The only people who were not assigned a room were me and a 6’1”, 300-pound guy named Tim Green. Tim was from Bainbridge, Georgia. I remembered him from the recruit visit back in January. He didn’t say a word to anyone, and he barely even spoke when someone addressed him. He was just a big, quiet guy.
I walked over to him after we were given our room assignments, and he still didn’t say anything to me. He just gave me a look, grabbed his bags and started walking towards the dorm. This is a crazy-ass mother…! We were in the room for a few days before he started talking. I still remember those days fondly, though, because once Tim got started, he didn’t shut up until five years later, when we left school! Tim was my brother! God brought us together on that campus, and we learned so much from each other. It turns out Tim also was crazy, but equally hilarious.
One night, freshman year, the upperclassmen decided to shave the heads of every freshman player. They went through the hallways kicking in doors, dragging people out of their rooms, and shaving their heads. Some of the guys even got their eyebrows shaved. They came to our room last. Why, I still don’t know, but that was a mistake. They’d given Tim time to get a huge knife out of his duffel bag. The upperclassmen rushed through the door, and Tim lunged at them, screaming, “I will kill all of you motherfuckas!” He then lunged harder, barely missing a couple of guys. They closed our door and returned later, knocking diplomatically and asking if they could negotiate a haircut! Tim replied that he and I would cut our hair ourselves, and that they should go to hell.
That was my brother. He wasn’t a politician at all, but he knew the value of a good negotiation. And just like back home on Linwood, a knife can be a valuable tool sometimes. It provides leverage when wagering.
Tim and I were roommates our entire time at FAMU, with the exception of one semester. Due to a clerical error, we were assigned new roommates in the second semester of our third year, but our rooms were right next to each other. My roommate for that term was a guy named Hampton, from Mobile, Alabama.
Hampton was a small offensive guard, but he had very good blocking skills. He knew football, but when it came to life, he just couldn’t get right! Seriously, he had trouble figuring out some key functions. For instance, on one of our usual nights of immense alcoholic consumption, he stumbled back to the room and passed out. I returned a few hours later and was met, upon entry, by the incredibly pungent, malodorous smell of shit. It hung in the air like a swamp. I turned on the light and found Hampton lying in a pile of the real thing. It was all over the wall near his bed, on his sheets, hands and clothes.
This had to be one of the biggest dumps he’d ever taken, and he was too inebriated to make it past his own bed. I went to get every ball player I could find to help wake his ass up. I used a stick, and started jabbing and yelling at him. He finally awakened, and stumbled to the shower to clean himself. The odor was stubborn. It overpowered the scent of soap. In fact, it never went away. I had to do something, so I went to the school’s Housing Director and negotiated a room change. Tim Green once again became my roomie. Hampton left school after that semester, and I never heard from him again. Every now and then, however, I still can smell him.
Those were just two crazy experiences at FAMU. The campus culture bore no shortage of shocking occurrences. I still remember some of the comments thrown at me, early on, when I encountered Southerners on campus. They’d cuss at us, and repeat themselves. But they’d change the attributions.
“You one of them Northerners.”
“You one of them Up-North dudes.”
“Y’all think y’all better than us. Forget y’all!” They were really aggressive. I’d never been in a situation like that. Plus, I thought I was a big guy until I got there.
“Dang, man!” I would say. “I don’t even know you, man!”
Of all the people on the football team, there were only four guys from the North—one from New Jersey, one from New York, another from Chicago, and me. It was a heck of a learning experience, but I always managed to get along with everyone, and it always worked out. That’s been a gift of mine all my life. I’m affable, and I look for the good in people. It’s always helped me diffuse aggressive situations, no matter who I’m talking to, or where they’re from.
Still, FAM wasn’t for the faint-hearted. Although many Southern African-Americans had more docile attitudes than those of typical revolutionary Detroiters, the proud, strong, aggressive and diligent nature of “FAMUans” always made me feel at home. Those currently enrolled were complemented by the tremendous number of graduates who had returned to work at the university or who held elected offices on the state and federal level. They routinely spoke to our classes, or to the football team. They emanated a kind of strength, perseverance and tenacity that was only matched by the spirit of Detroit, and that really drew me in. The men and women of FAMU truly believed that they had a responsibility to their community, and that they were born to serve. Those people, and that place shaped me, and made me who I am today. But it started with the discomfort of the dreaded first semester. I’d begun the journey to adulthood, away from my incredibly nurturing family and community, which gave me a firm foundation.
Detroit.
Man… Detroit had everything I wanted. There seemed to be nothing else at first, and the prospect of adjusting to another community during my freshman year only made me more homesick. Matter of fact, I left. I decided I’d had it and up and bolted FAM, driving home with a guy from Detroit. We were eating in the cafeteria and said, “Man, we hate this place. Let’s get outta here.”
It was a Tuesday at 6 p.m., and we literally left and drove home.
Non-stop. Sixteen hours.
We pulled into Detroit Wednesday morning. When I got to the door, my mother was worried sick because my coaches had called, telling her I’d disappeared. This was before cell phones. You couldn’t catch a man if he wasn’t sitting by a line. So when I got to her house on LaSalle Boulevard, she was worried. And she was mad.
“Oh my gosh! What happened?” she said. “What are you doing here!”
I said, “Ma, I don’t wanna go there anymore. That’s it. I can’t take it. Them some crazy folks down there, and it’s too hot!”
Mom was like, “Oooh…” She launched into me. Called me “sorry.” Asked me if I was a punk. That was the first time she’d done that. It really messed me up.
“You’re just going to quit?” she said, raising her voice. “What, you a punk?”
“Punk? I ain’t no punk!” I said, jumping to my own defense.
My coach, Conway Hayman, was the one who had been talking to my mother. “We got a ticket for him,” he told her. “Don’t even worry about it. Go on down there and put him on that bus.” I boarded a Greyhound at 10:00 that night, and rode twenty-seven hours straight back to FAM. Upon my arrival, Coach Hayman made me run to the airport every morning, for two weeks. The airport was almost eight miles away. And then I had to bear-crawl the whole football field, walking on my elbows.
Coach Conway Hayman was what I call certifiable. They should’ve locked his ass up a long time ago. He was an offensive guard with the Houston Oilers. He blocked for Earl Campbell. And he was our coach. A good coach, but he was crazy.
It would be 104 degrees, and Coach Hayman would say, “Oh, my God! What a great day for football! You know what I’m a do today? I’m a kill each and every one of you! I’m a kill ya! I want somebody to die, right out here on the field! So we’re gonna just run until somebody dies!”
What do you do? In that experience, you either grow up or die. It was just something that you had to contend with—we had to practice, running around with all that equipment on, and it just happened to be 96 degrees with 100 percent humidity. Guys were passing out. It was crazy, but it was either that or never get in any practice. I learned to overcome it because I had no choice. I learned then that in life you can’t run from anything.
By my sophomore year, Tallahassee felt like home. With the exception of trips to
Detroit during Christmas holidays and the Summer, I stayed in Florida. The football team always had a game on Thanksgiving weekend, the Florida Classic, against Bethune-Cookman. That’s a big game that happens every year.
A large contingent of students from Detroit attended the school. They weren’t on the football team, which was in essence its own community. That was a problem for me. I’ve never been able to function in just one population. I can’t do it—I need interaction outside of my own group, now and then. I needed to do different things. I wanted to act, go to plays, sing. I grew up playing the drums in church. I can’t be a black nationalist on the basketball court. I wanted to always be in several different communities.
That was the great thing about my parents. I believe I got these qualities from them. Although they subscribed to, and were very much a part of the Black Power Movement, they always believed that you had to have a wide range of opportunities and experiences. So I couldn’t just be a football guy. All they liked to do was hang with each other. And then, there were football women. All this insulation made me miss entire sects of campus life.
chapter 3
Interceptions
GIRLS LIKE Carlita Ebony Poles didn’t date football players. They thought we were crazy. I give myself credit—and other guys I played with will do the same—for pulling many of the football players out of that football-only mentality. I was the low man on the totem pole as a freshman, so I really couldn’t say anything, but I felt trapped in that football culture. Once I became a vet, my stance changed. “Nah, man” became my standard response to a lot of football-related activities..
My eclecticism probably drove people nuts, but there was a whole campus out there. There were the other parties to go to, and I had other interests other than football. There were also other girls, the ones who weren’t attracted to football. There was the occasional Epicurean Modeling Night, a talent show in which I sang (and don’t get it twisted; I definitely did my thing).
I give my teammates some credit, but they bought in when I started to do different things. They wanted to shed the football mentality as much as I did. I was just one of the first to step out there.
I had also chosen Political Science/Public Administration, with a teacher’s certification, as my major because I knew I’d eventually enter public service. A professor, however, advised that a teaching certification would position me to find a job immediately following graduation.
I pledged Alpha Phi Alpha as a sophomore, another thing football players didn’t do. They normally joined the Omega Psi Phi fraternity. Alpha Phi Alpha, Inc., was the first of all African-American fraternities. It’s history attracted me—not stepping, not colors. African-American fraternities, for the uninitiated, are known for “stepping,” a form of dance derived from African boot dances. It’s driven by aggressive, hard-stomping, syncopated routines. And the art form is legendary.
Now, I don’t mean to brag, but the Brothers of the Beta Nu Chapter of Alpha Phi Alpha could step! We were too damn cold! Smooth, aggressive, well-rehearsed and united! We won state and national competitions. But as enthralled as I was by step, I was drawn by the lore.
Cory Brown, an Alpha from Chicago, stayed in our dorm during my first year when he pledged. He gave me the fraternity’s history book and said, “Man, read up on this. You’re a deep brother. You know about black men. Here, read this.” I did, and I was impressed.
History tells the story of seven black men who had a meeting on Cornell University’s campus in 1906. They decided to form a fraternity. Theirs was a unifying cause, centered around scholarship, empowerment and confidence, all of which were critical to any black student’s success, especially in an Ivy League school. They started the fraternity with the support of a woman, Annie Singleton, who allowed them to meet in her house. They convened secretly because, at that time, blacks weren’t allowed to engage in this kind of activity.
All of that background appealed to me. Psychologically, it brought the plantations to mind, to slaves who would steal away and learn to read and to the brothers who met in the lodge and committed to becoming Prince Hall Masons. Men, on the sly, started building institutions to protect their wives, their women and their children. That sense of history really appealed to me.
The fraternity they started has hundreds of thousands of members today, and it spurred the growth of other fraternities. I just thought that was exceptional, along with the symbols of the fraternity, its history, and the Conversations about the Ethiopian Brotherhood. All of this made me want to be a part of it.
Those seven black men, in 1906, graduated from an Ivy League school and would go on to become doctors, teachers and engineers. As a matter of fact, one of the “jewels,” Charles Henry Chapman, left Cornell and taught at Florida A&M University. So, FAMU had what was called a “jewel” chapter because of Chapman’s influence.
I was happier when I felt I’d carved my own identity, one that wasn’t defined solely by football. I may have been a little provident, as well, because these decisions ultimately directed my path to Carlita.
I’d first noticed Carlita when I was a freshman, and met her as a sophomore. Life at FAMU was very clique-y. Everyone “belonged” to some crew on campus. When we met, I was pledging Alpha (pledges were said to be “on line”), and she had friends of her own. And a boyfriend. He was older, and lived off campus. I suppose this worked for her, because she behaved and carried herself far beyond her years. She was responsible, didn’t go to a lot of parties, and studied hard. This made her a minority as an undergrad. I wasn’t ready to go there yet—at least not as a sophomore. I was still hanging out, doing what college students do—playing ball, hollering at women. But I always thought she was cute.
One day she saw me walking through Tucker Hall, one of the political science buildings, when the fatigue of life on line had gotten to me. For the uninitiated, being on line is intense. It means that pledges get a beat-down in many ways, and on a regular basis. We had to be outside at 4:30 every morning for physical training, and dragged ourselves to class afterward. Then, I had football practice in the afternoon. But it didn’t stop there, because you met with the “bruhs” again, the frat members who’d crossed and were pledging you, that evening.
It was grueling. There was no time to eat, so I’d lost about thirty-five pounds. I guess I looked tired and pekid when I ran into Carlita, because she gave me a Snickers bar.
“Hey, thanks, Carlita,” I said. I thought that was nice of her. I took it and walked away. It was just a brief exchange, but I appreciated it.
I saw her weeks later, though, after I’d crossed and been accepted as a member of Alpha Phi Alpha. I thanked her for the Snickers bar, and asked if she still had that “old-ass boyfriend.” She said yes.
“Oh, well,” I said. “Nice talking to you.” She gave me her phone number, though and said to call. Again, it was a friendly gesture, and I took it that way.
I was in my room with Mahlon Clift, my friend from Chicago, a few days later, and he was flipping through my little book of phone numbers. I kept them all in one place and, while browsing, he saw Carlita’s number.
“Man, you ain’t called this girl yet?” he said. “Man, call her!”
Like I said, I wasn’t trying to be with a good girl. I was out having fun, so it began to feel like denying the inevitable when, days later, Mahlon and I ended up at a Burger King drive-through where Carlita worked. We ordered a couple of meal deals, but she gave us a whole bunch of Whoppers. Again, Mahlon started pushing me to call her. I finally made the call in my junior year.
We had a class together, American National Government, in the fall of 1990. The professor, who we called Attorney Williams, was famous at FAMU. He passed a few years ago, but when he lived, you couldn’t get a degree at the school without taking his class. I don’t care if you were a biology major, you had to take American National Government. For some reason, it was the class where all the majors met, a forum course comprised of about seventy students when I
took it.
Atty. Williams was also crazy, by the way. He spoke with a high, shrieking voice that always carried a distressed tone, almost like the comedian Gilbert Godfrey. Carlita sat behind me one day, and I finally decided to talk to her. I turned to face her.
“Hey, we should go to a movie or something,” I said. Why did I do that?
“Mister Kilpatrick!” Atty. Williams shrieked. He called my name a couple of times. “Stand up! Stand up now!”
I sat there, like, “Oh, shit.” And this is what he did to embarrass me.
“Mister Kilpatrick, why are you talking to that girl in my class? She doesn’t like you! Get your bad breath out of her face and tell me what policy is!”
“Well, it’s, uh-”
“What? Policy is! Policy is! I ask you a question, you start with ‘Policy is!’”
“Policy is, um-”
“It’s not ‘Um’! You’re a dummy! Go to the library and learn what policy is! Get out of my class!”
True to his word, he threw me out. Several other football players were in the class, and they cracked up. I had to pack my bag and walk out of class, but not before he added a directive.
“Before this class is over, I want you to come back with the working definition of what policy is.”
I did it. At the end of the class, I returned and handed it to him, upon which he balled it up and threw it in the trash.
After class, Carlita said she felt a little sorry for me. She found it funny, but she felt bad. She said she’d go to the movies, but that first we had to go to library. Our first date took place there. Carlita was highly organized—a bookworm, really. She was a journalism major, was on her way to graduating magna cum laude, and the library was where she studied. I’d gotten more serious about studies, but the library was not my workspace. I invited two of my partners to come with me, John Redd and Greg Smith. They’d both graduated from Cass Tech with me in 1988. Carlita and I were technically on a date, but it felt casual enough to me. We clowned so badly, the staff threw us all out of the place. Carlita was so embarrassed. She’d never been thrown out of a library before. I must not have offended her too much, though, because we still went to the movies the following night, and we haven’t been apart since.
Surrendered: The Rise, Fall & Revolution of Kwame Kilpatrick Page 4