My son subscribes to "The Amazing Spider-Man" – it’s something
he is always eager to read – and I often thumb through the issues after he is done with them. In the one that arrived
today (#508, July 2004) a recurring character with exceptional powers dies; after his death, another character speaks of him
as follows:
"Many times … he spoke of being a hero someday. But that day
was always the next day, never this day. He wanted the power to change the world. But he never used it because he was too
busy, and because he did not understand."
"Didn’t understand what?"
"That he had that power long before he ever came here. We think we
cannot change things. We are wrong. We do not lack for power, or influence, or money. All we ever miss is the moment of decision."
This idea is almost a commonplace these days. That we all have the
power to change the world. That we can all be heroes. That if our lives are pointless muddles, it is because we have made
them that way – and we can change them. That we never need anything more than what we have right now in order to do
marvels, so long as we make the right choices – and that we can make the right choices so long as our hearts are pure
and our minds are not distracted with ephemera. That it is all up to us.
But is it true?
It would be really great to know this. If it is false, then the world
is pretty much the way most of us treat it most of the time. We lurch along from one thing to another, and as long as we keep
our heads above water we can figure we’re doing OK. Nobody ever promised us fame and fortune, so we have no right to
grouse if we don’t get them. Plus we can afford not to try too hard, because we probably couldn’t ever get them
anyway … so why bother?
But if it is true – if Spider-Man and hundreds of commencement
speakers across the country all have it right – then we have infinite possibilities in front of us. In a way this prospect
is dazzling, although it leaves us with a Herculean challenge. And on the dark side, this teaching can be pretty depressing
for those of us who aren’t heroes and who will probably never change the world. After all, what this tells us is that
our failure to achieve Greatness is All Our Fault. And that’s a hard thing to hear.
I really don’t know if this idea is true, and I don’t
know how to settle the question. In the interests of completeness, though, I should add that even the comic book doesn’t
claim that being an everyday hero will make your life perfect. On a personal level, Spider-Man has probably the worst luck
of any major cartoon character. For years his interactions with other people – family, friends, associates – were
characterized by one embarrassing mistake after another. We all know that Superman disguises himself as Clark Kent, the world’s
greatest nebbish, so nobody will guess who he really is. But Peter Parker (Spider-Man’s civilian identity) makes Clark
Kent look like James Bond. And on the surface, Peter Parker’s life is one long string of failures, errors, miscalculations,
and disappointments.
Except, of course, that he is also a superhero. And this brings us
back to the question: can all of us really be heroes? And if so, why aren’t we? Maybe the cost is too high for most
of us – since it seems to mean letting the rest of your life slide down the tubes while you are busy being heroic. Or
maybe we just don’t notice those little moments of decision, and we let them slide past us.
Or maybe it’s not really true after all. I still don’t
know the answer to that.
