Thomas Cruise

Tom Cruise jumping on the Oprah Winfrey Show. (http://img.timeinc.net/ew/dynamic/imgs/050608/134827__oprah_l.jpg)

My hero is Tom Cruise. He is a very famous actor. He’s happy, rich, and popular. So why is he a hero? He didn’t do anything special. Well, Tom was diagnosed with dyslexia when he was only seven years old. Dyslexia is a disease that makes reading and spelling difficult. He was then faced with a tough childhood. He is admired for his talent, great courage and achievement despite this disability.

He was born in Syracuse, New York on July 3, 1962. As a boy, his family moved often. He attended eight elementary schools and three high schools. He took preliminary classes that could have led to Catholic priesthood, but abandoned it after one semester. After his parents divorced, he joined the wrestling team, but quit after a knee injury. So then he tried acting and auditioned for Guys and Dolls, and got the role.

When Tom was growing up, he tried to hide his disability from the other children at school. He has described his childhood as "a functional illiterate," through high school and his first films. He also said, "I’d try to concentrate on what I was reading, then I’d get to the end of the page and have very little memory of anything I’d read. I would go blank, feel anxious, dumb, frustrated and bored."

After the production Guys and Dolls, he knew he wanted to act. The ringing of applause in his ears, he knew right away that this was what he wanted to do for the rest of his life. So he took drama classes in the evening. He auditioned for TV commercials, but was often turned down as "too handsome" or "too inverse." In later years, Tom married Nicole Kidman on Christmas Eve in 1990. They adopted two babies two years later. They later divorced in 2001. In 2005, Cruise started dating Katie Holmes. In 2006, she had a baby named Suri and seven months later they married. He also acted in several movies. One of the movies was "Mission Impossible 2."

Some interesting facts about Tom are… when Tom was on the Oprah Winfrey show, he jumped on the couch yelling how much he loved Katie Holmes. It was voted Most Surprising Television Moment. October 10, 2006 was declared Tom Cruise Day in Japan because he made more trips to Japan than any other Hollywood star. Tom’s daughter was named Suri because it means princess in Hebrew and red rose in Persian. He also proposed to Katie on top of the Eiffel Tower in Paris.

Tom has had many achievements. He has been in thirty one movies and his newest, Lions for Lambs. Even though Tom battled dyslexia, he has been nominated and won several awards for best actor. Tom has inspired me to not give up on a dream. He tried many things in life, wrestling, becoming a priest, and then acting. His family moved often forcing him to go to different schools. He had to make new friends and then leave them to go to another school. That would be very difficult, but that didn’t stop him from his dream. I learned that trying new things can lead you to what you really like. I’ve tried many sports, gymnastics, T- ball (when I was younger), tennis, volleyball, basketball, and soccer. I figured out that soccer and basketball are my favorites. Tom didn’t let dyslexia in the way of his dream, so I’m not going to let anything in the way of my dream.