Read Online Five Quarts: A Personal and Natural History of Blood by Bill Hayes - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Bill Hayes
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victims of freakish science experiments gone wrong or of sudden exposure to mysterious biohazards; they were born that way—they had a genetic quirk in their DNA, an X-factor. Their powers, though, often didn’t manifest until their teen years. You woke up one morning to find your body was starting to change. The intended parallel was to puberty, but to any readers who saw in themselves something shameful, the X-Men struck a deeper chord. Although they were heroes doing good, the mutant X-Men were grossly misunderstood, despised by society at large, hunted down by the government. Where Superman was lauded in the bright light of day, the X-Men had to stick to the shadows.
With its monthly tales of prejudice and perseverance, the comic book slowly instilled in Steve a resolve that would make his coming out far less torturous than mine. Not being an only son or raised a devout Catholic also helped ease his way. It seemed perfectly normal to him to keep secret his “identity” while at the same time accepting it as a natural part of himself. Just as mutations occurred in nature, so did homosexuality. He also knew a time and a place would come when he could safely expose this aspect of himself. High school was just not it. He never doubted that a real-world correlate to the X-Men existed, a group somewhere who’d accept him.
I read the occasional comic book as a kid, yet they were never a constant in my life. While I could’ve named the major superheroes, my taste ran more to
Richie Rich
and
Archie’s Pals & Gals.
Now, viewing superhero comics through Steve’s eyes, I see not only how much they’ve evolved but also how, with their godlike heroes and grand-scale drama, they are like the ancient Greek tales I’ve always loved. Superhero comics are the medium of modern myths.
Their unique dynamism, I’ve learned, hinges on a device that’s crucial to this art form: the blank space between panels—the gutter, it’s called. Much happens in these narrow strips of nothing. There, your mind takes two scenes and bridges them, filling in the elements that are not drawn or lettered. A fist is thrown in one panel; the villain careens backward in the next; but you envision the wallop. The moment of impact and the crunch of cartilage are your creations, as is the breadth of emotion. An eerie calm can stretch as long as you decide. This involvement turns you from a mere reader of the comic book into a collaborator, a member of the creative team that makes the story work.
Time passes at a slower rate in a comic-book universe than in our own. While it’s been almost thirty years since Steve picked up his first superhero comic, in Marvel Time, as it’s called, only a few years have gone by. So when Steve reads the latest issue of
Uncanny X-Men
, say, he meets up with old friends who’ve hardly aged since he was a kid. Up till now I’d thought this was the whole appeal, a sweet nostalgia trip for a forty-year-old man battling AIDS, a well-deserved escape from his reality. But it’s clearly more. There’s a powerful draw in a stack of comics. In their pages, overwhelming odds are overcome. Good guys win. Death is not always final. And the question
What comes next?
is never frightening. It’s exciting.
The only time he reads comic books, I notice, is at bedtime. It’s shortly after he’s taken his handful of nighttime meds. His stomach roils, sorting out the pills, sending them out through his blood. His feet, pinging like sonar from the pain of his neuropathy, kick at the sheets. His fingers are almost too numb to turn the thin paper. Though the sedating effect of the drugs sets in, he fights to stay awake, to read another page, then another, just one more. I give up before he does and turn out my reading light. Before drifting off, I look over. Steve’s smiling. He’s lost to another world, fighting the good fight in the space between panels.
F OUR
Blood Sister
WHEN I WAS A LITTLE KID GROWING UP IN 1960s Spokane, I
With its monthly tales of prejudice and perseverance, the comic book slowly instilled in Steve a resolve that would make his coming out far less torturous than mine. Not being an only son or raised a devout Catholic also helped ease his way. It seemed perfectly normal to him to keep secret his “identity” while at the same time accepting it as a natural part of himself. Just as mutations occurred in nature, so did homosexuality. He also knew a time and a place would come when he could safely expose this aspect of himself. High school was just not it. He never doubted that a real-world correlate to the X-Men existed, a group somewhere who’d accept him.
I read the occasional comic book as a kid, yet they were never a constant in my life. While I could’ve named the major superheroes, my taste ran more to
Richie Rich
and
Archie’s Pals & Gals.
Now, viewing superhero comics through Steve’s eyes, I see not only how much they’ve evolved but also how, with their godlike heroes and grand-scale drama, they are like the ancient Greek tales I’ve always loved. Superhero comics are the medium of modern myths.
Their unique dynamism, I’ve learned, hinges on a device that’s crucial to this art form: the blank space between panels—the gutter, it’s called. Much happens in these narrow strips of nothing. There, your mind takes two scenes and bridges them, filling in the elements that are not drawn or lettered. A fist is thrown in one panel; the villain careens backward in the next; but you envision the wallop. The moment of impact and the crunch of cartilage are your creations, as is the breadth of emotion. An eerie calm can stretch as long as you decide. This involvement turns you from a mere reader of the comic book into a collaborator, a member of the creative team that makes the story work.
Time passes at a slower rate in a comic-book universe than in our own. While it’s been almost thirty years since Steve picked up his first superhero comic, in Marvel Time, as it’s called, only a few years have gone by. So when Steve reads the latest issue of
Uncanny X-Men
, say, he meets up with old friends who’ve hardly aged since he was a kid. Up till now I’d thought this was the whole appeal, a sweet nostalgia trip for a forty-year-old man battling AIDS, a well-deserved escape from his reality. But it’s clearly more. There’s a powerful draw in a stack of comics. In their pages, overwhelming odds are overcome. Good guys win. Death is not always final. And the question
What comes next?
is never frightening. It’s exciting.
The only time he reads comic books, I notice, is at bedtime. It’s shortly after he’s taken his handful of nighttime meds. His stomach roils, sorting out the pills, sending them out through his blood. His feet, pinging like sonar from the pain of his neuropathy, kick at the sheets. His fingers are almost too numb to turn the thin paper. Though the sedating effect of the drugs sets in, he fights to stay awake, to read another page, then another, just one more. I give up before he does and turn out my reading light. Before drifting off, I look over. Steve’s smiling. He’s lost to another world, fighting the good fight in the space between panels.
F OUR
Blood Sister
WHEN I WAS A LITTLE KID GROWING UP IN 1960s Spokane, I
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