Let your warm hands break right through

Tonight, my brother and I saw this movie:


so should you.

Forgetting, for a moment, that I'm a sucker for space travel and Salvation Army wardrobes (Lois got that entire outfit for no more than $3.75, I guarantee that), what I loved most about Superman was the company. And here's where I run into a bit of trouble, because people used to tell me that I only talked about my brother, that they never knew I had a sister, and I feel guilty because that's probably true. Both are equally amazing, equally lovely people; it's just that, for the longest time, Patrick was my fellow rabble-rouser, and Jen was the rabble that got roused. Here's one example: Jenny made the mistake of falling asleep early one evening, and Pat and I proceeded to cover her entire body in a bottle of Elmer's glue. We spoke of it as if it were the perfect crime: she didn't wake up, and we had the strange and sickly satisfaction that comes with peeling things off of people. Years later, she calmly informed us that she had been awake the entire time but hadn't moved--she had just been too timid to object. (Oh, but she has the last laugh: this weekend, Pat and I are going to a classical concert. Jen is camping in her backyard. Go figure.)

I could tell you the million little things I loved about this movie, but the truth is that I'm writing this here for one reason, and one reason only. I know that, when she finally crawls out of the jungle, Jen will be able to picture the following scene more vividly than I can paint it: two gangly kids sit near the back of the theater a little bit apart from everyone else, still smitten with the idea of a world where superheroes save days. One still has an affinity for Nice Guys; whether they finish last or first, she won't care so long as they are on time. The other used to actually wear a jerry curl. Both still find it amusing that Superman flies the way the girl plays video games, jerking the controller to change direction, and that screenwriters create such awful dialogue. "I'd forgotten how warm you are"?! Like that's really the first thing you'd say to the Man of Steel. I think she'll agree with me when I say that I've missed those crazy kids. It's nice to see them back finally and true to form.

I should have been in bed an hour ago. Instead I'm sitting here, writing an open letter on the Internt to my sister in South America, listening to Imogen Heap and Snow Patrol courtesy of my brother. (I'm so behind!) I feel a little bit as though my mother's going to come in this room any minute and tell us all to turn the lights off, that it's time for bed. I get the feeling that if I go to sleep right. now. I will wake up in my own past, in my old house, with a bottle of glue in one hand and a feather in the other, just to see if she was lying about that being awake business.

Good night, kids.

for my brother, who knows how to say things

Lift this wing.
Sweet child, lift this wing.
I've gotta know right now,
love--you gonna lift this wing?

Is this the right place for the right time?
You got your marching orders, your shoes shined?
Come on, sweet devil, come on now!
Come on, lift this wing.

Two long years and seven days
spent living hard and fast, loose
cats on dying knees now with their heads
bent low -- they wanna know,
love -- they wanna know, you gonna lift this wing?

Bah, there's no harm in open windows
when you've got eyes to see; and Me,
Well, I've been walking to you
for miles now and singing,

thinking life is grand when you've been
drinking good times down
with blondes and browns --when God Himself
could call from Heaven and it wouldn't knock you --

down past Orleans and across the sea, yeah,
I've been thinking myself straight into the arms of
the right place and the right time
for you to come on, climb on
down the mountain of your life and

Lift this wing.