I'm an introvert. I feel like this is obvious. I'm also fairly shy, which keeps me from getting to know a lot of people. But I sure admire some people from a slight distance, and really commit some favorites to my heart. With some people, it's everything about them, some it's one thing in particular, and some it's just one distinct moment that stands out in my mind. But I watch these people in person, or read about them, and smile. I kind of want to share some of my inspirations. So I'll just start with two huge ones:
1.) Marjorie Pay Hinckley. If you don't yet know, our daughter Jori was named after this awesome lady. (We just dropped the last letter and the first syllable.) Oh, how I love this woman. I can feel her warmth in quotes of hers, seriously. I'm sure she wasn't always happy but she sure seemed to find the positive in situations, and keep that sunshine warming those around her. Weird coincidence: Sam's boss is Gordon B. Hinckley's nephew, so they knew Marjorie personally. I'm super jealous. I aspire to be like this elect lady. She seemed to have her head on all the things that did matter and not on any that didn't. Here's a favorite quote:
“I don't want to drive up to the pearly gates in a shiny sports car, wearing beautifully, tailored clothes, my hair expertly coiffed, and with long, perfectly manicured fingernails.
I want to drive up in a station wagon that has mud on the wheels from taking kids to scout camp.
I want to be there with a smudge of peanut butter on my shirt from making sandwiches for a sick neighbor's children.
I want to be there with a little dirt under my fingernails from helping to weed someone's garden.
I want to be there with children's sticky kisses on my cheeks and the tears of a friend on my shoulder.
I want the Lord to know I was really here and that I really lived.”
Oh, she is such a gem. I hope I do get to meet her someday, and hope I don't feel I'm not interesting enough to keep her company.
2.) Atticus Finch. Yes, I know, I know. He's fictional. And it's probably overdone. But I want to explain why I love and admire this man, and why I wanted to name our son after him. (Sam hadn't read or seen "To Kill a Mockingbird" until after we'd already named him.)
Yes, he makes a stand against racism in a time and place where it was socially unacceptable. Of course, this is inspiring. But I feel like what he did was more broad than that. I don't only take away from his actions a stand against racism: I take his actions as a stand against anything that is wrong, regardless of public sentiment. Regardless of what everyone is determining is right or wrong, regardless of what will happen to him, regardless of what is popular. He stands for what he knows is truth.
And greatest of all, to me, is that he knew before he even began that he was going to fail. It's in the book, in a conversation he's having with his brother. It's such a powerful passage, their conversation. Atticus reveals he didn't ask for this case, which makes you think perhaps it wasn't a battle that he necessarily was ready to charge into. But it comes to him, and ready or not he knows his duty and rises to it. And then he also reveals, quite simply, that he will not succeed. He knows this clear back in December, when the trial didn't actually take place in the court until the summer. (I think...correct me if I'm wrong, I don't have a copy handy.)
That is so, so inspiring to me. It's always wonderful (and extremely challenging) to fight for what's right, regardless of popular opinion. And it's even harder to fight, knowing there is strong opposition to your own position. But knowing you're going to fail? And doing it anyway? Because the message is important enough, the cause is great enough? What an inspiration.
So these are two of my inspirations. What/who are some of yours?
I remember when you told me you were thinking about using the name Marjorie, I thought it was an awful, old fashioned name and then I read Sis. Hinckley's book and suddenly it was the most lovely name, just because of the woman who bore it. And I'm sure I've told you before but we also thought Atticus was upright enough and worthy of a namesake, hence we named Hyrum's first stuffed animal after him and don't tell any bad guys, but its also been our family's secret (safety) code word for so long we forgot we even had one. I've never been able to pick specific or favorite role models, too many good ones. And my level of admiraton changes with my mood, I must have been feeling terribly romantic when I named Gavin's stuffed animal Mr. Rochester. He's a good guy too, right? Just a flawed hero. Ah, well, at least its just a stuffed animal. You were smart to stick with Atticus, he is a much better hero, good choice.
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