On The Road For Stan Lee

It's during the middle of June 2017 working a dead end job, where you're overworked and underpaid. You've been out of college for a few years where you and your girlfriend live in a small apartment. To make it worse your girlfriend is unemployed,  you're barely making ends meet and paying off your student loans.  You can't even afford to take any days off. Being broke definitely sucks. As time is always passing you're only way out of reality is to think about pop culture. Your favorite in particular is Marvel, something you've loved since childhood so you can avoid a broken household. You don't wanna give up but you know you're near burnout. On that one Friday you get a text from your girlfriend that Stan Lee is gonna appear at a convention; suddenly you've become more excited than you've been in a long time.

Stan Lee was one of the primary writers for Marvel Comics for 3 decades in creating some of the world's most popular superheroes and supervillains in comic book history. He is your biggest idol. You look up the convention but you realize it's in Washington DC when you live in New Jersey. It's a long three and a half hour drive. It may be a stretch, but you remember that you had a lifelong dream of getting a personalized autograph, face to face because he is your life long hero. Adam West had unexpectedly died one month before at a similar age; this is where you realized that this may be your only chance in seeing your hero. If you don't do this you'll regret it for the rest of your life.

A week goes by; any abuse you got from work doesn’t affect you because your mind was only on Stan Lee. It was the first Saturday you didn’t show up for extra overtime. You and your girlfriend get up early at 7am and got on the road with your tickets and the poster you made, for that one day. That one day pass for both only cost you close to $80, but doesn’t cover any autographs so you have to pay in cash. The website says that Stan Lee’s autograph was $120 each. You know you have slightly over $1000  saved, but you take out $500 from your checking account. This is a lot for you, but know you deserve to have some fun and actually live your life.

From New Jersey to Washington DC it’s pretty simple; you just get on the I-95 NJ Turnpike South until you get to Maryland and hop on the 195 West until you get to the convention center. It’s basically a 3 and a half hour straight line. When arriving at Washington DC everything changed. You're out of your comfort zone. The streets are covered in garbage with rats scavenging for food, cars are broken into, junkie's are barely fighting to survive. The White House still looks nice seeing it a couple blocks down. When you're thinking you're almost there; you hear a loud "THUD" sound. This is the sound of your tire blown out from a rusty nail.

You can't believe what. Your girlfriend is afraid of the environment while you're starting to doubt yourself. NO; this isn't the end. Without panicking you call for Triple A to tow you to the nearest shoppe. The entire wait time for the tow truck to show up, the cab to take you to the shoppe, and the repairmen changing the tire took close to 3 and a half hours. You could've driven home by then. When seeing the bill you realize that you can't put the cost on your debit card, for your small checking account, so you put it on your credit card. Haven't used that in a while.

It's almost 2pm, the convention closes at 6; you realize how much time you have left to get that autograph. You don't want to be an asshole, so you feed your girlfriend Wendy's. When getting through the traffic and driving around a “nice area” hoping that nobody would try to break into my car for no junkie's to steal. Fast walking to this place; every Marvel character all at once in a 3 mile radius. Some of these cosplay’s looked better than the actual Marvel movies. Obviously you're both not the only people here to see Stan Lee.

You enter inside the Walter E Washington Convention center and get past the security gates you hop on an escalator to the top floor; they actually hand out these maps to the convention. It’s definitely not a small pamphlet; this thing is actually folded up as if you're taking a tour through Manhattan. This convention takes up 3 and a half blocks to where it's got its own zip code. The place has so many hallways and staircases it's like you're in the Overlook Hotel from The Shining. You should've brought some mountain bikes.

You finally find out where Stan Lee is located, but as you're getting closer. You're girlfriend's having some stomach problems. Turns out that Wendy's chicken sandwich wasn’t properly cooked. She hastily runs into the bathroom. It's here where you're thinking should you go into the convention for Stan Lee or should you wait by the side to see if shes okay. Of course you waited, you're not a monster. Definitely wishing that she could hurry up though.

It took 35 minutes just to find the area and it's taking over 20 minutes for your girlfriend to stop puking. Time is really not on your side. She comes out, you don't even ask if she's okay, you both just walk into the area. It's not surprising this place being so big that the area was overcrowded. There's so many people it's definitely a fire hazard. You're feeling claustrophobic. The staff is even guiding all the people like if it's traffic control. Of course Stan's booth just so happens to be on the opposite side of where we entered. There's a giant digital screen that you can’t miss that tells all the schedules for autographs, photo ops, and Q&A panels for every actor. It’s like being at the JFK Airport. Stan Lee's final autograph hour is at 4 pm, and it's already close to 3:45.

You make it to he's booth; of course there's a long line sticking out of the booth, but you made it. Finally you both made it, "what could possibly go wrong" is what you're thinking? You spoke too soon. A man with a staff shirt walks right up to you and says "can I see your tickets please." "Tickets? What tickets?," you reply. "We're here to pay for an autograph." The man then says, "You have to reserve tickets to get on line for an autograph."

You’re broken. Your blood is beginning to boil. While sweating you say to him, "Sir, I've checked the website. It didn't say anything about reserving a ticket." Losing patience he replies "I'm sorry sir, Stan Lee is giving out limited signings a day. If you want a ticket you'll have to come back at his booth tomorrow morning. Now please step off the line."

It happened. Your childhood dream is shattered right there. You actually want to cry, but you're too afraid to show your girlfriend your feelings. Your girlfriend actually feels your pain and thinking that it's her fault she says to you "babe, we can still come back tomorrow." Holding back your tears; you just remembered that tomorrow is Father's Day. Yes plot-twist,the plan was to just spend Saturday at the convention and then take her home to celebrate Father's Day the next day. Thinking that she's going to get mad you still ask her "are you okay with that?" She replies with "babe, it's your hero. Lets just check into a hotel and we'll come back tomorrow."

At first you're happy that she's letting you have another shot at this, but then it's slowly hitting you that you're putting more things on your credit card. You leave the convention disappointed, definitely jealous to see so many people walking out with a Stan Lee autograph. Your girlfriend is scrolling on her phone secretly hoping that she finds a cheap motel room to spend the night. Nope, it's the Cortland by Marriott hotel thanks to her "you know we can sleep in my car," hoping that she'll say yes to this. Nope she's not that dumb; this is a bad neighborhood. Looks like you're spending more money.

First you park your car into a parking garage. You bought two tickets for Sunday's convention. Then you check in at the motel and paid for all them using your credit card; by now you've come to realize that you took out $500 in cash and you charged over $500 on your credit card all within one day. You're definitely realizing that this day off isn't going as well as you planned. Constantly spending money is becoming a problem. Somehow the hotel offering you free apples and coffee is lowering your anxiety. What also helps is having sex with your girlfriend. Yeah that definitely took some stress off.

It's midnight; you spend 7 hours at the motel thinking that tomorrow will be better. Sorry life doesn't work that way. Out of nowhere a large cockroach crawls out of the vent. This is one of those flying roaches, too. With no clothes on you jump out of the bed and look for something to kill it with. Don't use your shoe; stepping on a cockroach will bring the eggs to your house. You search for something in the bathroom where your girlfriend shouts in fear "HONEY" like maybe it's coming right for her. You grab the garbage can and a washcloth to crush it. You see your scared girlfriend on the hotel couch ready to jump out the tenth floor window. You're slowly approaching it but you don't want it to fly. It must've known what was going on because it just crawled inside the only pair of pants. You shake him out, but he crawled under the bed. After that you immediately grab your things and complain to the clerk.

You tell him what happened and you demand your money back. The clerk then tells you that "since there was no proof of the cockroach and you're passed the midnight mark the hotel won't refund your money." Don't you just love hotels? There is one option; you can have them transfer you into another room. Your girlfriend refuses; one cockroach is one too many for her. You both check out; not a penny was given back to you. Where oh where are you two to go?

  There's only one place for you both to go: the parking garage. How ironic you suggested to sleep in your car for free, and now you're sleeping in your car for the cost of a hotel room. Your car is parked in the bottom level, two floors underground, of the garage. Let me rephrase this: it's June 18th, very hot and muggy, you both didn't shower, with no clothes to change into, and you both are gonna sleep in your car where you could ether keep the AC on all night and drain the battery or keep the windows open and hope for no crackheads to rob you both. If you listen closely you can hear the wind blow the word "LOSERS." At this point you might be  thinking that you both need to take control of your lives.

You're on and off sleeping in your car. You guys had some experience in napping in your car from your college years. This heat is making you swim in your own sweat, while your girlfriend is too scared to sleep. This garage is slightly safer than sleeping in the streets of DC. At 4:30 your girlfriend wakes you up wanting to leave because a homeless man is openly defecating behind a dumpster not even hiding himself for any privacy. How many hours till this stupid convention opens?

Without hesitation you leave the garage. Casually driving around Washington DC for an hour where the sun is rising. If there's light out, you can maybe feel a little bit safer. A bus stop has two people having sex; that definitely answered your question.  It's strange to see that when you are actually driving right next to the White House. It's just that easy to drive that close to the gates. You've probably seen more shit in one day than the president has seen in his whole life.

  You park in the exact spot as you were in yesterday. After napping in the hot sun for a few hours you both walk your stench to the convention. The convention has an early bird special for letting people inside and wait for two hours in an auditorium until everything opens up at 10am. You sit in line, on the floor, where nobody wants to smell your body odor. When they opened that door, you immediately ditched your girlfriend and ran straight to Stan Lee's booth. My God you're out of shape, you're sweating harder than sleeping in your car.

You made it; you're the first one at the booth. Every staff member is just setting up the tables on the outside of the booth so they can sell some of Stan Lee's expensive merchandise. A small button can cost you $5. The same man from yesterday confusingly says "can I help you?" You respond "I'm here to reserve two tickets for Stan Lee." The man just smirked and said "yeah sorry the guy who gives them out didn't show up yet. You're gonna have to wait maybe an hour." What did you do to piss off God,you're thinking. If it wasn't for bad luck, you wouldn't have any luck at all.

You creepily wait. Your girlfriend looks exhausted so she is resting at a dining table. After waiting 35 minutes more people begin to show up, suddenly realizing you're not the only parasite. The man shows up and hands out the tickets. He warns you that Stan Lee can cancel at any time because of his old age. After everything you've been through, you're thinking that it's your right for getting that autograph. Nothing else is more important; not even calling your father for Father's Day.

The time to come back is 1pm. You sit at the table counting every second until Stan Lee is ready to come out. You're too scared to think that you're gonna miss your only chance to see him.

They call for everybody. You go to the booth where all the people line up. They check you inside the booth. Already, there has to be at least 300 people that are ahead of you because of a special pass. You wait in line to get into more lines. Behind you is a guy who doesn't make the wait comfortable. At last he finally comes out. You finally see your hero and: he actually looks like he's in pain. It just occurred to you that Stan Lee is 94 years old and he looks like he shouldn't be doing conventions because of his age and health.

The line moves quickly: despite his age Stan Lee is a printing machine. He can definitely clear a room of 300 people in 15 minutes. Unfortunately you and your girlfriend are not those first 300 people. Stan Lee is on a schedule and he'll be back at 4pm. You both made it this far and suffered a lot, you're not going anywhere. You sit and wait for 2 and a half hours until he comes back. This guy who's behind you keeps asking you weird questions. He's definitely not right in the head. If there was no security you'd think he's the next Mark David Chapman.

Stan Lee comes back. The crowd cheers for him with excitement, despite waiting for 2 and a half hours. He once again clears the line in a short amount of time. This is it, the moment you dreamed for as a kid. Your eyes begin to water, but you're too scared to cry in public. You follow the line to give the money and the tickets for two autographs. Due to Stan Lee's age there's two men sitting on his left and his right. They both use their hands to keep Stan Lee's arm in place and to drag all items across the table. There's also four police officers guarding Stan Lee. They touch the poster you made and your girlfriend's Stan Lee autobiography book to give to her dad as a Father's Day present. He signs it like a scribble and you simply keep moving.

And that's basically it. What were you expecting? Stan Lee most likely made over $100,000 at this whole convention and he has a 60 year lifelong legacy. Why would he care about you; you're simply another fanboy obsessed with his work. This is what expectations vs reality is. You both got what you came here for, now you guys can leave and drive three hours back home.

And now comes the part where I tie it all together. There are two ways you can look at this. First, you feel that this was a waste of both time and resources. Why someone would go through all of this seems like a huge waste of your life.  The other way to look at this is it was a childhood dream fulfilled. You have to struggle sometimes in order to make your dreams a reality. Nobody would ever care about the struggle but if it was rewarding to you then it would be worth it. Now that you've experienced my pain, would you take a similar chance?

Stan Lee’s catchphrase was the Latin phrase "EXCELSIOR," meaning "always higher/ always forward," to not focus on the past, but to move forward.