I've been complaining a lot lately. Not because I can't handle what I need to do, but because I want people to notice how hard I am working, and I want to connect with people.

But I've decided to give it up. Like some kind of mental diet, a fasting of sorts. Because here's what I've noticed--nobody cares much how hard another person works. Nobody even can understand. They can't sit in your skin and feel the frustrations or difficulties, and telling them doesn't get anybody anywhere.

My boss' son, one of the more creative children to fall onto the planet, needed the difference explained to him between sympathy and empathy the other day, and she told him that there were some things about which she could have sympathy for him--like being bullied--but that she would never know empathy for him because she had never experienced it.

That's what is interesting about being a reporter. You can complain, and people may have sympathy, (which I don't really want, because I don't want a pity party,) but very few know what it's like. And I've noticed that those who do know what it's like don't want to hear you complain because it's so damn unproductive. Excuse my language. That's because the act of dealing with what is difficult every day gives you that hardness after awhile, makes you insensitive to other people's difficulties while you try to focus on your own. The upside is that the focus gives you the ability to do what is necessary, (sometimes not an iota more,) to make it through the day.

I don't know what I'm saying except that for thirty days, I'm going to attempt to stop complaining and focus all my energy on completing things. Completing and complaining are opposites for the moment.

My superhero uniform

Ironman is my favorite movie, (although I haven't seen the second,) and it's not because I'm a crazy comic book fan. My favorite movies are all hero movies.

I remember the 1989 Michael Keaton/Tim Burton version of Batman that I watched and rewatched on an old tape that my stepdad, Daddy Ken, had taped for us, bookmarked between Stephen Seagull's Hard to Kill and a movie called St. Elmo's Fire. This was back when people taped things on VHS off the TV, and you still had commercials in them.

It was my favorite movie because Batman looked at a very frightening world and dealt with the extremes of human horror by becoming an angel that worked in the dark. But he wasn't anything more than human. He wasn't bit by a spider. He, like Ironman, used his ingenuity and resources to do something good in the world, and instead of taking credit for the work, he became a stand in for every person, and for me.

What I love is that Ironman has that big, glowing heart in the center of his chest, and he has to learn how to power his heart all by himself. We don't live in a world that makes it easy to be heartful, and Ironman's heart makes him vulnerable, just like caring deeply about the world can make a person feel vulnerable, and to continue caring, we have to find our own source of power to work from. We have to power our own hearts against apathy.

I like that he stands against the modern issue of terrorism. And I like that he makes me feel patriotic in a post-1950s world that has moved us to cynicism, jaded outlooks and great divides due to politics.

I want to be a hero. As I look for my source of power, I look to my skills, and I look to the superheroes who have shaped my understanding of how to fight evil.

Which brings me to my plan for heroic actions.
1) Saving lives. It's time to learn CPR and First Aid. Eventually a time will come when I will be in the right place at the right time to help someone, and I may only get one chance. We can never know when our chance will come to step out and be extraordinary, if it ever comes at all. But it won't come if the knowledge isn't there. Not long ago, one of my co-workers was having a serious health problem in my presence. If something more serious had happened, I may have missed a chance to save a life, and I would have carried that helpless feeling with me. So CPR and First Aid are first on my list.

2) Fighting crime. I really believe that every time we help people in desperate situations that we help keep them from resorting to desperate actions. Yes, I suppose there is such a thing as a moral disregard/degradation, but I think a lot happens before a person gets to that point. My version of fighting crime will be to care about the people who are at risk for becoming criminals--people who feel like no one cares about them. Examples how to do this would be to join the Big Brother, Big Sister program as a role model. Volunteer to lead after-school programs like I did in Springfield. Donate to programs that help struggling single parents so they can feel less desperate and spend more time caring for their children. I care a lot about the children of single parents including my own brothers. And also just not adding to the negative, stressful part of the world.

Using my skills.

My superhero identity is female, a kind of Super Lois Lane, because I work as a reporter, although not in a Gotham-sized town. I have super hips, so this outfit will definitely need to proudly show off the hip to waist ratio, and I'd like a plant-green stripe up the size that looks a little like a vine. I'm thinking boots with peter pan style cuffs because I am always dashing off to some assignment where I have to get down in the muck; then your average skintight suit, black, but sleeveless with a high neck, armbands, and fingerless gloves, (for the typing aspect.)

My utility belt will have writing utensils, and gear that will help with my job. More to come on the super hero subject.