The July/August "Saturday Evening Post" magazine is on the same theme. I'll read their articles after I write this. Another set of people I admire are volunteers, no matter what they're doing. They give of their time, energy, themselves for the good of others. I especially admire those who help animals, especially cats because that's where my heart is. Some rescue pets or wildlife, some foster, some adopt or feed strays, some find homes for displaced or dumped pets, some adopt special needs animals that would otherwise be put down, some volunteer at animal shelters, & some help ferals by feeding them daily & getting them neutered. I know many who do these things. I've been involved in some & I can tell you that those who help have the biggest hearts & the hardest part is just that. It's very hard to see what some do to helpless animals. It's very hard not to be able to help & save them all. I understand this better than any other kind of volunteer work so these people are some of the biggest heroes in my mind.
The other biggest group of heroes in my mind have overcome, grown, evolved, have a positive outlook, despite all odds. My daughter & sister are in my top 5 because of these things. I know what they've overcome, so my admiration is built on true knowledge of this. I've gotten to watch my daughter blossom & grow into one of my all time favorite people in the world ever. She & my sister, who I didn't really get to know until she was in her 40s, are 2 of the most beautiful, accomplished women I know. They are strong, radiant, talented & gifted, & they conduct their lives around giving of themselves to others, professionally & personally. They are spiritual, open-minded possibility thinkers who bring creativity & love into all they do. They manage to give love & understanding to some of those most difficult to love & understand. And they do it without being judgmental & without becoming sour on people or suspicious of them. They are hard-working & they aren't quitters, but they recoup with grace & flexibility when needed. Those are all characteristics of triumphant survivors, which defines this category of those I admire.
I admire people like my friend Jane, who has overcome physical handicaps & many emotional set backs. She too never stops, never quits, finds creative ways to make a living & make things work. And she'll happily share with me any & all ideas to help me do the same. I love & admire those who encourage others, like my friend Pam, like Jane, my daughter, my sister, & so many more strong & beautiful people I know (mostly women). My friend Ron falls into that category too though. He's the one who told me, a total stranger, that Reiki would be perfect for me. He'd spent an hour on the phone by then, learning my interests & ambitions, encouraging me with stories of friends with similar talents who'd managed to make a living from their interests. I admire people like Oprah Winfrey & Fran Santi, & I've mentioned this is a blog before. Both used their business to build up people & touched many lives. My friend Sharon goes along with them. Despite the fact that I was in the same area (Annapolis, Maryland) in direct competition in the same sales business (Tupperware), she taught me all the nuances I was missing in order to be a great success & befriended me for life.
Thanks to my Reiki circle & metaphysical events I've attended, I now know more of these supportive, giving people than ever before. I could fill a whole blog just with them. Instead, I'm going to salute the last of the heroes I'm going to mention - Pauline & Bill Jones, the grandparents I keep mentioning. I'm also going to salute Al Schwartz, who was my father's father. I salute him for loving me & his other grandchildren enough to stay connected with me despite the distance of the whole country between us, & keeping me connected to my half-siblings. Most men don't write letters or communicate that well. Grandpa Schwartz used to write me newsy letters full of the doings of my father & half siblings. He was my only source of photos & info, my only real connection. He's #3 in my top 5 most admirable men. My son is #2 & Bill Jones is #1. Grandpa Jones never met a stranger, would truly give anyone in need the shirt off his back. I used to see him in action every time I was around him. Everyone loved him. It was so cool to be known as Bill Jones's granddaughter around their area. Once he took my cousin & me ice skating & he could skate his name in the ice! He used to take us to the Shriner's circuses. Mostly though, he just held me on his lap, talked to me as I'd tag along while he did chores & things, & show endless patience for my childish tricks & games. He loved to show me his tomatoes growing, the horses when we were on one of the family farms. He turned one side of the garage into a playhouse for me, complete with the half working doorbell from the front door he had to replace. My favorite place in the whole world, & the only place of complete safety I ever knew, was on his lap. And he never deemed me too big for his lap, never denied me that comfort & haven. I lost that lap & haven in 1985 but I haven't lost my Grandpa. I've never doubted that he's with me each & every day. I was the daughter he never had (he married my grandmother when my mother was 18, never had kids of his own), the light of his life. He's with me in spirit but I miss him every day. It doesn't hurt like it did at first. You heal & learn to go on, gradually the intensity of the pain lessens, & it also hurts less often. I now sleep in the bed they slept in when I was a child, & it helps. I have their furnishings & things all around me, as the biggest part of my home. These things are the deepest part of me. My taste is mostly theirs, as well as my interests. I'm totally my own person but I must have absorbed them growing up. They were my only role models, & really big ones because of the contrast they provided in my life. Most of the time I don't separately see them within me or my home, but their things around me provide me with that sense of warmth they used to. They also sometimes spark special memories. That bed - I remember back to when I was so little that it took forever to crawl up the foot board & from the foot of the bed to the pillows. I'd snuggle between them & they'd stay in bed a little longer so I could nestle with them. My grandma could make something out of nothing, had a lot of creativity. She was so resourceful, & kept her house so neat & clean. Yet she too was infinitely patient with me & my games. They both taught me all kinds of things while I'd hang around them, watch whatever they were doing. The best times were when she trusted me to help, since she so cared about the outcome. Or they'd find ways to include me with child-sized things. She could make something out of bits of nothing, & would see neat ideas in magazines & make them. From her I learned housekeeping, cooking, baking, as well as that craftiness. I learned to nest, the importance of home & family, & how to work hard & give them your all. She taught me to make that my focus but still have fun & socialize. I learned her flow of work, hobbies, breaks, & social time. I learned how to be the household manager. I am mostly my grandmother through & through. She also passed in 1985, 3 months before Grandpa did, but is with me daily. She loves what I'm doing with the house & my products, especially my face pillows. She sits with me when I sew them & makes it all go smoothly. She also guides me in the kitchen, depending on what I'm making. I haven't said, but what I admire most about her is her resilience & resourcefulness. Her first husband died when her children were 4 & 6. She took care of him & then did all she had to do to survive & support herself. She had a home in the city & had to farm her kids out to relatives in the country, go to work & take in boarders. I don't think my mother ever forgave her for the choices she made & the mistakes. I know she made up for all she could when it came to me, that whenever I was around she mothered me the way she'd wanted to raise her own children & didn't get to. She was an excellent teacher & role model. She's obviously #1 on my list of female heroes, since I'm so proud to be like her!
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