One Mentoring Experience

CCC Mentors in Training: a Saturday morning training class in Bloomfield.
Standing l-r: Nancy Crouch, Vince Tully, Deng Wol, Ron Patterson, Bill Miller, Cyndee Madden, Beth Ryan, Jim Mangan.
Seated: (l-r): Mae Clayton, Alene Roman, Kelly Weikel, Lauren Herlihy.

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I wanted to share a few excerpts from a March 15th “Parade” magazine interview with a NYC mentor.

If you mentor, you may relate to much of it. If you are on the way, you can look forward to some of these blessings.

Each mentoring story is important in its own right. Each would prove inspirational if told.

MENTOR:

I was always seeking some outside guidance to fill the emptiness I felt at suffering parental loss.

“So why don’t you pull up a chair Brandon. Let’s find a way not to be bored” – first words exchanged

During the early years I ate more fast food than I’d ever eaten before, until Brandon learned a new word: brunch. Now he’d rather eat Eggs Benedict than Eggs McMuffin.

At 14, he is now the same age his mother was when she gave birth to him.

Our first grown up conversation was about forgiveness and understanding.

The little boy with the tough-guy act is maturing into a young man who knows that toughness can be a shell
that protects the tenderness inside.

I was curious about what Brandon’s favorite memory was of the last 7 years?
Was it the Yankees or Knicks games?
Was it persuading Mariah Carey to sing “Happy Birthday” to him on my tape recorder?
Was it meeting Marisa Tomei at my local flee market in Chelsea?
Was it the first airplane ride?
Was it bowling?
Was it summer at Cape Cod???????

Brandon: “ I think it was the first time we played “Clue”.
I suddenly had an accident. You didn’t make fun of me. I had diarrhea. And you took care of me.

He paused. “ I tell you things I don’t tell nobody else," he said softly. “I’d have a lot more pain inside me if you hadn’t been around”

At our first Broadway show he held my hand, frightened of the matinee crowd. Now he’s careful to walk a few steps ahead of me with that sweetly thuggish swagger of someone who has left 13 behind.

At another show I lost him in a downstairs lobby. I spotted him cowering in a corner, his little face a fist of tears. I folded him in my arms and swept him back up the stairs… "I will never abandon you."

It was then I realized I had wanted to hear those words since I was healing myself.
In that moment a healing began. By becoming Brandon’s mentor, I had become my own.”

If you think you have a friend who should read this, by all means pass it on.

Rich Davis
Reach One Youth Mentoring Program Coordinator
Covenant to Care for Children
120 Mountain Avenue, Suite 212
Bloomfield, CT 06002
Phone (860) 243-1806
Fax (860) 243-0100
richdavis@covenantocare.org