When I hear the word hero, a series of images float through my mind each one more special than the last. There is a baby smiling drowsily up at a nurse while she stands over him, tears pooled in her eyes. There is that same baby, sitting in a bouncy seat, a phone held to one ear, a smile plastered across his face as his grandmother coos to him. There is a toddler, bursting out of the bedroom on hands and knees when he hears my voice, smiling and lifting his arms up to me. I see the same toddler the first time he ever moved himself in the walker, and again the first time he ever pointed to my sister and said mom.

I see him the first time he learned to say yes... and the first time he ever shook his head no. I see him waiting patiently outside my door and the smile that breaks across his little face when I open it. I see the way he laughs so hard, he loses his balance and falls over, which only serves to cause a fresh peal of giggles. I see the way he gets so excited when the Backyardigans come on, all he can do is flail his little arms, dancing on his knees in the closest thing the sheer joy I've ever witnessed.

When I share those images, people have a tendency to say that's not really a hero. Perhaps not. He hasn't done anything truly amazing for the word. He hasn't saved the lives of others. He hasn't given the clothes off of his back. He hasn't even moved the masses to tears with an impassioned speech.

But, he is amazing, nonetheless.

He has thrived, when no one was really ever sure he would survive. He has brought religious communities of every stripe together, despite their differences, to pray for the selfsame thing. He's taught complete strangers how easy it is to cry tears of sadness and tears of joy for a child they'll never really know and has pulled many of those selfsame people out of their own problems to offer their strength to a family they didn't know. He's reminded people, family, friends and strangers alike, of what is important in life and what really doesn't matter at all and in so doing, has taught people that sometimes, the problems we think are unsolvable, are really the ones that don't matter in the least.

Perhaps hero isn't the right word... but I can't think of a single other one that even comes close to describing everything he is and everything he has done... for is own family and for the families that consider him one of their own even though they have never held him in their arms.

I remember the letters, the emails, and the phone calls we have received from people we will never meet during the first touch and go year of his life. I remember the people that did not really know him, but took time every day when he was ill to stop and check on him anyway. I remember the tears they shed with us when he took a turn for the worse... or when things began to look up.

I lost count long, long ago of how many people eagerly awaited word of him... how many people filled the walls of his hospital room with cards and letters of encouragement during his seemingly never ending 6 month stay. I never knew the names of everyone that was praying for him, that was cheering for him, that would send along a note during the darker days to help speed us towards the lighter. Nor will I ever know the names of all of those that were right there with us when the ambulance finally brought him home.

Perhaps those people are the real heroes in all of this, but even so, every time I hear that word... I think of that toddler that even now scurries through the living room on hands and knees, squealing and laughing as loud as he can while his mom chases behind him, laughing as loudly as he.

We were never sure that would happen... but sometimes not even the largest of physical frailties can contain such an amazing spirit or suppress such joy.  He may only be three, but in those three years… he has taught so many so much more than they had ever hoped to learn about life, about love... about simply living. For that, if for no other reason, he reserves the title of hero for my family.