How Do I Get One Of Those Rings?

I ask myself weird, or at least uncommon, questions all the time. Like why does nearly every airport feel like it was designed by a blind monkey? Or why do we have mittens when we have gloves? Or how, exactly, do I get one of those fancy Green Lantern Rings?

That last one has been on my mind for a while. Talking up space like a bookcase full of stories I’ve already read, but want to visit again.

Technically, I suppose one has to be fearless, right? The ring will just sort of find you. But is fearless even possible? Or, more importantly, is fearlessness even a strength?

When we find ourselves in unfamiliar territory, say an unplanned trip to an overflowing river, atop mossy rocks, an alarm goes off somewhere in our minds that says “hold up!” Now maybe that’s just being rightfully cautious, but isn’t that fear? And if it is, isn’t that just one of the many primal systems were blessed with? The important ones that help us survive.

The Green Lantern was created in 1940, and I’m sure these questions have been answered a million times. But I’m asking them again anyway because I’m a Batman fan. So you, oh knowledgeable reader, will have to forgive me if I’m missing something in the last 80 years of lore. To be fearless means a would-be host is born with the ability to wield one of the greatest powers in the universe. Like being born a Noble or a King. And of course, I, and others like me, hate that. It means that anyone who is not born a King — or fearless — will never have the power.

So I choose to believe that the Green Lantern Ring is more like Thor’s Mjolnir, in that it is more of a judge of one’s action in the face of feeling the fear that is inescapable.

Humans are, simply, fearful. And those who aren’t are usually lying or insane, making for a pretty poor choice when it comes to a space cop. Acting despite fear, in the face of it — selflessly no less — now that’s different. That’s something to be proud of and something few can do. It’s like religion; almost every religion that says to forgive and forget and to have mercy goes against our very human want for revenge. Forgiveness, therefore, cannot be divine if it’s in our nature. It’s going against our nature that makes it so special. It’s becoming something more than our genes that makes us worthy of an afterlife. And it’s the same with the ring.

We’re all born with the same basic desires; win, kill, screw, feed, screw some more, and survive. There’s nothing special about any of that. We’re even born with the reflex to run when in danger. All of us. It’s when we do the opposite that the ring takes notice. It’s when we overcome our fear, that the ring finds it’s host. Instead of giving the world’s greatest power to a supposedly fearless entity, who could not possibly understand it, the Green Lantern’s Ring goes to someone who is just as fearful as the rest of us. Who understands the natural human condition. Who wants to run and hide but who chooses to fight anyway.