The Spectacular Spider-Dad!

Father’s day this year snuck up on me like it does just about every year. Always it’s something different each year but the feeling is always the same, a lack of any feeling, as I hardly knew my father. He passed away in the early Summer of 2007, the day is unspecific as I was given a call days after he died so I never got to know the exact date but I can tell it’s been over 2 years now since that night.

I thought it would be best to honor my father by mentioning his love for comics here. He is the man who you all have to thank for getting me into comics after all.

My first ever comic was Peter Parker, The Spectacular Spider-man #1 as a gift from my father when he was in town that day. When he saw how much I loved it he sent me a huge package full of all kinds of great comics, Hulk, Iron Man, Fantastic Four, Superman, Batman, Thor, Spider-man (of course, his favorite) X-men, Flash, Black Panther, Ghost Rider, all kinds of incredible books that enchanted me as a child.

My father and I never had a good relationship I hate to admit. We barely talked and when we did it was one long awkward “so how’s it going?” as it was like 2 strangers talking really. Though one way we connected was through comics, though his heroes I learned a lot about my father. When discussing Ghost Rider he revealed he always wanted to be a biker. With Spider-man he always wanted to be wild and free. With Hulk he always wanted to be big and strong like that. While it isn’t much, it was enough to find some connection with him.

Nowadays I may not be as big on Marvel or DC as my father, I’ve grown into my own scene mostly at Image Comics with great stuff like Spawn, Invincible and Witchblade (and so much more) each month but I always wondered what if he’d survived, and come down here. Just after his death is when I started really getting into comics, I doubt there is a connection but you never know. I always would have liked to talk to him about the comics I read, see what he thinks of them.

There’s also the question of how would he feel about current events? As a longtime Spider-man fan, would he hate or love One More Day? Would Secret Invasion be cool to him? Would Final Crisis make more sense to him? Would he be upset with Bruce Wayne’s “death”? All of the events of comics that I wonder how he’d feel about that are questions that can never be answered.

When I was still young, we bonded by watching episodes of Batman or Spider-man and renting the Batman movies. We never went to baseball games or rode bikes through the park. We’d sit around and talk about the comics we both loved and that was as close as I ever really got to having a real relationship with my father. Maybe that’s a little sad, but it’s better than nothing.

So this post and this day is in honor of my father, Capricorn. I have much to thank him for, even when we did not talk much, he still had little life lessons like responsibility even if they where few. He was still a good father in the end and I am glad I got to know him as much as I did, even if I wished I could have known him more.

So happy father’s day, Dad.