my time was up, I said my goodbyes and hit the road hoping to catch the second half of the ballgame. On a high, I couldn’t stop thinking about the simple question that had made my day.

Can we reconnect?

Thanks to Betty, an employee at the Walden’s Bookstore in Pensacola, I’m willing to find out.

We could have gone to “the mountaintop”, the big stage, become media darlings. Instead, Auburn University, my alma mater, is again attempting to go “Back to the Future.”

Auburn’s first new head coach hire of the 21st century, is now mired in racial controversy. ESPN, CNN, and daily talk shows are having a ratings bonanza at Auburn’s expense. Damn, here we go again.

I, like most Auburn lovers, believed Auburn officials when they gave the impression they would do something bold in choosing the next head football coach at Auburn, maybe reach for the stars, command the stage, play in prime time, get the cutest girl on the block, get national billing on shows like 60 minutes, Jay Leno.  Big names were thrown around, Spurrier, Petrino, Houston Nutt; great upcoming coaches were interviewed, Johnson at Georgia Tech, Patterson at TCU. We had a chance to be on the digital, high tech, new fangled, world stage and what did we do? We chose cable.

We forced out a winning coach supposedly for a new sleek 21st century model of head football coach with all the accompanying bells and whistles. A coach that recruits five star players who not only want to play for him but emulate the coach in their young lives.

Here’s what the back room boys at Auburn did with this wonderful opportunity? They hired a guy with a 5-19 record as a head coach? They hired a guy who had jilted the University once before because he wanted to be a head coach and thought The University of Texas could do that for him better than Auburn. They hired a guy that suddenly sprang from nowhere. They hired a guy the majority of Auburn people didn’t want. They hired a guy that would have been fired in 1-2 more years at Iowa State. They doubled his salary. Finally, they hired new Auburn head coach Gene Chizik because according to athletic director Jay Jacobs “Chizik was a good fit.”

Look at what we could have had. The best new age, new media, bells and whistles, sleek 21st century model coach to come down the pipe this century is Turner Gill. Gill has turned the worst program in America into a league champion. On the field, he takes care of business.  But more importantly, he has the “it” factor. The brother’s got “it”. The “it,” that could have made Auburn a lead dog in the SEC sled.

Surprisingly, he agreed to talk to Auburn.

Gill speaks from his heart. He’s a shining star. He’s about motivating young men. Coming from small town Texas by way of Nebraska, he knows small town, rural, down home people. In my mind, the perfect “fit for Auburn.” On top of it all, the dude just happened to be black. Hell, we could get the best young coach in America, make Auburn, the number one news story right up until he played his first game next fall and made Auburn, the first top twenty college football program to hire a minority head football coach. We would be on the right side of history.  Imagine a recruit deciding if he wanted to just go to college and play football or if he wanted to make history while also playing football for an African American pioneer and a forward thinking University.  Every Auburn person I talked to white or black was fired-up about the guy. Gill’s skin color was just the cherry on top.

But Gill wasn’t a good fit for Auburn AD Jay Jacobs and the small band that guide his hand. The reasons for not hiring Gill were conjured up right out of the 1960’s. In other words, let’s find something he can’t do. The reasons I read were, “He did not have SEC coaching experience.” “Why didn’t his alma mater Nebraska hire him last year?”

The Auburn brass made a big show of interviewing Gill, “look at us ain’t we don come a long way.” By most measurable criteria and intangible characteristics, Gill is the better of the two candidates. But to them Gill wasn’t “a good fit.” Favored Auburn son, Charles Barkley and others are crying racism. Gill is black and has a white wife. Chizit is white and safe. At the introductory press conference for the new coach, Auburn’s President Dr. Gogue, did not bother to show up. His message “This is your show, Jay Jacobs. Your job depends on it.”

Can Chizik win? He should. He’s a good coach. Auburn has talent and can recruit talent. Although, I can imagine rival coaches telling young black men that the AD at Auburn says Gill did not fit at Auburn, then asking. Do you think you will fit there?

The back-room boys will make sure Chizik gets good coaches. If smart thinking makes a comeback, Rodney Garner will be hired from Georgia. Garner a former Auburn player is the best recruiter in the conference.

Given the same circumstances, Gill would win just as many games, but also put us on a national recruiting basis, which then puts us on a national championship track. He could walk into a recruit’s house as Nick Saban walks out. Auburn would rise to the top of the media parade. Imagine; Positive attention, for the athletic department, the alumni, recruits, fund raising, the University; 21st century thinking.

The Auburn faithful are deflated. Good friend Sherman Moon, an Auburn teammate from the 70’s says, “We were expecting, Clark Gable, Cary Grant, Brad Pitt, and we got Orlando Bloom.”

Chris Wilson, lovingly referred to as “Fat Daddy” in my memoir Walk-On says, “When I found out he had a white wife, I said, ‘I understand.’ Unbelievable.”

Mary Pope my down the street neighbor says to me, “you and Charles (Barkley) got to go up there (Auburn) and straighten them out.”

All three of these individuals are white.

Most Auburn people are upset. They should be. We are all stained by the alleged racism. Our university is stained. We are being dragged through the mud because a few good ole boys, a few gatekeepers, feel they know what’s best for us all. And what they think is best is to go backwards, to the good old days, a time gone by.

They are counting on the Auburn Nation being good Auburn people and falling in line and supporting the new coach and team. We will. That’s what Auburn people do. We support our team in good times and bad.

The latest incident reminds me of an instance from my memoir, Walk-On, concerning the decision to recruit Auburn’s first black athlete in 1968. One member of the then Auburn board of trustees questioned whether, “the state of Alabama, is ready for a black athlete?”

Auburn needs dynamic leadership. Visionaries that see the future, see down the road, not continually looking back over our shoulders trying to go backward. Memories are about yesterday. Dreams are about the future, tomorrow.

Walk-On, My Reluctant Journey to Integration at Auburn University, by Thom Gossom Jr, is available in Borders and Walden bookstores, J&M Bookstore in Auburn, The Zoo Gallery is Destin, Fl. and at walkongossom.com

By the time we made it to the elevator to transport us to the top floor of Jordan Hare Stadium at Auburn University we were both sucking wind and ready for a comfortable chair. We’d walked maybe a quarter mile, but when you use a walking stick because of shot knees and a bad back, and limp like old gimp-legged Chester in the TV series “Gunsmoke,” a quarter mile can be an Olympian feat. For the record my friend, brother and former teammate James Owens was the one hobbling along with the cane. I was doing the Chester imitation because of a knee that a doctor told me ten years ago, at age 45, looked like the knee of a 75 year old.  But hey, we made it to the President’s Suite and what a sight! It was my first game since the infamous 2002, reunion I speak of in my memoir, Walk-On. Thousands of shades of orange shone brightly under the nightlights of the Jordan Hare. Full, and plump from a full buffet, we sat down for a fun football game between my alma mater, Auburn and those dreaded tigers from the bayou, LSU.

While waiting for the pomp and circumstance to end and the game to begin, James and I tried to catch up on our lives. But well-wishers kept interrupting. Many know me from television and film work, the recent publicity on the book, and my days on the Plains as split end #49 with the huge afro. Some knew James, but not nearly enough, from his history making days as Auburn’s first black footballer.

James and I reminisced about our time together. We were Shug Jordan’s first two black players in the early 1970s when integration found its way to Auburn athletics. It’s a bond we’ll share all our lives.  We remembered the fun stuff. We laughed at the sorry second team offensive linemen Coach Pap Morris would daily dog cuss. “You are not a football player! You just want to walk around with the football players! You just want someone to say, ‘he’s one of the football players.’ YOu just want to get on the bus with the football players. But you’re not a football player!” We laughed about going to the Goal Post Grill and being served more hamburgers, fries and shakes than we could have ever paid for. With very little money we would come out with full stomachs and big happy smiles. Sadly, we remembered our brother, Henry Harris, Auburn’s first black athlete. We wondered what his life would be like today. James said to me, “He’d be proud of you.” I hope so. He and James were my big brothers in those dark days.

At halftime (I’ll get to the game) we ventured into the letterman’s lounge. I’d already seen many of my teammates. Bobby Davis and Jimmy Sirmans both linebackers, greeted me warmly. The lefthander, a good guy defensive end, Rusty Deen, was smiling as usual. Receiver Mike Gates and fullback Rusty Fuller, perpetual twins, jazzed me up. Gates again gave me a hard time about the car I sold him. I’m lucky they didn’t have the lemon law then. Randy Walls one of my favorites gave me a big hug. Randy, as a sophomore quarterback, led us to ten wins against one defeat in 1972. We became know as “The Amazins.” Coach Jordan proclaimed that team his favorite after 25 years of coaching, and our miracle 17-16 win over Alabama.

Among unsure former teammates, my memoir, Walk-On has caused a stir. Many were cautious in asking about it. One asked quietly, ”Thomas I was nice to you wasn’t I?” “Of course,” I said with my fingers crossed. Two concerned women, cornered me and blurted out, “I’m not in that book am I?”

There was one flashback to yesteryear. One of the former footballers, whiskey breath and all, felt the need to tell me and James and any one else who would listen, how he now felt like he was a black man and the one final wish in his life was to f— a black woman. “I feel black,” he announced.  He embarrassed his wife as he continued with his faux soul brother act. “Just one time I’d like to f— a black woman,” he kept telling me. We begged off and fled back to the Presidents suite.

The game: I’m sure the spread offense will get better, but will it be good enough to beat the better teams in the SEC? It’s hard to say, “yes” right now. The offensive coordinator says Auburn will throw the ball even more than we did against LSU. Hell, that’s a no-brainer when you can’t run. Don’t know what happened to the “Bow your neck up and shove it down their throats” lineman and running backs we had before. The personnel is still there. But the linemen are pass blocking NFL caliber defensive ends almost every play with no running threat. Hell, let’s run a dive so our guys can fire off and knock the shit out of them every once in a while. Mario Fanning doesn’t even carry the ball (enough said). Ben Tate, a good runner, spends his running plays trying to go east-west. In the SEC that’s a waste of a good down. If you ain’t hitting it north-south forget it. Tristan Davis fumbled once. That’s it for him.

The offense has been bad the last three years. Last year’s quarterback, Brandon Cox, was shot after the Georgia game of 2006. Offensive coordinator, Al Borges was very limited in what he could call with Cox. A pass over the middle had the whole stadium and AU fans watching television, cringing. The new quarterback wears Cox’s number 12. Enough said. If Kodi Burns can’t play alongside this guy, he doesn’t deserve a scholarship. Can 90,000 fans all be wrong? If Burns doesn’t know the system, the coach should teach it to him. That’s his job.

Also, forget the numbers. The numbers don’t mean anything. I saw the game. These pop gun offenses without a running quarterback can pile up big numbers and beat teams when you have the talent edge. The offensive coordinator says the quarterback played good against LSU. I saw the game. I hope he gets better.

At the end of the night, James and I boarded the elevator to begin the quarter mile trek back to the car. In the crowded elevator, a man struck up a conversation with James. “Did you play here,” he asked? “Yes,” James responded. He then asked me. I nodded, “Yes.” Another gentleman on the elevator pointed to James and told the inquirer, “He was the first.” The questioner didn’t get it. But, the other man didn’t go further, not feeling comfortable saying the first “what” on the elevator. Finally, I told the inquisitive man, “James was the first black football player at Auburn.” The man looked at James admiringly.

Walk-On, My Reluctant Journey to Integration at Auburn University, by Thom Gossom Jr, is available in Borders and Walden bookstores, J&M Bookstore and at walkongossom.com

I wheeled into the driveway of my condo complex after a grueling, mind-clearing Saturday morning bike ride along the beach. The Santa Monica sun climbed overhead, forecasting one of summer’s warmer days. Sweat poured over me. Literally exhausted, I unlocked the gate to the storage area. Then I saw Mary…

Mary was crying on the sidewalk in front of the building. It was a silent, but honest cry. There were no wails, no moans, and no big demonstration. She was just standing there motionless with quiet tears flowing down her cheeks and off her face. Immediately, I knew why. Mary had given up her baby.

Mary, a foster mom was on the sidewalk on the passenger side of a big, black expensive SUV. Another woman, I didn’t recognize stood in the street on the driver’s side of the vehicle; two mothers in love with the same child. The SUV, with Mary’s baby boy snugly and securely strapped in the back seat, separated them.

The two women’s eyes were locked onto each other’s. Mary had been here before; there was always sadness with her having to give up her babies.  But this time was different. She’d fallen in love with the baby boy. The new Mom was negotiating unfamiliar emotional turf. She made a heartfelt, earnest plea to Mary. “Call anytime you want to,” she said. “I mean it. Early in the morning, it doesn’t matter. Visit whenever you want.” Mary nodded through her tears.

Mary’s latest child, the baby boy now in the back seat of the SUV stole the hearts of the neighbors in our complex. Mary had other babies before, but this baby, with those eyes, and that smile, the self-awareness, became my favorite. He was our baby. He fit our little community until now.

My bike ride had been to flesh out some of my ”problems.” Simple situations complicated by unnecessary drama. Mentally and physically exhausted, I still had not settled on any “answers,” but, with the drama of Mary, the new mom and the baby cuddled into the back seat, I cancelled the sit-com running in my head.

The new Mom could not leave. She tried. She paced back and forth from the driver’s door then back to Mary. Once the new Mom actually reached for the handle, opened it and then couldn’t get in. She let the door slide closed again. All the time her eyes were connected to Mary’s. Finally, with nothing more to say, she got into the big vehicle.  The SUV with Mary’s baby rolled off down the street and into other lives.

Joining Mary on the sidewalk, I gave her a big hug.

She told me, “I’ve had him longer than any of the others. This is the most difficult good-bye.”

”Yes, he’s special.” I agreed.

I held on to her. She managed, “He’s going to a great family.”

We broke up our little pity party and headed to our respective condo’s. My mind, churning again, wouldn’t stop thinking of the baby boy. Born into some adverse circumstance he’d already gotten a lifetime of love from two mothers and a condo building full of well-wishers in just his first ten months of life. I hoped the love would continue to flow for him. I thought of the new Mom, a warm, seemingly loving human being, who was empathic enough to temper her excitement for herself, her family and their new loved one with compassion for Mary’s loss. My mind ran to Mary whose love is so strong, it allows her to give the babies up so others can love them as well. I tried to remember why I’d been so bombed earlier in the morning and I couldn’t or I wouldn’t. It didn’t matter anymore.

I’ve been given the word that Walk-On will hit the stores on September 9^th. Am I excited? Hell yeah! Excited for any number of reasons.

One, the moment I left Auburn University I knew I would write this book. Actually I knew it in my junior year. We were living through an historical time and I was fortunate enough to be aware of the journey I was on. We were traveling through the hills, valleys and mountainsides of desegregation, integration, and the dying breaths of racism. It was a trip of isolation, and loneliness, filled with the occasional high of a good time.

As excited as I am for myself, I’m equally excited to have honored the people who were there doing those times. Those brave souls who marched headlong into the new south and believed in the dawning of a new day. My Mom and Dad are two such people. I dedicate Walk-On to them.

Hard working, blue-collar parents, they bent their backs to make possible my dreams, my hopes, and my opportunities. More and more I’ve come to realize how fortunate my sisters and I were to live in a loving, encouraging, and psychologically nourishing household. My dreams and goals weren’t selected for me rather my Mom and Dad fertilized the hopes and dreams simmering in my head as a new world opened up in my home state of Alabama. A world they had been denied access to.

A search through old photos leads me to a cracked black and white photo of my Mom and me, as a fat baby boy. It’s my favorite picture of the two of us. My Mom is all-smiles through the cracks in the paper. The world lies ahead for her son and knowing her as I do now, she had already decided by then that she would give me the gifts of imagination, freedom to dream, a love for reading and unrequited hope for a better life.

Another photo of my, then thirty-two year old, Mom is a church portrait of our family. My Mom’s smile radiates through the freckles in her face. We’re all wearing our Sunday best, the five of us, Dad, Mom, sisters Donna and Kim, and me. “Hope and promise,” is what I call the photo. It’s evident in our faces. Yes, we were blue collar in regards to our financial resources, but we owned our own home, had plenty to eat, wore nice clothes and went to private schools. More importantly, we’d been taught to dream about a world our parents could only imagine. Daddy, the captain, was the vessel by which money came into our home. Mama, the first mate, was the conduit in terms of how our money was dispensed and what happened on a day in and day out basis.

There’s one final snapshot of my Mom. It’s in my head. It’s a snapshot of Mom’s last days with us as she struggled with that bastard, Cancer. It’s not a pretty picture. Mom left us in 2000. Need I say more?

The other half of that dynamic duo is the man I physically resemble more than anyone else in the world. I’m his spitting image. Sometimes at night, sitting before a droning television, I catch myself sitting exactly like him, my hands folded across my lap, nodding. Yep, just like him. My dad, now eighty-three years of age, taught me to be a good man and to work hard. He set his lessons in examples. He never came home drunk, never missed a day of work, never missed a night coming home, and never beat on my Mom. When we needed something he went out and worked for it, whether at his regular job, his night job, or doing plumbing on the weekend.

The photo of my Dad I’m most proud of is a solo shot of him picketing outside the federal courthouse in Birmingham in the 1970s. He was involved in a class action suit against his employer. He’d weighed doing what he thought was right against the possibilities that, in those times, he could lose everything at the whim of an angry white man. He chose to stand up, that lesson is still with me today. In 2000, my Dad lost his partner of 49 years and life will never be as good.

He is excited about Walk-On. The very first copy I get, I will put in his hands. He’s already told me, “I’ll get in my room, under my extra light, so I can take my time and read a little bit every day.” I hope he enjoys it.

“So what do you think of Barack Obama?” It’s the daily question for me, these days whether I’m at the YMCA, over lunch, at screenings, visiting my Dad and for those who need a little courage, in happy hour settings after a libation or two.

Some of the questioners are Black California transplants. In diverse settings, they ask the question in a stealth manner with an assuredness and a sly smile that says they already know my answer. If faces could wink, theirs would blink and say, “We’ve got a secret.” Quiet optimism is their calling card.

Surprisingly, in the South, where I’m from and have spent the majority of my life, my Black friend’s questions and reactions are very much the same as the California Blacks, with the exception of the execution. They ask the question in much lower voices, almost a whisper. They do not want to be overheard. If Whites are present, a verbal discussion is foregone and replaced with stealth, unspoken communication through the eyes.

Many of my questioners are Whites eagerly seeking me out to answer the hot button question of this year, “Thom, what do you think of Obama?”

I’ve always tried to be approachable on the subject of “race” and “ethnicity.” Reasonable is the word my white friends would use to describe me. Translation: I’m not quick to pull the gun of racism from my holster, simply because you express your opinion.

What has become more interesting to me than the question itself is the divide between my white friends in California and those in my home state of Alabama and Northwest Florida where I reside.

With the whites the great divide of red states and blue states is evident. In Los Angeles, discussion of and support for Obama is aggressive. The enthusiastic questioner asks and answers in the same breath, conducting his or her own discussion while I standby. Others will flash their Obama T-shirts at me. “I’m cool,” is the inference.

I must admit it takes some getting used to, hearing the glee in their loud voices as they proclaim their love and support for this bi-racial man who wants to take the U.S. in a different direction from whence we have come the last eight years. 

Many of these whites are both angry with George Bush and proud of themselves that they can express their positive opinions of “a man of color.”

In Los Angeles, I encounter few Obama non-supporters. The ones I have wear the “chip on their shoulder” that comes with being in the minority. It makes you angry when no one wants to hear your opinion, because it’s unpopular.  

In Alabama, among my white friends, the question is asked in an almost whisper and there’s genuine interest in my answer. On election night, Alabama is one of those states that will be declared for McCain right after lunch. For my white friends who are for Obama, reassurance means they are “doing the right thing, based on their beliefs.” Still doing the right thing has to be tempered with a secrecy of quiet, almost undercover public discussions with the obligatory look over the head to make sure no one is listening. Loud support, T-shirts and yard signs are for the flakes, the untouchable rich, the intelligentsia and the intelligent poor.  Belonging to the club is still a life priority.

Some will tell me “I still haven’t made up my mind.” I shrug, don’t push further. The depth of friendship means I know they have made up their mind but are not comfortable talking to me about it, which I respect.  A discussion of the issues and positions won’t change any minds. There’s a darker issue at hand here.

Northwest Florida is still Bush Country with the exception of a minority of vocal Democrats and Independents who refused to join the white flight migration to the Republican Party in the 1980’s. Heated and vocal arguments between my Democrat and “conservative” friends always end with both holding firmly to their position.

Still, after eight years many of the Bush supporters are quietly pissed that they and he got it so wrong. But that admission is shared solely between them and those like them. In these cases, we avoid politics unless courage can be found at the bottom of a bottle. Avoidance makes for better friendships. When we find ourselves heading down the divided road of politics we quickly leave it alone. Those conversations generally end with one of them declaring, ”I’m not for either of them.”

“Right,” I nod.

He left home 40 years ago this month, traveling east then due South to Auburn University to pursue his passion, grow into manhood and make history. He made history.

His story is one of those sad, let’s toss it by the wayside stories. One of those, “Why you want to keep bringing him up?” stories. Obviously, his story is more important to me, and to some others, than it is to those who’d rather not hear about Henry. Too bad!

Henry Harris accepted the challenge of integrating Auburn University and deep-south college athletics “for the old folks.” He left home, his calling card and meal ticket, the game of basketball. He could not have imagined the price he would pay so others could play.

During those dark days of the crumbling walls of segregation and newly found civil rights, Henry Harris made a quiet history that has been long forgotten by many. He became the black athlete, the darker brother in the Auburn University uniform when it was still a rarity, when there was still a quota for the number of blacks per team and how many could be on the floor at the same time. He understood his responsibility to us, those athletes that came behind him. We had “to make it,” so that Charles Barkley, Bo Jackson, Cadillac Williams and others could be possible.

Henry Harris and I were friends. In the early days of our relationship, we were closer than in the latter days. But we were always friends. He always felt my row in life was a little easier to hoe than his. It was. Still the role of pioneering black athletes in a conference, state and region that was itself adjusting to a new way of life, was our commonality. In 1969, James Owens signed at Auburn as the first Black Football player. In 1970 I followed James.  We became the three black Auburn University athletic pioneers. Our challenge was to “make things better.” Plus, we got to play a little ball.

In those days, athletes were more socially conscious. We didn’t worry ourselves with dreams of big contracts. There were no under-the-table shoe deals. We were responsible for our own self-esteem. Our job was to clear a path to integration out of thorns and coarse weeds with our bare hands for those who followed. We knew that and were reminded of it daily. 

It’s been over 30 years since I last laid eyes on my friend. He never saw his thirtieth birthday. Still, I’ll never let him die.

He gave to me and every Auburn University black athlete, and every black athlete since, in the state of Alabama, a chance to play ball on a level that had been denied before he accepted the challenge of integration. His star shined intermittently at Auburn. There were good days and bad ones but not many happy ones. The burdens he carried, representing all the black and those white people who wanted and who needed the social experiment to succeed, were a daily load. But he bore it for those of us who followed. Those of us who remember, who understand what he did for us will never forget.

I’m in shock. Caught totally off guard.

One of the soul pleasing aspects of writing my memoir Walk-On is traveling back into time, looking at the life I lived as a twenty year old, now that I’m fifty plus. There has been joy, some sadness and many laughs but, until now, there has been no shock; up until now.

Reading the May 1^st issue of the New York Times, I learned that an old football nemesis from the University of Tennessee died six years ago. I didn’t know Jackie Walker personally. I only knew him as a fierce, talented football player who made All-America at Tennessee, the first African American in the Southeastern Conference to do so. As a senior in 1971, with just three blacks on Tennessee’s team, his teammates thought enough of him to name him captain. He still holds the NCAA record for returning interceptions for touchdowns. At Auburn, when we played Tennessee the entire offensive game plan was geared around trying to block Jackie Walker. Bear Bryant at Alabama designed the “Jackie Walker Play” to contain Walker by having three men block him. He was one of the best college linebackers I’d ever seen.

I found out in the Times, that Jackie Walker was gay.

I’m being honest when I say I’m shocked. Am I being homophobic by not imagining this great football player could be gay? I’m sure there is some of that. But more relevant to the topic I’ve been researching, I’m trying to imagine what his life was like being one of the pioneer African Americans football players in the Southeastern conference and gay.

I know the loneliness and isolation I felt being one of only two blacks on Auburn’s 1970-1973 football teams. I remember the secret lives I had from the coaches and administrators. Secret lives that included who I dated (especially if she was white). Secrets about how I really felt about things that happened or did not happen on the field, the lack of social life and what it was like to have teammates but not many who were friends.

I can only imagine the secrecy required to hide the stigma of being a pioneering, black, gay All-America football player in the Southeastern conference in 1970. That would be a tough act, even today. According to the article in the Times, after playing ball at Tennessee, he lived in Atlanta and made no effort to hide his sexuality. He had little contact with Tennessee and returned only for visits with family and friends.

This week, almost four decades after his football exploits and six years after his death from AIDS, Jackie Walker will be inducted with the latest class into the Knoxville Sports Hall Of Fame. There are questions as to why it has taken so long, when others of far less athletic notoriety have gone in before him. Did his sexuality have to do with the delay?

His brother Marshall Walker thinks so. As a matter of fact when Jackie was dying of AIDS in 2002, Marshall made a pledge to Jackie that he would get him into the Greater Knoxville Hall of Fame. Jackie Walker, never thinking it would happen, laughed. But it has happened and many say it’s past time.

Testimonials from friends, teammates, and others describe a man, well respected and liked both on and off the football field. Upon finding out he was gay, old teammate Jamie Rotella said, “I was totally shocked. But it didn’t affect the way I admired and respected him. We were confused, but everybody had too much respect for Jackie, for his character as well as for his football play.”

David Smith, a co-worker in Atlanta, describes Walker this way. “Jackie Walker was like a brother to me, just a wonderful friend. My kids called him Uncle Jackie.”

“Jackie was a great football player. But I knew him after football, and his football accomplishments pale compared to what a great person he was.”

Marshall Walker says of his brother, “Football was never the end all for him. Playing sports wasn’t going to make or break him.”

I wish I had been lucky enough to get to know him.

I get at least one to two calls and/or e-mails a week from former teammates and friends with ideas and suggestions, for my upcoming novel Walk-On. They’ve all got a story to tell. “Hey Thomas, do you remember…? ” Many of the stories I’ve forgotten or never knew in the first place. Many of the stories I can’t repeat. They’re the best ones. Most of the guys don’t want them repeated.

Here’s a sampling of some of the ones I can tell. I got this one from Tommy Morales, now living in Nashville. “Because I’m Cuban, they didn’t know what to do with me. My first year all the brothers lockers were in a small dingy locker room separate from everyone else. Because I’m dark they put me in the locker room with the brothers.”

Mike Flynn sent word to me from Miami through Chris Wilson. Flynn wants to know, “If you are going to use the story of your stepping out of bounds and scoring a touchdown against Alabama and having it called back.”

Wilson wants to know “If you’re going to tell the nutty buddy story.”

Good friend and neighbor, Sherman Moon offered a copy of the senior photo we took before our last game at midfield with Coach “Shug” Jordan. Sherman has also been my fact checker. He remembers many things I’ve forgotten. Terry Henley tells me, “The two worst days of my life was the day I found out there was no Santa Claus and the day I left Auburn.” There have been many others along the way.

Walk-On has become a reunion for many of us, a great opportunity to catch up on the good old days that we’d only catch up on among ourselves. It has allowed us to look back individually and collectively. We are boys again; full of bluster and braggadocio without dragging the baggage and responsibilities of today along.

Exploring our past from various angles and points of view has yielded numerous nuggets for the book and warm memories for our souls. I’ve been pleasantly surprised at how easy it’s been to go backward as I go forward.

I look forward to continuing the journey.

Can you go back again? Can you walk through a path of life you’ve already traveled? Most would answer no. I would be inclined to agree. But then again, there are exceptions to every rule.

This past August I got the opportunity to go back. To travel through my past to a time when, as a young man, I participated in a culture change in the state of Alabama that permanently altered the state, my life, and the lives of many others.

Was I able to transport myself back in time through some whacky futuristic time machine? If that machine is a computer then that answer is yes also. You see for thirty years I’d pondered writing about my experience as a walk-on football player at Auburn University. A successful walk-on is of interest but this story is more compelling when you factor in the fact that there were few Black Players on Southeastern Conference football fields. On most, there were none. There were so few in fact that I became the first Black athlete to graduate from Auburn University.

What a time! The wave of change was happening so rapidly in our society it was enough to catch the wave and ride it out to wherever it took you. And, what a ride!

I, like most young men with choices, opted to defer my military obligation by going to college. Brave young men were honoring the “American Dream” in the jungles of Vietnam. My “American Dream” meant I got to cross barriers, open doors, and pave the way for generations whose ancestors had been denied opportunity. I do not compare it in any way to being shot at in a strange country. Yet it was exhilarating and made a contribution to our society.

In August of this year, I signed a book deal with Borders Books to tell my story,

Walk-On^©, for publication. It is set for publication and release in summer 2008. It will be sold nationally, exclusively in Borders Bookstores.

Walk-On^© is the story of one young man’s dream. My dream. A naive dream to play football at Auburn University in a time when Black players had not crossed that threshold of opportunity in most major Southern Universities.

There is so much more. The 70s were such an exciting time. The resignation of a President under a cloud of suspicion. That resignation broadcast live on national television. Closer to home, parents were faced with the decision of whether or not to send their children into a social experiment of cultural change. Young people clashed in the streets for what they believed. The admittance of the first Black man into Auburn University was conducted under armed guard. In my case, my parents faced a quiet fear as I ventured into the unknown. Later I would experience the young death of one of my soul mates in the athletic dormitory. There’s also the almost indescribable fear, isolation, and loneliness of being a pioneer.

The tag line for the memoir is:

A coming of age tale of overcoming adversity, gaining success, losing it, regaining it, and in doing so making history: A literal history of the integration of Auburn University and SEC football in the cultural changing south of the 1970s.

The story is compelling; a great read, and is much, much more than a sports story. Look for it. Take it along on your next summer’s vacation. Travel back to the 1970s, with me when the country changed for the better for all of us. It’s a fun read. If you were there, you’ll remember. If you weren’t around yet, it’s a great history lesson.