What Marcus Lattimore is doing across the country after departing South Carolina job
Being home brings many things.
Home is comfortable. Home is familiar. Home means seeing old faces and plenty of people who know who you are. But there can also be a weight to that. A person’s history becomes shorthand. Who he or she is becomes inexorably blended with the memories those around have of them.
That’s true for most folks, more true for someone with a bit of a profile. When Marcus Lattimore was in South Carolina, there was always going to be an element of being “Marcus Lattimore, former decorated star athlete.”
So right now, Lattimore is not in South Carolina, the place where he became a household name in the world of sports. He has a strong affection for his home state, but as he and his wife take next steps on their own journey of learning and growth, there’s a value in the different perspective one gets when they step away.
“I love South Carolina,” Lattimore said. “And I realized that’s what made me who I am.
“It’s important for me to experience a different place, personally.”
Lattimore left a position with South Carolina’s football program at the start of the year. He’s now living thousands of miles away in Portland, Oregon. He’s no stranger to the West Coast, having spent several seasons on the San Francisco 49ers roster. But now, he and his wife are experiencing something different.
Had things gone to plan, Lattimore and his wife, Miranda, would be in Paris right now. He had hoped to experience a different culture in Europe, take some classes, expand his mind more.
“COVID changed everything,” Lattimore said. “There was a ban on travel, so we weren’t able to go.
“We both looked at ourselves and said, ‘You know, we both know Portland. It’s a place where we feel comfortable. It’s a place that’s conducive to our growth.’ So we made it happen.”
Miranda recalled an avalanche of big decisions all at once. They’d already sold their house, planning to cross the Atlantic (it went within 48 hours). They thought about staying around Columbia, but started looking at either Portland or California.
“We felt like, ‘What do we do?’” Miranda said.
Some opportunities in the creative world made Portland the place.
Europe is still potentially in the plans down the road, but for now, the Pacific Northwest is the next step.
In pursuit of their passions
Oregon holds a special place in Marcus’ history because the first plane he ever got on landed there. That was when he was still a high school football star playing for Bobby Bentley at Byrnes High School.
Miranda remembered hiking up Mount Hood when the couple visited around New Year’s at the start of 2017. They had a conversation in the chilly Pacific Northwestern air and agreed, “We could really live here.”
After his high school days, Marcus went on to star for his home-state Gamecocks, take a shot at the NFL after a devastating knee injury and then return home to the Palmetto State.
After his playing days, he started the Marcus Lattimore Foundation, a youth organization with a wide-ranging set of goals. In the years after finishing his degree, he spent two years coaching football at Heathwood Hall in Columbia and two more years leading the “Beyond Football” program with the Gamecocks team he once played for.
Through all of that, Marcus maintained a passion for psychology, studying the mind and trauma, especially when it comes to young people. In Portland, that’s become a cornerstone of his daily routine.
“I’ve been loading up on reading and writing, trying to understand the mind a little bit better,” Marcus said. “Because that’s what’s helped me so much in my professional life, which has been mentoring and counseling, dealing with kids under the age of 18 and trying to understand their brain and how I could best help them thrive.”
He said he’s been in talks with some athletic departments in the Portland area about potentially consulting or helping on that front, but for the most part he’s pursuing his passions: reading and writing, sometimes prose, sometimes poetry.
Miranda is starting a new chapter of her own. After working in real estate in Columbia, she’s connecting to her passion for photography. She did a little of that in her real estate job, and she’s also writing, creating pieces that uplift.
Marcus’ background in sports has helped in this time because it showed him how to structure his time. He still gives himself daily responsibilities, but is not in a rush to get back into anything too quickly.
And he’s getting his thoughts out into the world.
“I write on topics that I feel I have the expertise to speak on,” Marcus said. “And those are the only topics I write on. I don’t write on anything that I don’t know about, or I haven’t experienced, something that’s helped me in my life.”
Of late, he’s spoken up about issues of race in America and police brutality. Even far from home, he has his platform, and he won’t shy from using it when he believes strongly in something.
A new sense of home for Lattimores
In the end, he aims to find himself in a place where he can help people figure out their lives.
His own life has seen those different steps, going from the life of a star amateur athlete to a professional far from home to a mentor to a coach and to his alma mater for a different sort of role.
And this step has something different. They’re no longer in a place where joining a kickball league means a conversation in some office the next day with the phrase, “You’ll never guess who was on the other team. Marcus Lattimore!” They don’t end up in grocery store conversations with a stranger about the college years.
Home is home and will always be home. But there’s a learning experience in going to a place where one isn’t quite so known and perhaps more removed from a public persona tied to memories now years old.
It’s a chance for a journey of self-discovery, something Miranda called a privilege to be able to do.
“I figure why not now?” Miranda said. “In our 20s. I feel like we don’t have a lot of obligations. We don’t have children. We’re lucky that our parents are in great health, so we don’t have to worry.
“I just see it as a strategic move, right now.”
The Lattimores get to indulge in being Portland foodies (Miranda said the food sold her on Portland initially). They get to experience something different, but it’s a place that harmonizes with them as well. Travel will always be a part of their lives, and who knows what the next year might bring?
But thousands of miles from Duncan where they grew up, they’ve found a different sense of home.
“It just allows me to experience the outdoors, which is something we love as a family but I love personally,” Marcus said. “It’s a community of people here that are accepting of different ideas and different philosophies and there’s a lot of groups that are like-minded with myself.”
This story was originally published July 1, 2020 at 5:00 AM with the headline "What Marcus Lattimore is doing across the country after departing South Carolina job."
