O P I N I O N

NOT THAT PROFOUND

By Nathan Graziano

What if I were to tell you about a guy so cool that he spits ice?

What if I were to tell you about a guy so good-looking that you can look at him with a side glance, otherwise you’ll hurt your eyes?

What if I were to tell you about a guy so smart that he proves theorems in his head?

What if I were to tell you about a guy so athletically gifted that you would need to erect an entire Hall of Fame for his records alone?

There is such a man, and he goes by the name of Herman McDerman. But I must also mention to you that Herman McDerman is not a man, rather an eraser and a character that I created when I was in the fifth grade.

I understand that it’s not unusual for young people to create imaginative worlds that exist only inside their own minds. Many of us have had imaginary friends at some point as children.

Most people, however, don’t still have imaginary friends when they’re 50 years old unless they’re suffering from some kind of psychosis.

I suppose I’m the exception here.

You see, I created Herman 40 years ago along with an entire community of eraser people. I took regular office erasers and drew faces on them, giving them names¹ and their own unique personalities. I later extended my community to include any figurine smaller than two inches—basically DEI hires—and welcomed them as well.

I would also have my erasers compete in athletic competitions on the back posterboards that I used for science projects and breakdancing then, after their games, my community would hang out in a locker room that I made out of a shoebox.

Herman McDerman— “Look on [his] Works, ye Mighty, and despair!”—eventually moved into one of my sister’s old Barbie dollhouses.

Listen, I get it. To someone reading this right now, it probably seems like I was a pretty strange kid who became an even stranger adult, and I’m not sure I have much of a defense on that charge. But I also grew up to write fiction, where entire communities of people still live inside my head.

But of all of the characters I’ve ever created on a page or elsewhere, Herman McDerman is someone special and dear to me.

In some ways, Herman McDerman is the Platonic form of Nate, embodying everything that I hoped I would be but never achieved. Where I was an average athlete, Herman was exceptional. When I struggled to speak out or make friends, Herman did it effortlessly.

And Herman was never anxious speaking to girls. In fact, I had a Herman McDerman voice that still plays in my head, a cool, deep and measured voice with a strong Rhode Island-accent. And, sometimes, he even scored dates with Barbie².

But Herman is also a calm eraser, never someone who feels the need to puff out his chest, or boast, or lie, or disparage and denigrate others to make himself feel strong, or take to social media with borderline literate rants about things that Herman knew he was too ignorant to speak about with any authority but he rages like petulant child anyway.

For every team I invented, Herman was a leader and a gracious loser in those odds times when I allowed him to lose.

And Herman McDerman still watches over me from his perch above my desk. But until now, few people knew about him—my wife is incredibly jealous and rude to Herman, refusing to greet him when she enters the room.

So world, meet Herman McDerman, the best there ever was.

1. They all had given names as well as surnames, and the McDermans were a prominent family. ↩︎
2. The height difference was problematic, but nothing Herman or Barbie allowed to stop their dalliance. ↩︎

You can reach Nate Graziano at ngrazio5@yahoo.com.