SEPTEMBER 2008

 

James’ Mom On Her Son’s Problematic Birth and
Not-So-Humble Early Years

 

By BETTY BLAKE

 

The first few years my husband Tom and I spent together proved a little chaotic. After living in an apartment in Yonkers, N.Y.,  for several years, we managed to save enough for a down payment on our first house, on St. Andrews Place, just below the Riverdale-Yonkers line, and about a five-minute walk from Fay Park, where Tom and I first met.                      

We moved in the summer of 1979. Our son Thomas was two, and we were expecting another child in January. At the time, St. Andrews Place was a street in flux. Respectable homeowners, mostly older people, lived on the east end, while low-rent apartments occupied the west end. Our house, made of white stone trimmed with imported Italian marble with ornate terraces, graced the middle of the block. A different-looking house, it stood out as the most elegant on the street, which probably accounted for the three break-ins we endured during the six years we lived there. Our sons’ friends tended to look up to us as the wealthier residents of the neighborhood and loved to be invited in to play.

At the time we moved in, my 14-year-old son Chris and I were involved in a national mother-son tournament. We played four matches and managed to win them all. No one knew of my condition until we had won — but they didn’t disqualify us for being a mother and two sons. In photos, I’m the only one wearing warm-ups. So James really received his introduction to tennis while still in utero.

Playing helped to keep me from worrying about my doctor’s dire predictions. Given my age (43), he advocated an early abortion. He told me how tiny and insignificant the baby was at this stage, and warned that I risked having a baby with water on the brain or Down Syndrome. He was certain that I would comply. I looked for another opinion. I talked with a Spanish priest at St. Peter’s, Father Jose, who told me I would never forgive myself if I had an abortion. I knew that. I just wanted someone of authority to tell me.

When pregnant with Thomas at age 41, I had underwent amniocentesis (that same doctor’s suggestion). I did what he prescribed without question, thinking, as we often do, that doctors know best. Had I inquired further about the procedure, I would have spared myself the inconvenience. By the time they gave me the good news that the baby was fine, I was just under the legal limit for abortion, and Thomas was kicking vigorously. Because of this, again against doctor’s orders, I refused to go through amnio three years later. Instead we relied on prayer and hope.

On December 27, the day before James’ birth, Tom had booked two hours of court time at an indoor facility in Hastings. I went along to watch. Before the two hours ended, his partner tired and Tom beckoned me onto the court for the last 15 minutes. He may have had an ulterior motive, for, remembering the healthy tax refund he received for Thomas (due in January but born on December 29), he had been encouraging me to again give birth early. If it were a ploy, it worked. I hadn’t hit for a few months, so it felt good to swing a racket again, until, after about 10 minutes, I had to excuse myself and go to the ladies’ room. My water had broken. James was practically born on a tennis court.           

The next day James Riley Blake came into the world. I had insisted on having no drugs or painkillers, and my doctor went along, so I was fully awake. With Tom by my side, I put my first anxious question to him, “Is he alright?”

“He’s beautiful,” he assured me. “All the right numbers of fingers and toes.” His eyes shone above the surgical mask, and we shared a moment of ecstasy. Unfortunately, the doctor who first counseled me had retired, so he never knew how wrong his predictions were.

James showed early signs of unusual athletic ability, but being my fourth son, all of whom possess good coordination, I paid scant attention. Before he could walk he invented games that involved hitting objects with a stick. He had little use for the corn popper section of his Fisher-Price toy, but he put the handle to good use. He unscrewed it from its base and used it to hit tennis balls the length of our kitchen, then he would crawl to the other end and hit them back. He rarely missed making contact. He never seemed to tire of this and it kept him happy for hours.

As they grew older, James and Thomas found ways to amuse themselves on court while Tom and I played. They would find sticks and hit rocks or bottle caps into the trees, seeing who could hit the furthest. One day my friend Herb said to James, “You’ll hit anything with a stick won’t you.” Three-year-old James gravely considered the question and replied, “Anything but doo-doo.”

At age five, Thomas began first grade at St. Margaret’s in Riverdale. James, aged two, went with me when I volunteered for lunch duty. For the first half-hour, he ran around happily in the smaller playground. Then we went to the upper playground. Here, James amused the older boys by throwing a tennis ball as high as he could up the side of the building. A lofty structure, he aimed for the roof and almost made it. He attracted quite an audience, and they kept supplying him with balls so he could try again.

I don’t remember everything about those six years we spent in Yonkers. But I do remember being happy. We had a beautiful house, wonderful sons, and I’d found my soul mate. Yet when the media began to take an interest in James in ‘01, reporters had a field day describing his “humble beginnings.” They would come up with a tiny grain of truth and embellish it. We couldn’t believe what they were writing. They talked about the “mean” or “crime-infested” streets of Yonkers, conjuring up images of muggings, prostitution and drug-busts. It wasn’t like that.

Thomas and James enjoyed normal, happy childhoods. I doubt if they ever felt deprived (except perhaps when we refused to buy the latest Nintendo cartridge). We did take some precautions. We accompanied them when they went trick-or-treating, and we had to be wary during the weeks leading up to July 4, as some of the fireworks sounded more like bombs. But these seemed minor problems.

An English publication went a step further in ‘02 and wrote a piece entitled “Ghetto Master,” which described James as “the ghetto kid who escaped the privations of youth.” In the article, James talked about coming home after a break-in. Not overly concerned, his main worry was his stickball bat, which, happily, the burglars had not touched. Our boys were too young to worry about danger, and it helped that Tom and I showed no real concern.

I’m reminded of how my brother and I felt during the early years of WWII. Both too young to understand the gravity of the situation, we implicitly believed our mother when she told us that England is the motherland, Germany the fatherland, and when mother and father fight, mother always wins. Thus, in our minds, England’s victory was assured. In the selfish way of children, the end of the war to us meant only that we would finally get everything that mom had promised “when the war ends,” including more than one chocolate bar per week. In the same way, for our children, the move to Fairfield, Conn., in ‘86 meant that now they could go out without an adult, and they could play stickball in the street.

“From Harlem to Harvard” became another favorite headline in more than one publication. We never lived in Harlem, and we didn’t appreciate the tacit implication that for someone from Harlem to attend Harvard verges on the miraculous, sort of like the surprise reporters (and others) show when an Afro-American speaks articulately. Tom and I did play indoor tennis in Harlem, at the 369th Armory, where we volunteered for junior programs, so Thomas and James received their early tennis instruction there.

My second son, Chris, is amused and slightly indignant when he reads accounts such as these. “How can they say these kids are deprived?” he asks. “They’re living in the lap of luxury compared to how Howard (his older brother) and I grew up. We were the deprived ones.” And he’s right. I became a single parent when Chris was seven, with an ex-husband who contributed nothing toward our upkeep. I changed my part-time position to full-time so that I could pay the rent, and what I earned from giving private tennis lessons helped put food on the table, with little left over for luxuries. Fortunately, I had taught both boys how to play tennis, and they became good enough to earn scholarships. I recall Howard saying as he filled out his college financial forms, “Just stay poor, Mom, and we’ll be okay.”

Back to Yonkers, we spent much of our time at Fay Park. I would load up the stroller with stickball bats, balls, rackets and anything else that might keep them amused. I took the rackets in case I found someone to hit with, and in case Thomas and James felt like trying their hand at tennis. This only happened if there was nothing more exciting to do. Whenever a group of boys organized a game of stickball, they wanted to play. At first, the older boys seemed skeptical at including little James, but when they saw how he could swing a bat, he regularly became one of the first picks when they chose sides. Thomas, much bigger and stronger than his brother, regularly hit home runs. But the first time James hit one it caused quite a stir.

When the boys needed some quiet time they played a curious game called Skullsy. They searched for discarded plastic bottle caps, which they then filled with candle wax. Everyone brought their favorite caps to the park and the game entailed sliding them around and hitting other caps on an elaborate chalk-drawn board. Finding a suitable cap in the gutter became cause for much rejoicing. 

Their tennis playing came mostly on the weekends when Tom came to the park with us. After he and I played, we would spend a lot of time showing our boys the right way to hit a ball. We enjoyed the game and wanted it to become a part of their lives, too. We never envisioned it as a career.

At this point, the rivalry between Thomas and James had not yet developed, but James’ mission to emulate his brother in everything had. James accepted that Thomas could accomplish more. In the only video we have of them playing tennis at this age we see Thomas showing how well he can hit forehands and backhands and bowing to the camera after he hits an overhead. When the camera turns on James, perhaps aware of the act he is following, he prefaces his playing with, “This won’t be very good.” In this video, James hits with my racket. For some reason, we never thought of buying them junior rackets. More evidence of our parsimony? I don’t think so. Tennis was just something they tried their hands at because they saw we enjoyed it. It never occurred to us to invest money in equipment. That came later. Until they began to take it seriously, they used whatever was available.

We spent six and a half happy years in Yonkers. Since coming to the U.S., I had longed to own my own house. After more 0than 20 years, I finally realized that dream. Though now in my 40s, I thoroughly enjoyed my role as mother and homemaker. The happiest times of my life had been when I had a baby to take care of, and now I had two.

 

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