Does My Son Know You?

Ringer NBA writer Jonathan Tjarks, diagnosed at 32 with a vanishingly rare metastatic Ewing's-like sarcoma (BCOR–CCNB3 rearrangement, roughly 25-million-to-one odds), writes about fatherhood while facing a terminal prognosis. The piece spirals around one question — if he dies, who will know his young son well enough to step in as a father figure? — and uses his own life to argue that the only insurance is to build deep, present friendships long before you need them. Tjarks died on September 10, 2022.