Some of you already know this, but I feel I should give a bit of background ere beginning this post. You see, I work for the Community Blood Center in Kansas City. I'm a phlebotomist; that is, I draw the blood from donors, blood which ultimately goes to people who are, literally, dying for the lack of it. Now, I shan't go into any diatribe about the value of blood or why people should donate or any of that; gods ken ye've probably heard that often enough. If you're a donor, good on ye. If not, I'm sure your reasons are valid and sufficient. I'm not trying to drum up donors, y'see.
Every day I go to work, though, I am humbled. It is my honor, y'see, to be in the company of true heroes.
Aye, heroes, for that's exactly what my donors are. No, not for permitting me to stick a needle in their arms, though they certainly deserve a special award for bravery for that, but simply because they donate and ask nowt for it.
I believe a true hero isn't some flashy, death-defying, larger-than-life cartoon character, but is just an ordinary person who unselfishly and willingly gives of himerself for the betterment of hiser fellows. And blood donors are and do just that. Think of it, they willingly and with malice aforethought give a significant part of their most private organ, their blood, to total strangers so that those strangers may have another shot at life.
Donors ask nothing in return, not even the tiniest thank you - although, believe me, we thank them to pieces before, during, and after their donations. Oh, sure, we give them cookies and juice, but that's really just protecting our raw materials and making sure we'll be able to tap that particular person again; although there are those donors who swear they only donate to get the Nutter-Butters we give them. And we give them t-shirts and other gew-gaws, but all those are just miniscule tokens.
So, what is it, then, that spurs a person to willingly give such an intimate part of himerself to strangers? 'Tain't the cookies ... or the t-shirts, coffee cups, cheesy pens, clocks shaped like giant blood drops, or what have you. I'm sure that, for some, it's bragging rights or a way of upstaging their neighbors or co-workers. For others, maybe some sort of atonement for wrongs they've committed, whether actual or only in their minds. And I'm sure there are some who do it as an attempt to buy their way into their version of heaven. But, not all donors fit these categories. Not all.
For instance, I was at a high school the other day and a 16-year-old girl came up to me to donate. She was cute - no, she was gorgeous in that mid-teenaged way. She had a smile that made all male creatures, human or not, melt. She had a 4.0 grade average and wanted to be an astronaut when she grew up. In short, she had it all.
And, as you might guess, she was more than a tad frightened. I mean, she'd never even had blood drawn at her doctor's office or anything. Of course, her "friends" had gleefully filled her head full of horror stories about how big the needle is and how excruciating the pain and how she would pass out and all that crap, so she was just a tad, shall we say, intimidated.
I asked her if she wanted to change her mind.
"NOOOoooooooo!!!" Her denial was adamant. Despite her very natural fear and the scare stories of those so-called friends, she was determined to see it through.
Okay, let's go, then. Later I asked her why she chose to donate. She told me she was doing it "just because I want to." She had no conscious idea as to why she wanted to - no pompous proclamation of saving humanity or anything - just that she wanted to.
And, that, my friends, is a hero. Oh, I mean no disrespect to the soldiers, public safety folk, doctors, teachers, et al. - they're every bit as heroic (for the most part) as their press proclaims. But, being a hero isn't flashy. It isn't filled with sturm-und-drang. It's not sirens screaming in the night or artillery booming across the countryside. It's the quiet ones. The lone student quietly and with sheer courage facing down his country's military might. Another student deliberately saying no to an angry policeman.
A hero is a blood donor.
