Saturday, January 19, 2019

Supper Man Hero

When I was first learning to read, I was told NOT to read comics, aka graphic novels. So it was an especially lucky day, I thought, when my next door neighbor Peter (who was about five or six years older) invited me to his house to read them.

I didn't much think about rationalizing what we were reading--I just wanted to page through the comics in his basement, seeing how stories could be told with pictures and words in a magical near-cinematic style that jumped around the page.

His comics were all the super-hero variety and most belonged to Super Man.

In the distant future I would learn about Super Man's genesis as a sort of antidote to Nazi Germany, invented by Jewish men who, I'm guessing, felt anything but heroic in their world. But as a six year old, I wanted to read out loud, either because I wanted to be an actor or just wanted to read better--I can't remember now.

What I do remember is reading to Peter and pronouncing Superman as Supper Man.

The weird thing was, Peter (who obviously knew better) didn't correct me. So I read on and on, for quite a while, Supper Man did this, Supper Man said that, and I think finally at some point Peter told me it was really Superman, and I was embarrassed, and think I went home, probably sulking for the rest of the day.

But years later, when I told a friend this story, he was completely intrigued with the idea of Supper Man as a superhero, and we decided he would fly over the city, bringing supper to hungry people, and as such he would be a truly novel and believable super hero that most people would prefer to the bare-knuckle violence loving batch of non-hipsters we have now.

Or at least, people would prefer a supper-bringer in their daily lives. Wouldn't you? Fighting traffic or wading onto crowded subways to get home, or maybe you don't have a home or job or maybe you're new in town and don't know anyone to break bread with; whatever, Supper Man has you covered.

Maybe he'd set up a big, beautiful dinner service with really silver silverware, or maybe just a home cooked meal sliding onto your plain old plates; regardless, it would always be delicious, it would be what you always wanted for supper, and might even make you dance like Snoopy when he sings Suppertime... if it wasn't copyrighted, it could even be in the same comic book. Sorry, graphic novel.

My friend also thought Supper Man should be accompanied by Tele-Girl, (pronounced Tella-Girl) and God help me, I cannot remember what she did? Maybe it was something to do with the telephone, calling ahead to say supper was coming? She was supposed to fly around with Supper Man, though, maybe she was his pilot? I would like that better than having them actually fly.

Because if you're going to be a superhero, I think you should at least be different than the usual fly by nights. Don't you think?

For now, let's say she was his pilot and used her speaker phone to call ahead. We'll call her Tele-Woman, though, much better than the old comic book label.

"Hello, there, Sally Bedecker, is it? Government shut down shut off your paycheck? No worries. Bringing a week's worth of meals your way, in seventeen minutes, we are just north of Rochester, you're the blue house, yes? No, this is not a hoax and we really ARE Supper Man and Tele Woman.

Hopefully they would have their own comic so people would know who they were and not be frightened of them. I just think we need these superheroes right now, in the midst of so many clowns and buffoons, telling tales like idiots, full of sound and fury and signifying nothing" (as Shakespeare would say).

All this is to say, I guess, is that I'm hungry for politicians that get it, who figure out we are not looking for gnashing teeth and locking horns; that a simple supper will do, and if you can deliver that instead of impoverishing working people, you'd go a long way toward being a real hero.

We need you so badly, Supper Man. Can you please, please just get here as soon as you can?

Superman action figure by Fisher-Price Imaginext photoJD Hancock

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2 comments:

  1. I like the way you think. Hopefully, Supper Man will show up soon. :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. I hope so, Lydia! Maybe I can get him to do the dishes if he does. :)

    ReplyDelete

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