3-8: "All the world's waiting for you..."

When I was young, I loved Wonder Woman. I watched the TV show - I'm sure that what I remember watching must be the reruns, since it's original run was 1975-1979, which would have been a little early for me to watch and remember. I once convinced my mom to let me wear my Wonder Woman Underoos for Halloween. I know that someone once truth lassoed my little brother, but I"m sure I don't know anything about it. I admit with no shame that I was going to *be* Wonder Woman (or a cowgirl) when I grew up. But my first real, solid memory of Wonder Woman was a glow-in-the dark light switch cover that was on the wall in my childhood bedroom, and had been for as long as I could remember. I remember standing in front of it, making sure my arms were in the right position to start my power twirl. And I can remember further back, when I was even younger, imagining that she was protecting me when the lights were off—that the glow-in-the-dark-ness was a magic of some sort, warding off any number of unspecified "scary things."
"All the world is waiting for you/and the magic that you do..."
When I got older, and certainly didn't think silly things like that anymore, I redecorated my room. I wanted to change it from the space I thought of as my mom's creation to one that was my own, so the baby pink on the walls changed to a more teenagery shade of...well, pink. But the little girly art—-an angel my mom had painted -- came down. My mother told me she'd put the angel there to watch over me when I was a baby; I gently reminded her that I wasn't a baby anymore, and put posters of an actor I've long-since forgotten on the wall where my gaurdian had been. My mom smiled and asked if I wanted her to help me take the screws out of Wonder Woman. She was sure the regular switch cover was around somewhere, and we could put it up after the paint was dry. "Why would I take Wonder Woman down?" I asked. "She looks good with the new pink." And so she stayed.

To be honest, I don't think I could imagine taking her down. And hadn't I always loved Wonder Woman? I don't think it occurred to me, at the time, that she must have been put there by one of the people old enough to watch and love Wonder Woman at the time that the show was happening. The people who'd bought me the Underoos, who'd actually been paying attention to the show while I was busy twirling with my eyes closed. Who'd put not one, but two protectors in my room. It's funny the things teenagers don't think of.

When I was 21, my brother and I sold our house in a somewhat hurried fashion. We did well for a 17 and 21 year old left with the responsibility of selling their childhood home in the middle of the school year, but a few things were bound to go wrong, and my forgetting to take that light switch cover off the wall was one of them. I've thought of it often over the years, and for some reason, it hasn't occurred to me until now that I could probably find one somewhere, and that it might even be for a price I was willing and able to pay.

Maybe she was waiting until I really needed her. It feels a little safer around here already.

*(Edited a little, because there are things we don't think of as grown ups either. Thanks, dad.)