Let another praise you, and not your own mouth; a stranger, and not your own lips.
—P
ROVERBS 27:2
My memories
of my life and surroundings—at least those I myself can remember—really begin in Jacksonville. We returned from the Philippines in October of 1990 and moved back into the house on Sheri Lane that my parents owned since 1977.
I was three when we returned to Jacksonville; that’s when I met Uncle Dick.
Uncle Dick was our next-door neighbor and an important part of our lives. Known to the rest of the world as Richard Fowler, I really thought he was my uncle. He was close to all the children in the Tebow family, probably in no small part because he’d never been married and therefore never had children of his own.
As a family, we children spent a great deal of time with him, including almost every Saturday morning. A partial explanation for spending Saturday mornings at Uncle Dick’s might be the fact that he owned a television and we didn’t. My parents would let us watch cartoons over there with him on Saturday mornings, but the reasons for letting us hang out there went much deeper than that.
No, I don’t mean the small bottles of Coke that he always had on hand in the refrigerator and popsicles that he kept in the freezer. Although he gave us plenty of those, too. I’m sure that he told us no, or that we had too much of one thing or another, on occasion. I’m sure he told us that too much Coke or popsicles, or whatever, wasn’t that good for you. Actually, now that I think about it, I’m not sure he ever did say no to any request any of us made for anything in his refrigerator, freezer, or pantry.
It’s funny. My folks always preferred that we bring our friends over to our house whenever possible, since they wanted to be the parents of influence, not necessarily allowing us to be influenced by whoever’s house we were headed to. Not that the influence would be bad elsewhere, but they just felt more comfortable when they knew exactly what the influence was to which we were being exposed. And so for that reason, and the simple fact that they loved kids, anyone and everyone was always welcome to hang out with us, at all sorts of crazy hours.
But with Uncle Dick, they relaxed some of the rules—at least on the television we could watch and the snacks we were allowed to eat. Even on weekdays we were there; you might have found us watching old Westerns or
Flipper
or whatever he’d let us watch. He was pretty strict about the kind of things we could see. Maybe that’s why Mom and Dad let us go over so much—they trusted him and were assured of the influence we were getting through his guidance.
Robby would often dress up, before we headed next door, in his little Western outfit with fake six-shooter and holster, especially for those movie times where a Western would be the highlight show at Uncle Dick’s. In fact, those movies were a part of the inspiration that caused Robby to break his arm.
It happened a year and a half later, when my parents decided to move us from the house on Sheri Lane to a farm—but only because my parents were desperate for more room and the farm was being sold at a government auction at an incredible price. One of the additional pluses to life on the farm, besides having more room, was that we were able to keep some horses. Now, keeping and boarding horses may sound glamorous to some, for riding purposes, but as anyone who has kept horses knows, the work required in making sure they get the care and feeding they need and deserve is never ending.
And so the stage was set for the broken arm inspired by one of Uncle Dick’s Western movies.
As I remember it, at the time one of our horses was in its stall—and Robby was hanging from the barn rafters, above the stall door—waiting for me to open it. It was a scene Robby envisioned straight out of the movies. Of course, right on cue as Robby had orchestrated, I opened the door, the horse came out, and Robby dropped onto the horse’s bare back, just like in the movies we watched at Uncle Dick’s house. Robby may have held on to his seat on the horse for maybe one of the horse’s strides out of the barn before he slid off and fell to the ground, landing on his arm extended to brace his fall. His arm broke. By the time Robby was twelve, he had broken his arm three times.
Our parents have told us on numerous occasions, both then and now, that Uncle Dick loved our visits. I have no doubt he did—I mean, after all, who wouldn’t have loved five brothers and sisters descending upon your house and food supply on a regular basis? But as a kid, all I knew was that we loved going over there. He was truly a member of our family. In fact, he spent every Thanksgiving and Christmas with us.
The relationship with Uncle Dick and our family, though, began long before I was born. In 1982, my dad left the staff of Southside Baptist Church in Jacksonville and began a church out of our house. The total attendance that first Sunday in the living room, of those who didn’t have a name ending in “Tebow”?
One.
Uncle Dick.
Dad preached that Sunday, Uncle Dick accepted Christ, and the church and relationship with Uncle Dick was off and running, for the church and for Uncle Dick. Uncle Dick then became the treasurer of the church, Cornerstone Community Church, and later became the treasurer of the Bob Tebow Evangelical Association (BTEA), when we moved to the Philippines. Richard Fowler was faithful and meticulous with the ledgers of the church and BTEA, and even when the rest of the world started migrating to computers and accounting software methods in the 1980s, Uncle Dick continued to keep the books by hand—the long way—and my parents found it incredible that he never made a single mistake.
When we arrived back in the States, Uncle Dick made sure I also came over as much as possible, along with my four older brothers and sisters whom he already knew and loved. After all, I was his namesake, Timothy Richard Tebow. He wanted to give to all of us at every turn in every way; he was a giver and a great influence in that way and in so many others.
He truly was almost like a third parent, albeit one who played big-band music all the time. I mean, all the time. I remember once when Dad was out of town and a couple of us spent the night at Uncle Dick’s. The next day, he took us to Peter’s baseball game. While we were there at his house, he was—as always—continually working through and listening to all of his big-band collection.
In order. From the beginning. To the very last one in the collection.
He had a routine and followed it day after day. Over the course of the year he would follow his order of music, picking up the next day where he had stopped the previous day. Must have been the meticulous bookkeeper in him that served others, including the Cornerstone Community Church and BTEA, so well.
It was great
growing up with two older brothers always around to play with. Actually, all of us were very competitive, including my parents and all my siblings. It didn’t matter if it was Monopoly or chess inside with my sisters or baseball or basketball outside with my brothers—or if I was only four and the rest of them were far older. They took no prisoners—the rules applied equally to all. There was no “letting someone win” because he was younger, or to cheer her up or encourage her to keep playing. The first time I won any of those games or contests, I earned it.
It was something I remembered.
Most of my first clear memories seem to revolve around sports and all the crazy stuff that I did trying to be just like Robby and Peter, and to do everything they did, despite the fact that they were nine and six years old when we returned from the Philippines and I was three. We were in constant motion, always playing whatever game was in season or, if for some reason one of those didn’t interest us, then just the ones that we made up ourselves.
My dad says that I wasn’t much fun to throw with, even at age four. Apparently, even then I was a bit too intense and threw pretty hard. A lot of my competitiveness was probably just how I was wired, but part of it was because I looked up to my brothers and wanted to be just like them. For example, I had started working out, even then. I wanted to be as strong as my brothers, so when I was a bit older, I used surgical tubing that was attached to the top of the door—only because my dad wouldn’t let me use any weights. He didn’t feel they were safe enough for my development at that age or would provide anything more beneficial at that point than the rubber tubing could provide. While my brothers and I were sitting or standing around talking or doing whatever we were doing—and it was always something—I wasted no time and would stand in front of the door and pull against the tubing, working each shoulder. For thirty minutes or so. Looking back, I’m not sure why I didn’t tire of it, but I didn’t and simply kept pulling on the tubing, working each shoulder. Over and over.
When it came time to play T-ball at age five, I had already played so much actual player pitch with my brothers that the idea of hitting off of a tee didn’t interest me. So instead of my using a tee for my at bats, my coach at Normandy Athletic Association would toss the ball to me underhand, while my brothers took great pride—maybe even more than I did—in watching me hit ball after ball over the fence during the course of the baseball season. Peter claims I hit thirty-six home runs that year. Then again, he was eight at the time and maybe not the best and most unbiased source of information for keeping the records. I know, though, that I finished second in the league in home runs to a kid who was two years older. I made a commitment to myself right then and there that that would be my last year of finishing second.
Apparently I had such a good year that my dad even claims that one of the parents from that team said he was saving my baseball card (the league had a photographer come out and take photos of all the kids) for the future. He was kind to say that, and it certainly made me feel good at the time, but I’m somewhat doubtful that he ended up saving it, since I doubt that even
my parents
saved one of my cards—part of the family plan, I’m sure, to keep me and the rest of us humble.
I do know that I didn’t enjoy little league baseball for the fun of playing. I can’t help it—but that’s true. When I hear parents tell their kids today, “It doesn’t matter if you win or lose, as long as you have fun,” I’m puzzled. That’s just not how I’m wired. Bottom line, losing simply isn’t any fun. Oh sure, in thinking back on plays and moments, I knew I was loving every minute of playing the game. But if there’s a score, then there’s a purpose to the game beyond having fun—it’s having a greater score. Of course, there is intrinsic value in playing the game itself and how well you play it, and always playing to the best of your ability, but at some point the actual competition has to be a piece of the analysis as well. After all, there’d be no point to the rules or to keeping score if it were simply and only about having fun.
Just like in life. For better or worse, we don’t all end up getting patted on the back. “Hey, Bill, you didn’t come close to hitting your sales numbers, but it looked like you really enjoyed the interaction with the customers, so we’re giving you a raise.” Maybe, but I don’t think so.
I had two brothers who beat me at everything, at every turn, as badly as they could. So when I played anything else with them, I wanted to win. When our coach would say, “I just wanted to make sure you’re having fun,” I didn’t understand. And when my teammates seemed more interested in ice cream or snow cones after the game, especially if it was a game we lost, I was baffled and upset. I couldn’t understand why they bothered to play. Just go get dessert without bothering to be on the team, I figured. What’s the point?
The preseason Home Run Derby was like that as well. Every year that I played baseball, the league conducted a Home Run Derby before the regular season began. I knew it was an exhibition contest and had no bearing on the outcome of the season or anything else. I knew it was supposed to be “fun.” But I couldn’t see the point of entering the contest unless you were going to do all you could to win. And so each year, I entered with that goal in mind—to win. Not to simply compete. Not to simply enjoy myself. But to win. And sometimes I did, and sometimes I didn’t, and that was okay. But what mattered to me was the mind-set that I entered the Home Run Derby contest with. I really think, looking back, that it made me perform better and at least closer to the fullest extent of my ability. And I believe this approach served me well later in life when the competition got tougher.
That outlook may have had an impact on my ability as a teammate back then. In T-ball, I was friends with the other players, and I remember very few of them then who could catch or throw. Early in the games I would tolerate this, but as it got later and more critical to the outcome, I found myself wanting the ball in my hands.
Once, in the last inning of a close game, the ball was hit to me at shortstop. I fielded it and ran down the runner, who was breaking from third to score, for the final out. After the game, the coach asked me why I didn’t throw it to the catcher. The question puzzled me because I thought the answer would have been obvious to him.
“Because he can’t catch.”
“Well, he’s the catcher. You’re supposed to throw it to him for him to try and catch it to get the runner out. That’s how you do it.”
I was sure—no I was positive—that wasn’t how you do it. I wasn’t interested in someone’s “trying to catch” it with the game on the line. I also wasn’t interested in someone’s trying to remember if he was supposed to tag the base or the runner. If he didn’t know what to do, I would do it myself. I would let him try to catch early on, but I wanted to win, and when the game was on the line, I would do whatever I had to—within the rules—to win the game.
My parents decided that, with three boys around the house who were as competitive as we were, we had to institute a new rule. I was still young, and they were already concerned about the bragging that we were doing among ourselves. Here was the rule: we were forbidden from talking about our own accomplishments, unless asked first by someone else. If someone specifically asked us how the game went or how we played, we could answer, but we couldn’t volunteer the information. They based this new rule on the admonition found in Proverbs 27:2: