Secret Origins of a (Very Likely) Fangirl

By Tracey Gray
May 1, 2007

Not so long ago in a galaxy not too far away — well actually, it was this one — an infant girl was beamed onto the door step of a rural Southern home. The baby was therein discovered by the young woman who lived in the house along with her husband, but the woman was much too young to have a daughter, especially at my current age. Or so that's always been the story I've heard. And honestly, sometimes I believe dear old mom as there are times when she or a member of my family does something that leads me to believe there is no way in hell I could possibly be related to them. Either I actually was beamed to her doorstep as she claims or I was switched at birth.

In any event, I wasn't the typical child, always marching to the beat of my own drummer. I've been called a geek (which I wear proudly, thank you very much), a bookworm, a bad influence, and even the family embarrassment by some of my siblings. I got into comics basically on my own. I have no older brothers who collected nor read comics to introduce me into them. I'm the oldest so that's pretty much a moot point. But I've always been creative. I can remember making my own little fantasy world as a child which I visited in my head whenever I was bored, and I frequently got in trouble with my teachers for day dreaming. I've always had my nose stuck in a book, or I was drawing something. In fact, I've been drawing since I was able to hold a crayon which progressed to paints. Mom still has a painting I called "Barnyard" that I did when I was about four years of age, hanging in the family homestead.

It's my creativity that led to the Silly Putty incident when I was around 3, that eventually got me into comics. I was handed this wondrous egg with this stretchy goo inside that you could imprint images onto it and magically distort them. I spent countless hours messing up the Sunday newspaper, slapping the wondrous goo onto pictures to distort them much to my grandfather's chagrin. That's when he introduced me to the "funny papers." That's when I became acquainted with the Peanuts gang (other than the holiday specials), Prince Valiant (I loved his horse), and Beetle Bailey (I liked Otto.). Of course I couldn't read at the time, so mom had to read the comic strips to me.

This then graduated into actual comic books. Whenever I accompanied Mom or my grandparents to the local dime store, I always picked up at least one comic book. They usually consisted of Disney, Casper the Friendly Ghost, or the like. Then I got into Superboy because of his dog Krypto and Supergirl because of her horse Comet. Hey, I was a kid who liked the fuzzy critters, okay?

Then, and oh is this going to date me, the campy Batman series premiered on television starring Adam West. I was an instant fan, religiously tuning in at the same Bat time on the same Bat channel every week to see what happened to the Dynamic Duo. From that point on, Batman was the schiznit for me. I even had a younger brother by one year who instantly became my sidekick. Mom never really elaborated on where he came from though, I just assume she got him from the hospital like most people got their babies. He wasn't beamed down like I was, so I guess that made me special. But no matter his origins, he became the Robin to my Batman. Yes, I was the eldest so I always got the lead. Muwahahaha!

I started adding the Batman comic books to my usual takings and one Christmas, I got the best present ever from Santa. A 12” Batman action figure! Hey, to a 4 or 5 year old, that was pretty special. That was also the same year mom bought me a life-like baby with a frilly basinet which I totally ignored, making a bee line straight for the Batman figure. Poor mom, I was never the frilly girl she wanted me to be, but she got another chance when my baby sister was born many years later. Now, I know where she came, she was labeled the "Oops!" Heh.

My parents got divorced and Mom eventually remarried which prompted a major move to another state not too soon there after. And with that move, she threw away stuff that wasn't essential which, by the way, included my comic books. D'oh! So, I had to start all over again in the new house. But the neat part about it is that I was reading on my own then and I used my allowance to get my Batman fix. I had also matured into Superman and Wonder Woman. This was also about the time that I created and drew my first comic book when I was in second grade. But as fate would have it, there was another major move, and out went the comics once again. There were several changes of location in my life as a child, and I lost comics with each move and I eventually got tired of it. So, I got to the point where I eventually stopped buying comics, however that didn't keep me from watching the superhero cartoons; Spider-Man, The Justice League, Super Friends, X-Men, and the like.

It wasn't until years later when I was in college that I got back into comics. I was in art school before getting into the graphic design program when I ventured into the local comic shop. Part of the reason I went was to collect reference/research material for a project I was working on and the other reason was, I just wanted to go check the place out and I was totally floored at how much comics had changed. They had glossy covers now with stunning art work and no longer printed on cheap newsprint. Comics had evolved into its own unique art form. I fell in love with David Mack's work on Kabuki well before he became Marvel's darling. I admired Billy Tucci's Shi and her more anatomically correct proportions in which she didn't have to defy gravity in order to walk up right. I later found out by talking to him a few years later that his father died when he was young, leaving him to be raised by his mother and older sisters, strong women role models in which he based his character on.

I picked up a few of these comics based on their covers to see what they were about and one of the comics I picked up was the X-Men. I'd seen the animated series and was curious enough, coupled with the art work to get a few issues and became hooked. I was especially intrigued with the anti-hero Wolverine and quickly began following his solo exploits. I can proudly say that I now have all the Wolverine issues. I've basically gone from DC to making mine Marvel with a few Star Wars and Indies thrown in for good measure. And I'm quite happy to say that now, whenever I move, my comics go with me.