Thrilled by Hope

Superman, someone, anyone, save us

Each week, a menu of sorts, around a revolving theme. This week: a new and glorious morn.

If you haven’t yet, please subscribe to Suppertime! I promise to feed you only once a week, and never after midnight.

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Author’s note: I usually put these kind of links at the end of the newsletter, but if you want to learn about my entire life story in the most condensed way possible (which is still two hours long!), then go listen to my oral history of it on The Drop podcast, of which I am usually a co-host, but this time appeared as a guest for a series of Origin Stories that we’re doing.

You should also listen to my boss/co-worker’s episode as well (Thomas, Founder of Believe in the Run), because it’s also fantastic.

Course 1

A Word of Gratitude: Shaken, Not Stirred

I don’t have a lot to say here this week, just that I’m very thankful for the time I’ve been able to spend with friends and family over the holiday season. I do feel like it’s a special time of year, and for some reason, this year felt more alive, more hopeful even.

For my subscribers, all of you have felt like family to me since I started building this almost a year ago, and a couple of you even passed along some gifts this year, for which I thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Thanks to Ali for sending me some packs of 1990 Skybox basketball cards, which was peak card design and a nice nostalgia throwback. I was also able to explain to my son that yes, there is indeed a loose connection between Post Malone and Karl Malone.

Thank you to Matt for sending a nice Christmas card and this biography of Ian Fleming. Starting the Chicago Marathon with the Shoe Gazers and finishing it with you was one of the top highlights of my year in running:

And for that, I am grateful.

Course 2

The Main:

Last week, DC Studios dropped the first trailer for Superman, an upcoming sure-to-be blockbuster film that features the man of steel himself. It’s directed by James Gunn, the man behind the golden goose of Guardians of the Galaxy, which has already created a controversy within the diehard comic community. I do not know why, nor do I care about this at all; personally, my favorite Superman is the one in the 1940s Max Fleischer shorts, a fine throwback to the golden age of animation that I was lucky enough to have on VHS while growing up.

As a (very) casual fan, I found the trailer to be fantastic. There’s heroes versus villains, action galore, Clark Kent and Lois Lane and even his dog Krytpo. All backed by a Top Gun, symphonic ‘80s arena rock guitar solo rendition of the Superman theme. I dare say I even got a little emotional.

I wondered if it would affect my kids in the same way, though I had my doubts. They think Superman is lame and out of shape, which means they’re either fatphobic or blind or stupid or all of the above, so before showing them the trailer, I gave my best “let me tell you kids something” lecture about how without Superman they don’t have Batman or Spiderman or maybe even Pokémon. They didn’t care, of course. They just wanted to watch something on a screen, so let’s get to the point, Dad.

Post lecture, I pulled up YouTube and we watched it together. Afterwards, I asked Rye, my 8-year-old, what his favorite part was, and he said: “The kid with the flag. I liked him because it was like he was praying for Superman to come.”

I’m not going to force you to watch it, so let me explain: In the middle of the trailer, in between all of the special effects and Lex Luthor staredowns and Superman doing super things, there’s a cut to a scene in Boravia, a place I wish was ruled by Borat, but is really just a fictional country on the brink of war. On what appears to be a battlefield or borderline, a mass of fighters and fiery explosions surround a child, alone in the chaos. The boy, who is probably the same age as Rye, is carrying a flagpole cobbled together with wood and duct tape. At the end of the pole is a yellow flag with the Superman insignia, which he hoists– Iwo Jima-style– into the air.

Clutching on to the pole with all his might, the kid closes his eyes and says: “Superman. Superman.” It’s a quiet call, the shortest prayer, hoping for someone to save him.

This too was my favorite scene in the trailer, and I suspect it was the same for many others out there. But why? There was plenty more to be excited about. Why wasn’t it the full-blown action scenes or the showdowns with multiple archnemeses or Superman himself blasting into the stratosphere, something we literally dreamed about as kids?

What makes a fictional kid in a fictional war in a fictional country closing his eyes and saying “Superman” pull something deep from inside of us?

It was the thrill of hope, that a savior would come when all seems lost.

As some of you know, I grew up in the American Christian tradition and have been through the wringer of faith movements within that world, from my pentecostal upbringing via my ex-Catholic dad to non-denominational megachurches to attending a liberal arts college in the Reformed Presbyterian faith. Currently, my faith tradition is “trying to figure out what that is while stripping away all the horrible stuff the American church has done over the past few decades.”

So it’s probably no surprise that a central thread through a large portion of my life has been the story of Jesus Christ, a child of God who came to earth in the form of man, who lived and died and was resurrected so that we all could be saved from the tragedy of this life and move on to a better, eternal one with him and everyone else who believes.

All of that sounds very much like another American tradition, that of a man who came from another planet and landed on Earth as an orphan, adopted by a mother and father in the middle of Nowhere, America. A god disguised as a guy named Clark Kent who worked as a journalist instead of a carpenter, who would eventually become the savior of the world. Omnipotent and omnipresent and a beacon of hope to all. He also had a pet dog named Krypto, and let’s be real– Jesus definitely took in a stray dog or two as a kid roaming the back alleys of Nazareth.

Both stories sound absolutely insane. And I realize there are atheists and agnostics and Jewish and Buddhist readers who are saying: “Yeah, because they are.” Which is a totally fair point, one I can’t really argue.

I’m not trying to debate the merits of the Christian tradition or its flaws or ways in which most faith traditions have been distorted and abused and justified to start wars and take land and inflict equal measures of tragedy to offset any charity. I’m not great at apologetics and there are plenty of people who are much smarter than me at defending or criticizing religion in general.

But at the beginning of all of this, before crusades were fought and televangelists extorted grandmothers living off a monthly Social Security check and pastors pushed presidential candidates from their pulpits, there was a boy in a barn, born on Christmas day. Or so the story goes.

As with most times on earth, it was a tumultuous time. The Roman reign of Herod the Great was bloody and brutal, especially as he became more paranoid and clung to his lessening power. Unrest was brewing and conflict was inevitable as power shifted within the region. In short, it was a time of war, not peace. Things were bleak. But it was also a period that was primed for revolutionary change.

That change, of course– came in the form of Jesus of Nazareth– a regular man who was not so regular, who upended the Roman empire and the entire course of human history over the course of his three decades on earth. He subverted the culture by bringing a message of peace, hope, grace, and love. The least becoming the greatest. Doing good to those who do evil. His teachings broke all the laws of cultural norms and human behavior at that time. At this time, too.

The message he brought– that love conquers all, that forgiveness is necessary even in the face of death, that the peacemakers are blessed– was a thrill of hope in the darkness, a liferaft in a weary world. A spark was lit and its fire has burned through the past 2,000 years of civilization, across all longitudes and latitudes. The ripples of his life’s work rolled further than any other person who has walked this earth, an inarguable fact.

Somewhere along the line, in a grand mix of pagan festivities and Christian faith and secular traditions, Christmas came to be. Within the Christian tradition, the holiday became a time to reflect on the arrival of Christ on earth, and with it, the hope that a savior could save us from the pain that humanity has wrought. As with most things good, it was bastardized and sold off to the highest bidder, so that it eventually became a time to consume egregious amounts of material goods, to boycott brands for the stupidest cultural war bullshit, and embrace Americanism at its worst. So it goes.

Point being– there are plenty of reasons to be cynical about Christmas. I surely have been over the years. I’ve given up on Christmas plenty of times, which isn’t hard to do when you have to wait tables in a ballroom at a Holiday Inn, serving disgruntled Dursley-like families loading up on plate after plate at the all-you-can-eat Christmas brunch buffet. The closest thing I got to celebrating the birth of Chrhist was watching a guy named Chris perform the miracle of five loaves of bread and two plates of fish going straight into a single stomach. Joy to the world. You may be in the same boat, most of you are, and I can’t blame you for it. The commercialization of it all, the hypocrisy writ large. Why put lipstick on a pig when you know it’s just gonna roll around in the mud?

In a way, I wish I could just stay cynical, or nihilistic, or agnostic, or just something to cleanse my hands of it all and not care. It’s a stupid holiday after all– for all we know, Christ was born in September in the middle of a baseball pennant race.

But I do care, and dammit if we don’t need a thrill of hope right now.

While I am an eternal optimist and think that the worst times on earth provide the best times for renewal, I have to admit that there is a tangible weariness in the world. The promise of the machine has turned into a nightmare, technology is outpacing our ability to control it, politics have corrupted our minds, we’re on the brink of world war, and fundamental societal norms are falling apart. For chrissakes, just this week we saw a sleeping woman burned alive on a subway car in the greatest city in America, and people stood around recording it with their fucking cellphones as her skin melted off her body in full view of a passing policeman. Like, that is a thing that actually happened and truly made me wonder if maybe we are in a simulation and the game developers are just going off the rails. Because that can’t be real. But it was.

Community is collapsing, we’re all pedaling through our own boxed-off lived experiences and acting like we have it figured out, ignoring the fact that our moral compass spins whichever way the wind blows. We’ve created our own tailored gods and custom religions for our own little lives and it turns out they all pretty much suck, because, you know– we all kind of suck.

Is there any more case for a savior than now? Couldn’t we use a thrill of hope?

I’m not here to convince you on conversion, nor will I come knocking on your door in a short-sleeve dress shirt and tie. I’m not telling you to incorporate the Christmas tradition into your December calendar. Maybe that’s for you in the same way it is for me and maybe it isn’t.

But I’m weary and tired and the more I try to make sense of it all, the more I can’t. It feels like we’re all just fighting against a current that’s becoming more swift, the whitewater rising above the gunwales of our little rowboat. We don’t have the answer because– whether physically, mentally, or socially– we’re just as broken as the man sleeping on the sidewalk, the recovering addicts in the halfway house, the CEOs dodging taxes, the cartels captains trafficking in misery, the single moms on welfare, the porn-addicted dads and the social-media addled teens and the school shooters in training. At one time, they were us. At this time, we are them.

We don’t need another politician with empty promises, or the next version of AI with glossy presentation decks of the future it has planned for us. I think we’ve all seen how that’s been working out and none of us are better for it.

We need something to believe in, something to thrill us. Whether that’s a superman or savior, I don’t know, but I’m willing to raise the flag and find out.

Because we need a name to call on, someone who can hear us across space and time and give rest to the weary. To break chains and free the prisoner, to lift up the downtrodden. Something to bring a new and glorious morn.

Course 4

Dessert: A Repast of the Past Week

It got pretty cold around these parts, but it is winter, so I guess that makes sense. Can’t tell you how stoked I am that the days are now getting longer the whole way until June.

I randomly got sick on Thursday night with a nausea and some hot and cold and then woke up and threw up and then had a horrible headache in the front of my head. All of this on a day we were hosting a Christmas party at our house. I was feeling much better by dinnertime and a few bold souls still showed up, so it still made for a nice evening.

Saturday night we drove up to Harrisburg for another Christmas party at a friend’s house, former lead guitarist in my band. All nine of his siblings showed up, as well as their spouses and some other friends, so it was a great night of games, drinks, darts, and Spotify playlists.

Sunday morning I was feeling fully recovered and went on a run back in the mountains, which still had a couple inches of snow on the ground. Been awhile since I’ve run in 15F temps, but dialed it in perfectly so it all felt great after the first mile. Thanks to Andy (paid subscriber to Suppertime! Great friend! Awesome person!) for joining me on the 8-mile run.

Lastly, I finally met my run coach (Greg of Treeline Endurance) this week, as he was in town to visit his in-laws for Christmas. It was our first time meeting in person after working together for the last year, so it was nice to share a 6-mile run around the Inner Harbor and to the top of Fed Hill.

I also contribute to The Drop, a weekly email from Believe in the Run, where I round up running news and stories in a generally sarcastic (and sometimes heartfelt) manner. You can subscribe here.

Ingredient List

📖 : “I Will Never Embrace Christmas” by Matt Gross, author of “Trying!” newsletter // For an alternative take on Christmas, read this Jewish atheist perspective, which I absolutely loved.

Of course, here is the trailer to Superman:

Also, here is a nice version of Billie Eilish performing “O Holy Night,” whose lyrics I referenced about a thousand times in this newsletter. (Side note: the commenter who said “Singing this song while dressed like Adam Sandler is crazy work” absolutely took me out.)

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END OF MENU

Thank you for dining with me this evening, I hope the service was acceptable. Tips (whether monetary or recommendations to others) are appreciated, but not expected.

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