Prologue

Socrates penned his “dialogues.” Shakespeare created his “sonnets.” Ovid dreamed up “the heroides.” And despite all our modern progress we choose to name our personal musings “blogs.” I suppose there are worse words out there, but I think I can safely say that “blogging” wouldn’t have even made my top fifty choices for a creative title.

Yet, here I am, in all my nearly graduated glory taking a step that has practically become a cultural rite of passage: creating a blog. Something I swore I would never do unless driven to by a conviction so strong it forced its way out in word form splattered across my computer screen. That newly found conviction can be summed up in one word: heroes.

Life changes. Problems come and go. And sometimes the heroes you loved as a child no longer seem to help. As my days of forced research come to an end, I’ve decided to create a new research project just for myself. One that I can love and nurture with all my heart. One that I believe can make a difference, if not in other’s lives, at least in mine. I’ve decided to research people, and have created this as a place to remember those I deem worthy of the title: hero. I plan to record their individual songs here as a reservoir of courage, wisdom, and strength for when my own is spent. A place where, as Longfellow said, “a forlorn and shipwreck’d brother, seeing, can take heart again.”

Fair Warning: this means anything is up for grabs. I’m going to pull people from anywhere I find them. This includes history, literature, fact, fairytale, myth … because I believe that nothing is more motivating than real experience that borders on the fantastic or more inspirational than the fantastic that borders on real experience. So here it goes, the research project that will either flop or fly … one that will either carry me through hard times or fling me into insanity. Either way it will be an adventure.