Raised in Miami's historic black neighborhood of Overtown, Sophia Gilbert learned her survival instincts from two maternal mentors: her mother, who toiled for years at low-paying retail jobs, and her grandmother, who often looked after her and her four siblings.
Sophia now relies on those instincts years later as she raises two young children alone after their father was murdered _ but she could still use help making the holidays more joyful for her struggling family.
A straitlaced kid who attended Booker T. Washington Senior High School, Gilbert started working during her teen years. "I went to work at 16 to help my mom pay for expenses like clothes and school supplies," she said. "During the summer, I worked as a camp counselor mentoring young girls on how to take care of yourself and be a lady."
As part of her daily routine, Gilbert used to walk to the bus stop at Northwest Third Avenue and 14th Street for her ride north to a job at McDonald's on 62nd Street in the heart of Liberty City. It was on her walks to the bus stop where she first encountered Willie James Gordon, an outgoing guy who would bring both profound sweetness and sorrow to her life.
"Every time he'd see me, he'd say 'I'm gonna get you. You're gonna be my wife one day,' " Gilbert, 34, recalled, choking up over the innocent memory of how he flirted with her on the street before they later exchanged phone numbers at a neighborhood party. "We really hit it off. He was like a jokester; I was more reserved."
Like her, Gordon attended Booker T. Washington Senior High School and then went to work in the kitchen at Denny's while Gilbert became a manager at the McDonald's in Liberty City. They grew romantically close and planned on getting married. They shared an apartment with Gilbert's sister and her two children in Overtown.
Barely in their 20s, they were struggling to make ends meet. And it was during this difficult time that Gordon got into serious trouble with the law. He was busted for selling cocaine and ended up in jail. Gilbert said she knew he was selling drugs on the side, but it was a matter of survival.
"When he got caught, that shocked me because everything landed back on me," said Gilbert, who regularly visited her boyfriend at the Miami-Dade County jail.
After his release, Gordon was lucky to get a job with a local glass company that made novelty items for the Miami Heat. He moved back in with Gilbert. But it wasn't long before he was also back on the street selling cocaine. Gordon got busted again.
"He was doing it to make money to help me," Gilbert said.
After another short term in jail, Gordon was released and moved in with Gilbert again. He was able to get rehired by the glass company. They shared an apartment in Overtown.
"We started to settle down, but he was still hanging out on the streets and smoking weed and drinking," she said.
In 2007, the couple had their first child, Jahkari Gordon, and they eventually moved into a new apartment in a federally subsidized high-rise in the Little Haiti neighborhood of Miami. They had a second child, Samya Gordon, in 2012.
After celebrating Samya's first birthday the following year, the couple seemed to be turning a corner as a family. Still, Gordon could not shake his life on the streets or his use of marijuana and alcohol. He would go to his brother's apartment building in Liberty City to hang out. "This was his getaway spot," Gilbert said.
The couple would argue over his visiting the brother's place because Gilbert knew there was always the potential for trouble, she said. There was constant drug trafficking and gun violence in the area. "The whole thing about that place didn't seem right," she said.
Gordon went to visit his brother against her wishes, while she went to work at McDonald's. When she returned home from her shift, she received a frantic phone call from Gordon's mother, on the evening of Oct. 7, 2013. The mother was hysterical.
"Did anybody call you?" the mother asked, sobbing on the phone.
"No," Gilbert replied.
"They shot him up," the mother said.
Gilbert rushed over to the brother's apartment building in Liberty City. By the time she arrived, however, Gordon had been transported to Jackson Memorial Hospital.
Gilbert later learned that her boyfriend had been in an argument with some neighbors at his brother's apartment complex and had gone to a corner store to buy something to drink. Upon his return to the building, the argument flared up again. She said Gordon tried to calm everyone down, with no success. In the next moment, someone grabbed a gun and shot Gordon multiple times and killed him, she said.
To this day, Gilbert said she doesn't know who murdered Gordon, who was 28. "The police investigation didn't really go anywhere," she said.
Gilbert felt alone and lost. "I would look up in the sky because I didn't know what to do," she said.
After taking some time off, she continued to work at McDonald's and then moved into a rental home in the Model City area of Miami with her two children. In the past year, she started working at her kids' charter school so she could be closer to them.
"I struggle to make it every year," Gilbert said.
Recently, a woman who is seen as a "guardian angel" to people who have experienced gun violence came to her aid and recommended the single mother for the Miami Herald's Wish Book series.
Denise Brown lost her son, Roman Bradley, 20, when he was gunned down in a drive-by shooting seven years ago. She and two other mothers who suffered similar losses established the RJT Foundation to help grieving parents.
Brown said she created this foundation as therapy for herself and to help others like Gilbert who have suffered through similar tragedies. She sees her cause as not only a way of giving back but as keeping her son's memory alive.
Brown reached out to help Gilbert "because she has struggled as a single parent when her life was shattered after the death of her children's father, Willie. Willie was murdered by senseless gun violence while visiting his brother."
Brown described the single mother as shy and modest, saying Gilbert's Christmas wish list consists of laptop computers, clothing, shoes and toys for her two children, Jahkari, 12, and Samya, 7.
"Her last wish that brought tears to my eyes was a headstone for the children's father," Brown said. "It is my hope that with the help of the Wish Book, we can restore some level of joy and trust into their home this Christmas."
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HOW TO HELP
Wish Book is trying to help hundreds of families this year. To donate, pay securely at MiamiHerald.com/wishbook. For information, call 305-376-2906 or email wishbook@miamiherald.com. (Most requested items are laptops and tablets for school, furniture and vans.) Read more at MiamiHerald.com/wishbook.
