Superhero

I SAW IT on Twitter. Vote! Who’s the best Batman ever? Adam West wasn’t on the list, which made me sad. A mistake, surely.

But then I realised Adam West wasn’t even my best Batman, let alone the best Batman ever.

The best Batman ever is the one in the photo, because this Batman is real. All the other Batmen are fake.

The Batman in the photo is the only Batman who’s ever rescued me when I’ve been in trouble. He’s rescuing me as I write this, as I become the child in the Batman suit again, the child in the photo dad took of me in the place where I grew up.

Jesus held children in such high regard. No human being aside from Jesus will ever be perfect, but Jesus knew that a child is the closest thing; the closest thing before the world takes hold, before the awe, the wonder, the abandon, starts to ebb away. Before grown up happens.

I can still do awe and wonder, but life can be tough, and often I need Photo Batman to jump in and show me a time when awe and wonder was easier because it just poured out of me. It’s how he beats up my baddies. My baddies don’t stand a chance when Photo Batman’s around.

For you, maybe it’s not Batman. For you, maybe it’s a different costume, in a photo of a different you, in a different time and place.

‘Let the children come to me,’ says Jesus in the story. ‘The kingdom of heaven belongs to ones such as these.’

Maybe coming to Jesus is easier when we make ourselves children.

If heaven can be customised, mine is me as Batman, brown balaclava replacing the hood long since gone, playing on a school field in the sun in 1981. Everyone I’ve ever loved and lost is there with me. We’re all of us the same age in my heaven. We won’t get any older. Nan is still beautiful, but now she’s nine. Jesus is there, and he’s Mr Davies, my favourite primary school teacher.

Playtime goes on forever. Batman doesn’t need to save everyone because Mr Davies has already done it.

copyright (c) carterbloke, 2023