You know the saying “never meet your heroes”?
Never meet your heroes because they will disappoint you? Never meet the wonderful people you admire from afar because they are not so great up close?
Yeah, that did not turn out true for me, even if the ‘hero’ in question is my senior by just one year: The Sidekick staff designer Ahana Roy.
It is difficult not to admire Ahana with her effortless talent and never-ending hidden intellect, and I am no exception. I spent sophomore year, last year, ooooh-ing and aaaah-ing at her beautiful works of art, curious from the start with my head filled with compliments everyone dished out to her on a daily basis.
“Ahana’s one of our best artists,” The Sidekick adviser Chase Wofford has said on more than one occasion, to enthusiastically agreeing nods from everyone in the room.
These things are facts I always knew to be true of Ahana Roy. But getting to know the girl gave the idea of her in my head so much more color.
Ahana is weird. I say that with a lot of love, because to be normal is boring, and neither of us claim that word.
Her weirdness brought (and still brings) me a lot of joy simply because I wasn’t expecting it. To find out that my hero is just as odd as me was quite fantastic.
She and I share a boatload of the same or extremely similar interests and I have been ecstatic to learn our humor matches up nicely as well. From fandoms to features, we bond over the most diverse topics under the sun.
That is not to say we are completely alike, mind you, but the resemblance is uncanny. To me, befriending Ahana was like meeting a celebrity and finding solid proof that they are just like you. It is a completely surprising and entirely exhilarating fun.
I am extremely thankful that our shared double-blocked Sidekick class this year meant seeing Ahana every day. One of my most treasured memories of the year is watching the anime “Yuri!!! on Ice” with her during the Great CHS Sewage Disaster of 2025 (you know the one). In the show, a young but shaken skater named Yuri meets and is coached by his figure skating hero Victor and realizes the man is so much more than he appears. So many of our shared loves became clear while we binged every episode of this spectacular show and that is when I truly came to my realization.
Ahana Roy is my kind of weird. Even a full year into our friendship, she still sometimes acts embarrassed before telling me something particularly silly that she’s done, as if I have not most likely done something similar as well. We’re at the point where I know what she’s going to admit to before she says it.
Now, I regret to inform you she is leaving me – I mean, going away to college. Ahana is the type of girl to excel no matter where she goes and I am undoubtedly excited to see what she will accomplish.
Still, I will miss her.
To Ahana, your art, jokes and disasters have made this year so much more bearable. Thank you for being the best, weirdest hero I could ever ask for. Go forth and conquer, and never forget to be yourself.
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