Thursday, September 11, 2014

Nobodies role model: a sap story.

All my life I have tried to avoid being anyone’s role model.
I was in the sixth grade the first time someone told me I was their hero. I was eleven and had just become fast friends with some girl… We’ll call her Chloe.
Chloe came out of nowhere ditched her old friends and started hanging out with me. She told me I was her hero, she started dressing like me. At first I helped her pick out clothes and then I realized I didn’t want Chloe to look like me because I liked her how she was, but that was too complex an emotion for me at eleven so I did the mature thing and just stopped answering her calls.
Forever.
All my life I have never wanted to be anyone’s role model.
I have a cousin who is four years younger who used to come live with me during the summers from when I was ten until I was about seventeen; she too adopted my look, and my attitude, and my vernacular.
I was a shitty role model and we got into a whole heap of trouble but she now has a job, a cat, goes to college and lives on her own. So maybe I wasn’t all that bad.
All my life I never wanted to be anyone’s role model.
I was seventeen when I took over my first beginning drama class, I directed their one act, I designed their blocking, I did all of their warm ups, I helped them choose and write their own monologues.
I was eighteen when I wrote, blocked, directed, and starred in my very own first play. I was eighteen when one of the girls I casted gave me the
“I’m cooler than everyone and I know it award”
And told me I was her hero and her inspiration on a microphone in front of everyone and I cried.
So maybe I’m not all that bad.
I was nineteen when one of my students from my very first beginning drama class told me that she had become a student state officer for drama and wanted to thank me for keeping her out of trouble and on the right track and inspiring her.
So maybe I am not all that bad.
Still, all my life I have never wanted to be anyone’s role model.
I was twenty-one when I sat in my friend Hannah’s car and told her about how I tried to commit suicide when I was twenty and she got mad and frustratedly told me I don’t know the impact I have on people’s lives and shouldn’t be selfish with my life. 
I am twenty-two now, and I still don’t want to be anyone’s role model.
But today one of my students, an eight year old, said to me:
"Ms. Breeann, look I got glasses just like you! My vans are all black like your vans!"
And I laughed and said
“Why dear? People will start thinking we’re twins!”
And she looked at me and very seriously said 
"I want them to. You’re my hero." 

Eight years old is the most honest age and I can’t help but feel like maybe I’m not all that bad.

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