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With 'Spike' on the prowl,
a guy needed invisibility
By LEN KLEMPNAUER
of TheColumnists.com
World War II had
wended about three-quarters of the way through its four-year
run--Japan bombed Pearl Harbor three months after I entered kindergarten--when
I turned into a comic book junkie.
In our household a new comic book was considered a luxury item,
even though it cost only 10 cents. But a spare dime wasn’t
easy to come by then. Everything--sugar, meats, butter, coffee,
gasoline, shoes, tires--seemed to be rationed “For The Duration.”
Kids’ allowances, too! Besides, any extra dime was supposed
to be spent buying a war savings stamp at school, to be licked
and then stuck into a little booklet and, when enough booklets
were filled, to be turned in for a war bond. Those 10-cent war
stamps helped finance the war effort.
Whenever a stray dime did manage to find its way into my pocket,
I diligently stashed it in a cigar box hidden in the deepest,
darkest recesses of the closet in the bedroom I shared with my
younger sister. (For young parents who had scrimped enough to
buy a home as The Depression merged into WWII, the two-bedroom,
one-bath house was de rigueur.)
There my booty lay until the very next Saturday morning when
I would trek the four blocks to our neighborhood drug store in
Kansas City, Mo., to buy the latest edition of Captain Marvel or Plastic Man
or Batman or Blackhawk or my all-time favorite comic book hero, Captain America.
In the fantasy world of an 8-year-old who now could read all
the words as well as enjoy the pictures, I morphed monthly into
Captain America’s teen-aged sidekick, Bucky, and together
we helped Allied troops beat up the Axis. Occasionally I became
the fifth, albeit unofficial, member of the Boy Commandos, a multi-national
clique of Allied-born, orphaned youths fighting for our side.
On paper anyway, the Boy Commandos were tougher than any street
gang today.
The key to becoming a good comic book collector, I learned early
on, was to buy the comics that other guys wanted and then start
trading one of mine for two of theirs. There were 11 boys between
the ages of 6 and 10 just on our block-long street, and every
guy had his favorite. I would sometimes shun the latest edition
of Captain America in favor of, for example, a Captain Marvel.
I then might trade the newest Captain Marvel for a Captain America
and a Boy Commandos.
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"Boy Commandos" comic book, a valuable rarity today. It sold a million copies in 1942. |
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Most comic book heroes boasted some type of superhuman powers. Superman, of course, was the super-est of them all. Except, of course, when that damn kryptonite showed up unexpectedly to render him about as effective as Medicare Plan D. But not one of them, as best as I can recall some six decades later, could make himself invisible.
That’s what I wanted to be: Invisible!
Well, that and being able to fly like Superman and Captain Marvel. Like a lot of kids, I tried the cape bit, but I wasn’t about to try soaring off the top of our house with a bath towel tied around my neck. Perhaps because any structure, man-made or natural, that stood higher than I was tall was too high for me. More likely, however, my still developing brain realized there was an even more dangerous risk inherent in propelling myself off the roof. If my dad ever found out that I had laddered to the roof, he would have wielded the backside of my mother’s hair brush more than a couple of times across my backside.
Consequently, a running jump off our three-foot high back porch was high enough, thank you. But my makeshift cape never seemed to catch any updrafts and I plopped promptly to the ground. Every time.
Flapping my arms like a bird didn’t help either.
Luckily for my brain, I was smart enough not to dive off noggin-first with my arms pointed straight in front of me in an attempt to mimic Clark Kent’s alter ego.
I had another, more compelling reason for wanting to become invisible on demand. Blame it on Spike (not his real nickname), who lived a few houses down the street. He had chosen me as his private punching bag after our parents got into some kind of squabble. Whatever it was about, the rest of the parents in the neighborhood had sided with my folks. Spike, consequently, decided he must beat me up every day after school to uphold his family’s honor.
Although we were both the same age, I was as skinny as a #2 pencil while Spike was as squat as a fireplug. We both were in the same grade but in different classrooms. If my room got out first, there was no sweat because I had too big of a head start on him in the race home, and fireplugs don’t move too swiftly anyway. I wasn’t noted for my speed either, but fear can be a great motivator.
No, the sweat came if his class got out first. Spike would lurk behind some bushes or tree on the way home so he could bushwhack me. He wasn’t so slow in his thinking that he would start anything in the schoolyard and risk being caught by a teacher and face detention.
It only took a couple of ambushes for me to figure out his tactics, and from that point forward, I varied my route home. Our little cat-and-mouse game didn’t last more than a month, I’d guess, but a month is like a year when you’re 8. We never became friends again, i.e., we never traded comic books with each other after that. The next year my family migrated to California. I never saw Spike again.
When we left Kansas City after the war, I had amassed the largest collection of comic books in the neighborhood. Not because I bought more but because I was a better “two-fer” trader. Sadly, I had to leave all my “worthless” comic books behind.
If only we had known . . .
I scattered them among the other boys on the block. Spike, by the way, didn’t get any.
I had forgotten about my desire to become invisible until a year ago when my cardiologist ordered me off the couch and onto my feet in my leisure time. I took up walking, joining my wife, who had been pounding the pavement routinely for a few years.
As we began walking side by side along the narrow sidewalks in the beach area of hometown Capitola, Calif., no one seemed to notice us. Hell, no one even seemed to see us. When approaching two or more people walking side by side toward us, we are almost always the ones who fall into single file or who step off the curb to avoid bumping into the oncoming strollers. I say almost always because those over the age of 55 usually observe the same protocol as my wife and I. But those under 55? We surely must be invisible to them, for I stand 6-1 and weigh 215.
(I’m talking adults here, not teenagers. Teenagers only have eyes for each other.)
Common courtesy, according to the way my generation was brought up, dictated that the young make way for anyone who is older--without qualification. Therefore, the only reason those so much younger than us aren’t observing the dictates of society must be that I finally achieved my childhood dream of becoming invisible.
I have virtually the same effect on vehicles, particularly when I’m walking alone. I’ll step off the curb into a crosswalk and invariably two or three cars that had plenty of time to stop will fly past me before the third or fourth decides to stop. In such incidents, however, I don’t believe I’m completely invisible. Frequently a drive-by motorist will glance my way with a weird look on his face, as if he had seen an apparition. Age or sex makes no difference. Young, middle-aged or elderly, male or female--they all just keep on truckin’.
If I hadn’t made way for someone older than me during my childhood, regardless of how much older, or given up my seat on a streetcar or bus, my dad would have wielded that ol’ hair brush more wickedly on my haunches than my grandma thrashed the dust out of a throw-rug hanging across the clothes line.
As for Spike . . . I posted a note on the message board of his high school at one of the many Internet alumni web sites and learned from one of his classmates that he, too, had left Kansas City years ago and had moved to, of all places, California--just a little more than an hour’s drive away from me. I can’t help but wonder whether we have ever unknowingly come across each other.
Maybe, just maybe, he is one of those senior citizens who had made room for me as he and his wife passed by us on the sidewalks of Capitola.
After all, we were both were members of the Gracious Generation.
©2006 by Len Klempnauer. The top illustration is from IMSI's Master Clips Collection, 1895 Francisco Blvd. E., San Rafael, CA, 94901-5506, USA. The cover of "Boy Commandos" #1 is courtesy of DC Comics. This column first posted March 6, 2006.
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