A Serious Discussion

During dinner last night, Jack and I got into one of those age-old discussions about a subject that all married couples repeatedly have if they’ve been together for any length of time—what super power would you have if given the choice?

I know that in many families, only one super power is usually allowed, but bon vivants and free spirits that we are, we’ve always allowed two super powers per person. Now I must admit that I’ve faced some frustrations with this over the years, because I have remained steadfastly loyal to invisibility and teleportation. What could be wrong with those super powers? you might ask. (Or you might not ask.) Well, I’ll tell you Mr. or Ms. Not-thinking-it-through! The answer is simple: clothing and accessories.

You see, I want to use these powers to better the world, to spy on people who threaten our freedom and our country. I also want to listen to what people are saying about me behind my back and to do some cool party tricks. Also, I could get into many parties to which I wasn’t invited, so that I could actually do the cool party tricks. But here’s the problem. I think that a big part of the fun of being invisible is that one could suddenly become visible and freak people out. “Surprise! I heard what you just said about me!” However, you couldn’t do this with much enjoyment because you’d always have to be naked when you suddenly reappeared. Why? Because clothes and accessories (such as weapons) aren’t invisible. And who isn’t going to react if they see like a dress, a pair of shoes, and a couple of earrings walk into a room? There goes your espionage attempt right there. What if you just get invisible/naked and walk into a spy enclave to off a bunch of terror types? Well an AK-47 floating into the front door is going to tip them off, don’t you think? Industrial espionage for a person with these two powers might be the only fallback plan, but then you would have to have a good memory because you couldn’t record conversations, and there you are back in the boring corporate world again.

Why teleportation? At first glance, the casual observer might believe that as an invisible person, one could get on any subway, train, or airplane for free. But no! People are going to feel you, especially on public transportation. Hello, you’re invisible, not vaporized. I’ve never even heard of a super power called unfeelability. That sounds more like a bad date!

“What’s your super power?”

“Unfeelability!”

“Ewww.”

Sure, if you were a spy, you could ship your clothes to a hotel near your destination, teleport to the James Bond-like casino (invisible and in the nude) to listen to some information, then teleport back to your room to get clothes for say, when you want to see and be seen. But that scenario really cuts out the spontaneity of the whole invisible thing. As is probably transparent to you now, these factors are quite problematic when seriously contemplating a choice of super power.
In fact, our dinner discussion became a bit heated at one point, especially when Jack, who should never be trusted with the Monopoly bank and who hides puzzle pieces so he can put in the finishing piece of the jigsaw, tried to sneak in a third super power for himself. He, too, chose invisibility, but then attempted to claim that time travel came part-and-parcel with teleportation. No way Mistah! You have to watch that sneaky rascal.

(I think he may be a spy.)