It's Spiderman!

I was just watching an interview with a director of a recent comic book, superhero movie, where the two people were discussing how everyone is into superheroes. Everyone wants to be a superhero at some point in their life.

It reminded me of a little boy I passed by the other night. I was riding my bike with two of my friends to another friend's house, a sporadic trip on a Thursday night. We made it the mile or so to his neighborhood and we were leisurely gliding down his street to his home when out of the shadows of the night appeared Spiderman!

What danger and adventure lurked in our friend's neighborhood, we knew not, but we understood that something exciting and scary must be afoot. Spiderman's brooding, emotion-sticken alter ego always made me a little hesitant about him as a superhero, so my surprise at seeing him around contained more than a hint of nervousness.

The idea of seeing a superhero sounds really good, until you recognize that you only see superheroes when villains are near.

I cried, "Oh my, it's Spiderman!" My two friends gasped and squealed as well - being boys, they were totally starstruck.

He was staring at us, his eyes bearing down on us, either as a warning to flee before danger struck, or to decide if we were part of the danger. I wasn't sure which.

He ran a little ways with us, as we gawked sideways at him, unsure if we should wave or flee.

Suddenly, he stopped. He grasped at his mask, pulled it above his eyes, and shouted, "I'm not Spiderman - I'm just a kid!"

We'd been duped. My curiosity at his shortness had previously been quelled by remembering that Spiderman was short (that was really why he was one of my lesser favorite superheroes, my memory recalled). But it turns out, the mysterious webslinger was just a young boy, roughly 6 years years of age.

Or so he made us believe.

What a 6 year old boy in full Spiderman garb was doing wandering alone around his front yard at 9:30 at night was beyond me. But we expressed our relief at the real Spiderman's non-appearance with sighs and a "thank goodness" breathed through our lips as we pedalled on. Just in case we hadn't heard him, he hollered to our disappearing backs, "I'M A KID!!" My friend made sure our relief was heard by him this time as well, as he yelled, "OH GOOD, THANKS FOR TELLING US!" Then we biked off, leaving Spiderman to do his work alone, pretending to believe his cover story while he dropped some mean "BAM" and "KA-POW" action on the bad guys behind us.

Apparently the kid was not at a point in his life where he actually wanted to be a superhero. Rather than trying to make us believe he actually was Spiderman, he wanted to make sure we knew he was actually a kid. Which maybe means he really is a superhero - aren't superheroes always trying to convince the people around them they are merely ordinary people? While my nephew is constantly trying to sell me on the fact that he's really Batman, the resident Batman of Centerville City is constantly trying to sell me on the fact that he's just a normal billionaire.

Well, I'll tell you what, I'm watching out for that kid everywhere I go now, just in case...