One of my nieces was in line at L’Accademia in Florence. (Spoiler alert: it’s where Michelangelo’s David is located. Oh. You haven’t seen the David? What’s the matter with you? And don’t tell me you’ve seen it on YouTube. Just go. Don’t argue with me).

So my niece is in line and there’s an older man in front of her. After a bit of conversation, she realizes that he too is an American, and she has a nagging feeling that she should know who he is, but she doesn’t ask. He in turn seems amused that she doesn’t know who he is.

After returning home, she’s watching something on TV, and she sees the man being interviewed and realizes that this man is John Glenn.

Glenn was the first American in space, and after leaving the space program, he’s elected to the US Senate, and he’s a very serious contender for the Presidency.

Should she have known him? Probably not. She’s too young for him to have been important in her mental world. A lot of people probably would have known him, but many wouldn’t, and that’s okay.

For most of us, there’s a tiny universe of people we are important to. Parents, children, a few close friends: we are important to those people, and they important to us.

But the stark realty is that most of us are not all that important to the world is general, and that’s the way it should be.

I’m sure John Glenn had that small coterie of important people. But to them, he was a son or a father or a brother or a husband or a friend. Not an astronaut or a senator or anything else.

Cherish those relationships. Cultivate them. And when you’re tempted to place someone else in line ahead of those Important People, reconsider. And remember who’s truly important. And who’s not