All of these gatherings, and the divisions that naturally follow from them, happen almost without our trying. We do that in our communities and our workplaces, sorting ourselves by family, faith, ethnicity, education, politics, authority, department, and so on. We commonly gather and connect with people like ourselves. There is something foundationally powerful about Charles' and Lin's friendship. If not, I will post links to her story and Charles' eulogy at Lin's funeral in the comments. But perhaps that is true for all of us to some degree, and perhaps even for Lin, who honored that friendship by keeping it to himself rather than trying to gain any advantage from it.Īfter her father's passing at age 53, Lin's daughter wrote about their friendship and the story went viral. And Charles, immediately after an NBA playoff game, flew to Iowa to attend, and ultimately speak, at Lin's funeral.įor a famous person like Charles Barkley, real, stringless friendships are likely hard to come by. Lin traveled to the small town of Leeds, Alabama for the funeral of Charles' mom. Gifted story tellers both, with a gift for gab and making people smile, they shared drinks for a couple of hours, followed by a three hour conversation over dinner and then semi-regular get-togethers when travels led them to the same town. The two met in a chance encounter in a Sacramento hotel lobby in 2014. Charles Barkley, of course, is the larger-than-life former NBA superstar who is now a larger-than-life TV personality. The Chinese-born Wang was a scientist in the midwest who specialized in cat litter. Charles Barkley and Lin Wang were unlikely friends.
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