Mateo dreamed of being a dancer, watching video upon video of various ways to move. He was not pleased when his dad handed him a box with a Judo uniform it in, not saying much more than a “we start tomorrow, okay?” This isn’t a story of a man who was bent on destroying his son’s dreams. It’s a story of how he taught him to fight for it.
Mateo and his father woke up early the next morning, walking past a group of jeering kids. They taunted him with, “‘Sup, Mateo? Where you goin’ Daddy’s boy?” These were the guys that put him through the gauntlet every day of his life. Mateo kept his head down. His father put his arm around him and walked on. Mateo went through his first day of training. The next day, he did the same thing. He was taunted. He went to training. It was the same thing the next day and the next and the next.