Heather Finn’s Value of Family

Everyone values their family in different ways and amounts, but never as much as my educators. As a senior, I have had a lot of teacher introductions; every interaction involving their family dynamic and how passionate they are about it. Whether it’s a significant other and a couple kids, or a sibling that lives a couple states out, family never fails to be a significant piece to a teacher’s personality. 

Heather Finn, my high school math teacher, is all about family. Every year I receive the same introduction. She shows a picture of all her dogs and gives us the run down of their names, ages, and personalities. Then she moves onto talking about her husband and two loving children. Any other teacher would talk about a hobby or favorite food of theirs, but Mrs. Finn only talks about her family. This leads me to believe she is the number one person to talk to about the value of family. 

I started off by covering her “Teacher Introduction”: the age and order of her dogs, the family dynamic, and the ages of the family as well. She seemed to struggle more with answering her family’s ages than she did with the sentimental questions. I had asked her what she is most proud of about her family and the response spilled out immediately. There was no sign of hesitation or of thought in between. It was as if she had been waiting her whole life to answer: “I guess just for me I feel so lucky that Ted and I are still together and that my girls- I just…I didn’t know you couldn’t love anyone that much.” That really took me back. She continued to talk about how when people first start dating that it is their whole world and how that hasn’t changed for her and Ted. As well as how grateful she is that “I love going home and being with them and when people say ‘what do you wanna do?’ I just want to do anything with them…I just enjoy everybody so much.” She doesn’t have to say “family comes first” for everyone to be aware she puts them first. Her blood pumps for her family and it is very admirable. 

I started to question if she could pick out a favorite memory with her family. I was thinking she would answer with a trip or a funny board game moment, but I was surprised to hear “times with grandparents.” I did not consider that her favorite memory with her immediate family would actually be fun times with the intermediate family. However she did find it to be a very broad question and bounced between answers of times with grandparents and “times when we are all together” which is a rather broad and fair answer. I realized that the value of family to her may be different for others when she said “I mean maybe if you had a kid and hated them, you’d be like ‘yeah get out see you later’, but I don’t hate my kids.” Mrs. Finn had good role model parents and as a result, she knew that is how she wanted her kids to grow up. Ted had the same, but being one of ten, there were some differences. I went back a couple weeks later to ask some follow up questions. As she is well aware that different families have different values, I asked her how she would advise someone else to value their family, even if their situation is not as lucky as hers. She struggled to find the words at first but settled with “When things go bad I can count on them no matter what and unfortunately with some families that’s not always the case, so that’s why it’s so hard to make people believe or do what I do because they have different experiences.” Listening to her express that and see the compassion in her eyes was really heartwarming. I could tell she meant every word she was saying and that she cares not only for her family but for her students as well. 

 I came into this interview thinking I would receive a universal response to the value of family. An answer anyone could relate to, but the only fair answer I could receive was Mrs. Finn’s “value of family.” She puts them first. They will always be number one. She couldn’t imagine life without them. As she put it “I want my kids to fly but at the same time don’t fly too far” as she wants them to always feel comfortable coming back to the nest. Family to her is “Everything.” Family to her is “Trust.” Family to her is “Love.” Family to all is safety.

“The R Family – 2” by RebeccaVC1 is licensed under CC BY-ND 2.0

“Hugging Salt Shakers” by HarlanH is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0

“Trust” by Pro-Zak is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0