You couldn't be him...

Faster than a speeding bullet

More powerful than a locomotive

Able to leap tall buildings in a single bound...

These are the powers of Superman and I contend even if most people had those abilities and more: they could not be Superman.

To the superficial, superheroes can easily be written off as silly stories of men in tights. But if you look just below their costumed surfaces, you'll see it isn't the garish clothing, super powers or even muscles that truly separate characters like Superman from the rest of us. It's something far greater. Something we all could possess if we truly wanted to.

Superman possesses great character.

If Superman didn't have his great powers he would still help people. He would find a way to do something for people in need with whatever resources he had at his disposal. Can the rest of us say the same?

Super powers come in many forms. It's all relative to the situations find ourselves in. The ability to fly would be fantastic and could be used to save a great number of people, but to a person who's in dire financial straits any extra money you could spare would be just as fantastic of a superpower.

My father is a mechanic by trade. As a kid I would sweep the floor our family shop while my dad talked to the customers. I would see mothers in the dead of winter explain to my father how their cars didn't have heat and their kids had to wrap themselves in blankets to keep warm. They would go on about how they didn't have the money to get the heater fixed. I would then watch my dad tell them it would be ok and fix the heater for whatever they could pay him. My father may not have been Superman to the world, but he was Superman to that Mother and her kids in that instance.

I have no doubt in my mind if my father had the powers of Superman he would help the world. Not because of the powers, but because of the man he is. My father has character. In a world where daily technological breakthroughs make the rift between what is science fiction and science fact smaller, we will soon live in a world of super-powered men, but sadly, we won't live in a world of superheroes. It won't be because men won't possess the great powers, but because too few of them won't possess the character to use those abilities to help their fellow man.

Sadly, it's not the powers and the costumes of superheroes people find incredulous. What they find unbelievable is that a person possessed of such great abilities would actually have the social conscious and character to use those abilities to better the lives of everyone else for no tangible compensation.

Most people have super powers. They have stations in life, physical abilities and financial clout to "save" somebody. They simply choose not to. They routinely miss their opportunities to be Superman and save the life of someone in need. Most people are too self absorbed to see the good they could do for others or they use their "powers" for personal gain at the expense of other people.

There are too few superheroes in the world, but we're teeming with super villains.