Aging Superhero
Photo By: Kevin Friedly
There he sat. An aging superhero. In my own garage office. I never pictures superheroes getting old. I guess I never wondered where superheroes went when they got old. Now I knew...it was my garage.Superman had showed up on my doorstep 3 months ago. I barely recognized him. The famous "S" on his shirt had faded and lost its top hook so it looked like a modifed "J." His muscles had atrophied from years of lack of use and hung ugly like the folds on a hippo. Faster than a speeding bulldog. That's what he had been reduced to. Now he sat there strumming one of my guitars, plucking some sad blues tune he had learned from Blind Leamon Jefferson back when he was still Superboy. Somewhere during the chorus of "Candyman" he began to talk in a slow monotone. "I almost gave it all up, this superhero crap. When I met Lemon he taught me to finger-style and I knew that was my real calling," he began. "What? Playing the blues" I replied. "Sure. I was good. I was real good! Lemon loved how hard I could pluck the string. I was a natural," he said. "Well of course you could pluck the strings hard...you're Superman!" I cried. "Was Superman. Was," he retorted. "I suppose you could bend the string and play the Rev. Gary Davis fat G chord real good too," I whined. "Yeh," he said. "It really pissed Lemon off too." I couldn't believe we were sitting here talking about this. Here I had one of the greatest superheroes ever sitting in my office and instead of talking about his great rescues and defeats of the ultimate evil doers, I was listening to him whine about the blues. "I could have recorded with some of the greats. Mississippi John Hurt loved the way I sang too. He said I was smooth. Real smooth." "What made you decide to stick with the superhero gig then?" I asked. "Oh, guilt I guess." he replied. "Every time I took some time off to explore my artistic side, I was interrupted by some jerk getting himself stuck in a grain elevator or some girl getting kidnapped by a one-armed pyscho bent on controlling the world. One time I just ignored the call and people died. I felt like crap for weeks." |
Skip to content.
|
Sitting in my Yard
Trying to think of nothing A moment of peace |
Sections
Personal tools
News
|
|
Important Links |
||||||||||||
