Prime let me in on a little something last week that we’ll be getting in the near future: A Transformers story, narrated by Peter Cullen, is coming to the Calm App. You can hear a small preview of the piece if you head over to the Allspark and I have taken advantage of that feature a lot. As I mentioned to Prime in a text, hearing that voice, the voice of Optimus Prime, is like wrapping my spark in a warm blanket. I know that somehow, things will be alright.
Now, Bumblebee is my main squeeze; I’ve had a huge crush on him since I was in fourth grade. But it was easy to adore Optimus Prime from a distance. He was kind, compassionate, wise, gentle, understanding.
He was literally everything my mother was not.
My mother was authoritarian: what she said, went. If she told–or rather, ordered–my to do anything, it was to be done with no questions asked. Compromise was not in her vocabulary. If I objected, her response was a screamed, “DO LIKE I ASK YOU TO DO!“
Nothing was actually asked. It was ordered. Honestly, being in my home when I was younger felt like living in the Deception headquarters, dealing with an angry Megatron. That was on a good day.
Optimus was the exact polar opposite of my mother: he didn’t raise his voice to the Autobots. He didn’t make unreasonable requests. He never demanded obedience; the Autobots were willing to follow him to hell and back because he inspired that sort of loyalty.
In short, the Autobots loved him. I did as well, from a distance, I loved him.
To be quite honest, I wanted nothing more than to live in that universe, with Bumblebee, with Optimus Prime, knowing that the Decepticons weren’t nearly as terrifying as my mother. At least in that world, I would have protectors. That world seemed much safer.
Yes, I will be downloading the Calm App. I will be listening to that story, multiple times. I’ll probably listen to it enough to where I will have it memorized, where I can quietly murmur a few words of it while at work, to settle my nerves and feel better, to feel that warm blanket around my spark. To feel something I wish I could have felt in my formative years: peace.
Not through tyranny. But through understanding. Through compassion. Through someone who felt more like a parent to me than my own mother.
Iacon East 