11/07/2014
The following is an adapted version of a reflection offered at the National Honor Society Induction Ceremony on November 6, 2014
This time last week I was in Chicago, meeting up with family to attend the rugby match between New Zealand and the US at Soldier Field. This was a very big deal; I left New Zealand almost 30 years ago but the arrival on American soil of New Zealand’s famed rugby team, the All Blacks, presented a chance to leap back in time, a chance to see a team wearing the same jerseys as the heroes of my youth.
You would think I would have outgrown a boy’s obsession. No, not really. I grew up sports mad in a sports mad country. I collected trading cards for the All Blacks, New Zealand’s national rugby team. Since I was a better rugby nerd than a rugby player, there was no piece of trivia that did not satisfy. Forty-five years on, I still remember my heroes: from the ridiculous – Jazz Muller who reputedly trimmed the hedge around his home by holding a lawn mower on its side; to the sublime – my deep distress when a favorite player, Chris Laidlaw, quit rugby in his prime to take a Rhodes Scholarship at Oxford University.
The day after last Saturday’s big game, I was waiting to meet someone in the lobby of the Chicago Hyatt Regency Hotel when the current captain of the All Blacks, Richie McCaw, walked past me. Initially I was struck dumb. Richie had walked all the way to the elevators before I blurted out something like, “Hey Richie, can I do a selfie?” Pretty slick, right? He could not have been more obliging. 56 years old, and I could barely utter an intelligent word in front of the three-time International Rugby Player of the Year. Awed AND inarticulate – I was a 10 year old meeting his hero.
When you were 10 years old, who were your heroes? Now Mom and Dad, your grandparents, we’ll put them in the hero column. But outside of family-centered choices, who were your heroes? Whose presence might have rendered you tongue-tied, star-struck?
When you were ten, let’s say in 2007, the top Billboard performers were Beyoncé and Rihanna. Daniel Radcliffe and Emma Watson starred in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. Recently arrived guilty pleasures on TV were Gossip Girl and Veronica Mars. Any heroes there? Peyton Manning won his sole Super Bowl. Tiger won another major. Who were your heroes?
We grow up. You have come a long way from 10 years old. You have come a long way since the day you walked in here at Freshman Convocation. Your accomplishments speak loudly about you, what you value, what you strive for, how you have moved ahead. Perhaps it is time to turn the hero proposition on its head. I have no doubt that you have what it takes to inspire others in the years to come. You are that good.
My deep wish and challenge for each of you, as we publicly recognize your scholarship, leadership, character and service as members of the National Honor Society, is that you will go on to realize the abundant promise we see in you. In whatever field you are drawn to – and if it’s rugby, that would be tremendous – make it your mission to achieve excellence. Be someone to stop us in our tracks, to render us speechless. Make us brag to have known you, make us want you in our selfies. Turn us into ten year olds. Be a hero.
