"He is only 7 years old, you're being too hard on your son." "You're like Michael Jackson's father (Joe Jackson), abusing your son."
"I hope you're not coercing him into living your failed basketball dreams."
Misconception - an idea that is wrong because it has been based on a failure to understand a situation. Yes, our coach-dad-player-son situation. Who would have thought that being a tough-loving-Coach-Dad comes with so much misunderstanding? But then again, if you're judging from the outside, looking in, it's evident that you will never live through the entire story; the actual truth and not just some make-believe story living in your head.
Many years before Amarion was born, I had a strong feeling that my first child was going to be a boy. I even had his name picked out when I was only 18 years old - Amarion of Greek origin which means eternal. To me, it was a perfect name for my first born because, back then, it looked like a combination of my first and middle names, Arnold and Mario. Don't get me wrong though, I didn't have any plans of having a child during my young adulthood years, but what I did remember was making a promise that Amarion is going to have the father I wish I had - an actively involved male role model who would say to me that I am still proud of you when I needed to hear it the most. At that time, basketball was one of my first loves, so I'd vowed to teach my son everything I'd learned about the game. It all made sense to me since I was thinking of how much easier my basketball journey could have been if I had a father who I could have spoken to when I was facing the many adversities in my life. But such is life. My journeys are what brought me here today, and it is what made me the proud and loving father I am. So, ironically, I've learned to embraced the absences of my past despite the void in my heart.
When people say to me that I should stop living my failed basketball dreams through my son's life, I've always been curious to know how does one jump to this conclusion? In 2013, after sustaining an injury that would derail my hopes as a professional basketball player in Europe, I decided to let go of my hoop dreams. I had had enough. It was one of the toughest decision I ever had to make. But I knew it was time to hang up my jersey and focus on achieving other milestones in my life. I hadn't touch a basketball until a year later, after Amarion was born in the month of November, 2014. Seeing a mini version of myself, I felt the need to introduce basketball into his world at a younger age, in hopes that someday we would share a special bond due to our love for the game. It was never about molding my son into some superstar athlete, but rather, creating valuable moments through our love of sports. Basketball has been a huge part of my upbringing, and all I wanted to do was pass along all of its valuable life-lessons I'd learned throughout the course of my life. And if he had no interests in pursuing basketball, I would give him the same love and energy in anything that he was passionate about.
In the summer of 2015, I felt the need to start-up a business called, ABC Skills Development, to assist in the fundamental develop of young kids within my community. Because of the lack of amenities and facilities within my city of Chestermere, I had no other choice but to collaborate with our local recreation center to gain access to indoor school's gyms. For some weird reason, profitable businesses weren't allowed to rent the school's indoor basketball gyms. Hence, I had to partner with our local, non-profit recreation center. Pursing a basketball trainer career, I felt like this was my calling and I had found a new joy and purpose in my life. I had such big hopes for this initiative, especially to help create college basketball scholarship opportunities for kids within my community with the resources at my disposal. Well, unfortunately, after 2 years of success, I decided to discontinue doing business with that same local recreation center due to a disagreement on finances. There's more to this termination but I'll just leave it as that for now. Let's just say, they kept on demanding a higher percentage of our partnership to a point where I wasn't able to feed my family. I was so disappointed it resorted to this outcome that I'd fell out of love with basketball. From there on, I said to myself that I will just wait to reintroduce basketball back into my life when it was time to train Amarion.
Leading up to Amarion's 6th birthday, he would constantly countdown the days until I'd promised to train him basketball. He was excited for that moment where he no longer had to shoot on his Little Tikes basketball net - the same net that my wife and I gifted to him on his very first birthday. However, Amarion was turning 6 years old in the year 2020, and mentally, I just wasn't ready to fulfil this promise. The Covid-19 Pandemic was a time that I'll never forget. In February, 2020, I remember when life was amazing and everything was going according as planned. My wife and I had just welcomed our second baby boy, Ajay, in the month of October, 2019; I had a decent paying job as a pre-board screening officer at the Calgary Airport; I also owned a successful comedy club business on the side; I'd launched 2 new books, "Mommy's Mini-Me" and "Patiently Waiting for Hope" and I had just started my children's book tour with my first stop in New York City; I was getting paid gigs as an author to read my children's books at schools or daycares. Then, one month later, our world flipped upside-down when everything got shut down due to the global outbreak of the Coronavirus. Everything I had worked so hard for had gotten shut down. I'd lost my day job and I was forced to cancel all my plans for my book signings in major cities in America, England and my birth country of Saint Lucia. Thousands of my children's book was printed to just catch dust. I was so depressed with the events that was occurring in our world. The lockdowns, limitations and restrictions were quite intense and I just couldn't fathomed the idea of this being my new normality.
"Daddy, will you ever teach me how to play basketball?" Amarion would beg me on a daily basis. On the outside, I put on a mask and pretended as if everything was going to be okay, but deep down inside, all I wanted to do was lay down in bed until this nightmare was over. Basketball was the least of my worries. Regardless of breaking my promise to Amarion, he still continued to demonstrate his love for the game by utilizing his Little Tikes basketball net, even though he had outgrown it. So, how did I go from completely losing my interest in basketball, to now being so enthusiastic as his trainer and coach? Well, let's just say, I wouldn't be here today if it wasn't for Amarion...
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What you are doing is amazing. You are a great father. The vision you have is beautiful and will come to fruition in it's fullest. There is no limit on how far Amarion will go!