My Wonder Woman

Tammy Duckworth

My sister and I loved comic books when we were kids, although she read the encyclopedia, too. I particularly studied the crime comics. There was something about pictures showing a bullet going in a bad guy’s shoulder or arm and coming out the other side, with the word “Boom,” and a puff of smoke. And the fedora always stayed on his head. Not exactly CSI stuff. 

I also liked Archie and Veronica, but I was sort of obsessed with Jughead’s hat, which I would try to duplicate with construction paper for various Brownie projects. By the way, there are several copies available online, but they don’t hold a candle.

My all-time favorite comic book was Wonder Woman. I loved her looks — remember when comic book black hair would have streaks of navy blue in it? I loved her costume and her flying and her adventures. When I was about 8 years old, I was very sick; the doctor came to the house, a sure sign. I realized, in my delirium, that I could have adventures like Wonder Woman. After they woke me for medicine from the dreaded “medicine” spoon — and jello and ice cream — I couldn’t wait to get back to sleep and pick up my Wonder Woman adventure where had I left off. 

Mind you, flying and jumping was thrilling; I was not entirely happy to recover from my illness.

I never watched Wonder Woman on television, but when the movie came out this month and got rave reviews, I really looked forward to seeing it. Before going, maybe I should have taken several swigs of that sweet medicine they gave me all those years ago.

First of all, any movie that’s 2½ hours long is too long. The opening business with beautiful — size 2 — Amazons and swordplay and horses was endless. And how the hell did the little girl — well, all of them for that matter — get born if there were no men? I lasted for an hour and a half before I left. 

I like to think I haven’t completely lost my sense of whimsy; The Umbrellas of Cherbourg is still my favorite movie.

My real-life Wonder Woman is Senator Tammy Duckworth. Maybe I relate to her because I have a granddaughter who is also part Chinese, along with Cherokee and Irish; I’m thrilled when I see people of other races become American heroes. 

Duckworth was born in Thailand to a Chinese mother and a U.S. Marine father who traced his family’s American roots to the Revolutionary War. The family settled in Hawaii when she was 16 and were, for a time, on welfare. She graduated from high school after skipping freshman year, got a B.A. in political science from the University of Hawaii and then got a master’s in international affairs from George Washington University. She joined ROTC as a graduate student at GW, then became a commissioned officer in the Army Reserve and chose to fly helicopters because it was one of the few combat jobs open to women. (And one of the most dangerous, only for the careful and the brave.)

When she was deployed to Iraq in 2004, she was co-piloting a Black Hawk helicopter that was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade. She lost her right leg near the hip and her left leg below the knee and became the first female double amputee from the Iraq war. The explosion almost completely destroyed her right arm, breaking it in three places and tearing tissue from the back side of it, but doctors were able to save the arm. 

Duckworth received a Purple Heart and was promoted to major at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, where she was presented with an Air Medal and Army Commendation Medal. The Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) erected a statue with Duckworth’s likeness and that of the Revolution’s Molly Pitcher in Mount Vernon, Illinois, in 2011 to honor female veterans.

She was elected to Congress for two terms in 2012, to the Senate in 2016 (and during that period had a baby), finished her Ph.D. and retired as a lieutenant colonel in the Illinois Army National Guard. 

Wonder Woman.