Guest Post from Emma: My Family Hero

A family hero is an individual member of the family whose actions and deeds change the fate of a family, if only temporarily, for the better.”

Family: A person, people or beings that someone can trust with everything. Those people would die to save those they love most, their family. There is no need for actual legal or blood ties to be part of a family and those members will always have eternal unconditional love for each other. My sister, Mary Katherine Clifford Fiala, meets my definition of family criteria. She is 12 and we are best friends. We also happen to be complete opposites. I know she has changed my life because she has taught me how to live, accept others and stand up for myself.

Mary personifies life at its fullest. She taught me how to live through her endless love and compassion she has for all living things. Mary is possibly the most eager to laugh person ever. I’m positive that if the least funny person told her a really bad joke, she would laugh. Mary is a Broadway fanatic and I love how she randomly bursts into song. Mary loves me. When she sees another Asian, she thinks that they are pretty. She has so much energy and she has taught me not to be so serious.

Mary accepts pretty much everyone for who they are. She doesn’t judge until after she has met them. She convinces everyone that she is their best friend because she is so open and non-questioning of them. She could have been part of the “popular” kids at her school but she saw how they treated others and she wanted nothing to do with them. Her group of friends at school consists of a deaf girl, a fat girl, and a poor girl. She takes them in and makes them feel accepted when they are being bullied. She has one best friend, named Olivia, who is sort of like me. She says that she accepts people because people need to be accepted in order to live.

Mary sticks up for herself because she doesn’t care what others think of her. She does what she wants. I wish more people and I could think like that because we waste time thinking what others think about us when Mary doesn’t care if they think she’s weird, annoying, nice, funny or strange. Mary was in gym class one day and she forgot her tennis shoes. Nobody cared that she did until she lined up to go back to the “hell hole” that is her classroom. This snotty girl in her class named Maya said to her in a disgusted voice, “Those aren’t gym shoes, Mary.” Mary said in a fake snooty voice, “Thanks, I haven’t noticed.” And waved her shoes in Maya’s face. Maya got a frightened and a ‘she’s crazy’ look on her face and walked back to her posse to make fun of her. Mary just laughed.

Another day she decided to have a British accent the whole day and she asked her teacher if she could go to the loo. Then at lunch she said really loudly in the accent, “Don’t get your knickers in a twist” and “Jolly good.” She also sang songs from My Fair Lady. All the eighth grade boys gave her strange looks. She didn’t care. When people give her strange looks, she likes it and laughs.

Mary has changed my life and the life of my family in a positive forever kind of way. She is my sister, best friend, and greatest person I have ever met. Even though we aren’t blood related, we are 100 percent family. If there are past and future lives, I’m sure she was/is in every single one of them. Mary has changed me from being a serious person to being more random, gentle, goofy, standing up for myself and helped me accept more people even if they aren’t practically perfect. She has made me a more complete human being and I love her, forever.