Being Supersuit

For years of my childhood, my friend Chris and I would have hours-long G.I. Joe battles. We invented complex character traits for all the action figures. For example, the ironically named, Guile, was the loose cannon who was always threatening to trick or abandon the team. He was a loner (come to think of it, Chris always made his action figures "the loner." X-Men's Wolverine was one of his favorites). But the Joes would always reel him in just in time to ambush the evil Cobra forces … by driving a school bus right into the teeth of heavy machine gun fire from Cobras occupying the elevated position of the bookcase. My tactical understanding at that time was on par with Lord Cardigan, who commanded the charge of the Light Brigade. No matter. The Joes always prevailed in the end.

Sometimes instead of G. I. Joes, it was superhero action figures. Sometimes it was just the two of us inventing elaborate stories of our meteoric rise to NBA superstardom on my driveway basketball hoop. Sometimes we lived in the virtual space of video games. But as often happens with childhood friends, it wasn't meant to last. Chris' family moved to Arkansas and I did less and less imagining.

Before Chris, there was my sister, Jennifer. On land we were Jonathan and Jennifer, brother and sister dynamic duo, but when we put on bathing suits and jumped into our grandparents' community pool, we transformed into the aquatic superheroes Supersuit and Buddy—oddly fitting alter egos in a universe populated by prosaically named superheroes like Super-man, Bat-man, Spider-man, Iron-man, Ant-man ... need I go on?

My superpowers consisted mostly of doing chin-ups on the railing of the wheelchair ramp, aided by the buoyancy of pool water; or swimming underwater between my dad's legs; or doing handstands. Her superpowers consisted of copying me. If we were feeling particularly brave, we would challenge the imaginary pool sharks hidden in the murky fathoms of the deep end of the pool. We were a poor man's Batman and Robin, if the poor man were a merman. As we got older Supersuit and Buddy hung up our oversize trunks and frilly tie-dyed onepiece and became regular citizens. Without their fearless heroes, the retirement community of Tucson, Arizona is probably being terrorized by pool sharks to this day.

When I was in middle school, my parents took me to a garage sale, where I discovered stacks of Spider-man and Captain America comics from the 70's, the "bronze age" of comics. I think the woman at the table was eager to get rid of them, or maybe she just saw the glimmer of longing in my eyes, cause I got a huge stack of them for $10. I read and re-read those comics, imbibing the delicious mythology.

I related most to Spider-man. He was like me: a shy, insecure nerd. But when he put on that red and blue bodysuit with the plump red spider design on the back, he had all the answers. I imagine on weekends he turned that bodysuit inside out and became the faceless neon green man who shows up at every tailgate event. But those weekend escapades never made it into the comic books, just the serious crime-fighting of a man in a leotard: the superhero's business casual.

He was so free, swinging through the city on his homespun strands of web. His acrobatic battles with the likes of Dr. Octopus, The Vulture, and The Green Goblin were epic.  More often than not, it was his mind and not his muscles that saved the day. I got him. And I lived out my wildest superhero dreams through him.

I don't mean to brag, but when I was a kid I could imagine with the best of them. When you're an introvert a top-of-the-line imagination is a must. I've since traded my imagination in for bad puns and big words—and we think kids make bad trades. Bamboozled by linguistic legerdemain again! Holy Adam West!

But every once in awhile, something happens that makes this boy tear off his man suit with all its overseriousness and stuffy alliteration, and don the colorful duds of boyhood again. The Greater Chicago Snowpacolypse© did it to me last year. The movie Cool Runnings does it to me. Hanging out with little kids does it to me. Riding roller coasters does it to me. Being around women does it to me ... hmm ... no wonder I'm single ...

It happened again a couple weeks ago when I saw The Avengers on opening night. As I was picking up the tickets I reserved for my buddies and myself, the Avengers themselves walked through the doors of the theater; or rather, adults dressed up like the Avengers walked through the doors. These weren't cheap cardboard cutout costumes they were wearing, but serious Marvel brand business casual. They had either bought them from some Hollywood overstock prop warehouse or fashioned them in their basements with meticulous care. These people were Comic-Connies, and they perfectly set the mood of childlike whimsy.

The movie itself was sheer bliss; a convergence of sorts: childhood superheroes, meet masterful storyteller. I drank deeply from a vintage draught of fun distilled from the summers of my youth. The characters were compelling and winsome. The good guys were good guys, the bad guys were bad guys. The infighting of the superheroes was hilarious: comically futile battles between indestructible characters. And the electric synnergy of teaming up so many superheroes in one movie will make me feel the lack in future one-hero movies.

The expansive aerial battle scenes captured the thrilling velocity of a roller coaster, yet avoided the incomprehensible messiness of a Transformers battle scene. And throughout, there was an undercurrent of knowing glances and nods to a community that shares the common language of childhood. Several times, I felt myself involuntarily grinning, the boy inside coming to the surface. The Avengers took me back to the world of my childhood; back to a world where heroes always prevail.

Just a Moment

Glass is a liquid. I can't see it, but the pane is sagging under the weight of gravity ever so slightly. In a few hundred years it'll be pudgy at the midsection—if the library surrounding it lasts that long. From my chair, all I see is a transparent wall separating me from Adams Park. I view the world like it's trapped in an aquarium. Or am I in the aquarium? A magazine lies spread on my lap, but for this moment I'm in my head again. I can almost lose myself, eyes focused on what's outside—trees and sidewalks and streets interlocked—as if this moment were all there is. I am just sun-warmth and breath, like a pie cooling on a windowsill.

I've just read in an article from The Atlantic on how lonely we've become: the Facebook generation. But I'm not lonely. I'm just alone. A fish in an aquarium above the street. The room I'm in is a shrine to reading. Some study, some read, some simply stare with an unnerving focus that wipes expression from their faces. I wonder about their stories. Why, like me, have they chosen to cool next to the window overlooking the sidewalk below?

I've put my cellphone away, so time isn't passing. Time flows, but just like with the glass, I can't tell. Not when everything around me moves so slowly.  Not without ticking clocks or anxious thoughts or rushing people. It seems to just stand still—a moment, a photograph, a single frame.

This is where I dwell most comfortably, in this timeless state, so immersed that I'm not even aware I'm immersed. Does a fish know it swims? Like fish, we all float through this vast universe, unaware that gravity is working on us. We can't see the strings. We can't see the gears inside the watch. We can't see the picture flickering at 24 frames per second. But it is.

We can try to pretend that this world spins more slowly than our minds, but it just keeps spinning. While we try to vivisect it, it keeps going. While we hold up a magnifying glass, it moves beneath us. While I try to explain what's happening, it is. We must learn to live in the moment. It's all we have. We do all of our living and learning and loving and losing in the moment. Memories are the archival footage you can't change and the future is a London fog.

How many hours have I spent robbing the present so I could pay for a glance forwards or backwards? We carry the past with us, there's no need to backtrack. And trying to gaze into the future only makes us dizzy with all of the unactualized possibilities. Dwelling in the present is an act of faith. It requires letting go—of the impulse to hang onto the past as well as the need to control the future. It's simply living in the moment and trusting that God will not waste your past experiences, that he will reward your faithfulness in the present, and that he is orchestrating your future for the best. For this moment, that's enough.