Joey Kamide: Running With Uncle Chris

Running With Uncle Chris

Many of you who read this blog knew my Uncle Chris. One of the five Kamide brothers who grew up in Carthage, N.Y., he served with the Army in the war in the middle east, worked as a school teacher and a school board member, spent years as a high school and collegiate basketball referee, and above all else, was a great father to my cousins, Chris, Gabbi and Alyssa.

Uncle Chris and I shared a number of similarities. Like each of my uncles on both sides of my family, we shared a passion for sports. He enjoyed watching Syracuse football and hoops, his Dolphins, grew up a baseball fan, and jumped on the lacrosse bandwagon when his kids advanced on to play at the high school and collegiate levels.

Everyone said we looked a lot alike, we both - like my cousin Nate - battled Crohn's Disease, and both of us enjoyed going for a recreational run to keep in shape and get our mind off the daily grind and stress we had in our lives.

When Uncle Chris passed away in April 2013, it hit our family pretty hard. He was only 48-years-old, with young children who had yet to hit the prime of their lives. He had so much to offer this world, and for nearly five decades, he had done so with a big smile on his face and an energy and passion for life that I always noticed whenever I was around him. Just a couple years earlier, he had run in a marathon in Las Vegas to fundraise for the Crohn's and Colitis Foundation of America, and I had helped organize a fundraiser here in Northern Virginia for his cause. 

A few of his personal belongings were passed to members of the family, and since he and I had the same shoe size, I was given a pair of essentially brand new Nike running shoes of his. This, I told myself, couldn't be a more perfect opportunity for me to honor my uncle. I have had the opportunity via baseball to do a lot of traveling, and in the 28 months since his passing, have taken those running shoes with me to all parts of the country and to Europe for runs. I've worn his shoes for jogs here in Virginia, in upstate New York, in New York City, in South Carolina, in Georgia, and in Europe in Hungary, Germany, Austria, Slovakia and the Czech Republic. 

I don't know the exact mileage, but it's well over 200 miles I've run in Uncle Chris' shoes. Every time I tie the shoes before heading out for my run, I think of him. And I think of my cousins, who are without their father. Something I could not comprehend. 

And then there is the irony of the shoes being Nike. My grandfather owned a shoe store in Carthage for over four decades, 'Faye's Boot Shop', and the only brand of sneakers he sold were Nike. So until his passing in 1996, that's all the Kamide family wore. Each summer, we knew we'd get a new pair of kicks for the school year, and each winter, a new pair of basketball sneakers. The fact that Uncle Chris, like many of us in the family, still swore by Nikes, was just another example of the tightness of the family, and the loyalty shown to Grandpa whenever it was time for a new pair of sneakers.

That loyalty exists whenever I look at these two pairs of sneakers I inherited from my Uncle Chris. There are days where I don't feel like going for a run. I've got a bunch on my plate. I'm hungover. I had a big breakfast, and don't feel like cramping up a mile into it. I didn't get much sleep, and the snooze button on my phone or alarm looked very appealing. I won't lie and tell you the thought of Uncle Chris and the shoes forces me to go on that run every time, I unfortunately don't have that type of will power. But he and the shoes are working at about a 75 percent clip right now, and I'm in pretty good shape. A big reason for that is there is a part of me that says get off your butt and go make your uncle proud.

I know you're up there resting in peace, Uncle Chris. We all miss you very much. And I'll keep running until these things fall apart. And keep thinking of you each time I lace them up.