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| Image copyright MARVEL COMICS |
It was a pleasantly sunny afternoon in 1979, probably in June or July. I was working in my town's central library back then, and had become pally with a summer worker who was also a comics fan. We'll call him Bob Billens to spare his blushes should he ever see this, and we'd been sent out by our 'library masters' to collect overdue books from houses around the town.
During our break, we'd driven along to his in-laws' house where he and his wife were then staying and, while sipping tea in the back garden, he showed me some of his comics collection. He even gave me a few which were surplus to his requirements. (I'd given him some of mine on a previous occasion, so he was merely reciprocating my friendly, generous gesture.)
Among the five or six comics he gave me (all MARVEL, as he wasn't so much a fan of their mags as he was of DC) was The FANTASTIC FOUR #111, wherein The THING meets The HULK. I eventually cut out the final two panel tier of the last page and affixed it to my bedroom wall, where it remained until my family moved to another house in 1983.
Then it went up on the wall of my new bedroom for a few years, until we returned to our former residence in 1987, whereupon it resumed its previous place on the wall. And there it stayed 'til the early hours of this morning, when I replaced it with a duplicate of the tier, scanned from a replacement copy of the comic acquired quite a few years back now.
It was time, you see. The original had rippled and faded after 35-plus years stuck to a wall, and my room had taken on a distinctly 'aged' appearance. The new picture is brighter and whiter, and adds a much-needed splash of colour to the room. Still, I'm not exactly comfortable in disposing of something that's been part of the decor for a significant proportion of my 'adult' life, and I feel a bit of a callous b*st*rd for doing so. Surely it deserved far better consideration for its many years of faithful and uncomplaining service?
So far, I've replaced six browned and faded pictures and intend to do more from time to time until nothing looks old. It'll be good to once again see white margins surrounding these pictorial presentations which adorn the wall, looking just as fresh and new as the day they were printed. If there were only some way of rejuvenating the originals I'd do it, but substitution with a 'double' seems my only option.
Anyway, what's done is done and, in time, maybe I'll eventually forget that the doppelgangers in my room aren't the originals and delude myself that they're the ones that have always been there. Still, it'll be a while before I can look at the fresh, flat, bright, new incarnation of that old picture and not feel guilty for so cruelly abandoning its predecessor.
I try and console myself with the thought that at least its image yet graces its accustomed spot on the wall, and hopefully will still be there in another 35 or so years. Whether I'll still be around then is, of course, far more open to question.
