Ok, not funny. Tragic? In some cases. Disgusting? Disappointing? All of those could describe some circumstances.
Let’s see. . .
The first hero I remember was someone I knew personally. I saw him every Sunday at church. His name was Bobby Forsyth and in my very young opinion, he was to be much admired. He was a few years older than me, though how many, I couldn’t say.
And what made him my hero?
Bobby could recite every commercial on television. Every slogan. Every jingle. He knew them all. What could be more significant, right?
Over time, over the next few years, Bobby remained the same. Ok, a little larger — both taller and wider — but still, the same.
And since I was by then exposed to more and more worldly viewpoints, compliments of my classmates and those in older classes, the word “hero” was no longer applied.
Why?
Because I learned a word, a word that described Bobby in what were considered more accurate terms: retarded.
Suddenly he wasn’t so admirable, at least not as I heard that word used by my peers. Derogatory? Um, yeah.
Bobby never really “grew up.” He was eventually institutionalized. Later I’d hear other terms: “Idiot savant.” “Autistic.” I didn’t hear those applied to Bobby, not specifically, but as I learned what those meant, as I studied cases and symptoms, I had to wonder. And I wondered if in a different time his end would have been different.
Other heroes. . .
Elvis Presley, of course. He was a simply God-fearing Southern boy who changed the world of music. Films, records, even a military career. I followed those — though not as carefully as did so many others.
But as he aged — not that he ever reached an age that would be considered “elderly” — but as he aged, he put on weight and indulged openly in his vices. Eventually, at the age of 42, he died in a pool of his own vomit.
No more hero.
John F. Kennedy? As an elementary school student, I eagerly devoured the magazine articles about our President and his family, both his wife and children and the larger Kennedy clan. His death kept us home from school and riveted to the television, watching replays and live events. It turned many of us — including a ten-year-old me — into news junkies.
But years later, I heard JFK characterized as a womanizer. I saw the fall of others in the much beloved clan.
There were more — athletes, rock stars, politicians, and those I knew in person. Heroes — created and then fallen. On top and then plunging downward.
So why am I concerned with heroes right now? Why today?
Because yesterday was the first Penn State game of the first post-Paterno season and I sat with my parents in their living room, watching, watching something so familiar and yet with eerie undertones.
No Joe Paterno. No JoePa on the field. No statue of him on campus.
Wow. Heroes do fall, don’t they?
But this leads me back to the beginning and the fall of those we admire. Is it tragic? Disgusting? Disappointing? Finding out about JFK and the slide of Elvis: disappointing. Joe Paterno? The situation surrounding him is disgusting, but was he the evil one or simply weak and trying to present himself as the strong one that everyone expected? And Bobby Forsyth? His story is more tragic than anything else.
In fact, in some ways, whenever one of our heroes falls, it’s tragic.
Why?
Because even if we stop seeing them as heroes, they still are — or were. At some point there was something that we admired in that person, something that was worth emulating, right? Does the fall make the original qualities any less?
What makes a hero? Did any of those people ask to be idolized? Or did it just happen, and then they had to live up to the image?
I don’t know the answers, don’t know what makes a hero.
But I’ve been thinking about it.
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