O Captain, My Captain

The first comic book I remember was an issue of The Avengers in which the frozen body of Steve Rogers, aka Captain America, was found floating in the North Atlantic. It was an epic tale that included the Sub-Mariner, and Cap filling the Hulk sized hole in the Avengers. It was the first Jack Kirby comic I had ever seen, and all those big faces and square fingers really made an impression on me. So much so that I started buying every issue of the "New" Captain America. Superman may have been fighting for "truth, justice, and the American way," but he didn't have "America" in his name. And he didn't have that shield.
The shield: It had been radically redesigned since Cap's origin. When he first appeared, the shield was more of a red, white and blue badge. According to retroactive continuity (as Captain America has existed through many publishers), the original triangular shield was given by Captain America to King T’Chaka (father of T’Challa, the Black Panther) of the fictional isolated African country Wakanda as a pledge that the nation would remain uninvolved in the rest of the war. The original shield still resides in Wakanda as a national treasure. The circular shield, a jumbo-metal Frisbee, was presented to Steve Rogers by President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The shield was created by an American metallurgist named Dr. Myron MacLain, who had been commissioned by the United States government to create an indestructible armor material to aid the war effort. MacLain experimented with vibranium, an alien metal found only in Wakanda that had unique vibration absorption properties. I know this now, but back then I was very keen on the way it made sounds like "spang!" as it bounced off of bad guy's heads.
Captain America was my guy until I hit puberty. Then it just seemed to make more sense to read Spiderman. I still picked up an issue now and then, but Steve Rogers didn't translate as well into the seventies as Peter Parker in bell bottoms. Imagine my surprise, thirty years later, when I find out that Captain America is dead. He was shot several times, according to eyewitness accounts, by a lone sniper. Conspiracy theorists, start your search engines. Marvel's President and Publisher Dan Buckley: "Captain America will continue to be published despite the very real death of Steve Rogers. Over the next few weeks, we will be publishing a number of books that deal with the fall-out of this turn of events in Captain America #25. In May, Captain America #26 is where the aftermath of his death must be faced, beginning with the autopsy of his body. So, yes, Captain America, Steve Rogers, is dead."
As for me, I'm sorry to see him go. I know that in the comics world, nobody's really gone. Even Superman was dead for a few issues back in the 1990's. Still, I can't help but think that this is exactly the time that America needs its Captain. Back in 1969, about the time I started to devote myself to all things Captain America, a movie called "Easy Rider" hit the theaters. The hero, played by Peter Fonda, gets blown off his chopper by rednecks in a pickup. The bike blows apart and the camera pans up to the sky - Captain America is dead by the side of the road. That was thirty-eight years ago. Since then he's teamed up with the Falcon, and even gone in to semi-retirement, only to return as Nomad (with a cape? please!). Others have carried the shield and worn the uniform, but Steve Rogers kept bouncing back. He even led the Anti-Registration faction that stood against the the Registration Acts—the Mutant Registration Act (or MRA) and Superhuman Registration Act (SRA or sometimes SHRA) — controversial legislative bills which, when passed into law, enforce the mandatory registration of superpowered individuals with the government. Steve Rogers was killed as he was surrendering to U.S. Marshals. Now he's gone. For now.

Taking A Leak

The wheels are really coming off now - of course, if the vehicle in question turns out to be a "Scooter", it really doesn't take more than one before it becomes an issue. Still, a guilty verdict in the trial of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby is a clear sign that the end, or something very much like it, is near for the Pinhead regime.
Dennis Collins, a juror on the case, said he was intrigued when defense lawyer Theodore Wells raised the idea the Libby was being made a scapegoat for White House political strategist Karl Rove. "There was a tremendous amount of sympathy for Mister Libby on the jury. It was said a number of times, 'What are we doing with this guy here? Where's Rove? Where are these other guys?'" Collins said. "I'm not saying we didn't think Mister Libby was guilty of the things we found him guilty of. It seemed like he was, as Mister Wells put it, he was the fall guy." And Mister Wells, defender of poor Scooter, suggested the only way he would lose the case was if they allowed their feelings about the Iraq war and the Bush administration to influence their decision. In the end, a jury decided that there was a difference between having a bad memory and lying. And Scooter was on the wrong end of that equation.
Here's something to ponder: Libby could face up to twenty-five years in prison when sentenced June 5, but federal sentencing guidelines will probably prescribe far less, perhaps one to three years. In other words, about two years - just about the same amount of time we have left with Pinhead. The clock continues to tick.

Percentages

What would a reasonable person expect? If you sent out personal invitations to parents a week in advance, left options for them to pick an alternative time and date, and made calls to remind them of their commitment - wouldn't you expect them to show up for a fifteen minute conference with their child's teacher to receive their report card? Perhaps I am being unreasonable, but I growled and grimaced as I made my way up and down the steps from the library to my classroom, trying to gather students and their wayward parents.
Schools are being closed, teachers are being fired, administrators are being shuffled, and no child will be left behind. Now, please understand that I should be grateful for the sixteen of twenty-five parents who did manage to make their appointments. I should be, and I am. The most frustrating part of this equation is that the sixteen students whose parents came for the conferences were those who are already very aware of their child's educational experience. These parents have already made the necessary connection - the one that we are trying to promote by having them in to sit across the table from me and listen to my appraisal of their child's fourth grade skills.
In a couple of instances, I spent almost as much time praising the mothers as I did the kids. I know how difficult it is to get a kid out of bed to school with a full stomach and a ready mind. It all starts at home. I wish I could say that I was such a fantastic teacher that I could stir up enthusiasm for the volume of prisms on any given day, but I know that it helps to have an audience that is there for the same purpose that I am. That's where the missing nine come in: These are the kids who show up late, unprepared, and uninspired. I can work around two out of the three of those on any given day, but every day becomes a battle. Now, in March, I find myself making hard choices. I have to decide how to move the sixteen I have ahead, and let the rest sort themselves out. Many of these kids have already been retained or are receiving some assistance or program that keeps me from being able to hold them back for another tour of fourth grade. I had one mother announce this to me at the beginning of the year - almost as a dare. "You can't hold him back again." Well, I suppose that's true, but in my mind I hear myself say, "But you can."
There is no moral or shiny truth to this one. It's simple percentages and the reality of the surroundings. You get back what you put in, and the sixteen who showed today will get to have the satisfaction of knowing they did what they could for their kid, and so did I.

I Hear Dat...Train

When he was just a few years old, my son would cock his head to the side and gaze off into the distance. He was listening for the sound of a train, far off in the distance. In just about two months, I will be the father of a ten-year old, a ten-year old train fanatic. There was some question, as the years began to pile up, just when he might grow out of this "phase." These days we aren't thinking about it as much as a phase but rather as a series of opportunities.
When I was a kid, there were some trains in the house: My older brother had an O gauge set that was put away before I got officially interested. My younger brother caught the HO gauge bug big time - for a couple of years. Eventually, all the Caven trains fell into disrepair and eventual storage in cardboard boxes. I didn't give them much of a thought. Not until I became the father of a GERF - a Glassy-Eyed Rail Freak.
I suppose I shouldn't have been surprised. My wife grew up learning the names of different engines and lines as her father poured out his obsession on his daughter. I blame DNA - and B&O. My son would spend hours creating freight yards with his Brio trains. This was age three. There were birthday cakes in the shape of trains, trips to the Sacramento Train Museum (more than I can count), and any location that offered a train ride as part of the experience was sought out by devoted parents.
We bought train t-shirts and hats. We own HO, O, Hot Wheel, Brio, Garden, and Lego gauge train sets. Our living room is regularly part of a vast switch yard with locomotives and dozens of cars of all sorts. I have had to do reading on the side to keep up with my son's encyclopedic knowledge of rolling stock. A few weeks back as we drove into the night toward Reno, my son announced that he saw two BR-54s (or something like that) on the tracks up the hill from us. I have no way of knowing if he knew what he was talking about, but I know from experience that it is useless to disagree with him. He knows his stuff.
It has been my great relief that over the past few years, toy trains have returned to vogue. "The Polar Express" and Harry Potter's Hogwarts Express have made it easier to find fuel to feed the beast. When I discovered that Neil Young had purchased a fifth of the Lionel Train Company, I felt a kindred spirit. After a photo shoot with Rolling Stone, Niel said, "I wish I was on the cover of Lionel Trains magazine. My kids would be so impressed if I showed them a copy of that." I know how he feels.

Noble Rot

There's always a lot of math to do when considering history. Last night I was reminded that Monday will be the twenty-fifth anniversary of John Belushi's death. That would have been 1982. I was nineteen. John was thirty-three. As with all those who die young, tragically foolishly and too soon, he will always be a mile marker on the road of life.
In the spring of 1982, I was finishing up my freshman year in college. It wasn't a lot like "Animal House", but the guys on One North in Slocum hall liked to think that we were a pretty rowdy bunch. We had fire extinguisher fights, and jousting with ski poles, and by February the carpet in the hallway no longer absorbed the beer that we spilled on it. We weren't a fraternity, but that was the point: The Deltas were the anti-fraternity. We all imagined ourselves as Bluto, but we were just a bunch of Pintos and Flounders.
The summer before I had gone to Red Rocks amphitheater to see the Blues Brothers. As the band blasted out "Can't Turn You Loose," Jake Blues meandered up to the mike and yelled, "Hello Colorado! I'll bet you guys get high on everything but life!" Jake/John was, no doubt, already a mile high and falling fast.
I paid to see all of his movies - even "Continental Divide". If Belushi could be a romantic lead, maybe I could too. I wasn't suave enough to pull off Steve Martin or Chevy Chase, and I wasn't hairy enough to be Robin Williams, but this guy made it look possible. He growled, he roared, he stomped on the terra and he got the girl.
Then, on the night of March 4, 1982, his luck ran out. I bought the Rolling Stone with his picture on the cover - a black and white shot that makes him look a little tired, and worried. As it turns out, he probably should have been. That issue included Hunter Thompson's farewell to his good friend, he said that John was more fun in twenty minutes than most people were in twenty years. If that math holds up, he would have been thirty million years old when he died. Then maybe I don't feel so bad that he's gone.

Rescue Renaissance

These were names from the past: Billy Blazes, Rocky Canyon, Wendy Waters, Jake Justice, Areil Flyer. They once occupied a large portion of my son's heart and mind, back in the days before Nintendo, and Star Wars. They were the Rescue Heroes. They were the backbone of our toy collection for a good three years. The most important thing, in my wife's mind about the Rescue Heroes was the positive images they projected for my son to play with. They didn't carry weapons (except for that axe) and their mission in life was helping others and teaching them important life lessons: "Being safe is half the battle." The most important thing, in my mind, about the Rescue Heroes was their extra-wide feet. This meant fewer tears of frustration as little hands attempted to recreate intricate scenarios they had seen on television.
The tears of frustration came from the parents. There were dozens of Heroes to collect. If you managed to purchase all the major characters, there were still minor characters as well as animal "helpers" to acquire. But, to have truly exciting adventures, you couldn't do without the myriad of vehicles and command centers. Six months later, the whole collection would be in turmoil because a new version of Billy or Wendy would appear at Toys R Us and a new cycle of purchasing would begin. And every single one of them required some new battery or tiny set of stickers that needed to be inserted or applied by a helpful adult.
Then one day, it was over. He decided to donate his Rescue Heroes to his old preschool. This made him something of a legend there, and it opened up hundreds of cubic feet of storage in our house. This allowed video games and Legos - more "grown up" toys to find their way in. It was fun to see our boy grow up, but sometimes mom and dad missed the old crew. Last week, so did he. After a few minor earth tremors, and a meeting at his school about emergency preparedness, he started pining for his pals. Wednesday, after school, he and his mom went by the preschool and re-borrowed the lot of them for a visit of undetermined length. It's nice to have them back, but to be honest, I'm not sure where the kid's going to sleep tonight.

Laura Says...

Our first lady, Laura Pinhead, had Larry King chat her up this past Monday. She had a lot on her mind. Things like the unveiling of the Red Dress Collection at the Reagan Library in Simi Valley in California. It's not just fashion, it's fashion for a cause: apparently, the red dress has become the symbol that people wear to remind women about heart disease. It just makes me think of Natalie Wood in "West Side Story." Poor, poor Maria.
Larry also wanted to know how Laura felt about the reports that were surfacing about the care of wounded servicemen at Walter Reed hospital. "We've had many of the soldiers who are there recovering from their wounds come here to the White House, as well. And we did not see anything like that, obviously." She is referring to the Washington Post article that brought about the firing of Major General George W. Weightman, the two-star general in charge of Walter Reed Army Medical Center. I suppose we can look forward to the parade honoring his service to the country sometime in the very near future.
Then Larry cut to the heart of the matter: "Has the war - I don't know if it's a good term - worn you down?"
Laura, wife of Pinhead, former elementary school teacher and librarian said, "Well, of course, it's wearing, wearying. There's no doubt about it. And I understand how the American people feel and that they feel like things aren't going like we want them to there."
And now we all breathe a sigh of relief, acknowledging the potential for something resembling compassion within the walls of 1600 Pinnsylvania Avenue. For a moment. Then she went on: "This is their opportunity to seize the moment, to build a really good and stable country. And many parts of Iraq are stable now. But, of course, what we see on television is the one bombing a day that discourages everybody."
How true. Why just the other day the U.S. command said that two U.S. Marines were "discouraged" by fighting in western Anbar province, which includes Fallujah. Four Iraqi civilians were "discouraged" and ten others were "let down" in a mortar attack Thursday in Iskandariyah. Maybe someone should tell them about the Red Dress collection. That should keep them from getting too discouraged, or at least deflect a little of the shrapnel.