I grew up poor. Not living in the desert, Sally Struthers pleading for donations kind of poor—just lower-income poor. My parents both had jobs. My dad ran a tiny restaurant and my mom did clerical work for a doctor. She’d bring home the billing each month to earn a few extra bucks and my brothers and sisters and I would stuff, seal and stamp hundreds of envelopes on our living-room floor. (This is waaaay before HIPAA).

We did it while watching our one channel on TV. Yes, I said that correctly—we had one, lowly channel. It was NBC. And I never understood NBC’s whole, “Brought to you in living color” peacock motto, because we only had a black & white set. (The first show I ever saw in color was Star Trek at Troy James’ house, and yes, it was a thing of beauty).

In the Ford household, we just learned to do without. We lived on the outskirts of cable, in a valley that defied the best intentions of our rooftop antenna to bring us Fantasy Island, Love Boat, Charlie's Angels and The Waltons. I know, by today’s standards it’s considered child abuse.

So how did I fill my brain with the daily-recommended allowance of pop culture? Simple. I binged on comic books. My garage-sailing grandma sent me armloads via the UPS man. (Even now I get all Pavlovian whenever that big brown truck pulls up to my house). I spent my paltry allowance buying old comics at Edna’s Used Books. I’d even pluck soda cans from the side of the road for the 5¢ deposit—saving up enough to buy the latest issues of Spider-Man, X-men, Fantastic Four and the Hulk.

Comics were easily the largest single influence on my early childhood. I drew constantly—eventually graduating from art school in Seattle. Deep down, I’ve always wanted to do something comics related. In fact, when I was choosing an agent, one prominent NYC rep found out I loved comics and suggested publishing HOTEL as a graphic novel. (Still an intriguing thought).

So when I popped over to AngryAsianMan.com and read that Secret Identities, the first Asian-American Superhero Anthology, was looking for contributors––bat-signals went off in my brain. Because it just so happens that I’ve been working on a story that fits nicely into their submission criteria. And I’ll be sending it off this week. If they like it, I’ll post the synopsis. Heck, even if they don’t like it, I’ll still post it.

Because as Marvel Comics mogul Stan Lee used to say––Excelsior!