My Life, Part VII: A New Beginning and a Strange Turn

I’d gone from living my dream to being stuck in a cruel reality. I tried to keep some perspective: This had to have happened for a reason. This could not have been done to me for some freak punishment that I deserved. I was not the best kid in the world, but I also did not deserve to lose my dream....at least this one.

Langston Hughes once asked, “What happens to a dream deferred?” One answer that few people consider is that it leads to the creation of a new dream. But at that time, I had no idea what my new dream was going to be.

So Kingsborough College back home in Brooklyn was going to have to do, at least until I was well and healed. It was not what I had in mind, but if I couldn't make something out of it, then I would be lost.

I had to be close to home, since my over obsessive parents wanted to make sure I did not wind up in a hospital again, and I needed some home comfort anyway. Most of my friends were far gone by the time I got back to Brooklyn. Some were up in Albany, the others scattered all over the country.

It didn’t matter, anyway – I wanted to keep what had happened to me a secret until I had done something great, something that would put me back on the map. I had been the "College Jock" who was going to make it. Now, I had to be someone else.

Kingsborough College was not so bad. Actually, it was ranked number three in most beautiful colleges in the country. The college has a 70-acre campus located on Manhattan Beach in Southern Brooklyn. The College campus is bounded by the Atlantic Ocean, Jamaica Bay and Sheepshead Bay. Most students wound up failing out because they were so busy tanning on the beach or partying to study. It was beautiful!

So where did the "strange turn" come in? Well, it all started my fist semester there. I registered for a Media class and took a job at the college radio station. There wasn’t anything unusual about this in and of itself, exepct that this wasn’t an ordinary college radio station. This was B91 WKRB.

For anyone who does not know the story: B91 is a part of Brooklyn history. It’s made people's careers – not just radio personalities, but some of rock’n’roll’s greatest hits. From DJs like “Frankie Bones "Little Suzy," Coro, Lizette Melendez, Noel to "The Mad Stunt Man," Crystal Waters during the “House” era, it was known as “Brooklyn’s Own.”

So there I was, working on the weekends at NY's finest Brokerage Firms with my bro and spending my days at B91. By “days,” I mean 24 hours. . Somehow, I soon became the Promotional Director and jumped on the B91 bandwagon. It was a different world. In this position, I would use our programming to showcase the top 20 mainstream artists of the month.

I began putting together the Promotions for the hottest acts in NYC on B91, hosting the number one-ranked show on the station. Things were looking up.

Everywhere I went, someone knew me. My football problems were out in the open, but who cared? I’d literally become an overnight success, running the entire Promotions department at B91.

More than that, I got to become the kind of radio personality that I’d grown up idolizing. I was soon promoting the firm I worked for on the weekends, along with live NY sport events.. I got to meet the Yankees, the Giants and any high school sensation that was recruited to the best schools around.

My last sports interview was with my long-time friend Stephon Marbury. I remember it clearly because it meant so much to me to interview this friend I’d grown up with playing ball at Lincoln High Just after that interview aired, things changed even more.

I got a call from a big New York manager, who wanted to meet me and set up an interview with his great talent, Crystal Waters. Little did I know it, but my career in radio was about to explode – and my career in brokerage was about to take off as well.