Everyday Heroics
I always find myself reevaluating around this time of year, simply because the last digit in the date changes and we move from one era to the next in one seemingly arbitrary night. It is always in December that I first find myself looking forward to what I want and where I’m going, then glancing backwards at where I have been as January approaches. It seems only natural timing.
Since I’ve been back in my hometown I’ve meet up with a few old friends and had some new experiences to put it all in perspective. I’ve been lucky enough to reconvene with a few highly influential figures in my life, people who at one point or another had a huge impact on my life, sometimes sending me careening into a new and exciting direction, other times just knowing when to listen and what to encourage.
I find it strange that we can look back at specific moments of our lives after the fact and say “this was a defining moment,” or “that changed everything,” but rarely do we say “I am currently in a difficult transitionary period” or “this decision is going to make or break me.” Yet there are a series of memories in my mind aligned like Christmas lights drawing from the source of my past the energy that makes me the me and I am today, memories where each would not be meaningful without the ones that came before it. But what impresses me most is how little it took to light the whole string up. Those defining moments and influential figures weren’t epic at all, but small, almost normal everyday occurrences. The teacher that listened, the friend that never gave up, the ever-willing luncheon companion; these are the heroes that challenged me and nurtured me and inspired me not with extraordinary acts of kindness or miraculous ventures, or prophetic lessons, but with dirty jokes, the occasional hug, and toasts. They changed my future with anecdotes and tangential conversations, with costume parties and over-the-phone invitations, with how freely they offered laughter and how often then doled out advice. My heroes are all ordinary people. And that makes them more powerful and more gallant than anyone the history books could proffer.
Even more remarkable has been my discovery that at times I was the hero in someone else’s life. In reconnecting with the people of my yesterdays, all of whom are just as close to me now as they were then even without conversation during the intervening years (the mark of a true friendship), I see now that one or two of the small, seemingly normal everyday occurrences from my existence had a major impact on someone else. Something I did helped make someone else who they are today. It’s a wonderful feeling to know that somewhere along the way you really touched someone else, you were able to make a difference for the better, and not by a donation to charity or time volunteered, but just by being you.
This suggests that a true hero is not one who accomplishes something worthy, but one who’s nature is worthy. These heroes may be rarer than the Napoleons and Nikola Teslas of the world, but they are realer, and far more influential than I had previously considered. So don’t think any deed goes unnoticed, and never doubt your ability to change the world.