Stanley Martin Lieber died the other day. He was 95 years old.He had a tremendous impact on my life, particularly when I was growing up.I never met him, but I felt like I had known him for years.It was through Stanley Lieber that I was first introduced to Spider-Man, the Hulk, the Fantastic Four, Thor, the X-Men, and Daredevil. Of course, he didn’t use that name in his professional life.We knew him as Stan Lee.Today he’s primarily known for his countless (and comic) cameo appearances in the Marvel Comics films, but Stan Lee’s association with Marvel dates back to the 1960s, when he was a writer, and later editor, publisher, and editor-in-chief.  He had an energetic style of writing that commanded your attention. His monthly column, Stan Lee’s Soapbox, often signed off with catch phrases like ‘nuff said!  When his competitors began imitating him, Stan began signing off with Excelsior!  because he correctly guessed they wouldn’t know what it meant. (It’s a Latin word for “ever upward.”)One thing I loved about Stan Lee’s superheroes was their humanity. While the ones in other comics seemed to have perfect lives, Stan created characters that were more realistic. You could relate to them on a more personal level because they weren’t perfect. Spider-Man had flaws. He could stick to walls, swing around town on webs, and take a punch, but he wasn’t invulnerable. I remember reading one issue as a kid in which Spidey had to duke it out with a villain while nursing a bad cold. It made him all the more real to me.I liked DC Comics as well, especially Superman. DC always had good stories, but Marvel was grittier and edgier. Marvel was closer to real life because it didn’t pull punches. The iconic issue in which Spider-Man/Peter Parker’s girlfriend, Gwen Stacy, is killed by the Green Goblin, is still one of the most poignant and shocking stories I’ve ever read. Even as a young kid, that last panel, depicting a distraught and angry Peter/Spider-Man cradling Gwen’s lifeless body in his arms, was absolutely heartbreaking. Spider-Man, Daredevil, Iron Man, the X-Men, all were like real people with real problems.I’ve heard life imitates art. I think that’s often true. Life doesn’t pull punches. We get our noses bloodied, we all have feet of clay, we make decisions that later come back to haunt us, we don’t always defeat the bad guy—and sometimes we lose people who are important to us. I never met Stan Lee but his vast legacy of believable characters, his wit, his stance against anti-racism and bigotry, his belief that, regardless of skin color, we are all brothers and sisters, helped shape my worldview as a young boy and continues to do so today.Goodbye, Stan. Thank you for keeping it real. Excelsior.‘Nuff said. 78