When my high school days ended I was ready to do anything except sit in a classroom for four more years. My mother and my dad were determined that college would be my next priority. Neither of them had the opportunity to go to high school. So they were going to make sure that my brother and I were going to get a college degree. A few weeks after graduation a coach from a junior college in Lebanon Tennessee stopped by our store and offered me a small scholarship to play baseball, and promised me a chance to play basketball. With that carrot dangling before me I grabbed the chance to continue to play the sport I loved. There was one problem with my decision; my decision was to play baseball, not to study.
I had a great season. There were a couple of coaches from four year colleges that talked to me about playing baseball for them after I finished my two junior college years. However, at the end of my freshman year my grades were so bad I was ineligible to play baseball the next year. My mother and I decided that I would go to a school closer to home. Western Kentucky University allowed me to enroll on academic probation as a freshman. I really enjoyed my second year of college. As a matter of fact, I enjoyed it too much. My grades were not a bit better. A couple of weeks after that year ended I got a letter from Western that broke my mothers heart. I was not going to be allowed to return for the next year. I had flunked out.
I will never forget how hurt and disappointed my mother was. I watched her as she sat with that letter in her hands crying because her dream for me had been destroyed. I had failed academically, but worse than that I had failed my mom and dad. I had given up, but my mother was not about to throw in the towel. She called Western and got an appointment for the two of us to meet with someone that might give me another chance. The next week we met with Dr. Brown.
Dr. Brown was an African American man, and probably the only person that would have given me a second chance to earn my way back into school. I could tell my mother was nervous. It was the first time for her to be on a college campus. Her voice shook as she told Dr. Brown about her desire for me to get the education she and my dad never got. She told him about how hard it had been for her to even get that eighth grade education. By the time she finished she was crying. Dr. Brown looked at me, very sternly, and began telling me about the struggles endured by him to become Dr. Brown.
The day of our meeting was in June of 1968, and I was listening to a black man, with a PhD. in education working for the president of a southern university. For Dr. Brown to get to where he was, professionally, was almost a miracle. Those of us who grew up in the fifties and sixties remember how times were for blacks in those days. Dr. Brown didn’t say much about that. He didn’t even tell me how hard it had been for him, but he did tell me how hard it had been for his mother who had worked two or three jobs to make sure he got an education. He told me about her struggles, and her hardships. He told me about how his mother had sacrificed because she loved him and wanted the best for him.
I don’t remember the exact words that Dr. Brown used, but he said something like this to me, “Look at your mother! I don’t know her, but I do know that it took courage for her to come here today, and ask that you be allowed to come back to school. I can tell she has made sacrifices for you. She loves you and wants the best for you just as my mother did for me. You don’t deserve to come back to our school, but I’m going to give you another chance to prove to me and to your mother that you are finally ready to to do what you should have done two years go. I’m not doing it for you, but for your mother. You need to man up and do what a man should do. Do it for your mother, but more importantly do it for yourself. “
I was allowed to go back to school if I could complete a correspondence class and make at least a B before the fall semester began. I did take that course and was allowed back in school again on academic probation. My girlfriend, Sherri, who was later to become my wife, also enrolled at Western. It was her first year in college. My academic habits changed. I actually went to my classes. Sherri and I went to the library to study almost every night, I took my books, and I studied. The most amazing thing happened, I began getting good grades. I had over a three point grade average that semester, and for the first time in two and a half years I was off academic probation. I continued to get good grades for the rest of my academic career. It took me five years to get my degree because I had wasted those first two years. It only took Sherri three years.
I’m sure the key to my success had something to do with attending my classes and studying. Dr. Brown’s lecture helped. But the biggest reason was what my mother did. I did not want to hurt her again. I did not want to watch her cry because I had failed. I finally realized how much she had sacrifice for me, not just so that I got a college degree, but her everyday sacrifices because she loved me. I thank God for mothers who love their children so much that they are willing to do anything for them.
No comments:
Post a Comment