Twan Russell leaving a lasting fingerprint

How many clinics have you done?

``Too many,'' Twan Russell says through a weary laugh, still at work at Miami Dolphins headquarters late one night.

No, really, how many?

``Last year, we did 178,'' he says.

No, today?

``Today?'' he says. ``Just three.''

It is hard work, changing your community child by child, but you wouldn't believe how much this job can pay.

There was the time, for example, that Russell was running through a football obstacle course with a disabled child who could barely lift his arms. The wheelchair grazed tackling dummies and weaved around cones, and the child kept laughing with uncommon delight. The boy, at one point, started barking. Russell was surprised when a woman rushed up to him then with tears in her eyes. He got scared. He thought maybe a child at camp had been injured.

``No,'' the woman said through sobs. ``You don't understand what you just did. That boy hasn't made a sound in 10 years.''

It is not uncommon for professional football teams to have a department that helps in the community. It is very uncommon for that department to be run by a young man who so recently played for the team. But here is the 35-year-old former Dolphins linebacker during another 6 a.m., unloading that 22-foot truck (``Football in a can,'' Russell calls it), eager to learn whom he might reach with his touch today and whom he might touch with his reach.

``Accidentally impacting,'' he says. ``The people who made the most difference in my life didn't know they made the most difference in my life. We need to leave a fingerprint. There's a moral responsibility to leave something real behind.''

AT THE CROSSROADS
Life sometimes gives you a literal crossroads, complete with a stop sign. Russell found his on U.S. Highway 441 and 21st Street, near where he grew up in Fort Lauderdale. He was visiting his mother, who was sick from cancer, in 2004. He crossed the street to buy a drink. And his damaged knee clicked with so much rigidity that he barely got out of the way of an oncoming car. He sat on the side of the road and wept. And quit football forever on the spot.
A month later, his calling. Not metaphorically. Actually. The Dolphins were on the phone. And the conversation with then-president Brian Weidermeyer went something like this:

``You want a job?''

``What would I be doing?''

``I'm not sure.''

They created a position -- director of youth and community programs. Russell always had shown a zeal about helping kids during his playing days. In his six years with the Dolphins, Redskins and Falcons, the former University of Miami player created a life skills and literacy program that now has more than 40 teachers and eight centers. But today, with the backing and resources of one of South Florida's most popular and credible brands, he can devote himself full-time to strengthening the South Florida that helped to make him so strong.

``I love to serve,'' he says. ``It is part of my DNA.''

He wasn't born with it, actually. His mother embedded it. Twan always was painting or cleaning up at church as a child. Twan could have gone one of two ways from there. His father got involved with drugs and ended up in jail after orchestrating the Pell Grant fraud that resulted in UM landing on probation. So Twan's mother, Corliss, raised five boys on her own. And she was still running Twan's foundation from her death bed. It took three people to replace her.

Corliss was a teacher. Always a teacher. And, through her boy, she teaches South Florida still. His camps aren't really about football, obviously. The football is just the bait on the end of the hook. You should see what Twan teaches them about attitude, responsibility and positive choices once he gets them out of that sea of trouble and onto the safety of his boat.

``We have a harvest,'' Twan says. ``We're harvesting kids. Something good will grow. I'm driven by all my mother invested in me while we were eating oodles of noodles for dinner. A lot of people would have quit. But she was a force field. She kept the streets out of our home.''

`JOB WAS SENT BY GOD'
He is such a gentle menace. He led the University of Miami in tackles one season. He was a special-teams zealot who still smiles when he describes his old job as, in his words, ``crashing into something and killing it.'' So he has credibility when he goes into the Dolphins locker room and prods current players to give up their off days to meet with kids. Russell loves his job so much that his laughing wife will call him at 10 p.m. at Dolphins headquarters and ask after he has lost track of time again, ``Are you coming home?'' There are so many areas of South Florida that need. And there's not enough time in the day to give back what he feels like he owes.

``This job was sent by God,'' he says. ``I've been preparing for it all my life. I adore it.''

It fulfills him in the smallest, biggest ways. A young boy telling him, ``Thank you for being patient with me.'' The crying mother of a misbehaving child telling him, ``I need my boy to be around a man. You can give him something I can't -- some courage, some bite.'' Or a 14-year-old writing this letter:

Dear Twan Russell and the Miami Dolphins,

I am writing this on behalf of all the kids who enjoyed your camp over the years. Attending has been the highlight of my summers since I was six. The best part, after a spectacular week of competing, is getting to play in Dolphin Stadium. But camp means more than that to most kids. It's about being able to play in the practice bubble, meeting players from your favorite team and making friends you may only know for one week but, for that week, they're your best friends. Even though they might be four years younger or older, faster or slower, taller or shorter, you treat them the same. This no doubt comes from the leadership of the staff and coaches. The attitude of each athlete is molded in just one week. I don't know too many teachers who can say or do the same.
I'm sad to say I won't be attending camp next year because I'm turning 15 in November. But I'll be watching my little brother from the stands. I hope he gets as much out of the experience as I did. All I can say is thank you for the memories. They will last forever.



(miamiherald.com)