“Can you stay around after everybody else leaves so we can talk?” I suggested to Nick.
Before the two of us sat down together, I asked God what I should say to him. Soon we were on our own, a few players lingering around to further a conversation with me but patiently waiting for me to finish up with Nick.
I looked at Nick as he was still wiping tears from his eyes.
“I could be wrong, but I think God wants you to know He has you where you are for a reason,” I said. “Nick, believe it and stop doubting. I see a picture of a mouth, and it feels like God wants you to open your mouth. There’s a lot in your mind. You like to stay quiet, but from now on, when people ask you for your input, you need to speak up. You have an important voice. There will come a time when people want to and will need to hear what you have to say. In fact, people may be surprised because you’re a football player but you are also a creative. An artist. A communicator.”
Nick was shocked by how accurate these words were. These were the very things he had been contemplating at that moment in his life. He was one of the best athletes in the world, but football really didn’t matter to him. He was ready to give it up. He could easily have another successful career with the many creative gifts he possessed.
“Dave, everything, I mean everything, you’re saying about me is spot on. That’s crazy.”
“Nick, I’ll be in Chicago in a couple weeks. Let’s connect then. I’d love to meet your wife too. What’s her name?”
“Anna-Marie.”
“Yes, I’ll meet her, as well, and we can do a formal consult. We can meet at my hotel.”
“That would be great. Thanks, Dave.”
We exchanged numbers. I walked away from that day feeling like it was one of the best days of my life. I got to feel like I was part of the team but didn’t have to get my body beat up or my brain potentially damaged from the constant hitting and tackling. That moment was memorable because of Nick’s vulnerability and how we seemed to have connected. It was love at first sight. He felt like a family member to me. Like a son.
Nick and Anna-Marie came to see me in Chicago. They treated me like family from day one. But it didn’t feel as odd for some reason as it normally did. The ease of our relationship was unusual, and the trust organic. They began calling me “Father Dave” or “Papa Dave.” Nick told me he wanted to be mentored by me and travel with me around the world to learn everything I know about developing people and leaders. Impacted by our interaction, he believed the adviser/consultant type of work I do could also be something he could do post-NFL.
Since that Monday Night Football day many years ago, Nick and Anna-Marie have had six beautiful children! And I don’t think they’re stopping! These little ones now also call me “Papa Dave” or “Father Dave.” When Nick and Anna-Marie’s children see me, they run to me and jump into my arms like I’m their grandpops. They are genuinely happy to see me. “Papa Dave, tell us another story! Please. Do you have anything to eat?” I knew the only way the kids could be this comfortable with me was because Nick and Anna-Marie spoke fondly about me to their children. I was familiar to them because of how often I was discussed. I’m family.
But despite all these feel good things, why did I still feel awkward being called “Papa Dave”?
One day, I asked Nick why he called me “Papa Dave” like it was the most natural thing in the world. He told me he started calling me this when he was processing his own fatherhood. As he was thinking about how he wanted to equip his kids and bring them up, Nick said he found himself drawing on a lot of what he had learned from me. He said that not only had I given him information on how to be a good dad, but I’d modeled it directly for him.
“I realized you’d played a greater, more impactful father role than anyone else in my life, and that I would never have had the type of love and unity we have in my family without you.”
I couldn’t believe he was talking about me. I felt like I was a horrible dad. Others seemed so much better than me. I said to myself, Nick must have such a low threshold to compare me with. For all Nick’s sincere sharing, I still found myself struggling with the idea that I was Papa Dave, and that I could be a good father. It didn’t feel that way with even my own children. My own children never said I was not a good father, but I’ve seen great dads like Nick, and I pale in comparison. Nick eventually left the NFL because of the multiple concussions he sustained while playing, and now he relishes the opportunity to be a “house dad.” Nick gladly accepted the full-time job of loving, teaching, and guiding his children, along with Anna-Marie. These kids are brilliant and are being taught Spanish and English and probably Mandarin next.
Nick was becoming more like a son to me every time I saw him.
It was the way he looked at me, the way he hugged me, the way he talked about me, the way he encouraged me, the way he wanted to listen to me, the way he thought about me, the way he wanted to be with me. He knows I have faults but he chose to focus on what is good about who I am. But something, too, was unexplainable in our connection.
Seeing myself through Nick’s eyes started changing me. I realized that my complicated relationship with my father—who had an absent father—was affecting my relationship with my children. To have Nick Roach, a son who didn’t have a strong relationship with his father, now have a relationship with me unlocked what was suppressed in me.
What was this unexplainable connection? It must be that Korean jeong thing.
One day Nick and I were casually talking when the day he was born was brought up.
“Hey, Nick, when is your birthday?”
“I was born June 16, 1985.”
My mouth dropped.
This was the very same day and year Rebecca had a miscarriage and we lost our first child, whom we rarely spoke about.
The very same day.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE This Is Me
I was doing a fair amount of speaking around this time, traveling around the world to give a talk to a group of entrepreneurs in Bangkok or to a group of NFL athletes ready to play on Monday Night Football, or to Silicon Valley technologists, or to Wall Street’s fund managers. Everywhere I went, from California to New York to Bangkok to São Paulo to Seoul to Singapore, I started my talk the same way. It went something like this:
“Hi, I’m Dave Gibbons.”
I always paused after saying my name.
“I know it’s hard to believe. You were probably expecting a white guy with the name ‘Gibbons.’ Well, believe it or not, I’m half-Korean and half-white. My mom is a beautiful five-feet-tall Korean woman with tons of passion, the kind that doesn’t care what people think. And my dad is a white guy from Michigan with blue eyes.”
Once again I would pause, letting the anticipation and curiosity grow.
Then with perfect comedic timing, I would say:
“Looking at me, you can tell Koreans have some strong genes!”
Audiences always laughed at that. People loved that line. And it answered the pressing question most people had when they saw me for the first time: “How does a hundred percent Asian-looking guy get a name like Gibbons?” (Probably the second-most pressing question was, “How come he speaks English with no accent?”)
While everyone was laughing, there was always one person who never cracked a smile if she happened to be in the audience: Rebecca. Her face would let you know what she thought. After being in a Korean church, she started to question whether I was half-white and half-Korean. Later she would come to the conclusion that I was 100 percent Korean. She had never met a Korean before me, which I thought was proof she didn’t know what she was talking about.
When I finally decided to talk to her about it after we had been married for a while, I came ready to plead my case like a lawyer.
“When I was young, I went to my dad and asked who I was. ‘Am I Korean or American?’ And he got defensive, almost angry. He told me ‘Of course you’re American.’ Dad wouldn’t lie to me. He said to me with conviction that I was American, meaning white.”
I proceeded to make my second point.
