I'm writing this post as much for myself as I am to share this with you...and I'm hoping to never forget a single moment of the last few days...so I'll tell you that this post may be long as a warning, not an apology.
About 2 months ago I received and email about an event called Superman Hall of Heroes. Joe and I spent a few weeks making sure this wasn't a hoax... and today it happened. Me, my awesome husband and my two amazing kids were in Times Square with some of the most inspiring people I've ever met, being inducted into the inaugural class of "hall of heroes" that Warner Brothers created! It was so surreal.
At about 5pm last night we arrived at the Tryp Hotel in Times Square. We were greeted in the hotel lobby by the hotel manager, the staff of the company that organized the event, and my dad who had flown in from St. Louis. In the lobby of the hotel hung a huge banner about the event and next to the elevators was a banner with 10 names on it - I still can't believe that mine was included!
We went to our room which was bigger than a New York apartment, I'm sure. It was amazing! Inside was a Superman bag with more Superman paraphernalia than I've owned in my entire life. (I learned that the Superman logo is the second most recognized symbol in the world, second only to the cross.)
At 6:30 there was a reception in the lobby of the hotel and I was so excited to go and meet the other recipients. I had made capes for everyone receiving the award - I was a little nervous to give them out but I brought them down to the reception. My dad stayed in the room and watched Rory and Milo (he was soon joined by my sister who bussed in from Philly and my cousin, Andy, who lives in Brooklyn). Joe and I went down to the reception where "casual" (how they told us to dress) was suits and ties. Oh well, we're 'from' Seattle...people don't even wear that to work!
The first amazing person we met was Sal Giunta. If you don't know his story, you should take the time to read it. (Click here to read it.) Sal is the first living person to receive the US Military's highest decoration for valor, the Medal of Honor, since the Vietnam War. I gave him his TinySuperheroes tote bag with his cape inside...and he LOVED it. Like, really, really loved it. He was overjoyed to have his own cape and he put it on right away.
The event was put on by Warner Brothers and DC Comics. Several executive staff members of Warner Brothers were there for the event and most were at the reception. It was really neat to meet them and humbling to hear their enthusiasm for TinySuperheroes.
Next, I saw Dick & Rick Hoyt arrive. Out of everyone I was probably most excited to meet them because like the rest of the country, I'm just totally amazed by them. Do you know that in the past 34 years they have competed in over 1,100 athletic competitions together? For their first Boston Marathon, they had to qualify at the pace of Rick (the son's) age group - and they did! Qualifying for Boston is hard enough - Dick had to do it at the same speed as men 20+ years younger than him, while pushing his son...and they did. It was extra special to meet them right now because I've been getting to know a TinySuperhero named Micah. He also has Cerebral Palsy and his dad pushes him in Marathons while supporting others through their organiation called Micah's Miles. I wished that Micah and his dad could be there with me to meet Team Hoyt. I told Dick and Rick all about Super Micah and what his family is doing to raise awareness and money for CP.
Next we met Alana Nichols. She is the first paralympian athlete to medal in both the summer and winter olympics (basketball and alpine skiing). In 2000, at 17 years old, she broke her back while snowboarding. Alana is radiant. I felt like I’d known her forever. She is just glowing - kind, humble, beautiful. She LOVED her cape. She put it on right away and everyone started taking photos of she and I with her cape. She came with her publicist who was equally kind, and we found out pretty quickly her family was from Dogtown in St. Louis! It was such an awesome connection and bonded our friendship right away. Alana turned out to be one of my favorite people I met on our trip.
While I was talking to Alana, David Burke arrived. He is a chef who owns several restaurants in New York and is known for providing food for those in need. When I gave him his cape, he put it on like an apron and just loved it. He is about to open another restaurant in the garment district of New York called “Fabrick”. He said he’s going to hang the cape in his restaurant!
After 45 minutes of mingling we all gathered together to introduce ourselves. The other inductees weren’t arriving until later that night (Jeff - teacher of the year, Salvatore - NYFD commissioner, Matthew Reeves - Christopher Reeve’s son, and CEO of Jackie Robinson Foundation) Krista Voda who is a Nascar reporter would be Emcee’ing the event so she and David from Warner Brothers spoke briefly and then we went around and all of the inductees introduced ourselves.
Joe and I started talking to Sal Giunta. He is awesome. He’s my age, is married and has a daughter that is Rory’s age. If you read his story, you’ll be blown away by what he did and what he survived. But you could meet him on the street, talk for an hour, have dinner, and he would probably never even mention it. Humble might not even be the accurate word - Sal truly doesn’t see that what he did was extraordinary. I think he truly believes that every guy that was with him and everyone fighting for our country deserves the same honor. His enthusiasm is out of the roof - especially for the cape I gave him. I’m pretty sure he had no clue what TinySuperheroes was and just giving him the cape made the whole concept click for him. He started telling joe and I about something he wanted to give me - a coin of some sort - that people in the military give each other as a sort of “kudos”. He explained the coin and gave it to me, but Joe and I were both really confused about what exactly was happening. I knew it was special, I just didn’t know how special it was. This is what the coin looks like.
When we went back to our room, I sent a picture of the coin to my brother in law who is also in the Army. He was like “where’d you see that?”. I Sal Giunta just gave it to me! I called Vic and he explained the significance of the coin. I think that Sal was given 74 of these coins to give out at his discretion. I am beyond honored that he gave it to me and I will treasure it. Sal received the highest honor in our country’s military and here we were chatting like we’d gone to high school together. It was so neat.
The reception ended after this and then we hung out with my dad, Lauren and cousin Andy upstairs. We were exhausted and Rory was in hyper mode. Joe’s friends Michael and Sally live in new York and last minute we told them we were in town and they came to say hi! It was great to see them. Soon enough we tried to get some sleep.
Tuesday was like a tornado. I wanted the day to last forever but it seemed to be over as quickly as it started. Our ride was at the hotel to get us at 9:30. Jeff had arrived and would be riding with us to Times Square. Nicest guy ever. He’s from Washington so it was fun to have something in common right away. I’ve never been in his classroom, but there’s no doubt in my mind that the right guy was chosen as National Teacher of the Year. Sal was outside as well and was supposed to take the shuttle with us but wanted to walk instead. David, from Victory Management Group (who organized the event) really didn’t want Sal to walk…I think he was afraid he’d be late or get lost or something. He was like “My boss would kill me if he knew I let you walk.” Sal said “well, I’m not asking permission, so I’ll see you there!” And Sal happily jaunted away! :)
I really didn’t know what it meant to have an event in Times Square - but it meant exactly that. The shuttle was pulling into Times Square and there it was - a stage, a huge screen - chairs set out. Right smack dab in the middle of everything was the event! There were people everywhere - cameras everywhere. Luckily the people organizing this really did a great job and told me exactly where to be and when. There was a tent, a “green room” set up behind the stage. In it was a woman at a table with makeup and hair-dresser tools. I had my hair in my typical braid and I asked if she wanted to do my hair and she didn’t even hesitate! I had my hair straightened in the middle of Times Square. hahaha
The scurry of things happening between 10 and 11 when the event started was just that - a scurry. There was a big banner for each inductee with a photo of our face on it (that was surreal) and one of the huge billboards on a building had Superman Hall of Heroes as one of its advertisements. People walking by stopped to look at the spectacle, many sticking around for the whole event.
A woman introduced herself to me and it was the reporter from People Magazine who had interviewed and written our story last summer. She did a brief interview, then I did a video interview with someone from DC comics online or something (I truthfully don’t even know who it was with!) They had each of us go on stage to get our photos taken before the event.
There was so much going on at this point, it was pretty chaotic but I loved every bit of it. I didn’t want to miss a thing! Everyone had arrived and we were all kind of just waiting and doing whatever we were told.
It was awesome to see Alana again - that morning she had been with Al Roker on the Today Show while he did the weather! Soon Matthew Reeves arrived. I haven’t ever really been a die hard Christopher Reeves fan or anything, but it was really awesome to meet his son who looks almost exactly like him and had just flown in from London to be there.
If Joe and I had been in New York on vacation and came across this event, and saw Team Hoyt there, I definitely would have stopped whatever plans we had that day to stay for the entirety of whatever was unfolding. I still haven’t wrapped my mind around the fact that not only were we lucky enough to meet these folks, we were among them! I’m not sure I’ll ever feel worthy of it, but it was amazing. Every second of the day, and every photo I snapped I was thinking about my TinySuperheroes. How much I wished they all could be there but I just wanted to capture every second to share with them. Because that was the only reason I was there - because of them. I truly felt that way the whole day.
I was getting really nervous at this point because I knew that we had about 1 minute to speak after accepting the award. I had some ideas of what I would say, but whenever I tried to stop and think about it everything just went blank. I knew that I had the ability to speak without planning every word but as the event was getting started, I was getting so nervous!
I spent a lot of time with Alana and Jeff as the event started because until our name was called we stayed behind stage and we were all in the bottom half. I really wished I was able to hear the other people speak and see the whole event but my sister video’d it and it was special to have to stay behind stage. I talked through my nerves with Alana, who of course was nothing but encouraging and then one by one it was getting closer to my turn.
Jeff left, then Team Hoyt, then Alana…and I was next and suddenly had to pee! hahaha They took me to the side of the stage and when they started my 30 second video introduction I walked along the side to the back. When the video ended, I walked down the center red carpet. I only vaguely remember doing this but before I knew it I was on stage with a trophy in one hand, a microphone in the other and I was speaking in the middle of Times Square! Barry from Warner Brothers was in the very front seat and I found myself making eye contact with him during it and trying to avoid eye contact with my family which would have made me very nervous! But I definitely knew they were there and it was so awesome to have them there. Rory was standing on my dad’s lap I think and I was SO proud that he was there. (I can definitely say it was worth the plane ride with him!) My biggest hope was that in the few sentences I said, I made it completely clear that I was only a stand in. I am so honored to receive the award and recognition but I really wish I had 5,000 TinySuperheroes up there with me. I want people to know how awesome they are - something that is hard to explain, but impossible to ignore once you meet even 1 of them. So it was my job to teach people this up there…I hope I gave them a glimpse.
I took my seat next to Alana. Next, the NYFD commissioner accepted his award, followed by the CEO of the Jackie Robinson Foundation, then Matthew Reeves. One funny side note - Alana and I whispered before Matthew came out about how perfect his glasses were. They were literally like as Clark Kent as a pair of glasses could get. It was perfect. Right as he turned the corner to walk to the stage he took them off and put them in his pocket! Later, Joe said the same thing…I can’t believe he took those glasses off!
The event ended pretty quickly after that so I actually didn’t get to see much of it at all. Since almost everyone watching the event were just bystanders in Times Square there isn’t much transition time. (There were probably less than 50 chairs for family, Warner Brothers staff, etc. Everyone else stood.) When its over, it’s over. The crowd leaves. We all went on stage for some photos, then there were a scurry of interviews, and then it was just a bunch of chaos! I soaked up every second. I didn’t have too many specific interviews so I was done fairly quickly and just walked around, took photos.
I made sure to talk to Team Hoyt again because I just love them. I had Dick say a short video for Micah which ended up being a message that I will rewatch to remind myself. Their motto is “Yes you can”. They say “No isn’t in the Hoyt vocabulary”. You really can’t argue with them after what they’ve done.
I was so proud to be there. I was so proud to have my family there - proud to have my cute, vibrant son walking around with his dad in his TinySuperheroes shirt just taking in everything around him. Proud to see my dad there holding my 5 week old baby. Proud to have my sister there who was undoubtedly proud of me. I could tell just by the way she was taking pictures. It was so cool to feel her support. I really felt it.
I didn’t want to leave. I couldn’t believe it was over and I couldn’t believe how awesome it was.
We had just 2 hours before a car came to pick us up from the airport. It was fun to be together and talk about what just happened, but we also had a crabby Rory, Milo needed to be fed, our bags needed to be packed. It was such a whirlwind. Before we knew it we were in a car. I literally could not keep my eyes open.
I won’t ruin the awesomeness of everything by going into detail about there remainder of our trip, but it included a 2 hour car ride (should have been 30 minutes) which led to us arriving to the airport 15 minutes before the departure time, missing our flight, having no options until the same flight 24 hours later…a train, a shuttle, a hotel, an EXHAUSTED 2 year old. Eh- it wasn’t ideal but we survived and I’m thankful to have the most awesome guy as my husband who could laugh at the unfortunate circumstance we found ourselves in. We literally ran out of diapers so Milo was wearing size 3 diapers (instead of newborn) and we were all wearing dirty clothes.
It was amazing. Amazing amazing amazing. Most certainly one of the neatest days of my life. Not sure I’ll ever fully grasp what just happened, but I’m thrilled to have pictures to remember it by!
Thank you for your loving support. For celebrating this with us and always supporting TinySuperheroes. I am so thankful to have so much love around me.
Love,
Robyn
