Erin Kasdin 2018-08-20 11:00:23
A Young Lion Leads by Example After 10 People Are Killed in a Nearby High School
The Photo
One evening, when Tayelor Adkins was 7 years old, as she sat with her parents at the dinner table, her dad, Lion Cory Thomas, asked her if she’d like to go volunteer in the morning.
“Sure,” she said.
“Ok, you’ll need to wake up at 6 am,” he said.
“Oh…” She wavered.
“And I’m not telling you what we’re going to do,” said Thomas.
Her curiosity won out and she went, sleepy-eyed, with Thomas the next morning. When they arrived at the local church, she saw food.
“I was excited,” she says. “I thought, ‘Oh! We’re gonna eat!’”
But she wasn’t going to eat. She was going to serve.
That morning she served breakfast to seniors at the League City Lion Club’s monthly senior breakfast. She noticed how grateful they seemed for the food, even though many were well-off and didn’t need charity. “It was the fact that a young person cared about them,” she says. “It made them feel valued. And that made me feel valuable.”
Now 15, she’s been to every service event since, tagging along with Thomas, who has been club president and director of the board, among other things. She’s too young to be a Lion officially, and there’s no Leo club in her small town of League City, Texas. But, this spring Tayelor unknowingly became an iconic symbol of what it means to be a Lion.
"It was the fact that a young person cared about them," she says. "It made them feel valued. And that made me feel valuable."
On Friday, May 18, 2018, a gunman opened fire and killed 10 people in a Santa Fe, Texas, high school, just 20 minutes from League City (about 12 miles) and home to one of Tayelor’s closest friends, Leila. Leila was in the arts program where the shooting took place. She made it out, but some of her friends did not. The following Sunday, Moms of Galveston County hosted an impromptu candlelight vigil and the Lions did what they do best. They came with food.
Leila, who has helped out at service events in the past, wanted to volunteer with Tayelor. She asked to wear something that identified her as a volunteer as she helped set up and hand out food, so Thomas handed her a Lions vest. However, as the evening wore on, Leila grew hot and gave the vest to Tayelor. “I never usually wear one,” Tayelor says, “but I put it on and then someone started playing a song and I could see Leila getting upset, so I tried to comfort her.” The moment was caught by a photographer and published in The New Yorker Magazine the following day.
“People Are Lonely”
For a long time, the League City Lions kept to themselves, says Thomas. Their philosophy when it came to district meetings and being a part of the greater Lions community was “Sorry, we’re busy working.” However, over the years they did begin reaching out, realizing that a network of Lions could do more good than a single club. While at first other Lions weren’t so welcoming to the insular League City folks, eventually, things started to warm up. They used social media to connect and now boast strong working relationships with many of their fellow Texas clubs.
League City’s focus is on children’s issues and they’re big supporters of the Texas Lions Camp, which provides kids with disabilities a place to enjoy that childhood rite of summer. And for the past 64 years, they’ve hosted the League City Music Festival to raise money for the camp. It’s the largest annual festival in League City and draws huge crowds. Tayelor gushes about volunteering at the festival. “I know that by volunteering, some kid from my area with diabetes, or who is deaf or blind, can go to this camp,” she says. “I go to camp and it makes me so happy, and I want other kids to have that.”
So how can a club that is focused on children help after eight teens are gunned down at a nearby high school? The answers aren’t easy. Thomas wants to implement a program he sees working at the elementary schools. It’s called “Dads at the Doors,” and is exactly what it sounds like. It stations Dads at every entry and exit to the school, ensuring kids have an adult figure to acknowledge them every day and ask how they are. “Every one of these school shooters has been a boy,” says Thomas. “Maybe if they knew Mr. Thomas would be there and say ‘Hi, how was your weekend,’ maybe that would make a difference,” he says.
Tayelor isn’t sure what can help, but she has an idea of what’s wrong. “People are lonely,” she says. “My school has 4,000 students but many times I just feel alone. And it sucks.” Tayelor combats this feeling of isolation with a small circle of close friends. But she also points out that kids have been feeling rejected and alone since the “beginning of time.” It’s only recently that they’ve coped by committing acts of violence against fellow students. “I think it’s because the kids around them are so insensitive,” she says. She notes how a stranger opening a door for her or a classmate smiling and making her laugh can have a big impact on her day. “Sometimes you just feel shut out. And the smallest thing can turn it around.”
“We need to just go back to being kind,” she says. “Just be kind.”
Back to That Photo
The night of the vigil, the girls hadn’t noticed any photographers and were surprised when they heard they’d made the home page of The New Yorker’s online magazine. In their grief they also became acutely aware of the intrusiveness of the press. “It was kind of disrespectful,” says Tayelor. They hadn’t wanted to be the face of the latest shooting tragedy. But Tayelor’s dad saw it from a different angle. “I was overwhelmed with pride,” he says. “The empathy she expressed while holding hands with her friend was just a proud thing to see.”
It was also an important moment for Lions. For an organization looking to reach more young people and increase awareness of who they are and what they stand for, this photo of a young Lion comforting a friend in a dark hour is powerful.
Tayelor isn’t old enough to be a dues-paying member, but she is a Lion in every way. While she made the national stage in a Lions vest, speaking to her only underscores how much more there is to being a Lion than wearing the uniform.
When asked if there’s anything else she’d like to say, anything she feels is important to get across, she’s quiet for a moment.
“We need to just go back to being kind,” she says. “Just be kind.”
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Being Kind
http://digital.lionmagazine.org/article/Being+Kind/3163465/519578/article.html