THIS WAS MY RELIGION

This is a chapter of a book I’ve been mulling over. The idea isn’t formalized yet, but I felt the need to write this. In it, I speak of my association with comic books. That may seem silly to a lot of people, but comics have been one of the pillars of my life. This isn’t just my story. There are millions of now- middle aged men who walked this same path.

Now read on…

I was always trying to connect to children my own age. I had it a little easier when I was very young, because my mother’s friends had children and so we played together. And they liked He-man.  And I liked He-man.  That was all you needed at that age.  We picked up sticks and pretended to be the characters, though I was never allowed to be the hero, despite the fact that I shared a name with He-man’s alter-ego, Prince Adam.  No, I was always forced to play the villain, the faceless Skeletor.

I’ll try not to read too much into that.

By the 4th or 5th grade, He-man and Transformers weren't enough.  Some kids joined sports, but I never cared for them. I wasn’t athletic and no one ever picked me for their teams.  I was always picked last.

When I was 11, all the kids in my school were given a pack of baseball cards.  I have no idea why.  But it was a thing and all the other kids seemed to enjoy it.  So, I figured this would be a way to make friends.  I’d overheard someone mention the name of a famous, talented player, Ozzie Smith.  And wouldn’t you know it? I had an Ozzie Smith baseball card!  As Dr Sam Beckett would say, “OH BOY!”

I saw some kids trading baseball cards. They were cool kids and I wanted them to like me. I ran to them and held up the card.  “Hey guys!  I got Ozzie Smith!”

One of the kids gave me an annoyed glare.  “So what? Everyone has that one.”

Dejected, I walked away.

I didn’t understand.  Human children liked baseball.  They collected baseball cards based on their popularity.  Some random kid- surely an expert on baseball and popularity- had announced that Ozzie Smith was popular.  …so why weren’t the human children excited by my Ozzie Smith baseball card?

Shockingly, my pubescent brain hadn’t yet learned the basics of economics.

At the time, I was staying in school after-care, for parents who worked and couldn’t pick up their children at 3pm.   It was a few weeks later when I saw some of the other after-care kids trading a different kind of card set.  They sort of looked like baseball cards, but with colorful illustrations instead of photos.

I asked the kids if I could see the cards.  And to my surprise and delight, none of them raised their pitchforks or torches!  Instead, one of them handed me a card. 

On it was a drawing of a beautiful, red-haired woman with a pink aura surrounding her.  “Jean Grey”, I read aloud.  On the back of the card was her life story as well as ratings of her abilities, including powers and intelligence.   Jean Grey was a member of X-factor. (I didn’t know what that was.) And she was a former member of the X-men.  (I had a passing familiarity with them.)  Her boyfriend was Scott Summers, also known as Cyclops.  I asked if they had a Cyclops card and one was passed to me. 

Cyclops was the leader of the X-men.  His eyes produced powerful force beams that could tear through anything, but he couldn’t turn them off. Scott was forced to wear special glasses to control his “optic blasts”.  And while he was their leader, Cyclops always walked a lonely path. He was friends with his teammates, but kept them at arm's length at all times, afraid he was putting them in danger. 

I don’t think it’s a coincidence that those are still two of my all-time favorite fictional characters.  

If I’m being honest, I still have a crush on the fictional Jean Grey.  Powerful, intelligent and indescribably beautiful.  And most of all, in love with Cyclops.

I saw Scott Summers’ spirit in myself.  A good person who was set apart from even the people he loved.  What made him special was also his curse.  I felt a kinship with this imaginary man.  I felt the burden described in his stories. And he became as real to me as you or I.

Writers often become obsessed with fictional characters.  

When I was very young, I fell in love with the story of King Arthur and his queen, Guinevere.  Arthur was a great leader and hero who had united the Kingdom in the name of Justice and won the heart of fair Guinevere.  But to that point, I’d only heard the child sanitized version. A few years later, Alex Trebek asked Jeopardy contestants who was Queen Guinevere’s true love?  “King Arthur!” I announced, to no one but the television set.  I was very excited that Jeopardy was talking about a subject on which I was an expert.  Little did I know.  I became enraged when Alex Trebek stated that her true love was Sir Lancelot, Arthur’s most loyal knight.  

This couldn’t be true!  Why would Guinevere be with Lancelot???

I felt similarly when I found out that Jean Grey was always tempted by her lust for Wolverine.  I took it personally.  Scott was her true love!  Why would she debase herself with that animal?

If Scott Summers and I were so similar, that surely meant that I was doomed to walk alone. Even if I found love, I would lose it to someone more badass and dangerous. Which was a problem, because everyone seemed to be more badass and dangerous than me.

As I said. I was invested in their stories.  But I am getting a bit ahead of myself.

After looking through the other kids’ Marvel trading cards, I asked where they got them.  That weekend, I asked my Mom if she could take me to Papergold, a local comic book store.  

And there began my new religion.

I’d read a few comics prior to this.  My Grandmother’s cousin, Wayne, collected comics. I’m not sure what his deal was, but Wayne was odd.  No one really talked about it, because he was of a generation that hid things that weren’t normal. I don’t know if Wayne was an undiagnosed autistic (I’m not even sure they had that term back then), disabled or just weird and lonely.  It makes me wonder what would have become of me if I was born in a different era.  Anyway, Wayne would occasionally give comics to my Grandmother to give to me.  And they were fun, but it just didn’t catch on at the time.

This was different.  Other kids liked comic books now, so I could share this with other humans.  And maybe make friends?  As it turned out, it mostly had the opposite effect at that time.  This was something I could disappear into.  The real world sucked.  No one liked me.  They told me I was weird and ugly.  But in the world of comic books, being weird and ugly meant you could be a mutant!  I wasn’t an alien, I was an X-man!!!!

And so I lived in that world.  I spent every dollar I had from my allowance on comic books.  And because of the cards, I made mine Marvel (that was their slogan) for several years.  

In addition to Cyclops, Spider-man also became one of my favorite characters.  Peter Parker is the patron saint of lonely nerds.  He is our “hometown boy makes good” story.  Peter is a nerd and an outcast.  He gets beaten up by the school bully.  His boss yells at him for being a weirdo.  He’s smart and sensitive and an artist. But then one day, fate gives him the chance to shine. The world comes to see him as the hero he always was inside. And the world keeps knocking him down, even then. But he always gets back up.   Also, he has a mega-hot red-headed wife.

Side note.  Many writers have tried to kill the Peter and Mary Jane romance.  It's been done a few times.  Garbage writers can’t figure out why MJ is in the story or what to do with a Peter who is in a happy, healthy relationship.  Which makes it sound like they need therapy.  For readers, the rejection of Peter Parker’s happiness and his marriage feels like an indictment of us.  He is our avatar.  The suggestion that he can’t be happy is personal in effect, if not in intent.

I get my generosity from my Mother.  She has her faults, but I’ve rarely met a more generous soul than her. She is the foundation for all that is good within me.

But if she is the foundation, comic books were the cornerstones upon which my house is built. I learned to stand up for Truth, Justice and the American Way from the Big Blue Boyscout. From Spider-man I learned that you have to stand up for what is right, no matter the odds against you..  Batman taught me the value of hard work.  And the X-men taught me that the world was worth fighting for, even if most of the world didn’t feel the same about you.

Until the 21st century, superhero comics were costume-laden morality plays. This lesson was and is important. And it has largely been eradicated by selfish, post-modern writers; more interested in their own egos than in sharing the gifts they were given.

I was raised Roman Catholic.  It just never took for me.  I wish it had.  Religion is important. Not for the Traditions, but for the lessons and the values they impart.  These are vital to society.

Though it makes me even more of an outcast, Comic Books and Science Fiction became a religion for me and many others.

They gave us more than just fun stories.  They gave us ideals.  And yes, the 21st century has shown me that we didn’t fully live up to them. But I still believe in them and their power.

The S still stands for Hope.

And so do I.