How I Was Built for Fatherhood
BY MARTIN DUNKLEY
I’m excited for my freshman year of high school. Finally, my life is coming together. I grew up in a dysfunctional home; fighting between my parents is the norm, and violence isn’t off-limits. If you aren’t my mother, I don’t have faith in your word. But, now I have a scholarship to St. Raymond High School, and I’m celebrated for my talent as an athlete.
Tonight the cafeteria is decorated with streamers and balloons for the dinner and ceremony to meet the person paying for our education. My mother and I find the table with my name assigned to it. As I sit down, I scan the room, catching one smile after another, one hug after another. What a wonderful feeling hearing the laughter and the murmuring of voices flood the room. I’m excited. “Who will my sponsor be? What will he look like? How will his presence affect my life?”
In the midst of all of my daydreaming, I don’t realize an hour has passed. I turn to my mother and say, “Ma, let’s get something to eat.”
Much of the night passes us by, and I am tired of waiting. Everyone else is enjoying themselves. Where is my sponsor? Reality begins to set in. I’m not going to meet anyone tonight. Much less a sponsor! Sitting there fiddling my thumbs, I began to feel something all too familiar. My sponsor's pain and disappointment, not showing up, feels like the pain I’ve come to expect from my own father.
My dad is a strict disciplinarian who was physically abused by his father. He speaks of those hard times often. He tells the story of his dad throwing him to the floor and stomping on his hand, intentionally disfiguring his thumb for life. I feel his stories to my core. My dad had a hard life. Yet, I don’t realize until later in my life that he is as abusive to his children as my grandfather was to him.
Of all his 15 children, I’m raised with him the longest. You would think that means I get the best of him, that’s what my siblings think, but that isn’t the case. Our relationship is confusing from the start.
On the one hand, he gives me ANYTHING I ask for, and we have talks that stay with me to this day but then, practically in the same breath, he says he hates me and that I will grow up to be a faggot, and I should step in front of a bus. One moment, I feel he loves me; the other moment, I KNOW he hates me. He never confirms the love part.
I promise myself that I will never be like my father. The problem is, I don’t have anyone to show me how not to be like him.
That evening in the cafeteria, my sponsor never shows, but I meet someone named Tom Pura, a white man and the chairman of Goldman Sachs. Tom becomes one of those adults who says they see my ‘potential,’ something I can’t see in myself.
What does this man see in me? I ask myself? A kid from the Bronx is sleeping in a furniture store on a pull-out couch because he doesn’t have a home. I’m reluctant to trust anyone, but something tells me this is different.
I find out that, like me, Tom is one of many siblings. Growing up, they lived in a small apartment, and there were nights he didn’t know where his next meal would come from. Yet now, he is a multi-millionaire, running a billion-dollar company and happily married. My struggles don’t feel so rare when I talk to Tom.
Tom becomes another person on my list who I can’t let down. I have to make him proud. I think that he’ll tell me how proud he is of me on my graduation day if I get into the NBA or become some lofty business owner. But, instead, Tom tells me when I least expect it. It happens during this one special weekend when I’m one of the luckiest teenagers in the world. Tom invites me to spend the weekend with him and his family in Bedford Hills, NY. His house is a mansion with eight bedrooms and a bridge that leads to another wing of the house. A far cry away from a storefront and pullout bed.
I meet his wife and 6-year-old daughter, Sarah. As it gets later, Tom walks me upstairs to where I will retire for the night. Thank god he did because the place is so big I’d probably be missing till this day. Tom says, “You can sleep here.”
I sit on the bed. His daughter walks in and jumps on the other bed! He walks over to tuck her in. I’m in shock. I say, “Tom, Sarah is staying in here with me?” He turns around at the door and says, “Yeah. Good night, guys,” and smiles. My next thought is, “These white people are crazy.”
The next morning starts early with apple picking. Then we learn how to take those apples and make an apple pie; somehow, it tastes so much sweeter when you’ve picked the ingredients yourself.
Later that day, a large group of disabled children starts pouring in. Awaiting them is a white horse with the longest white tail and mane I’ve ever seen. A beautiful carriage trails this horse, and the kids line up, one by one, for a ride. I watch in amazement. I feel inspired to spread this kind of joy as well when I become an adult.
I walk across a green lawn that looks so perfectly cut; it resembles a carpet. My steps and thoughts lead me up the hill to a place I always feel safe; a basketball court.
I’m truly happy, basketball in hand, surrounded by positive vibes. For the first time in my life, I can think clearly. I step back to take a jump shot and hear a soft voice, “Can I shoot too?”
I look down. A little boy is standing there; one of the children invited to the house for the day. I hand him the ball gently. As he takes his first shot, he struggles to hit the rim: one more shot and another bad miss. “Come here,” I say, and he walks over to me eagerly.
I grab the ball, hand it to him and say, “Okay, hold on.” I lift him high above my head, towards the rim. He dunks the ball! He screams with joy and runs in circles when I put him down.
Another child comes over and asks me, “Can you do that for me?” Then another, then another and another. Before I can blink, I’m surrounded by 20 children! I especially remember the ones on the plumpy side; my back won’t let me forget! Regardless, every child gets their dunk; they all get their shot.
Tom has been watching us from the steps, and he comes over to save me.
“OK, guys, let’s give him a rest,” he tells the kids. He puts his arm around my shoulder and smiles at me as he escorts me through the sea of children. I remember that smile; it was the same smile he gave me before he said goodnight to me as he trusted me in the same room with his daughter. He saw something in me I hadn’t seen in myself.
He sits me down and says, “Martin, I’m so proud of you and what you’ve accomplished thus far; you continue to fight when many of your peers would have given up.”
He laughs at the puzzled look on my face. I don’t know what I’ve done to make him proud. I don’t understand, but I take it in. This man trusts me.
Although I never look at Tom as a father figure, I appreciate his energy and interest in me. Tom is the one who showed up for me when I had no sponsor the night of my ceremony. This is the man who says, “Martin, I’m proud of you,” when my own father couldn’t.
For a long time, I don’t understand the struggle I have with my father. Honestly, for a long time, I don’t even know there is a struggle. But I’m confident that I will be a better father because I have the recipe; do the opposite of everything he did.
My father never said, “I love you,” so I annoy my children with lots of I love you’s. He hardly supported or attended my events, so I do my best never to miss any of my children’s events. He put strangers before his own family. I will always put my kids first.
When my kids were younger, I would whisper, “You are incredible, you are a queen” “You are beautiful” in their ears as they slept.
I believe I have the ability to speak life into my children. At times, it feels like the only sure thing I know how to do. I feel that confidence deep in my core. I believe I was built for it.
Martin’s story was originally written and performed as part of TMI Project’s Black Stories Matter program. Black Stories Matter provides Black-led true storytelling workshops where Black folks can write about, share, and reflect upon their experiences without having to justify, explain, or defend the truth of their lived experiences. The culminating content — written stories, live storytelling performances, videos, and podcasts — is accessible to an all-inclusive audience.
