I’m Holding out for a Hero…..

“Where have all the good men gone

And where are all the Gods?

Where is the street-wise Hercules to fight the rising odds?”

Well this week-end a whole lot of them are in Downtown Phoenix filling up the convention center and spilling out into the Hyatt and Rennaissance hotels, as well as littering the streets with costumes ranging from Spielberg set-ready Mandalorian Mercenaries to not even wearable in schloch sea monsters with a lot of Goth, Steampunk, anime and even Disney princesses dotting the scene.

Inside at long rows of piled and pillage-worthy tables media heroes will sign autographs and get pictures taken with you.  Amazing and well known authors like Peter S. Beagle, James A. Owen, and Michael Stackpole (who still doesn’t recognize me, LOL, but I am over it, my ego at least is healthier, and he certainly seems friendly and less full of himself as well, and he has some talent) meet, greet and autograph for fans wonderful novels on real paper. Artists and costume designers and movie weapons handlers and other names found in press packets and magazines and online blogs sign every imaginable kind of geektastic souvenir. All these people that make the magic of imagination happen for me and hundrerds of others are my heroes. They made my life bearable when reality was tough, and added the frosting when my life was a piece of cake.

And well, there are so many comics and characters walking around and available in purchasable formats there I could go broke just buying a smidgen of the cheapest things.

But my real heroes at this convention are the “invisibles” there. The young men and women, or sometimes not so young, who have ventured to their first event ; the ones who come year after year just to listen and learn and dream of the day they will be signing autographs;  and especially the handlers and table setters and all those with Tardis badges who actually make the event happen. You are all my heroes. Although both are needed to make sense of that old timey wimey, I have always been more fascinated with the cogs inside than the hands on the clock.

After about 7 hours at the opening I was exhausted, but I really I sort of wish I could be there again today. Still, I have a different kind of hero to serve today so I will go don my nursing scrubs and go be Robin to the Mom’s Batman, truly wish there was a female superhero/sidekick relationship I could use for this metaphor….hmmm. Maybe someone needs to write one, or maybe its already out there, in the aisles of Phoenix Comicon waiting for me to discover it on Sunday.

If you aren’t doing anything yet this week-end, go buy a day pass and bring some cash. Buy a couple comics, go to the Hyatt and try some new games, get your picture taken with the Mandalorian Mercs or R2D2.

But whatever you do this week-end, be a hero.

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