chance.
The idea of braving the drugstore to buy Tampax was suddenly too much for me. My head swam. Seventeen-year-olds don’t play with thirteen-year-olds, I thought. I sat by the wading pool and stared at the toddlers till I trusted my legs to get me home.
I didn’t tell Joanne what had happened to me the night before. I did mention that I had seen Duane playing with my brother and she agreed that it was odd.
“You should tell your mother,” she said. “Duane will be a bad influence on Pete.”
“Or the other way around,” I said.
Joanne looked at me funny.
I had to tell someone what I had done the previous night so I told a girl named Darlene whom I didn’t like very much. I left out the bad parts. She was shocked and made no secret of it. I wished immediately that I hadn’t told her.
As the days passed I tried to look on the bright side. I was no longer a virgin and in a way that was a good thing: I had gotten it over with. And it hadn’t hurt very much at all. But the overriding feeling was bad. I felt disposable, like garbage, and that stayed with me for a long time. I’m not sure it ever left me completely.
CHAPTER 8
When I tell you about my job and the reason I do it, you’ll probably agree with Joanne and Myrna that I’m asking for it, that I deserve whatever I get. Hermione isn’t quite so hard on me. She likes what I do, thinks of it as stirring things up which, as far as she’s concerned, can never be a bad thing.
It began when I became obsessed with thinking that large parts of the history I read are either lies or mistakes, that the way people want to be remembered and the prejudices of those keeping the records skewer the facts. We get the odd pocket of truth, but generally it comes out wrong.
And then there are the silences in the history books—the childhoods, the friendships, the family fights. Where were the home lives—the parts that shaped those who were written about? Elusive long-dead truths raise my curiosity but leave me edgy because I can’t know them.
I decided to try to add something genuine to the history being written today. I did this by interviewing people and asking them questions they couldn’t answer with clichés or platitudes:
When was the last time you cried? I asked.
Describe to me a time you recall in your life when you really hated someone.
I don’t believe you, I often said.
When did you last feel afraid, sad, hopeless, happy, proud, lustful? Describe those occasions.
Have you ever hit someone? No, but really.
Have you ever taunted someone?
Were you made fun of as a kid? What for? What did you do about it?
Have you ever planned your own death? your own escape? someone else’s death?
Those were the types of questions I asked.
The Winnipeg Free Press published several of these interviews and after a few years I was lucky enough to get a regular gig with the paper.
Public figures were my favourite subjects. And writers and teachers and business people and religious leaders and advocates for the downtrodden. If their answers didn’t ring true I threw the interview away. I spoke to them face to face—never on the phone. I wanted to see their eyes.
Pissing people off was part of it. I’d had more than one death threat.
Myrna thought I was wasting all my years of education. We bickered about this but I had no argument for her other than it was what I wanted to be doing. I wanted to tell the truth. Besides, she didn’t need a science degree for what she was doing, running the family funeral business, so what was she doing criticizing me?
The work wasn’t always satisfying. Sometimes weeks would go by without my getting anything real. The paper was very good about my column appearing sporadically. I was paid by the interview. But I tried to keep it regular, as best I could.
My column was called No, But Really .
I have a small income as a result of Murray’s life insurance policy. If I live frugally, which I do, I can get by.
Joanne never
The idea of braving the drugstore to buy Tampax was suddenly too much for me. My head swam. Seventeen-year-olds don’t play with thirteen-year-olds, I thought. I sat by the wading pool and stared at the toddlers till I trusted my legs to get me home.
I didn’t tell Joanne what had happened to me the night before. I did mention that I had seen Duane playing with my brother and she agreed that it was odd.
“You should tell your mother,” she said. “Duane will be a bad influence on Pete.”
“Or the other way around,” I said.
Joanne looked at me funny.
I had to tell someone what I had done the previous night so I told a girl named Darlene whom I didn’t like very much. I left out the bad parts. She was shocked and made no secret of it. I wished immediately that I hadn’t told her.
As the days passed I tried to look on the bright side. I was no longer a virgin and in a way that was a good thing: I had gotten it over with. And it hadn’t hurt very much at all. But the overriding feeling was bad. I felt disposable, like garbage, and that stayed with me for a long time. I’m not sure it ever left me completely.
CHAPTER 8
When I tell you about my job and the reason I do it, you’ll probably agree with Joanne and Myrna that I’m asking for it, that I deserve whatever I get. Hermione isn’t quite so hard on me. She likes what I do, thinks of it as stirring things up which, as far as she’s concerned, can never be a bad thing.
It began when I became obsessed with thinking that large parts of the history I read are either lies or mistakes, that the way people want to be remembered and the prejudices of those keeping the records skewer the facts. We get the odd pocket of truth, but generally it comes out wrong.
And then there are the silences in the history books—the childhoods, the friendships, the family fights. Where were the home lives—the parts that shaped those who were written about? Elusive long-dead truths raise my curiosity but leave me edgy because I can’t know them.
I decided to try to add something genuine to the history being written today. I did this by interviewing people and asking them questions they couldn’t answer with clichés or platitudes:
When was the last time you cried? I asked.
Describe to me a time you recall in your life when you really hated someone.
I don’t believe you, I often said.
When did you last feel afraid, sad, hopeless, happy, proud, lustful? Describe those occasions.
Have you ever hit someone? No, but really.
Have you ever taunted someone?
Were you made fun of as a kid? What for? What did you do about it?
Have you ever planned your own death? your own escape? someone else’s death?
Those were the types of questions I asked.
The Winnipeg Free Press published several of these interviews and after a few years I was lucky enough to get a regular gig with the paper.
Public figures were my favourite subjects. And writers and teachers and business people and religious leaders and advocates for the downtrodden. If their answers didn’t ring true I threw the interview away. I spoke to them face to face—never on the phone. I wanted to see their eyes.
Pissing people off was part of it. I’d had more than one death threat.
Myrna thought I was wasting all my years of education. We bickered about this but I had no argument for her other than it was what I wanted to be doing. I wanted to tell the truth. Besides, she didn’t need a science degree for what she was doing, running the family funeral business, so what was she doing criticizing me?
The work wasn’t always satisfying. Sometimes weeks would go by without my getting anything real. The paper was very good about my column appearing sporadically. I was paid by the interview. But I tried to keep it regular, as best I could.
My column was called No, But Really .
I have a small income as a result of Murray’s life insurance policy. If I live frugally, which I do, I can get by.
Joanne never
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