Kryptonite Immunity

I was managing a retail store in Niles, Illinois.  It was a winter in the late ‘70s.  I graduated high school and, with the least bit of encouragement, ran off to Chicago to climb a chain of management into that golden job at the end of every all-American rainbow.  On Christmas day, alone amidst a throng of noisy kids less than half my age, I sat - too cheap to even buy popcorn - in a mall multi-plex and waited for enough quiet and darkness to part the big red curtains and show me the movie “Superman”.  The advertisement was "You'll really believe a man can fly".

 

Looking at that movie now - especially having survived a stint as an actor in Hollywood, there's not much believable about it.  But, there in the darkness, with a couple hundred other awe-struck souls, I flew with Lois and the man of steel.  The bad guys stuck out like majorettes at a funeral... and it was easy to mop them up.  All the worlds wrongs were easy to spot and quick to correct.  Heck, you could even look up to the president.  Superman did.

 

I left that company after five promotions in a single year figuring, if I did that well without a collegiate sheepskin, how much better could I do with a degree.  Just for the record:  I never had a better paying job since.

 

Sitting here now, in the middle of Kansas, staring, point blank at the big 5-0, Superman is the least of my worries.  There's a big, old house with more work left to do than has so far been done; a yard full of half-baked projects that will, someday, be just beautiful.  My biggest earning days are behind me and my little, persistent aches remind me none of us were designed to live much past forty.

 

I'm titled now as a disabled veteran and with my resident alien titled wife of ten years, we're watching my nearly three year old, who is a little smarter than he ought to be, trying to figure out how bugs work without actually taking them apart.  Today, we applied for his passport.  We all waited in line at the post office and watched workmen tear up the asphalt-over-brick street so that they can lay a new one... even grabbed a brick for ourselves.

 

As he watched the diggers, my mind blew up to where a worn flag fluttered.  It wandered around the flagpole and lit on what that scrap of cloth would mean to him or, for that matter, to me.  Why had it never been as substantial as the one waving behind Clark Kent’s alter ego?  Then I drifted back to the reason for our visit and how my passport, worn from travel, had gotten me just about everywhere I’d ever wanted to go.

 

I worry sometimes about the world “junior” is getting but, more often, I wonder at the possibilities it will offer to a young man who will be smart enough to take good advantage of them.  He, his friends, and just now we’ve learned that a little brother is on the way, buoy me up.  Remind me the future is far from solid and inform me that doors long closed sometimes open to the slightest gust of hope.  Everyday brings new rays of sunshine – if your eyes are open and pointed in the right direction.

 

Nope, can't say I ever really believed in Superman.  But standing here, in line, with his hand in mine...  I do, once again, believe… that a man can fly.

Reviews

[Damian Alan Gray]

I think this is the true lesson of the Superman saga. When the world seems upside down, and we're left wondering where the hell he is in our moments of crisis and futility, we find that we can be our own Supermen.
Thank you. This is an inspiring piece.

[Michael X]

barry, this is excellent and is a very touching read, should be published, this one here, it carries an
inspiring messege that has the ability to leave a positive impact on the reader, sentimentally devised,
your words come to life with vivd clarity and emotional perception, written with imaginative,
heightened effect, you did an exceptional job on this work here, beautifully crafted, thanks for sharing.

[yinseriv]

The magic becomes all the more magical when you hit 50. I know now it is a gift, not an expectation. I am glad to see that magic still visits your life, even if the flag is tattered. This is a good story. You kept it simple and direct.