Eating Lightbulbs and Other Essays: Machete
Autor Steve Fellneren Limba Engleză Paperback – 3 noi 2021
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Specificații
ISBN-13: 9780814258071
ISBN-10: 0814258077
Pagini: 224
Dimensiuni: 140 x 216 x 8 mm
Greutate: 0.27 kg
Editura: Ohio State University Press
Colecția Mad Creek Books
Seria Machete
ISBN-10: 0814258077
Pagini: 224
Dimensiuni: 140 x 216 x 8 mm
Greutate: 0.27 kg
Editura: Ohio State University Press
Colecția Mad Creek Books
Seria Machete
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Recenzii
“In this moving collection, Steve Fellner spins fascinating fragments like a kaleidoscope, always surprising us. He showcases a profound love for the essay as he displays a Sedaris-like humor while also tracing the history of his darkest moments.” —Jill Talbot, author of The Way We Weren’t: A Memoir
“Oh god, this book. A wild mouse, a whoopy cushion, a threnody, a meme, a tsunami, a side stitch, a teeth-kick, a heart of ouch, and whoa and bunnies. It’s ‘little fragments of eternity’ and ‘desire of any sort makes me dizzy,’ says the author, who adds: ‘The best way I knew how to write someone a love letter was to write a book.’ I got my love letter, Reader. Go get yours.” —M. Seaton, author of Undersea
“Oh god, this book. A wild mouse, a whoopy cushion, a threnody, a meme, a tsunami, a side stitch, a teeth-kick, a heart of ouch, and whoa and bunnies. It’s ‘little fragments of eternity’ and ‘desire of any sort makes me dizzy,’ says the author, who adds: ‘The best way I knew how to write someone a love letter was to write a book.’ I got my love letter, Reader. Go get yours.” —M. Seaton, author of Undersea
Notă biografică
Steve Fellner is Professor of Creative Writing at SUNY Brockport. He is the author two books of poetry and a memoir, All Screwed Up. His essays have appeared in Brevity, Mississippi Review, The Normal School, North American Review, The Sun, and Mid-American Review, among others.
Extras
Eating Lightbulbs
I wanted to eat lightbulbs. I wanted to hear my teeth crunch the little pieces. I wanted to swallow them. I wanted to feel them cutting the insides of my throat.
On some days, lightbulbs scared me. There is a light directly above my treadmill. When I ran, I was afraid that the lightbulb would burst and some pieces would pierce my skin. Maybe one would even make its way into my eye, blinding me. During my exercise, I would unscrew the lightbulb and put it on the dryer, and then get back on. Everything would be fine for a few minutes until I realized that there was the possibility the lightbulb would roll onto the floor and then crack. My husband Phil would hear the noise, and then yell at me, I imagined, for not keeping the lightbulb in a safe space. “Why are you down here in the dark?” he’d say. “You’re going to trip and break your neck.”
*
I told my psychiatrist about my run-ins with lightbulbs. She wasn’t as amused as I pretended to be. “Why do you think you’re having these thoughts about lightbulbs? What’s a lightbulb standing in for?” she asked.
That’s when I knew I hated her. I needed to find a new psychiatrist. I humored her and offered some possibilities. I felt bad for her. If she failed me, no doubt she had failed a lot of other people. It’s not like I was anything special.
I told her that I’m afraid of the dark. When I was a child, I would curl up in bed, my blanket over my head, and no matter how hot it got, I would not come up for air. I’d sweat. I’d anticipate the morning when my mother would turn on the lights.
I told her that my dad worked for Commonwealth Edison. He was a meter reader. Perhaps the lightbulb was a stand-in for my father. I was sad. I was processing our relationship, which had been estranged for a number of years. (Happily, it’s now better than it has ever been.)
I told her that when I was young I used to burn myself. I liked the way the skin peeled back.
I told her a lot of things. I can’t remember a lot of them. All I remember is the resentment in trying to find a metaphor for her. Perhaps madness is when you can’t control what you’re substituting things for. Everything becomes something else and you lose track of the literal, the real. Or you believe that the real was never there to begin with, and that begins the descent into paranoia and anxiety.
I don’t know. After I started to rehabilitate myself, I began to grow resentful toward metaphor. The Universe, I made myself believe, is a beautiful and troubled thing. And no matter how troubled, metaphors are a lie; the people who feel the need to use them are weak. To use metaphor is to sin against the Universe. God has made everything so unique you can’t replace something with something else.
Maybe I believe that. Maybe I don’t. All I know is that metaphor lurks in places that I never willingly want to go again.
I wanted to eat lightbulbs. I wanted to hear my teeth crunch the little pieces. I wanted to swallow them. I wanted to feel them cutting the insides of my throat.
On some days, lightbulbs scared me. There is a light directly above my treadmill. When I ran, I was afraid that the lightbulb would burst and some pieces would pierce my skin. Maybe one would even make its way into my eye, blinding me. During my exercise, I would unscrew the lightbulb and put it on the dryer, and then get back on. Everything would be fine for a few minutes until I realized that there was the possibility the lightbulb would roll onto the floor and then crack. My husband Phil would hear the noise, and then yell at me, I imagined, for not keeping the lightbulb in a safe space. “Why are you down here in the dark?” he’d say. “You’re going to trip and break your neck.”
*
I told my psychiatrist about my run-ins with lightbulbs. She wasn’t as amused as I pretended to be. “Why do you think you’re having these thoughts about lightbulbs? What’s a lightbulb standing in for?” she asked.
That’s when I knew I hated her. I needed to find a new psychiatrist. I humored her and offered some possibilities. I felt bad for her. If she failed me, no doubt she had failed a lot of other people. It’s not like I was anything special.
I told her that I’m afraid of the dark. When I was a child, I would curl up in bed, my blanket over my head, and no matter how hot it got, I would not come up for air. I’d sweat. I’d anticipate the morning when my mother would turn on the lights.
I told her that my dad worked for Commonwealth Edison. He was a meter reader. Perhaps the lightbulb was a stand-in for my father. I was sad. I was processing our relationship, which had been estranged for a number of years. (Happily, it’s now better than it has ever been.)
I told her that when I was young I used to burn myself. I liked the way the skin peeled back.
I told her a lot of things. I can’t remember a lot of them. All I remember is the resentment in trying to find a metaphor for her. Perhaps madness is when you can’t control what you’re substituting things for. Everything becomes something else and you lose track of the literal, the real. Or you believe that the real was never there to begin with, and that begins the descent into paranoia and anxiety.
I don’t know. After I started to rehabilitate myself, I began to grow resentful toward metaphor. The Universe, I made myself believe, is a beautiful and troubled thing. And no matter how troubled, metaphors are a lie; the people who feel the need to use them are weak. To use metaphor is to sin against the Universe. God has made everything so unique you can’t replace something with something else.
Maybe I believe that. Maybe I don’t. All I know is that metaphor lurks in places that I never willingly want to go again.
Cuprins
I
Self-Portrait as a 1970s Cineplex Movie Theatre (An Abecedarian)
Eating Lightbulbs
On Redemption
II
No
Inside
Safe Haven
III
How to Survive a Baby Shower
On Apology
A Letter to David Buckel
Two Truths and a Lie
“I see flies, I see mosquitos, but I have never seen a gay man.”
Are You There Judy? It’s Me, Steve.
On Beauty
Self-Portrait as a 1980s Cineplex Movie Theatre (An Abecedarian)
IV
Ten Anecdotes about the Destruction of Books
Popsicles
On Insignificance
The Pencil Box
On Love, Sex, and Thom Gunn
Mad Max
Inspiration
On Fragmentation
My mother is suffering from uterine cancer and all I can think about is the ’80s.
V
On Marxism, My Mother’s Body, and the State of Creative Nonfiction
Deleted Scenes from My Unpublished Memoir
Acknowledgments
Self-Portrait as a 1970s Cineplex Movie Theatre (An Abecedarian)
Eating Lightbulbs
On Redemption
II
No
Inside
Safe Haven
III
How to Survive a Baby Shower
On Apology
A Letter to David Buckel
Two Truths and a Lie
“I see flies, I see mosquitos, but I have never seen a gay man.”
Are You There Judy? It’s Me, Steve.
On Beauty
Self-Portrait as a 1980s Cineplex Movie Theatre (An Abecedarian)
IV
Ten Anecdotes about the Destruction of Books
Popsicles
On Insignificance
The Pencil Box
On Love, Sex, and Thom Gunn
Mad Max
Inspiration
On Fragmentation
My mother is suffering from uterine cancer and all I can think about is the ’80s.
V
On Marxism, My Mother’s Body, and the State of Creative Nonfiction
Deleted Scenes from My Unpublished Memoir
Acknowledgments
Descriere
Hilarious and cutting essays about self-preservation, betrayal, family, gay sex, mental illness, and the inherently flawed way we live and love.