Once homeless, former running back Snow earns Ohio State degree
We like happy endings, so it makes sense that when reaching what appears to be the final scene in the Carlos Snow feelgood drama we applaud the former Ohio State tailback for receiving his diploma in the same stadium where three decades earlier he majored in football.
In the climactic closing, here was a 53-year-old with salt and pepper hair graduating Sunday next to students half his age.
“I guess I was kind of used to the age difference, because all this time I’ve been going to classes with them,” Snow said Monday. “A lot of them were like, ‘What class do you teach? You seem like you would be a cool professor.’ And I was like, ‘No, I’m in class with you.’ I had to laugh about that.”
Here was the one-time Blizzard, who led the Buckeyes in rushing in 1988, ’89 and ’91, now walking on reconstructed knees across the commencement stage on Mother’s Day to fulfill a mama’s wish for her son to complete his education.
“I promised my mother I would get my degree, and I felt her there, even though she is in heaven,” Snow said. “It’s like she put this together, on Mother’s Day, to let me know she is still paying attention.”
Here was a recovering alcoholic, now five years sober, able to remember how he got to the stadium in the first place. Prior to
Feb. 24, 2017, the date of his last drink, his power of recall would have tapped out in a blurry haze of booze and pain medication. A decades-long downward spiral led to suicidal thoughts. Homeless for much of 2018, he lived in his Toyota Camry and occasionally
visited shelters before eventually securing housing near Linden.
Inspirational stuff for sure, but what if Sunday was not actually the end? What if, like a Marvel movie, late in the credits another scene appeared that teased out coming attractions? More triumphs. More trials. And what if Snow was in that scene holding up his hands to signal “Don’t leave. We’re not finished.”
That is where things currently stand, three days removed from a black gown and white tassel victory parade in the Horseshoe. Even as Ohio State fans move past the storybook ending of a once down-on-his-luck former Buckeye graduating 30 years later with a 3.7 GPA, Snow’s comeback continues.
“I’m almost there but I can’t settle. I’ve got to keep going. I’m at the age now where everything counts,” he said, managing a chuckle.
Earning a degree is one thing; putting it to good use is another, and on that count Snow’s future remains in the air. For starters, the man needs a job. And not just any job. He needs to be selective, not just because his degree in sociology suits a specific career, but also his body is too fractured to last long doing the type of physical labor more readily available around Columbus.
“I’m on disability,” he said. “I’m kind of beat up and can’t do warehouse work anymore.”
Both knees have been replaced due to football injuries, and his right leg still is held together by a metal rod inserted when he had a benign tumor removed from his thigh, costing him the 1990 season. One hip is almost shot and his back retains the flexibility of a telephone pole.
Given his physical limitations, it’s good that Snow’s passion is for teaching and preaching about his experiences. His perfect job would be mentoring young men, a career move for which he feels especially qualified. All the better if he could land a job doing it at Ohio State.
“One of my goals is to change the life of young men for the better,” he said, noting the success of friend and former Ohio State tailback Maurice Clarett, who used his troubled past as an object lesson to advise young men how to avoid similar slip-ups.
“When I talk to young men in the city, I explain to them how important education is,” Snow said. “I tell them to pick out their favorite athlete, past or present. Then look how short their career is. Even if they play 13 or 14 years, that’s pretty successful, but life goes on. Life is a lot longer than that. That degree gives them an opportunity to get a career and have something to retire from.
“That’s what I want to explain to them, and what better person to listen to than the person who has been through it? Not reading it from a book or someone else’s memoir. I’m giving it to you straight. I can’t wait to get the word out.”
But wait he must. Real life is not reel life, not a Frank Capra film tied off in a red bow over the final five minutes. The truth is that stress continues after the screen goes dark. George Bailey may be the richest man in town, but how to spend the money? Private school for the kids? Buy the Five and Dime and turn it into a supper club? Maybe get some counseling to make sure Clarence was not just a psychological manifestation of a dysfunctional childhood?
Snow has lived long enough on “both sides of the tracks,” as he put it, to learn not to get fooled into thinking he should be crowned the early winner of a wonderful life still being contested.
“I can see the finish line, and I have a good lead,” he said, before cautioning the race has not been won, even if the congratulatory messages he continues to receive make it appear otherwise. In fact, the distance between where Snow is and where he wants to be feels more like a 10K than 40-meter dash.
It’s not that he is opposed to celebrating his success, which he agreed is worthy of recognition. But to hear him tell it, nothing really has been accomplished until everything gets accomplished.
“I’ve got to find employment. That’s Part II of our game plan,” he said.
Our game plan. Not just his. Snow needed help saving his life. Tailbacks need blockers and Snow needed Bernard Master, a retired doctor and longtime mentor from Worthington, to pancake the demons of despair that littered his path.
“Doctor Master is my mentor, my coach and my father, really,” Snow said. “He came up with a plan for me going back to school and I have followed it.”
Master cleared the way for Snow, initially by setting up a GoFundMe account that helped get him on his feet, then walking his friend through the necessary steps of financial, relational and emotional rehabilitation. Next, Ohio State athletic director Gene Smith facilitated the former Buckeyes’ return to Ohio State.
“Gene Smith was gracious enough to let me come back to school,” Snow said. “Ohio State has been so good to me.”
“So happy and proud of Carlos,” Smith texted. “He overcame so much, and chased his dream of getting his degree. He committed himself, focused, accepted help and got it done! So cool to see!!!”
Indeed. And it will be even cooler to watch where Snow goes from here. His story winds from Cincinnati, where he starred at the now long defunct Cincinnati Academy of Physical Education, to Ohio State, to a brief stint with the Denver Broncos in 1992, to a Hamilton County jail (for a 2017 OVI conviction), to homelessness, to Alcoholics Anonymous to a college degree.
Yet in a sense his story is just beginning.
“This has been a lifestyle change all the way around,” he said, explaining he put his social life on hold over much of the past three years. Divorced in 2006, he remains single.
“Part of it is getting myself together,” he said of not pursuing marriage. “I wouldn’t want to bring anyone into the situation I’m in. I’m waiting to get myself together. I want to have a meaningful job.”
This much is clear. Snow is willing to work his way back to financial, mental and emotional health. Many others in his situation would be the confused swimmer who gets halfway across the Atlantic and turns back, deciding the remaining distance ahead is too far to complete.
Snow wisely keeps going, knowing that what lies ahead cannot be more difficult than the choppy waters he already has traveled. He knows how to survive. It’s now time to thrive.