…because he makes me want to cry like a little girl.
Seriously. I am not kidding. It’s not, however, because I feel sorry for him. I do feel sad that he has been afflicted with a disease that is obviously no barrel of fun - but it’s deeper than that…
I grew up with Family Ties, Back to The Future and just about everything Michael J. Fox had ever done. At times I thought he was cocky and sometimes over-acted, but I always liked him. I felt like he was, at a root level, a good person. I don’t often feel this way about celebrities, nor everyday people for that matter.
At first, after I found out that he had Parkinson’s Disease, it made me incredibly sad to see him on television. He had difficulty controlling his motor skills, he was twitchy and certainly was not the person I remember as a kid growing up in my Chicago suburb. But after many instances bringing me to or close to tears, I started to see past the physical manifestations of his disease. I saw something that is not easy to come by these days: hope.
This might come as a shock to my personal friends, and those that read my articles, but I am a die-hard optimist. I believe in the inherent goodness of mankind, even in the worst of times. I believe that good things happen with hard work and sometimes hard decisions. I feel that we can’t just sit back and be OK with life’s problems and expect them to get better without action. We shold get behind people that do things to help us or motivate us to be better.
Michael J. Fox motivates me to be better - a better, crying, Keith.
Michael J. Fox’s charity: http://www.teamfox.org/
not a shock at all. you wouldn’t be where you are in your life had it been otherwise. great post keith.