I’ve always really loved the look and feel of the magazine-sized black and white comics produced by companies like Warren. I’m not sure what it was? The characters? Perhaps. The stories and concepts? Maybe. One thing is sure, they were usually not of the costumed variety. They weren’t exactly mainstream either. I’ve always wanted to create a book like Eerie Magazine and fill it with black and white comic and text stories. Shoot! I still do and maybe I should - Get together with some other creators, compile our work together and POD copies?

Warren Publishing

Warren Publishing was an American publisher of several comics produced in a black-and-white with a magazine format. Warren’s books weren’t comics, they were magazines and they were marketed and sold as such.

Two of my favorite comic book characters when I was young were Sgt. Rock and Jonah Hex.

Sgt. first appeared in Our Army at War #83 (June1959), and was created by Robert Kanigher and Joe Kubert. Joe Kubert produced the artwork when I was reading the book and his version of Sgt. Rock remains the definitive version of the character.

Jonah Hex is a fictional character, a Western comic book anti-hero created by writer John Albano and artist Tony DeZuniga and published by DC Comics. Again, despite the numerous artist who have taken up the pen, DeZuniga’s Hex remains the only Hex.

There was just something about these heroes that made them stand out to me. More than Superman or Batman or Spider-Man, characters like Hex and Rock along with Conan and Tarzan thrilled my ten year old mind more than costumed heroes ever did. (Not that I didn’t love them too.) I suppose it’s only natural that when it came time for me to create my own characters these were among the characters I would draw from.

Other characters along the same lines that I loved included (among others); Conan the Barbarian, Tarzan, The various “Kid-Cowboys” (Colt Kid, Two-Gun Kid, Rawhide Kid etc.), Sgt Fury, John Carter Warlord of Mars, Warlord (DC), The Spirit, The Phantom Stranger, The Human Target, Ghost Rider (the original Johnny Blaze) …

There simply was just something, even to my little underdeveloped prepubescent mind, that felt somehow off when a pair of tights entered the scene. Even then I realized that an iconic “look” was important and showing off the physique was almost a requirement, but there were simply other (better?) ways of accomplishing these goals that my hero donning tights and cape wearing their underwear on the outside.

Of course, as a ten year old, I never thought this all through and liked superheroes as much as the next kid. It’s simply as an adult, when I look back over those characters that I remember most fondly do I begin to see a pattern emerge.

I’ve been spending my days trying to relax and enjoy even the smallest bits and pieces of whatever comes along. Still, I know I’m missing far more than I’m finding.

It is hot and I mean hooottt. Okay. maybe it’s not Arizona-hot but it’s still hot. Maybe not so much hot as muggy. It is very humid. I’m breaking out in a sweat just sitting here and I’ve got the air conditioning on. I’d be so dead if I were a cave man or living in the old West. If the weather didn’t kill me someone would just to shut up my whining about the weather. That and of course I’m kind of blind and all. That would have been a hindrance as well.

I think I need to toughen up. Become more of a “man”, which probably means just keeping all my whining and complaining to myself. Or limiting it to the bunkhouse or sumthin’. Pardner.

Things didn’t work out (again) getting together with Ken over the weekend. Which really rather sucks. Too much time passes too quickly. Stuff needs to be done and finished and discussions need to be have-ed. Hum. Whatever. I NEED to make sure that we get to spend time this coming Saturday if not before. I also need to mow the lawn. Man. Life can sure be so mundane. I think it’s the mundaneness of it all that zaps the energy right out of me. Stimulation is what I need. Lots of it. Or maybe just a little. I’m not sure. Maybe I couldn’t handle a lot and just don’t know it. How does one set out to find something like that out? Google maybe? Maybe. Maybe. Maybe. Shut up Mark.

Portrait of the artist at work.

Not really. More like Portrait of the artist trying to look all cool and important. Like anyone really cares.

There are times, days like today, when my only goal is to just survive the day. While it would be nice and thrilling if something good were to come of the day, I’ll settle happily(ish) just making it from sunrise to sunset.

There are things I could be doing. There are things I probably should be doing. I’m not and I don’t want to. it’s that kind of day.

Interesting, isn’t it? You’d think I’d wait to post here until I actually had something, anything, to say. I don’t and yet apparently I do (post, that is). Aren’t I an interesting one? Maybe tomorrow I’ll be interesting and brilliant because it just doesn’t seem to be happening today.

Go away. Sorry for the interruption.

My schedule has been turned upside-down today. Which means that I’m beginning my day backwards and ending at the beginning. Or sumthin’. Basically, my head is all messed up, which for me is apparently a rather easy task to accomplish. I would have actually hoped that my constitution was a bit stronger than this. Instead, even something as seemingly mundane as a last minute, screwed up schedule has thrown my mental state a few inches out of whack. Suddenly all my plans are no good and I’m left thinking, “Huh? Wha?” Ya’ know, it’s a darned good thing that I’m not asked to do more things than I already am. Like folding socks or taking empties back to the store. I don’t think I could handle it. Even the thought is scary.

I’m finding myself annoyed at “people” again. I don’t like being annoyed at “people”. Yet here it is. Again. I really shouldn’t be working with the public. I don’t have the temperament. Life annoys me enough as it is without the added task of having to deal with “people”.

Such is life. Well. Mine anyway.

Of course, if I am to be true to the muse, I must admit that at times it seems as though almost everything is a little beyond me. Whatever. I’ll just sit here for a while and think a bit. It’ll be alright.

People are ignorant. I don’t mean this in a negative way, simply as a statement of fact. We are. We all are. Myself included. Little wonder we are told to be “like small children”. Kid’s have got it right. The younger, smaller, and more innocent the better. Before they are taught to hate and fear and judge. We teach those things; to fear and hate what is strange and different, to judge others and think we know best when, truthfully, all we can do, at best, is try our hardest and make our best guesses. The most ignorant of all are those who think themselves knowledgeable. Who think they know best and better than all. In the case of knowledge versus innocence, innocence is far, far wiser. It’s as we grow that our ignorance grows alongside us. We learn to hate and fear and look down upon others. We learn to judge others and set them apart from ourselves.

In our desire to have the smartest child, the safest and most precious child, we pass along our ignorance from generation to generation. Passing along our perversions and intolerance. Our inability to see that perhaps we aren’t so all-knowing and wise after all. If the adults could only learn from the children. They say that youth is wasted on the young but I don’t think that’s true. They deserve it. Perhaps it would be better to say that responsibility is poorly placed when placed upon the old? Look at the world we have created using all our knowledge and wisdom.

When the old envy the youthful, perhaps it is not the beauty and energy we miss but the innocence and optimism? The joy and love and acceptance that comes so easily? Love so easily given and so easily abused by others.

What are we doing? We think and strive and work and struggle and it seems that the more we push the further back we fall. We need to simplify. Purify. Find the truths we’ve been given and live them. Kindness, decency, joy, an easy smile and a good book. It’s all so simply and yet so difficult to do. We need to think like a three year old.

Thankfully for me, I already do.