by E. Paul Zehr
My DARING BOOK FOR GIRLS has a whole list of inventors. One that is super relevant to Batgirl and the extended Bat-Family is Stephanie Louise Kwolek, a chemist. In 1964 she invented Kevlar. It’s used everywhere nowadays, in police and military vests, helmets, rackets, and all kinds of stuff. Including the Batsuit, where a polymer fiber five times stronger than steel is a great thing to sew with!
Mary Phelps Jacob invented the modern bra in 1913 while she was still a teenager! She got sick and tired of WEARING A CORSET! Thankfully.
I know I’m not going to be an inventor. Or at least not an inventor of a real product that people can use and which changes the world. But if I do become a journalist, maybe I can help share ideas with people that will change how they think. That can help change the world too!
Yeah, maybe that’s how I’ll help change the world. With my words.
FRIDAY, MARCH 6
Superhero. Slam.
Today we set up the knockout bracket for the Superhero Slam. Ms. King had us each write our superhero on a recipe card and we then put them into a hat. She then had Mr. Richardson come in to draw names out to pair up all 16 teams. The winner of each debate will be determined by class vote and Ms. King’s vote. The only limitation is you can’t vote on your own match.
Based on the cards pulled out of the hat, Ms. King wrote out the tournament bracket.
Here’s the lineup!
On the one side of the bracket we have:
Batgirl vs. Green Lantern;
Captain America vs. Wonder Woman;
Black Canary vs. Aquaman;
and Thor vs. Superman.
On the other side:
Iron Man vs. Storm;
Invisible Girl vs. Daredevil;
The Flash vs. Spider-Woman;
and Elektra vs. Batman.
This is a pretty interesting set up! Audrey and I are on separate sides of the bracket. So if we keep winning, we have a chance at a straight-up duel on whether Batgirl could beat Iron Man! But Cade’s on the same side as me, so we could wind up against each other too.
Dylan is lined up on Audrey’s side. She has to beat him to get through to the final. Ordinarily I’d say no problem, but Dylan has me worried. I cannot figure him out — can anyone?
Still don’t know what he is up to by choosing Batman. But I’ll have to just put that out of my mind. I need to make sure my brain is fully focused on making a plan for why and how Batgirl could and should beat Green Lantern!
THURSDAY, MARCH 12
Just like Batman, all members of the Bat-Family need to learn detective skills. Never really thought about it, but I guess this links up with Batman and Batgirl having their debuts in Detective Comics, also known as DC! So critical thinking and analysis are on deck!
I always have been interested in solving mysteries. I have read a lot of Nancy Drew and I really like Sherlock Holmes. Elementary, my dear Watson Jessie! Auntie G is really into Sherlock Holmes too. She gave me The Official Nancy Drew Handbook for Christmas, and there is lots of interesting stuff in there. One thing I read today was about how to tell if somebody is lying!
I may try this out on Dylan when we get to school next week . . .
The part I wanted to read up on was how to study body language. Great for winning at Two Truths and a Lie.
Here are the important bits according to me . . . I used a likely suspect — Dylan.
How to know if Dylan is lying:
* His eyes — if Dylan is looking around a lot, blinking too much, and has big dilated pupils, he might be lying.
* If he’s keeping his body really stiff but crossing and uncrossing his arms and legs.
* If he’s all fidgety and nervous-looking and avoiding looking me in the eye.
* If he is either really pale or really flushed.
* If he has weird breathing, like really fast or really shallow.
* If he’s got a clenched jaw or tight lips or he covers his mouth with his hands . . .
You know, I think based on this list Dylan might be lying ALL THE TIME. Or none of the time. Basically he is hard to figure out. Whenever he is around me, he seems kind of on edge or freaked out or something.
More importantly, maybe Audrey should study up on this list to get better at Two Truths and a Lie. She’s terrible at it. She just blurts out as much stuff as possible and then looks away, avoiding eye contact completely.
Which brings something up that I really need to think about. If I’m honest and replaced “Dylan” with “Audrey” in the list of observations above, I’d have to admit my suspicion that Audrey is hiding something from me. I trust Audrey so, so much. We’ve been friends forever. But I trust my gut feelings too, and more so lately. And my gut tells me something is off with my friend.
MONDAY, MARCH 16
It gets curiouser and curiouser every time Audrey and I try to do anything together. We used to do so much together and also text all the time.
Today I wanted to ask her about how her Iron Man exoskeleton is going. I think her idea of the superpower being used to help people who can’t move their body is so good!
So I cruised up to her at the bus stop on the way home after school. I tried to chat with her, but she didn’t really want to talk so I didn’t push it. She said she had an assignment to work on and we went our own ways.
The problem is I couldn’t help noticing that she was fidgeting with her arms (crossing and then uncrossing and crossing — it was driving me nuts). And not really looking at me. And she was kind of pale. And kind of grinding her teeth or something. What is she not telling me or who is she going off to see?
Also, even more obviously a “not truth” — what assignment did she have to work on? We don’t have another assignment right now . . .
See? Curiouser and curiouser.
TUESDAY, MARCH 17
In class today, Mr. Richardson was talking about Sherlock Holmes and what was known about biology back in the 1900s. It was pretty neat. He talked about how the forensics and crime scene investigation Sherlock Holmes and John Watson used in the stories set in 1880 to 1914 was basically just looking at things, observing, asking questions, and being clever.
Today we have DNA samples, ballistics analysis of fired bullets, powder residue on the hand of a guy who shot a gun, not to mention fingerprints! They had nothing but their minds and magnifying glasses.
Mr. Richardson tried to make the point that we would all be awful at finding criminals if we had to do it the old-fashioned way. He said we don’t pay enough attention to anything. He then went off on a bit of a rant about “hand-held devices,” Facebook, Twitter, and other things “kids today” are addicted to!
But he did sort of prove his point about paying attention by leaving the room and coming back in again. He asked us if anything about him was different. Dylan, using his keen intellect, shouted out that it was later, so he was now older. Mr. Richardson just kind of stared Dylan down. When Dylan finally decided to look at his desk, he still had a bit of a smirk on his face.
Anyway, about half the class (me included) said that Mr. Richardson had changed his shirt. Great, he said, what color was it before? (It was blue now.) NO ONE could remember. It had been red. Oops.
Then he showed us this movie that some psychology guys had used in an experiment years ago. They were studying what Mr. Richardson called “inattentional blindness.” Basically it means you don’t notice stuff sometimes even when it’s right in front of you! And they used gorilla suits to test it out!
Back in 1975, these guys at Harvard University and at Illinois University had some people pass basketballs to each other in a gym. Then they had other people watch and they asked them stuff. Like, please count how many times they pass the ball or what kind of passes they used or whatever.
Then, while people are watching all this, they had somebody dressed as a
gorilla walk across the court. Yes. An actual gorilla suit. The other guys kept passing the ball. Turns out that when the scientists asked the people (who were supposed to be watching carefully) if they saw anything unusual, about half of the people said no! This was too funny because we all noticed the gorilla-suit guy.
Mr. Richardson says this means when you pay attention to some things you don’t see other things. He said that if you didn’t pay attention to stuff back in the time the Sherlock Holmes stories are set, you didn’t have a “redo” with video recordings or whatever. You couldn’t rewind — it was just gone.
And that’s when the bell rang and class ended. And then we were gone too. I actually couldn’t wait to get out of there. Nobody would have noticed, but today I was doing my sense training again and I chose vision.
So here I was trying all day to pay more attention to seeing things and details of stuff. And I couldn’t even remember the color of Mr. Richardson’s first shirt . . . EPIC FAIL.
But it’s no good just saying it’s a fail without a plan to avoid failure again! I’m thinking what I need to do is try to link the things I see together into something I can remember better.
Like if Batgirl is staking out a place where bad guys are coming and going, she would try to connect the height of someone, their hat, and their car. Together that’s a pattern that would be easier to remember. And to notice if it changed!
I think the key is looking for patterns.
THURSDAY, MARCH 19
It’s been six months but I haven’t been able to stop thinking about NYPD Sergeant Mike Bruen’s experiences and courage. So I got his address from Ms. King and sent him a letter to see if he had any thoughts that I could apply to my superhero project. And today I got my reply!
Dear Mike,
Thanks so much for coming and talking to our class about your life and experiences.
I know my class already wrote a different letter to thank you, but I wanted to write and ask some more questions. It’s about a school project. I hope that’s okay?
Hello Jessie,
It’s great to hear from you. Ms. King speaks highly of you and said I should be looking out for a message from you.
It was my pleasure to speak to your class and answer your questions—that is the best way to learn about the experiences of other people. Now, sometimes these things can be hard to talk about, but it is important to those of us who were there to pass these experiences on firsthand, so they are not forgotten.
You guys seemed genuinely interested so it was fun to me. Now let’s get to your questions!
Why did you decide to be a police officer? (I can’t believe no one asked you this when you visited our class! I was totally going to — you may not remember but I had my hand up for a loooooong time and I NEVER put my hand up — but Ms. King said we only had time for a few questions. So, of course that included the ridiculous question from Dylan. He’s the one who asked you if you ever put your lights and siren on in your squad car and drove super-fast around New York City just for fun. Dylan is a work in progress, BTW.)
Wow! Why did I become a police officer?? Hmm, let’s see. I went to college to become a more “well-rounded” person (that’s older adult talk for “doing lots of things”) majoring in economics.
Economics was great, but I was not sure if I wanted to spend the rest of my life behind a desk. During my economic internship, I started to look around and weigh my options.
I had a cousin who was a New York Police Department officer. Even his tamest stories were extremely exciting to me. So I took the plunge and signed up as a police officer.
This became the greatest thing I could ever have done. The best description I have ever heard for my job is like having a front row seat to the greatest show on earth . . . every day.
I’m telling you it is exciting and fulfilling and always a physical and ethical challenge. You make friends for life and get to help people. Sometimes it is dangerous, of course, but it is great to be that occasional knight in shining armor.
Oh yeah. Yes. I’m guilty. I have put my lights and sirens on for no reason and drove really fast once or twice. But let’s keep that our little secret, OK?
Do you have a hero you look up to?
From my mom to my dad, and the great friends I’ve made, and my wife and kids, I have been lucky to have many heroes. Then, as an NYPD narcotic sergeant (that means getting rid of drugs) and police officer, I have had the occasion to work beside heroes all my career. They have all affected me positively throughout my life.
Did your family worry about you when you were on duty?
Well, you know, they definitely did worry. And it would have been worse if they knew what work was really like, if I’m being honest.
But you keep most of those bad things to yourself. Only talking them through with people who have been there. My family were pretty confident that I could handle most of what was thrown at me. I always trained for the worst and hoped for the best, you know?
People (like coaches and teachers) are always talking about how we need to “conquer our fears.” You’ve seen lots of scary stuff. Do you think people conquer fear or just get used to it?
Hmm. Do you ever defeat fears or do you just get used to them? Well, I guess a little of both. There is no substitute for training and the other side of that is there is really no substitute for actually doing.
Not sure if that makes sense to you, so what I mean is that you can practice doing a speech all week, but there is no substitute for getting in front of a group of people and giving your speech. Can you see what I’m getting at?
If you “own” your subject—really master it and experience it—it is easy to speak about. If you go in owning your subject, then it’s easier when practice is over and the real test begins. Then after you have been tested a few times, you see you can do it.
I guess you conquer your control of your fears. They are still always there, but you can control them. You keep your wits about you and you react to the situation. The key is to stay calm. This last bit is often pretty hard to do! But you have to.
Did people in the city ever help you when you were trying to catch a bad guy?
I am happy to tell you that when the chips were down and I was in trouble, the people of New York rose to the occasion.
Once I had somebody do a subtle trip of a bad guy I was chasing, and somebody else pointed a quick finger to where the bad guy went so I could call and alert other police officers which way I was chasing someone. The people of New York helped me on many occasions.
The one I remember most was when I was by myself and a major fight ensued between me and the bad guy.
Jessie, I’ll be honest. The chips were down—I was in serious trouble—and this monster was just about getting the better of me. Suddenly I heard a door unlock—you know that click sound you hear?—right in front of me. The door opens and an old grandma came out wielding a big black skillet. She smacked the bad guy over the head with that frying pan and, well, she helped me out that day. Can you believe that? I will always be in debt to her.
Do you have a favorite superhero?
Well, it has to be Batman. I believe all technology fails from time to time and as far as superheroes go, he uses technology, but Batman realizes the most important technology to winning is the super computer between your two ears. (That’s your brain, get it?)
Wow. That makes me think back to what I wrote in this journal after Mike visited our class. But now I have to change my conclusion, I think. Heroes don’t just run towards danger — they are ready to take action and do something about the danger when they arrive.
Do I have that kind of courage inside of me? I don’t feel particularly brave a lot of the time. How do you get to be like that, I wonder? Can you learn it or does it just happen?
Maybe just by practicing the stuff I’m scared of over and over again
, I’ll get better.
One last thing . . . I am not telling Dylan that Mike Bruen likes Batman too.
FRIDAY, MARCH 20
Today was all about fear. Or really about defeating fear. Well, that’s what it was supposed to be about, anyway. But today did not exactly go as planned. Audrey and I were trying to see if I could be calm in the face of fear. You know, get scared by something but not really lose it? Just like Batgirl. And Daredevil. And Elektra and loads of superheroes.
But apparently I’m not ready for a fearsome Batgirl face-off yet. Unless it’s supposed to be a face-off to reveal my fear . . .
The idea was that Audrey should try and scare me at random times at school. The idea seemed like a pretty good one — you know, face your fears and defeat them and all that. And the general plan seemed pretty straightforward. It was supposed to go something like this.
* Step #1. Audrey hides somewhere. Like behind a door, around a corner. Maybe even in a locker. Whatever.
* Step #2. I come wandering along, having completely forgotten about what Audrey was doing in step #1. This is actually easier to do than you might think. Which was part of my problem today, actually.
* Step #3. Audrey jumps out and tries to scare me, but aha! Not so fast, because . . .
* Step #4. I stay calm and carry on. You know, it’s all good here people, nothing to see, move along.
Seems pretty simple. But my tendency to overreact to getting surprised made sticking to the whole plan a lot harder.