Headline, April13, 2013

'''MIKE TYSON : The Baddest Man On 

The Planet : NO MORE!'''

Even now people watch and glance up at him then freeze. As if, they had just seen a terrifying ghost. But then there are others, who looked thrilled to see the very baddest man on the planet, and excitedly take cell-phone pictures of him. ''I can't believe its you,'' a fan screams,  nor in a sense, can Mike Tyson.

He makes no fuss. ''If you have tomato-basil soup. I love that,'' he says unassumingly to the waitress, who assures him that the chef would be glad to make it for him. ''Thank you kindly, maam,'' he smiles through.

He goes on to ruminate his changes in a simple quiet way. ''I used to be extremely carnivorous. But I needed to change my life completely. In order to do that I have to be in the best physical and emotional state possible. I would call it a paradigm shift in my life. Because I was going to kill myself. or kill some people.''

And so, Mike Tyson proves to be as open about himself as an unhealed wound, and, perhaps most surprising of all, the gentlest of damaged souls. At a crossroads in his turbulent life, the former heavyweight champion of the world -whose epic rise and fall have branded him the American Icon -had that very morning visited the mean streets of his childhood ghetto, in Brownsville Brooklyn.

The $300 million he earned in the ring is gone, and with it the spoils of war  -the mansions, the jewels and the furs, the wild parties and the freeloading entourage. He reveals no bitterness  -suggesting the money was his to lose. ''When I was a kid, I told Cus D'Amato, my trainer, that I wanted to be rich, and  he said, 'that will happen, but that's not the hardest thing in the world.' The hardest thing is when your mother is walking the street late at night, and nobody touches her. Because you are a special person.''

''The science of boxing is magnificent. The art is great. But when that art is projected onto another human being, the first punch that lands makes it ugly  -really ugly,'' he explains. ''Fighting is not physical. The power and the pain and the hurt don't come from the muscles. Fighting is all about the spirit. The one who fights with brute strength alone is going to lose.''

Good Night & God Bless!

SAM Daily Times - the Voice of the Voiceless