Her communications director was forever advising her against speaking at engagements like this. "Stick to the voters," he would say. "Stick to your constituents." And though Martha could see the benefits to something like that, she was a U.S. Senator now. She had a much, much wider audience than she had in Kansas and she was determined to reach them. Besides, she missed the kids. She missed the reliable yet capricious nature of youth. They could never disappoint, because standards could not be set. They were too young, not fully formed, completely untamed, untainted. To set a standard for them would be unwise, would be asking to be disappointed. And children should never be predisposed to disappointment.
Despite his reservations about the event itself, said communications director took it upon himself to draw her up a little speech. The speech was careful, cautious, and cold. Martha gave it to the cab driver on her way to the ballroom at Georgetown University the morning of. She would have no use for it where she was going.
The ballroom were filled to the brim with high school students in the Presidential Classroom Scholars Program, homes ranging far and wide, all of them eagerly looking to her in a hushed silence as she walked down the aisle toward the podium which belonged to her for the next half hour. She was glad of it; public speaking had come very easy to her recently. She attributed this easiness to her childhood – endless debates, mock trials, long and intricate arguments with her father, etc. And she liked speaking to the kids. They had a chance to do something, be somebody. It was refreshing to have oratory command over such an impressionable, untainted captive audience. They weren't out to get her, weren't waiting for her to slip up and make a mistake; they were genuinely interested in what she had to say, thrilled and honored to be in the presence of a U.S. Senator. That was hard to come by in Washington.
When she finally reached the podium, she surveyed the sight before her for a moment, and for a moment couldn't help but think about how proud Jonathan would be of her. But then, had Jonathan still been with her, he might have been the one standing up at this podium. "Good morning," she says finally, and close to three hundred youths murmur a similar greeting in reply. "I know I've already been formally introduced, but I prefer to do it myself. I'm Martha Kent, one of the two democratic U.S. Senators from Kansas. Shocking, I know." This merits faint laughter from the crowd. It's early, she doesn't expect much. There are a few kids from her home state in the crowd; she can tell because they appear hopelessly unimpressed by her, yet their ears are perked up just a little bit more than everyone else's.
"I was asked to speak to you this morning about…anything, really. I was given free reign, which is very nearly unheard of in this town," she begins, speaking without a prompter, without any kind of speech prepared. This is how she prefers it. She's more likely to make a mistake this way, but it's a mistake she'll mean. "I've been in the U.S. Senate for about a year and a half. Not very long by any standard, certainly not my colleagues'. Many of them have had their positions since before you were born. As I'm sure many of you know, and I'm looking at my Kansas folk out there, I fell into my current situation quite accidentally, a little like Alice. Before moving to Washington, I was a state senator, working out of Topeka and, more often than not, Metropolis." She sees quite a few heads snap up at this – somehow Metropolis, like Gotham City, has always seemed to capture the imagination of America's youth.
Martha takes a deep breath before continuing. She's told this "story" many times since making the move to Washington, mostly to the ever curious press. True, it has gotten easier, but the words will never escape her lips without it being just a little hard to breathe. "I became a state senator only to fulfill the duties of my late husband, who passed away the night he was elected." It is at this point in the story when she usually notices the pity, the fear (what, after all, if such a thing had happened to them?) in the eyes of her listeners. Here, she does not. Surrounded by three hundred high school students, in their eyes she finds only interest and concern.
"About a year or so into my tenure as state senator, one of our U.S. Senators was, as you may know, tragically killed. For reasons I still have to ponder myself, the governor asked me to take his place. I was in no position to decline. And so I left Kansas. I left the farm I had run alongside my husband for twenty-seven years, the friends I had made, and the son I cherished, and do cherish, above all things. But…" She looks down for a moment, closing her eyes and seeing the words in her head before continuing. "That's not how my story began. It began, I suspect, much in the way yours did. Simple, unassuming, and dare I say it – normal. I was raised within the affluent high society of Metropolis. My father was a corporate lawyer, woven inescapably into the webs of corruption and greed that pervaded the city at the time. I was immediately put on the fast track to live that same life. As a child, I did everything. Ballet, gymnastics, swimming, tennis, drama, debate, mock trial, student government, cheerleading, piano. Because of this, for a long time, I was very, very unhappy."
She can feel how intently they're listening, silently comparing their own lives to hers at the time, probably wondering if they, too, are secretly unhappy. It is gratifying to be listened to and not judged, not criticized for her word choices or possible implicit, unintentional meanings to her thoughts. "When I went to college, I rebelled against my childhood, retroactively, knowing that once those four years went by, I would return to a life similar than the one I had known for the my first eighteen years. However…" She smiles, as the memory always causes her to do. "I was miraculously and unexpectedly saved from this fate by a man named Jonathan Kent. The antithesis of everything I'd ever known, he showed me aspects of myself I never knew existed. He showed me myself, and then I became someone else. Someone I liked a great deal more than the person I'd been before. He was the most amazing man I had ever met. Kind, gentle, protective, funny, steadfast, and proud. A better husband than most women even dream of."
She speaks with the conviction of a woman touting her man for president, not the nostalgic sadness of a lonely widow who feels as if she is now only half of a whole. She doesn't need to falter or cry for them to know how she feels. "For twenty-six years, I lived as his wife, and mother to our amazing son, on our farm in Smallville, a – yes, you guessed it – small town outside of Metropolis. During those years I did very little else. I did work as the executive assistant to Lionel Luthor…" Whose name she still has trouble saying out loud. "And tried my hand at managing the local coffee shop for a few years. But I harbored no other ambitions." Well, she fulfilled no other ambitions, at least. She gets quite a bit of flack from the press, and her adversaries on the Hill, for giving up law school and allowing herself to be but a dutiful housewife for most of her life. She's been called a hypocrite, a wolf in sheep's clothing, an empty shirt. Whenever this happens, she simply imagines the predator having his lights knocked out of him by Jonathan, and somehow she feels better.
"A life in public office was never in the cards for me. In fact, when my husband informed me of his decision to run, I was staunchly opposed to the whole idea, and I fought him vehemently on the matter. But he was, as always, determined and absolutely incorrigible." Another deep breath, as she holds tightly onto either side of the podium. "When he died, I was lost. Desolate, broken, practically inhuman. My instinct when the governor asked me to take his seat was to say no, right off the bat. But I realized, with some help, that fulfilling Jonathan's legacy was the only way I could be close to him again. They…they said, when I took office, that with my education and professional training, I should have been the one running for office in the first place. These people had very clearly never met my husband. If he were with us today, where I am, he would be the pit bull this party so desperately needs. He had the integrity, the strong will, and sheer force of mind to do this, and do it well."
She takes another moment to study the crowd, and is in that instant stunned to see that all eyes are on her. Attentive eyes, none glazed over or in a far off place. Somehow she's managed to completely capture the attention of three hundred seventeen-year-olds. If only she'd had such a similar effect on Clark. "…I miss him very much. But now, I can channel that integrity, that strong will, and force of mind to do what he so desperately wanted to, what I wanted to do when I was young and as ambitious as my father insisted I be. I do it for him, and I do it for you. I do it so that someday you might have the same opportunity. The opportunity to create change, incite a revolution, better your world, or at the very least your country." She wants to be fully honest, and add that she also does it because she doesn't have anything better to do, because the hard work and time she puts in to this job affords her the luxury of not having to think about the life back home she so desperately misses. But those reasons are not likely to inspire a nation.
"I love what I do. It was unexpected, terrifying, and almost reluctantly thrust upon me, but it's what's right. And in a world like ours, the times we live in, the pressures put upon us, we can ask for little more than to be offered a chance at doing what's right. And it is our duty, as countrymen and as humans, to take that chance, despite the risks involved. And so whatever the path you choose, wherever you presume that road will lead you, the best you can do is ensure that the destination makes you happy, and that the little stops along the way contribute to the betterment of yourself. Because that is the American Dream. No other. And if you spend twenty-six years as a farmer's wife…let it be. That twenty-seventh year could bring something extraordinary."
Then she looks down, her eyes closed, removing herself so that she hardly hears the deafening applause she has been awarded. It isn't the praise she's after. She needs no ego boost. All she can hope is that they've listened. And more than that, that they've understood. She knows better than anyone how important it is to make one's life extraordinary, even in the face of seemingly insurmountable mediocrity.
That's the American Dream she never had. The one that had been dreamed for her, and the one she had fallen into. Like Alice.