A Golden Gloves boxer got a golden opportunity from Sasha Bruce
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Version 0 of 1. Darryl Lane said most of the boxing movies he’s seen are pretty bad: corny, unrealistic. Then there’s “Rocky.” It’s hardly a documentary, but the 22-year-old said he can’t help but tear up whenever he watches it. “I know how he feels,” Darryl said. “I know what it takes.” What it takes is getting up when you’re knocked down. Darryl is a D.C.-based Golden Gloves boxer. Right here is where I’m required by the laws of column-writing to say Darryl’s hardest fight wasn’t in the ring. When he was a teenager, he found himself without a home. Sasha Bruce Youthwork, one of the charities that is part of The Washington Post Helping Hand, gave him a place to stay and provided stability when he had none. I don’t think I’d ever met a boxer before I sat down with Darryl at Sasha Bruce’s Eighth Street SE headquarters in the District. When we shook, I noticed that his palms were soft. But his knuckles were hard and calloused, with “Tuff” tattooed across the top of his right hand and “Love” on the left. Darryl’s parents split when he was 9. When he was 12, he moved in with an uncle in New Jersey. That didn’t go well, so he moved back in with his mother in North Carolina. Things soured there. Darryl was running with a bad crowd, breaking into cars to sleep at night, boxing in street fights. Shortly after turning 17, Darryl decided to join his dad in Washington. The father was delighted to welcome the son and, on Darryl’s first day here, showed him the sights of the city. “It started to get late,” Darryl remembered. “I was like, ‘Where we staying?’ He said, ‘It’s coming, just wait.’ It was going on 2 o’clock in the morning. I said, ‘Pops, what’s going on?’ He said, ‘Okay, you ready to sleep?’ ” They boarded the A6 bus to Anacostia and got out at a homeless shelter near St. Elizabeths. “He didn’t want to tell me his predicament at the time,” Darryl said. His father had a job — picking up trash in Northwest Washington — but wasn’t earning enough to afford an apartment. The pair slept in the shelter that night. Darryl said he still has nightmares sometimes about the smell. On the second night, a security guard at the shelter told Darryl that he shouldn’t really be there. It was a shelter for adults, not teenagers. “He gave me a flier to Sasha Bruce,” Darryl said. Sasha Bruce operates a 24-hour drop-in shelter for homeless teenagers. Some are runaways. Some have been thrown out of the family home. All are at risk if they stay on the streets. “They started showing warm hands” is the way Darryl describes his reception at Bruce House. “They started showing that they care.” Bruce House has temporary accommodation for 10 teens. After three months there, Darryl moved to Sasha Bruce Youthwork’s transitional living program, where he was able to stay for three months. He earned his GED with the help of Sasha Bruce and entered a program called YouthBuild that teaches work skills. Darryl continued to box — but in sanctioned fights. He won his very first fight — a good omen, according to his trainers. Darryl boxes as a light heavyweight — 178 pounds — and has racked up victories in Golden Gloves bouts around the area. His record is 30 and 1. He and his fiancee live with their 2-year-old son in the District. Darryl works as a stock clerk at a Harris Teeter supermarket and trains regularly at Enigma Gym in Capitol Heights, Md. “The sport is dangerous,” he allowed. “If you’re going to do this sport, it has to be second nature. If you’re going to do it, you have to do it he right way.” Darryl loves boxing. He loves the focus it demands, its solitary nature, the way you don’t have to depend on anyone but yourself, unlike playing on a football or basketball team. “It’s like, if you know you work hard for it,” Darryl said, “you’re gonna take the win.” It’s a cliche, but I’m going to say it anyway: Sasha Bruce Youthwork was in Darryl’s corner. Homeless teenagers can fall through the cracks of social service agencies, designed as they are to serve adults or families. Sasha Bruce strives to keep that from happening. “If it wasn’t for Sasha Bruce, there’s no telling where I’d be right now,” Darryl told me. “I’d probably still be on the streets.” Other teens need our help. To donate online to Sasha Bruce, go to posthelpinghand.com. To donate by mail, send a check payable to “Sasha Bruce Youthwork” to: Sasha Bruce Youthwork, 741 Eighth St. SE, Washington, D.C. 20003. Attention: James Beck. Thank you. Twitter: @johnkelly For previous columns, visit washingtonpost.com/johnkelly. |