who’s that girl? I in every issue
Story by mom, Sandra Honaker • Photographed by Jonathan Boatwright
Alex Honaker
Alex has never been normal, and personally, I blame her
father. She definitely looks like him. Although she is a unique
individual, she and her father, Pat, share many traits. They are
both stubborn, and they are happiest playing games (Alex’s
current favorite is Skyrim; Pat’s is Rome: Total War). They have
a running joke—or is it an argument?—that Alex is supposed
to take all of Pat’s food trash to the kitchen for him. He will
wait hours for her to walk into the den so he can hand her his
granola bar wrappers, and sometimes he even summons her.
As I write this, she is watching Pokemon and singing along
with the theme song, and while her father didn’t introduce
her to Pokemon, he did encourage her to love what people
call genre fiction and film—fantasy, horror and scifi.
They often watch episodes of Star Trek together, and he
has shared his love of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel
with her as well. They have arguments about who would win
in a pitched battle, a well-trained Jedi Knight with the force
as his ally or a top-ranked Claymore in full control of her
yoki aura. He has furthered her education in geekdom with
Godzilla’s Mothra vs. Godzilla and Ghidora, the Three-Headed
Monster, as well as Hercules vs. the Hydra, Conan the Barbarian (Schwarzenegger’s and Momoa’s versions) and Conan the
Destroyer. He has used these films to teach her what is best
in life, and when he asks her, she immediately answers: “To
crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and to hear
the lamentations of their women.” She has years of therapy
ahead of her. YEARS.
To be fair, though, Pat isn’t totally responsible for Alex’s
personality; Alex is probably a summation of all of her fam-
18
June 2014
ily’s weirdness, spiced with her own special flair. We all love
costumes, even Pat, who consented to be Gandalf the Grey
when we had our Lord of the Rings-themed Halloween year,
and her sister Morgan is often her partner in attending films
in character. They made their own costumes for The Last
Airbender, Sucker Punch, and Priest, and Morgan, as Bellatrix Lestrange, accompanied Alex, as Luna Lovegood, to two
Harry Potter films. And I don’t know who came up with the
idea, but Alex and Morgan spearheaded attending Marvel’s
The Avengers as members of the Justice League, playing Batman and Wonder Woman, respectively, and roping in Marion
Baptist Church’s youth pastor Adam Work to be Green Lantern and Melia’s son Jacob Tucker to be Superman. Alex never
broke character, not once, the whole night. She was the Batman. (She just spent several minutes explaining to me that
Batman is properly called The Batman and not just Batman.)
It was Alex who talked many of her friends into assembling
the Avengers one Halloween. She had them all: Iron Man,
Captain America, Thor, the Hulk, Black Widow and Hawkeye.
I was even Nick Fury. And who was Alex? Loki, of course. She
would love to be able to attend a comic con, and she has two
hand-sewn costumes she ordered from China, no less: Sailor
Jupiter (a compatriot of Sailor Moon) and Link (if you play Zelda, you’ll know who I’m talking about). Not content with just
the costume, Alex finishes out all the details, dying a pair of
shoes green for Sailor Jupiter, dying her hair blonde for Link,
and ordering The Master Sword and a Hylian shield as accessories. She carefully sculpts her face with make-up to match
the characters. She even helps with other people’s make-up,
and this Halloween concocted a gruesomely accurate depiction of peeling zombie flesh with toilet paper, lash adhesive
and fake blood.
She has toyed with the idea of becoming a make-up artist,
but her real passion and outlet for this obsession with detail is
revealed in her art. Alex loves to draw characters, and for every picture she draws there is an entire backstory, complete
with lineage and special powers. She makes up these stories
as she takes her dog Sheba on her daily walks, stomping
around the neighborhood listening to Daft Punk or The Glitch
Mob. Her dream job would be to work for Marvel, and as a
junior this year she has been eyeing colleges whose names
sound like Pokemon: RISD (Rhode Island School of Design),
MICA (Maryland Institute College of Art) and SCAD (Savannah
College of Art and Design). Although she is a good student
and does well in all her studies (I’m probably honor bound
as a parent to mention that she is head marshal this year),
her favorite class is Honors Art with Scott Collins at Marion
High School.
I hope she succeeds in her ambitions, but I think she will
always be creative, whether she has a paying job in her
field or not. Even now she has a website for her art, http://
alexthesinger.wix.com/wayfaringink. Maybe one day she will
write a famous comic or a graphic novel. At least in that one
respect she now influences her father—she has him hooked
on Neil Gaiman’s Sandman series. The circle is now complete.
Alex was once the learner; but now she is the master. And if
you recognize this quote, you are one of us.
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