Chris Bosh Day
On last month's very special trip to Dallas
March has always been big for me. And not just because my birthday’s at the end of the month.
March always marks the beginning of the end of the regular season—a time to give every last inch you’ve got, to push for the playoffs.
It’s also when my jersey went up to the rafters in Miami three years ago—a day I’ll never forget.
Now I’ve got another March milestone to add. As of this week, March 13th is officially Chris Bosh Day in Dallas, Texas. I’m not kidding—got the photos with the Mayor to prove it—but I will admit to being pretty damn surprised.
I thought I was going to Dallas just to get the key to the city. And what better place to do that than Lincoln High School, my alma mater—where, twenty years ago last month, we clinched state and national championships after a 40-0 season?
There are so many people tied to that moment for me—not just the wins, but that life-changing time as a whole. Teammates. Family. Coaches. All belong to the same inner circle: those who lifted me up early on. Who let me know greatness was something worth striving and pushing yourself for. So when I saw so many of them packed into the same gym I practiced and played in two decades ago, it was more than enough to make the long drive there and back worth it. I caught up with coaches, teachers, and principals—all looking like they hadn’t aged a day since I walked the halls of Lincoln..
I’ve believed education is a privilege ever since I had the honor of getting a great one myself. And looking out on a crowd of current Lincoln students, I wanted to make sure they understood that. I wanted to tell them the best way to honor that privilege is to find your own singular way to leave things better than you found them.
That can mean getting involved with a student group. It can mean becoming a teacher yourself. It can mean representing your school on the court. It can even be as simple as loving yourself while you’re a student, letting that love flow down to those younger than you. It’s called being a positive influence. Anyone can do it.
It’s hard to think of a better place than Lincoln High School to have said all this. Because I’ve never been anything but proud to have gotten my start there—or in South Dallas at large, matter of fact. You can’t have the key to a city you’re not proud to be from.
So thank you. Thank you to Lincoln High School and Humanities/Communications magnet, for imparting skills of the mind and heart that I find myself using to this day. To the coaches, teachers and principals who pushed me to be as good in the classroom as I was on the court. And thank you to the entire community—from the school bleachers to the blacktops of Hutchins, where I grew up. Thank you for supporting your neighborhood, your school, your team.
Thank you for supporting Dallas. You’ve already left our city better than you found it.