Batman, Jesus, and the Addams Family

My son’s first word was Batman.

Thrilled that he had said his first word, I immediately bought him a 12” Batman toy from the novelty section of Gateway Books where we used to hang out a lot. He carried that toy with him everywhere. Our dog Frank who, like Batman, had a black “mask,” chewed Batman’s bat ears off, but John-David still carried the toy with him all the time, even after the cape was lost and head had gaping holes where the ears had been.

Soon after his first word came his first full sentence: “Let’s collect them all.” He learned this sentence by asking me to read the backs of the blister cards that D.C. Comics action figures came on. Indeed, we began to collect them all.

An only-child, John-David preferred activities he could do by himself, such as arranging his action figures into “set-ups” as he called them. Sometimes other odd characters got mixed in with a collection. For example, there was a plaster figure of the Virgin Mary, the same scale as the D.C. Comics action figures. Sometimes she joined the other “superheroes” on adventures. While cooking supper one evening, I heard him talking for his figures in the next room and looked in to find the Virgin Mary begging Joker not to hurt her baby. About that time Batman flew in, knocked Joker off the coffee table, and the Virgin Mary sighed and said, “thanks Batman.” My mother did not find this story funny when I told her about it on the phone later that night. She thought it was “sacrilege”.

So I decided not to tell her a few months later when the Addams Family showed up at the stable to celebrate the birth of Jesus.

The Christmas that he was four, our dear friend Katharine, who had moved to Florida to be nearer to her daughter and her own grandchildren, sent John-David a nativity scene made of fabric: there was a quilted stable with a door that opened and closed with velcro and was filled with the members of the Holy Family. There were Wise Men, a shepherd, a camel, and a sheep. And a button was sewn into the star on top of the stable that, when pressed, played “Away In A Manger.” He loved the gift, just as I had always loved the presents Katharine had sent me when I was a child.

Naturally, as soon as he opened the package, he got busy making a Nativity “set-up” under our Christmas tree. The fabric Mary stood at one end of the fabric manger with Joseph by her side. The quilted animals and Wise Men looked on. But at the other end of the manger stood a 5” plastic Morticia Addams with the charming mustachioed Gomez by her side.

I did not see a little boy’s innocent gestures as sacrilege. I preferred to remember the scripture that tells us “a little child shall lead them” and to understand the expansive, not exclusive, nature of God and his grace. But unless she reads this piece, Mama won’t know about the time Morticia joined the Holy Family.

Copyright Marian Carcache,2009