The Big House on the Prairie Chapter Three :: The Baby, Part One
I don't know if I believe in destiny or that certain people were born to accomplish certain things but all of the makings of a great football player, I had them. My grandfather was of impressive status, standing all of six-foot-four and around two-hundred-and-fifty pounds, solidly built even in his later years. My grandfather -- Papa Book -- didn't play football past his boyhood years as he said that he didn't find much amusement or fulfilment in being "a big Negro hitting other big Negros for White folks entertainment".
For my father, football was a necessity, a way of life. He had an aggressive nature to him, perhaps born out of the fact that he didn't have the tender, loving care that most boys find in their mothers and had a competitiveness streak to him that bordered on insanity and cruelty. Even to his own teammates, my father could be insufferable so much so that at his wedding, Sam Thomas -- who I called Uncle Sam because he pretty much was one to me -- was his only teammate, high school or college, showed up to his wedding. Even with an open bar.
Uncle Sam had a son of his own, a year older than me in Jeremiah. This was all the excuse that my father needed to place me at five-years old, the first age I was legally allowed to play tackle football in the state of Texas, with the 7U football team as Jeremiah was also playing a year-up.
I got the absolute dog shit kicked out of me that year, perhaps my most memorable year of playing football in my life. I was small, slow and timid, a terrible combination on the football field. I didn't play much, never beyond the mandatory participation requirements levied by the league's rules, and when I did, I was picked on and targeted it by opposing teams until they felt sorry for me. My father never did and if he didn't, he didn't show it. To his credit, he didn't scold me on those car rides home either.
Those car rides are what I remember the most about that year, tears welling up on almost every trip home. On certain rides when I couldn't hold it and would break out into sobbing, my mom would try to comfort me only to get a cold stare from my dad or sometimes a profane lace tirade, telling her to not interfere in what he called "men business".
My dad didn't have a mom, at least not in the traditional sense. His mother, Cheryl, the daughter of a real estate mogul by today's standards, had hitched her ride to a good looking but, earlier in their relationship, a rather unimpressive man in my grandfather. As a nineteen year old mother, she probably resented that my grandfather had impregnated her and robbed her of her prime years. By all accounts, prior to the pregnancy, she was an outgoing and highly educated young woman with a bright future. Shortly after my father was born, she officially dropped out of school and once he was off the titty, it was a good day if she wasn’t drunk my noon.
Her relationship with my grandfather was a loveless but convenient marriage for as long as it lasted. At the time, her father, Hussey, was still helping them financially and both my grandfather and Cheryl felt that should they get separated or even worse divorced, Hussey likely would have stopped providing checks if she was just a single mom. For my grandfather, the connection to Hussey was worth too much to let love — or the lack thereof — get in the way of Hussey putting him through law school and then helping fund his growing law firm in the early days.
Cheryl had little care for my father, often going days without seeing a young Little Book, so my grandfather would take him to work with him, his rotating door of young secretaries and female clientele serving as my father’s surrogate mother for weeks at a time. Mary, my maternal grandmother, was one of those women. It’s why I always felt that my father had such a deep connection with my mother, despite his flaws. She centered him, cared for him, the same way her mother had. He did the same, just as his father had for my mother. Papa Book took care of my mom, even before she was his daughter-in-law. He helped pay for her clothes, making sure she had a suitable backpack or shoes before the start of every school year. When she got accepted to Texas Southern, he helped pay for her tuition, even after she had broken up with my father.
My mom never met her father and her mother likely couldn’t have picked him out of a lineup if her life depended on it. Her father was one of the many that rode through Houston during that time, looking for work. He likely found work, ironically enough, at one of Bossman Hussey’s developments before returning back home — wherever that was — with a couple month’s worth of a pay and a child he would never meet. Next release: 7/9/2025
The Big House on the Prairie Chapter Three :: The Baby, Part Two
My father's success in life, both as a football player and in politics, along with my Uncle Sam's failures to live up to his own athletic dreams, formed the imperfect cauldron in which I was forged. By seven years old, playing 9U football, I had began to close the gap in terms of physical attributes between myself and my older teammates. I wasn't as strong as my grandfather and father nor as sturdy but I now had the length and height and whatever I still lacked in size, I made up for it in spirit.
It was a false bravado, often a flimsy imitation of what I saw in my best friend Jeremiah, Uncle Sam's son. Jeremiah, despite playing one age group up, was the best player on the team by far and wasn't afraid to let you know. His dad was the coach and Jeremiah, even at a young age, was acutely aware of the perception that he was just the coaches' son, a notion that he quickly put to bed with his impressive play.
I also dealt with that, many viewing me through the lens of being my father's son and for the older crowd, my grandfather's grandson. The football field was one of the first stages where I was able to make my own name, escape from the large shadows that they casted. With that as my motivation, the gap between my teammates and I kept closing and closing until it was eventually flipped. By my eight grade year, I was no longer just my dad’s son. I wasn’t just Papa Book’s grandson. I had my earned a name on my own. Baby Book.
Growing up, I primarily played running back with Jeremiah being my quarterback as Uncle Sam coached us all through youth football, even coaching my seventh grade year despite Jeremiah already playing for Waller High School at the time. When I joined Jeremiah at Waller, who was now playing receiver, they were preparing to make the move to 6A, Texas’ highest classification. We went winless that year and it was personally a tough year for me as well as I made the switch from running back to cornerback. I played well but to go from touching the ball on nearly every play to often having a clean jersey by the end of the game was a tough transition. My penchant for talking trash to opposing players was born during that season as a mean to keep me engaged throughout the game.
My father, both as a father, alumni and mayor, wasn’t going to stand for our winless seasons. Our head coach, Robby Mendoza, was fired and after what was surely an extensive coaching search, Uncle Sam was hired as our head coach. With him, came about thirty new players, many of which had played for him throughout youth football. He also raided some of Houston’s better teams that had players stuck on the bench, looking for playing time. The influx of talent not only improved our team but helped raise my stature as a top prospect in the state, being involved in more competitive games against the state’s top schools as we won six games that year.
The real work, however, began in the summer. Uncle Sam was relentless when it came to Jeremiah and I. We’d have our team workouts in the morning and then head back to the school, just us two, to get some extra work done. We’d do footwork drills in the sand of a nearby volleyball court, run countless routes against each other and usually get another lift in before the end of the day. There was no rest for the wicked on the weekends, either. Uncle Sam had launched a 7-on-7 team comprising of some of the best players on our team and other local guys. If there was a tournament that he could drive us to, no matter how big or small, we were there. I might have played hundreds of games that summer, lining up against the best the country had to offer. I got my ass handed to me more than once, but I won my share of battles as well.
The best work I got, though, wasn’t against the five-star receivers I’d occasionally face in a tournament but the daily battles that Jeremiah and I went through. He pushed me and I pushed him and Uncle Sam pushed us all. By the end of that summer, ESPN had me featured as one of the top 300 rising sophomores to watch. Baby Book had arrived.
Family, would y'all prefer this current format of short, bite-sized updates or the entire chapter at once?
Personally, I think you’re really cooking with this so far, so I’m liking the shorter updates. But you’re also, ya know, the one writing it so my vote would be whichever you’d prefer to write.
Last edited by Chillcavern on 10 Jul 2025, 11:54, edited 2 times in total.
Family, would y'all prefer this current format of short, bite-sized updates or the entire chapter at once?
Personally, I think you’re really cooking with this so far, so I’m liking the shorter updates. But you’re also, ya know, the one writing it so my vote would be whichever you’d prefer to write.
It's the same amount of work on my side, I'm just splitting the updates up when I post them. I know a wall of text can sometimes be off putting but I also don't want to give you guys blue balls.
