Carrie and I would go three rounds. My nervousness had changed to excitement. It felt like I’d been training for a long, long time, and now I finally had a fight to show off my skills.
Hands wrapped, gloves on, headgear tight, mouthpiece in. There’s an unspoken requirement in boxing that the first thing a boxer does when he or she gets into a ring is go around and stomp their foot in the direction of each judge. It’s just kind of a way to say, “Thank you and I respect you” before the match begins. So I did that, and so did Carrie. Then we went back to our corners.
The announcer called my name—Jesselyn “Too Cute” Silva!—but I was so busy concentrating on what I needed to do during the match that I didn’t take in all the energy of the crowd or what was going on around me. All I remember is waiting for the cue from the ref to meet in the middle. After a few minutes of talking with the judges, the referee called us to the center of the ring to greet each other and listen to his final words before the match started. My heart was racing, and my blood was flowing. I was eager to fight, but I knew better than to show it. You never wanted to show emotion in the ring—might give your opponent an idea of how you were feeling—nervous, confident, or somewhere in between.
The referee made a joke about how long it takes to start these matches, and we both laughed. Then we bumped gloves and returned to our corners.
There are no red, yellow, and green lights in sanctioned events like the ones used in sparring at a gym; there’s only a bell to begin rounds and a bell to end rounds. It seemed like an eternity before the bell rang to start, but when it did, I came out hard and fast—I kind of surprised myself with my speed. I started in right away. The first punch woke Carrie up. She covered her face with her big blue boxing gloves and kept them there for most of my punches. She was smaller and a little delicate. I stepped back and waited for her to regroup. Then I went at her again.
I felt a little uncomfortable at first, hitting someone who wasn’t hitting back. Then Papi yelled from the bleachers, “Come on, Jess. Easy work.” I cut under into her stomach. I could tell that one hurt her a little. Don’t retreat. Keep punching. This was part of my training and part of growing as a boxer. I kept hitting. I nailed her with some body blows, and landed a few to her face. It felt easy because she didn’t really throw too many punches back. I was on the attack, and she was playing straight defense.
The bell rang, and round one was over before it ever began.
Carrie went to her corner, and I think she might have been crying. I didn’t feel terribly bad about it, because I realized that it was that first sparring match with the boy where I cried that I got my strength. This first fight was helping her become a better boxer just as much as it was making me one.
In my corner, Don said, “You’re doing a good job, kiddo, good job. But don’t assume that the next round will be like the first. Stay tall out there.”
Boxing can be an unpredictable sport. Even weaker fighters can take down stronger ones in just a few swipes. Sometimes when you think you know who’s going to win, the fighter comes out stronger and more determined in the next round and changes the results to their advantage. That’s what makes the sport exciting.
“Stay down on your punches . . . Keep going forward,” Don said.
It was time for the second round, and the crowd was cheering loudly. I dominated in the second as well. My entire family was screaming, “Go, Jess!” and “You got this, Jesselyn!” By the third round, we were both tired. I had let in a few punches, but I’d won the match.
When the fight was over, I was pretty pumped. I thought I would be more sore, but I wasn’t at all. Afterward Carrie was such a good sport, we hugged and went to the vending machine and bought candy bars. A security guard who’d watched the first round of our match said, “You were both pretty tough out there. Who ended up winning?”
“We were both winners!” Carrie said. I loved that answer. We were both winners.
After Fight Night was over, Don took Papi and me to my favorite restaurant, P.F. Chang’s, for dinner. I was starving!
Don asked me, “What did you like most about your first fight?”
I smiled. “I liked winning! And I liked that I’m one fight closer to the Junior Olympics.”
He laughed. Then he asked, “What did you like least?”
I thought about it for a few seconds and said, “That Mackenzie didn’t come to cheer me on.”
His voice got soft. “Well, then, I guess you’re going to have to tell her she’d better start coming to watch a future boxing champion while there are still tickets available.”
That Monday I went to school and told Mackenzie every detail about my first boxing match. She thought it was great! I walked around for weeks after the fight feeling like a new person—literally for weeks.
CHAPTER FOUR
WHAT DREAMS ARE MADE OF
Nothing really big ever happened in my hometown of Bergenfield, New Jersey. My father called it the suburbs he’d always dreamed of living in as a kid: tree-lined streets and white picket fences, pretty houses and nice neighbors. There seemed to be a hundred restaurants down Washington Street—everything from Lechón—roasted suckling pig—at one of the many Filipino restaurants, to fish-and-chips at Tommy Fox’s Irish pub. But what I loved most were the trains. There always seemed to be a CSX train passing through—on its way to or from New York City. I would imagine what those cars could be carrying . . . clothes, or toys, or millions of Jelly Bellys! The sound of the train horns would go unnoticed once you got used to them, but I hoped I would never get to the point where I didn’t hear their whistles blowing.
One time, Extreme Makeover came to Bergenfield and redid a house near ours, but after the cameras left, and the episode was long forgotten, the owners ended up having to sell the house because they couldn’t pay the increased taxes after the house was all done up. Other than that, things were pretty quiet where I grew up.
To me, Bergenfield had always seemed like a place that needed a bit of shaking up—someone to do something big to put it on the map—so I decided I was going to be that person: the youngest Junior Olympic female gold medalist boxer. I thought that aspiring to be a legend in one’s hometown was as good a start as any.
One night at dinner, Papi was explaining to Jesiah that if he wanted to be a boxer like me, he had to take it more seriously. “I am taking it seriously!” Jesiah said with a pout. Jesiah had started coming to the gym with me pretty regularly—mostly because Papi made him—but he would only “train” for a bit, then get distracted and go off and play.
“Guess we can’t all be passionate about boxing,” I said smugly.
“Oh yeah?” Jesiah said defensively. “And you’re going to the Junior Olympics?”
“Yep,” I said, shoveling a spoonful of peas into my mouth.
“Then what?”
His question caught me off guard. I was so focused on training to be ready for a championship at the Junior Olympics that I hadn’t really thought about anything beyond that.
Papi looked at me sideways with a curious expression.
“He’s got a point,” Papi said. “Maybe you should write down some long-term goals for yourself.”
* * *
AFTER DINNER I sat in my bedroom thinking about what exactly I wanted from boxing. What were my goals? I stared at the ceiling for a good long time, because I realized I probably needed a thought-out plan.
My bedroom was my favorite place in the entire house. Everything in my room was soft. Papi had painted the walls white like cotton, which was very soothing to me, and beautiful. I had a desk for studying, and an arts-and-crafts area, a dry-erase board, a comfy mattress with soft pillows, and a fish named Rose who nibbled on my finger. I named Rose after “Thug” Rose Namajunas, the Ultimate Fighting champion in the strawweight division that year. I think Rose the fish might have been male, but I liked the name and he/she look
ed like a Rose. And I really, really liked Rose the boxer, because she was tough as nails!
I went over to my desk and pulled out a piece of paper. In the movies they mark off days on regular calendars for regular things to happen, like dance lessons on Tuesday or someone’s birthday party coming up. I decided to come up with a calendar for big things that I wanted to happen in my life. A calendar of dreams.
My ultimate goal was to be a great boxer someday. But what did that mean, and how was I going to get there? I had to map it out. So at the top of the piece of paper I wrote “Dream Calendar.” Then I quickly drew a twelve-by-twenty grid and started numbering it 1–220. I wanted to fit all 365 days of the year on the paper, but I only got to 220 before I ran out of room. It was a pretty sloppy rough draft.
I thought long and hard about what exactly my goals were going to be. I figured easiest goals to hardest. I went over to my dry-erase board and wrote: “(1) WIN THE REST OF MY MATCHES THIS YEAR” (if Don found me some more girls to fight). Next, I wanted to do at least one state tournament, so I wrote “(2) GOLDEN GLOVES” underneath it. My next goal: “(3) QUALIFY FOR JUNIOR OLYMPICS,” which I wrote in big bold letters. I started circling numbers on my dream calendar and would x out numbers after each day I trained toward my goal was completed. Each crossed out number reminded me I was one step closer toward my goals and inspired me to keep going.
The next version of the dream calendar I would make would be full of color and straight lines . . . but something was missing. I still had to figure out what my ultimate goal was. My way-way-in-the-future goal. I thought and thought. Then I thought of my great-grandfather.
Shortly after my first sanctioned fight with Carrie, I visited my great-grandfather in Florida. He was Papi’s grandfather, and I always thought it was pretty neat that we had four generations of Silvas still around. Papi’s grandfather told me stories of his childhood in Cuba, and he always teased Papi about living in New Jersey, where the winters were so harsh. “When will you see the light and just move down to Florida and enjoy some warmth?” he’d ask.
I was nine years old when Papi’s grandpapi woke me up from a sound sleep and said, “Jesselyn, I want you to come with me.” It was the middle of the night, and it took my eyes a while to adjust to the light. He handed me a plate of his famous homemade flan—which was this delicious, soft, custardy dessert he’d always make for special occasions—sat me down in the recliner in his small living room, and made me watch hours of boxing matches on cable TV. He knew that I was serious about boxing and wanted to encourage me to follow what I loved. The next night I woke him up to watch boxing on TV. After that it became our evening ritual. During the fights he’d point out what the boxers were doing right and wrong. One night my father came into the room and said, “What are you two doing? It’s two a.m.!” Then he got himself a plate of flan and joined us.
Looking back, I think it was some of the best instruction I’ve ever had.
Not many people knew my great-grandfather was a boxing fan until he found out I had taken up the sport. After that it made our bond tighter until we became almost inseparable, talking about our favorite fights and boxers and how to improve both mentally and physically. My great-grandfather was very sick from lung cancer. It felt like I was just really getting to know him when he started to get weaker. One time we went to visit him in the hospital when he was getting chemotherapy. “Jess, I know if you go pro . . . ,” he said through hard breaths, “you’ll be having your first fight in Madison Square Garden.” I smiled and reassured him I’d continue with my boxing career.
He said, “You will keep working hard and you will be great. I know that much about you.” He was hooked up to monitors in a hospital room and looked so frail, yet he said those words with conviction. With a little struggle in his voice he said, “The day you fight in Madison Square, my spirit will be there with you. You will see me standing right there next to you.”
I’d never been to the Garden, but I knew it had hosted thousands of fights, including some of the most famous. That’s where, in 1943, Sugar Ray Robinson fought Henry Armstrong—two of the greatest boxers in history. They fought there thirty-seven times combined! Joe Louis fought there twelve times. In one of the most memorable fights at the Garden, labeled the Fight of the Century, Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier clashed on March 8, 1971, in a heavyweight championship to end all. Both were undefeated boxers, and both were out for the heavyweight title. Frazier won in fifteen grueling rounds. Then of course there’s Mike Tyson’s relationship with Madison Square Garden. Spectators loved to come watch the human wrecking ball dominate under that dome—he could sell out the place in minutes. In the 1980s, Tyson was one of the youngest heavyweight champions in history to box in Madison Square Garden, and he’s still one of the greatest, most ferocious, and entertaining boxers to watch to this day.
Then there was the important fight between Bernard “the Executioner” Hopkins and Puerto Rican boxer Felix Trinidad on September 29, 2001. Not only did Hopkins become the first man to become the undisputed middleweight champion after defeating Trinidad, but, more importantly, this was the first major sporting event after the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
But the fight I won’t forget wasn’t even a main event. In 2017, Mikaela Mayer fought on the undercard of the Vasyl Lomachenko versus Guillermo Rigondeaux fight. She dominated Nydia Feliciano by a majority decision in four rounds. When you fight undercard, it means you’re fighting before the main event—you’re the lesser-known boxers.
I had figured out my big dream goal for my dream calendar. I wrote at the very bottom of the dry-erase board in big, big, bold letters:
FIGHT AT MADISON SQUARE GARDEN!!!
But when I fought in the Garden, I decided, I wasn’t going to be on the undercard. I was going to headline!
My father is not an emotional man. But when I came down to show him my calendar and tell him about my goals, I could see that he was proud. “This is probably something we should all have,” he said. He understood how much boxing meant to me. “Promise me one thing, though, Jesselyn. Don’t take shortcuts in life. People think they can cut corners for some things, but it’ll always end up taking you more time in the end. Do the hard work. Focus on where you’re going.”
My father was saying this from experience. When he was in high school, he didn’t have any goals. His life wasn’t guided. He said he just didn’t care about anything. He never even went to prom. He liked football most of all, but not in the way I cared about boxing. He stopped doing his homework. Then he started skipping school and hanging out with the wrong kids. Then he pretty much dropped out of school and life altogether.
When he was sixteen, he ended up in a youth probation program for troubled boys. While in that program he received a surprise letter from his father, who was in prison at the time. In the letter, my grandfather told my father not to make the same bad decisions he had made. He wrote that all bad decisions lead to consequences, and that if my father kept going down that path, he would end up in prison just like him, and that was no life for anybody. And even though the details were a little murky, it was a known fact that Papi’s father eventually ended up dead on the streets because of his bad decisions. My father was so moved by this letter that he was determined to focus on making good decisions for himself and his family. A hard life just wasn’t going to happen to me if my father had anything to say about it.
I think because of a few hard knocks during his own teenage years, Papi was pretty strict with my brother and me. We had daily chores, and we had firm “Rules of the Household.” Beds were expected to be made in the morning, dishes cleaned and put away at night. We couldn’t listen to certain kinds of music, or watch certain shows on TV, no exceptions. There were no sleepovers, and homework had to be done before any playtime happened.
Whenever my father saw us being lazy or fighting with each other, he’d say, “Come on, too much
downtime. Get off the couch and go outside!”
I began going to the gym five days a week, several hours a day. Weekends I would usually show up to watch a match or spar with a boy. My technique was improving; my knowledge was expanding. Working with speed bags helped make my shoulders stronger. Sit-ups gave me a tighter core. Being on the treadmill strengthened my calves and improved my breathing. Shadowboxing for hours a week helped with my balance and my arm speed. A person has twenty-seven small bones in each hand. I needed to know my soft spots and how to punch the right way to keep my hands safe. I needed to learn to protect my face and head. I needed to learn to stop dragging my feet. Your brain can be bruised, and concussions heal slowly. I focused on protecting my skull. I punched with my lead hand over and over. I practiced repetitive motion.
I did a full routine every day until I collapsed. My father kept telling me to “use my energy” and fill myself with passion. He would remind me that being passionate about something is better than spending my time watching TV. And I kept dreaming of one day boxing in Madison Square Garden. I was falling in love with boxing, and even if some people thought it was a savage sport, I’d never felt more confident and determined. I was going to accomplish my dreams.
CHAPTER FIVE
SOMETHING LOST, SOMETHING GAINED
About the same time I created my dream calendar, my father was making his own goals. He quit his night-shift job at the meat processing plant and took a job with shorter day hours as a delivery guy for a Greek restaurant. His stress and chest pains had become so bad that his doctor had recommended trying a lighter load for a while. Switching from the long night job to an easier day job seemed like the logical first step toward change. A career as a food delivery guy wasn’t on his dream calendar, but raising two good kids was. He said the most important goal for him was to raise us the right way.
My Corner of the Ring Page 5
