Heroes

Thursday 6/18/26

There’s never been a hero who thought, “Someone else should be doing this instead of me.” 

If a hero cries, they dry their tears so that they can see better. A hero knows that the road isn’t the only thing you must keep your eyes on.

They may tremble in the lonely darkness for what tomorrow could bring.

They can become as afraid as anyone has ever been, but that doesn’t make them weak, because a hero understands that being scared and keeping going is just about the greatest strength there is.              

They hold on when it would be easier to let go or find something—anything—else to do instead, and help others hang on and be well, too.

A hero’s grip belongs to anyone who has use for it. That’s why they’re our biggest “we” people. It’s never just “me,” but also “you.”

Even if there is no you, because there could be.

You might happen along. There’s a chance you’ll wander over. Or you’re running away from something, when you hear a voice of someone who wants to help you, so you follow it.

You never know.

A hero keeps the door open in case someone else has to enter the room. That’s a hero of mine, because that’s a hero for everyone. It doesn’t matter if we don’t know them or have any idea they’re out there somewhere. We still might find ourselves outside of that room someday, and there’s the open door, waiting for us to come in and be where we need to be.

Sometimes heroes feel like there’s no such thing as hope for them or that it’s a joke made by beings not of this world for their personal amusement in whatever world they inhabit.   

But were it revealed that here are the final results, this is how it all ends, there is no avoiding the outcome—so says God, so says the universe, so says the all-knowing forces we cannot fathom—heroes would continue to do what they were doing, regardless of what it took to keep doing it.

If no one saw them, and they didn’t receive any credit or attention, they’d behave the same as though the entire world sang their praises and they were rich and famous and seen as a person everyone knew they should look up to and definitely treat as nicely as possible.

And if they were the very last of their kind in a world which couldn’t recognize them if anyone in it wanted to, a hero still wouldn’t choose to stop or give up—to have it all be over or become less than they were.

If it was them against a gargantuan, monstrous force, without assistance, and only themselves to count on, the gargantuan, monstrous force would have an opponent all the same.

Whatever that force was couldn’t truly claim, “There is nothing but open space for the taking,” because that wouldn’t be true.

What is that worth?

It’s worth all there is, which is why the hero gives everything they are and why a hero is hope itself. They are the beautiful proof that there is someone who always can—no matter what.

--from "Hero of Mine"/The Penguin Didn't Have Any Hot Chocolate: Anytime Bedtime Stories