My Spider-Senses
When I left home this week to go see Odyssey, I thought Iād left early after factoring in traffic. It didnāt turn out the way I expected. Since I missed that showing, I watched the only movie playing in the next available time slot: Spider-Man: Brand New Day. That day, I hadnāt even considered watching a Spider-Man movie or writing a blog post about it on Tumblr. While watching the movie, my traumas were triggered, and I intensely relived my past emotions. Here I am now. I couldnāt have written this in with my name or anywhere else, and Iām not rich enough to tell a psychologist about it either. As fate weaves its web, writing on the Tumblr blog I created a few weeks ago... Itās as if this was meant to be, and now that letter must be written, read, and burned. Bad news for those whoāve been using the internet for a few years: this is a real blog post, just like the ones we used to write 10 years ago, as I remember them. Long, maybe boring, no, just little big emotional. A real blog post. Dinosaurs are still alive on your internet. From a child who had everything to a man who has nothing...
I went through a period that Iāll come to see as the death of my ego. Iām still alive. This sentence isnāt arrogance, on the contrary, itās a lament. Because I created a cause Iād give my life for, and even though I lost it, I couldnāt die. Sometimes, even when all the conditions are right, person canāt die. Living with this, howeverā¦ Even if I wasnāt at the very peak just before my ego died, I was on a shadowless hilltop, and I was so focused on climbing that I kept moving forward without stopping, without setting checkpoints, and without looking back. Like Icarus, I didnāt feel my wings burning as I soared higher. That was the sense of ease my team and my lover had instilled in me over these five years, during which I lived this way and trusted them completely. Every morning weād wake up to a new battle, and every night weād feast. The clinking of our glasses was so loud that Iād win new battles that very night, before dawn even broke. It was an indescribable and uncontrollable power. This story was about a captain, a child, and love...
How can someone who doesnāt know how to lose ever lose?
The first time your ego is shaken, crashing into that massive rock, becoming a man with nothing left, is the most dangerous yet also the most honest moment. Because now you have no title to hide behind, no sense of belonging to a crowd. While everyone celebrates their victories, no one talks about what theyāve lost in the process. Iām balanced now; whether I like it or not, I have my routines and a new identityā¦ Thereās no one left around me who knew the old me. No one knows what I was doing three years ago. Iām starting to forget myself, too. It all feels like a fairy tale Iām listening to. The Captainās adventuresā¦ If Iām no longer that person, can I still continue to be that person from the past? My life has been reset. My position, my title, my workplace, my pursuits, and my hobbies theyāre all legacies of the past, but theyāre not a continuation of that path.
Is this what dying feels like? Then what does it mean to rise from the ashes? Is this my life? Can I get my old life, my title, everything back? If I started over and everything stayed the same, would that be the same as before? Or would it be a new reality? If I sewed my costume back together, could I be that captain again?
Whose captain will I be? Of which ship?
I have my own Frank Castle. I trust him because heās the only solid anchor in this game, an old colleague, a sharp mind. But our methods are completely opposite. He relies on brute force, rationality, and ruthless clarity; I, on the other hand, still carry the traces of that past, the weight of that nostalgia and emotional baggage. He doesnāt understand me, because he knows itās illogical to linger among the wreckage. He doesnāt pity me, because he sees that pity would swallow me whole. He stands over me, gazing at the ashes of my old ship, telling me, āStop crying and build the new infrastructure.ā Thatās why weāre a one-man team; he canāt stand my sentimental tragedy.
After losing everything, I took refuge in a Sheila Rivera. To escape facing my own problems, I sought solutions to her troubles; while bandaging her wounds, I thought Iād actually forgotten my own wreckage. But as I solved her problems, I was forced to confront my own realities. She was my first connection to the outside world, my first link to my new life. Just as I was trying to get used to that routine, she turned her back on her own life and on me. The place where I wanted to heal myself became a new breaking point. I fit in there, but I didnāt belong.
Iām in a place I donāt want to be, maybe Iām at ground zero, or maybe Iām just standing in front of a mirror. The most complex, most dangerous variable in the equation. I didnāt choose her from among the possibilities. She just happened to cross my path, little Jean Grey whoās hard to control, with no telling when sheāll explode. Iām not an expert on this or responsible for it, but in her, I see myself before I even became a captain that floundering version of me. Maybe I stayed by her side simply because no one else was there with me in that darkness. I donāt know. I donāt want to be with anyone anymore. But is this about forming a bond, like it says in the cookie fortune? Maybe Iām actually stirring up a wind that stirs my own ashes, because it makes me feel like Iām reconnecting with my shattered ego. Will I be able to resist that wind, like a rising kite?
Ned and MJ? Theyāre me horcruxes Iāve lost. When they left, I didnāt disappear. Was I the one left behind?
