Roy Exum: 5 Lessons Taught In 2014

  • Monday, December 29, 2014
  • Roy Exum
Roy Exum
Roy Exum

In mid-December, the geniuses at CNN aired a special about “Extraordinary People.” It showcased five of those who walk among us and what they did that was pretty special in 2014. From that program, writer Brandon Griggs has identified five traits that any of us can use as directional signs when the New Year blooms this Thursday.

Brandon writes that, while the five people chosen by the CNN editors became “overnight heroes,” each one inspired us “not through grandiose words and gestures but through the unspoken power of their example.”

Here are the five lessons they taught:

1. SHOW COURAGE IN A CRISIS

On September 15 helicopter pilot Gary Dahlen was on a refueling stop as he ferried water to fight a huge wildfire in the Sierra Nevada Mountain range when over the radio came a called he had never heard in 25 years working wildfires. “All helicopters, prepare for an emergency launch!”

Within minutes he was airborne and as he hovered his craft down through thick smoke, he saw 12 firefights who had been trapped by the ever-shifting blaze. “I saw a wall coming and I knew if they stayed there they were going to die.”

Unable to land, he immediately had an idea. He radioed and firefighter on the ground, told him to gather his men and run. But run where? Fire was everywhere. “Follow my chopper!” Because of his altitude, Dahlen could see a path where the men could escape, leading them to a clear logging road where another helicopter soon plucked them to safety.

"All I could think about was getting those guys out of there," he told CNN’s cameras in a humble voice. "I never thought about my safety or what was going to happen if it didn't work. I just saw a window of opportunity. A very short window of opportunity and I took it. I'm very happy that it worked out."

2. EXHIBIT GRACE UNDER PRESSURE

Ron Johnson, a Missouri Highway patrolman, was on his way back from a national conference of black state troopers when he heard Michael Brown had been shot by a white police officer in his hometown of Ferguson, Mo., so he hit the blue lights and “put the hammer down.”

Johnson had grown up in Ferguson and knew the black community there. "When I got there, I began to see people that I knew, out on that street," Johnson told CNN. "And, you know, when you see fire and you're hearing gunshots and you see people that you know, and you know their life story and you know their families and that (their) dreams are just like yours, and you're seeing the kids that are friends with your kids and that you've coached in football and baseball, it told me that I needed to be there."

Did he ever! In short order Gov. Jay Nixon tapped Johnson, a captain with the State Patrol, to lead the police presence in the riot-torn town and that very afternoon Johnson joined the protestors, walking with them and talking and listening. Soon those who had hurled rocks and insults were thanking him for what he was doing. “That was the turning point,” he told CNN.

"This community will never be the same," he said. "But this community doesn't deserve to be the same. It deserves to be better."

3. MEET EVIL HEAD ON

A crazed gunman, after murdering an Army Reservist near Parliament Hill in Ottawa on Oct. 22, forced his way into Canada’s House of Commons and gunfire soon erupted. The legislators barricaded themselves in caucus rooms as security teams chased Michael Zehaf-Bibeau.

Kevin Vickers, normally a shy man who serves as sergeant-at-arms at the House of Commons, saw the gunman hid in an alcove and begin firing. Vickers stealthily made his way towards the killer and, after diving from behind a column, emptied his 9 mm service pistol. It was the first time in his lengthy career that he had ever used it for that purpose.

The next day Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper and all of Parliament gave him a lengthy standing ovation for his immeasurable bravery that doubtlessly saved many lives. Vickers has declined all interview requests and is back on the job.

4. MIRACLES ARE WITHIN YOUR GRASP

Fatu Kekula was in her last year of nursing school this summer when the deadly Ebola virus hit Kakata, Liberia. Her father, stricken with the disease, was turned away from three hospitals so she took him home to treat him herself. Then her mother, sister and a cousin came down with the disease and her house became a clinic with Fatu as the sole caregiver.

She had no medicine, no equipment, and very little hope but she did what she could. She put plastic trash bags over her socks and tied them in a knot over her calves. She put on rubber boots and tied over bags over the boots. Her hair she wrapped in a stocking, and a plastic bag went over that. She put on a raincoat and four pairs of rubber gloves and finally a surgical mask.

For weeks she cooked and fed her “patients.” She bathed each one and later admitted while she cried often, she didn’t give up. Against unbelievable odds, three of her four patients survived – all but her cousin. (Ebola has an estimated death rate of 70 percent.)

Today her “trash bag” methods is being taught by health workers all across Africa and she is being hailed as a “giant” in her native country. Due to her notoriety – she was featured in Time Magazine as it named the “Ebola Health Worker” as the “Person of the Year” Kekula has attracted much-deserved attention and is coming to the United States to finish her nursing training at Emory in Atlanta. "I was not afraid," said Kekula. “I had my faith, and that is why I'm here today." 

5. SHARE CREDIT FOR YOUR SUCCESS

Kevin Durant, the great basketball player for the NBA Oklahoma City Thunder, stepped to the microphone on May 6 to accept the league’s Most Valuable Player award and in an unscripted and very emotional acceptance, he singled out each of his teammates for what they had done to help him with the award.

And then he looked down at his mother.

"We weren't supposed to be here. You made us believe, you kept us off the street, put clothes on our backs, food on the table. When you didn't eat, you made sure we ate. You went to sleep hungry, you sacrificed for us," Durant said, unashamedly fighting back tears. "You're the real MVP."

That’s pretty heady stuff, considering it was five days before Mother’s Day. "The only thing I wanted to do ... (was) to show love to everybody that helped me get to that point. And I think it was important for me to do that for them," he later told reporters.

"I just wanted to sit there and just, you know, not worry about tomorrow or what happened yesterday and just focus on today. And that's what I did with the speech ... just tried to inspire people," he said. “I've learned that these last few years, that basketball's my life, it's what I do. It's what I love to do," he told the CNN audience. "But there's so much more to me as a man."

* * *

Never forget that every life has an expiration date – make your moments count.

royexum@aol.com

 

 

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