I come from a family of fans. We are sports fans, music fans, history fans. Sometimes we fan family, as with our beloved Uncle Clifton, who just turned 95.
By fans, I mean passionately-consumed-and-verging-on-stalking fans. It’s not as scary as it sounds because we make fun of each other and our various objects of fandom. My brother Scotty latched on to the Beatles and the Yankees in the ’60s. I followed suit with the Yankees but added Amy Grant, Abraham Lincoln, James Taylor, and Jack Black. Sara, a reader, found her fandom in characters such as Laura Ingalls Wilder and Nancy Drew and political scientists who know what they are talking about. To this day, younger brother Shane can break out into any Madonna song/dance—and often does. And the baby of the family went her way: the old Houston Oilers and Warren Moon, the Atlanta Braves and Chipper Jones, and women history makers who defied the norms. All of the heifers on their ranch have First Lady names. Jackie K (Kennedy) O (Onassis) is a real knockout.
My siblings and I have given birth to children who carry on this starry-eyed gene. The New England Patriots, Pat Summitt, Harry Potter and all things Hogwarts, Randy Rogers, Tim Tebow, Beyoncé, Rafael Nadal, and Alamo Drafthouse (yes, one can obsess over a specific movie theater).
We’ve attended their games, seen their concerts, watched their movies, and read their books or listened to podcasts about them. Sabrina even made it to Cooperstown to watch Chipper’s induction into the Baseball Hall of Fame, this after she flew with her longsuffering husband to watch Chipper’s last game in Atlanta.
Our admiration does not stem from idolizing these people. Each of them is very human, with flaws and life experiences that make them relatable. Amy Grant divorced and remarried. Chipper Jones has six sons with three different women. James Taylor had a heroin addiction and spent time in a psychiatric hospital early in his career. Lincoln suffered from depression. Alamo Drafthouse prices are high, and Jack Black needs to lose weight. Still, in all of these, we find something admirable to which we are drawn.
“We need heroes first and foremost because our heroes help define the limits of our aspirations,” wrote Scott LaBarge of the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics at Santa Clara University. “We largely define our ideals by the heroes we choose, and our ideals— things like courage, honor, and justice—largely define us. Our heroes are symbols for us of all the qualities we would like to possess and all the ambitions we would like to satisfy.”
Who are your heroes? More important, do your children know about real people, real stories of those they can admire? Social media has created a strange phenomenon called influencers. It’s very likely some of your children know more about PewDiePie, Kylie Jenner, Gary Vee, Kevin Hart, Emma Chamberlain, and Charlie D’Amelio than they do about Sam Houston, Florence Nightingale, Roy Benavidez, Chuck Yeager, Arthur Ashe, or Dwight D. Eisenhower.
It’s okay—just point them in the direction of a broader base of influencers. Maybe your family has an aunt who is raising three children on her own with no child support. The neighbor across the street may have a Purple Heart license plate. Make a connection to see if he or she would share their story with your kids.
Finally, junior high and high school students in rural schools have a unique opportunity to be influencers themselves. The little guy in first grade who does not have a big brother is going to be watching closely at the pep rally. He sees you in the cafeteria when you choose to sit with someone who may need a friend. Those bus rides can mean everything to a kid who has been bullied all day but has a high school junior sit down beside him or her to share an afterschool snack. Have a chance to work with elementary students in their classrooms? Remember how you wanted to be treated when you were that age.
A fifth-grade book report on former first lady Eleanor Roosevelt was the beginning of what is now a long list of heroes. I may need to write a column just about her at some point. Considered the First Lady of the World, she overcame jokes about her looks and her voice to be an ambassador for equal rights, veterans, coal miners, those living in poverty, and women. She worked her fanny off, that much I figured out when doing the report. Since that report, I have continued to read biographies about her, and the admiration has multiplied.
Thank you, Mrs. Roosevelt.
Thank you, Jack Black.
I think you two would have been friends.
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