Wednesday 28 July 2010

Self-Portrait 2: Clark Kent is Superman!?!

Glasses are a brilliant disguise. Why do you think Bono wears his all the time? Even when he's indoors? It's so that people won't recognise him. Brilliant disguise. Clark Kent heroically hid in plain-view in front of Lois Lane at the Daily Planet for years with only his bi-focals to protect his identity.

Superman was the first 'superhero' in comics. All your arguments about The Phantom being the first are very interesting, but you're still wrong. "Batman's cooler" I hear you say, "Superman's lame, he's too powerful so he's never at risk, he's a do-gooder, kryptonite sucks, he's boring, Batman's better 'coz he's really dark..."

On and on you go, bemoaning Superman as the lamest thing since sliced lame, all the while forgetting one thing. Clark Kent makes Superman look like the freaking Fonz. Superman could leap tall buildings, stop speeding trains, he even made it cool to wear your underwear over your tights; Clark Kent got out of lifts on the wrong floor and spilled coffee over his mortgage application forms.



Today's self-portrait is me without glasses. I have removed the cunning disguise in order to reveal my heroic true self. Or something. I wore glasses when I was at school because I was having difficulty seeing the very important information about the poetry of Sheamus Heaney (something to do with cats?) written on the board just two meters away.

A visit to an opticians and the subsequent addition of lens to face paid off well and the B/B in GCSE English Language/Literature more than made up for the several years of playground punishment. After I left school I vainly stopped wearing my glasses for a couple of years. Years which I usefully spent falling over, ignoring close friends on the other side of the road and hailing a huge number of buses that weren't going anywhere near my intended destination. This may however be a natural state of being for an eighteen-year old boy.

Now I'm an adult and people aren't allowed to make fun of me anymore (this is definitely a true and real thing that is a law and everything) and I've finally come to terms with wearing glasses again. Now I get lost in Sainsburys on far fewer occasions, I can read the subtitles on Aldmovar films and I'm able to identify acquaintances without being over-reliant on my sense of smell or taste. Anyone dares call me four-eyes, I'll burn them with my FRICKIN' LASER-HEAT-VISION!

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