I have always depended on the kindness of strangers

Yesterday, Kate and I flew from Tucson to Chicago after a wonderful reunion with her family.  While we were at the Tucson airport waiting for our 3:20 flight, the folks at the gate came over the intercom to let us know that the plane would be a little late getting in from LA, but not to worry - that wouldn’t affect us much.  

 It turned out that the plane had some mechanical problems with the flaps, but not to worry - the mechanics would get it sorted out and we would be on our way quickly.  Well, the mechanics had some trouble figuring it out, but not to worry - they’ll get it together and you’ll be out of here in no time.  After a few of that kind of announcement, they came clean.  They had no idea what was wrong with the plane, and they weren’t going to get it fixed any time soon.  The soonest they could get us out was 9:30 or 10: PM, when another plane would arrive that they would use for us.

 For the average traveler, this would be pretty darn annoying.  Missed connections and long nights make everybody grumpy.  For us, the news was devastating.  We were counting on being on the plane and in the air by 3:30 or 4 so Hakon could take a nap.  We were counting on arriving in Chicago by 9:30 so we could get him to the hotel, get him in bed, and get some sleep before driving back to Iowa City today.  We were counting on the whole ordeal only taking a few hours, and we had checked all our diapers except a few for the plane.

 This was not going to be a pleasant afternoon.

 I walked around while Hakon toddled and ran and giggled at everything he saw.  That was pretty pleasant, but I saw around 4 that he was getting really tired and would need to sleep.  After a failed nap (we tried just holding him in the darkest, quietest corner we could find, but it was neither dark nor particularly quiet, so he didn’t sleep at all), Kate and I were already pretty frazzled with hours to go before the plane even took off.

 A sweet, matronly woman named Colleen saw us and asked if she could hold Hakon.  We let her take him, and she talked and played with him while Kate sat down and I just stood there, holding the bags, too tired to realize that I could also sit.  Eventually I sat, and Colleen walked off with our boy.  She came back periodically to check in on us, but mostly she just took care of him for the better part of an hour while her husband Doug waited in line to talk to a representative about rerouting their travel.

 A woman working at a coffee shop next to our terminal talked to us about how much she loved Hakon, and offered to steam us some milk if he needed warm milk to go to sleep.  

 Eventually, the diaper situation got dire.  We were on our last diaper and had hours to go.  I assumed that for security reasons (or at least “security” reasons) they wouldn’t let us get to our checked bags, but I had to try.  I talked to Jeffrey working at the gate, and he immediately said he would help me out.  He radioed one of the baggage handlers and said there was an emergency, and to pull our checked bag immediately.  He winked at me and said “I’ve got little ones, too.  I know how it is.”  

 Two little kids, maybe 5 and 6 years old, chased Hakon around the terminal playing peek-a-boo.  Max, the older one, just wanted to hug and hug my little boy til his Mom eventually had to tell him to cut it out.  They both offered their travel stuffed animals for him to play with.

 While we waited, Kate received kind and encouraging words from several people, rather than the annoyed looks we expected from people who had to put up with our poor, tired boy screaming.

 Eventually, we did get on the plane and the flight went very well.  We arrived in Chicago a little before 4, and Kate and I walked very slowly down to the baggage claim, running on fumes.  When the shuttle got there to take us to our hotel, Kate told the driver, “yours is the most beautiful face I have ever seen.”  We got to the hotel, and they were great to us.  When checking us in, without asking us, the guy said “I’ll extend your checkout til 2, don’t bother setting an alarm.  I can’t extend it further myself, but I’ll leave a note here for my manager.  I bet she’ll extend it if you guys need.”  We walked up to the room (the shuttle driver carried our bags up for us) and found a crib already set up.

 Hakon slept (so we slept) till almost 10 this morning.  It is the latest I’ve slept in years, and it was amazing.  Kate went down to the front desk to ask if there was a bagel or something left over from the continental breakfast she could have.  The manager disappeared into the back room and came out with sausage and egg breakfast sandwiches, juice, and yogurt.

I am so glad for the kindness of strangers.  This experience started because of a problem that was out of our control: the airplane was just broken.  Nothing to be done there.  It could have been so much worse if people hadn’t been so dang nice.  But people went out of their way to help a fellow traveler.  Someone who they would never see again, someone who could not possibly pay them back.  I wish I knew where these people lived so that I could send them all thank you notes, but I can’t.  So, strangers, thank you.  

Review: Dark Victory

It's been a busy couple months at the Payne home, but I haven't forgot you, dear reader.

It seems that my love of Batman is well known and understood by my family.  A couple weeks ago, we celebrated Christmas in Texas with my parents, John and JaNae, and Dan and Christina.  Dan and Christina gave me and Kate a special edition of Arkham Asylum, a famous Batman comic book.  When Kate saw it, she giggled, presumably because receiving a comic book as an adult is funny (and awesome).  A few minutes later, I opened a present from Kate: a different special edition of Arkham Asylum.

It's nice to have a thing.

And speaking of that thing, I thought I would get back into the groove of blogging by reviewing another Batman book: Dark Victory.

Dark Victory is another collaboration between Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale.  It follows directly after the events of The Long Halloween, which I reviewed a couple months back (Warning: Long Halloween spoilers ahead).  I'll start with the art.

he art is really fun.  There are, of course, lots of good "Batman is totally bad" pictures.

 There's lots of fun shots of the bad guys:

 Lots of the big blocks of color and shadow that I liked so much in Sale's other books.

 The art includes lots of empty space, often representing the empty lives of people in the pictures.

The last thing I'll point out about the art is how in several places, the main character is very small in the room.  Batman is seen as a tiny smudge in the corner of a courtroom, or Catwoman is barely visible in the shadows of the morgue.

All in all, I love the art, but it is very similar to Tim Sale's other work that I've already talked about, so there's not much to say there.

Dark Victory takes lots of the events and themes of Long Halloween and makes them take the next logical step.  For example, after Harvey Dent's betrayal at the end of Long Halloween, Bruce and Jim Gordon are left feeling lonely and suspicious.  Bruce sums it up nicely:

“I realize now that the burden of ridding Gotham CIty of the evil that took my parents’ lives… must be mine and mine alone”

This feeling of loneliness and isolation gives Jeph and Tim license to revisit the deaths of Thomas and Martha Wayne and explore Bruce's deep feelings of abandonment.  There is some beautiful, dream-like black and white art in the flashbacks.

Jim Gordon's obsession with catching the Holiday Killer during Long Halloween led him to neglect his family, and as a result, Dark Victory shows him alone after his wife left.  It is hard not to make this entire post about how heartbreaking Jim's story is.

He looks tired and beaten.

He looks alone

And that's what the title means, at least to me.  In Long Halloween, the good guys won, but in Dark Victory, we explore the costs of that victory.

We see those costs in very overt ways, like Jim losing his family, but also in some more subtle ways.  There are, for instance, callbacks to the iconic rooftop scene from Long Halloween where Harvey, Gordon, and Batman meet to discuss the killer, but this time, Harvey is conspicuously absent from the image.

The theme of "trusting is hard" is a good backdrop to both introduce new characters, and flesh out some old ones.  Alfred has a larger role, and is much more fun.

 Selina Kyle is back, and her relationship with Bruce continues to be complex.

And we get the introduction of Robin.  Robin is a tricky character, because he is, at his core, an annoying kid.  But, given the story, Robin fits nicely.  He allows us to explore more of Bruce's trust issues after being betrayed by one of his only friends.  He also parallels Bruce's own story, which allows for some nice symmetry.  We see Bruce's parents die:

And we see Dick's parents die:

We see Alfred raising Bruce:

And we see Alfred raising Dick:

It's really good.

This is getting long, but I really liked this book.  I would definitely recommend it, with the one caveat that you should read Long Halloween first to get the full impact.