Read an Exclusive Excerpt from ‘How to Succeed in Academia’ by Ross Bullen

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New this week from Humorist Books: How to Succeed in Academia (While Failing at Everything Else), by funny person, career-track professor, and podcaster Ross Bullen. It’s a book about the surprisingly terrifying quagmire that is being an academic for a living. Here’s a taste to get you to sign up to take the whole course.

***

YOU GOT THIS: Student Loan Debt, High Blood Pressure, and a 1995 Toyota Tercel

Are you passionate about learning, teaching, and making less than $15,000 a year? Do you enjoy tweed blazers, crisp autumn afternoons, and stealing lunch from unattended cafeteria trays? Have you ever longed to drive, sleep, and hold your office hours in a 30-year-old car? If so, then a career in academia might be right for you!

“But wait,” you ask, “how can someone like me break into a field as prestigious and rarefied as academia?”

First of all, you need to understand that academics never ask each other questions this directly. If you want to fit in, you should try something like:

“I have a question that is more of a comment.”

Or “I have a two-part question. And one of those parts has two parts, so it’s really three questions.” You should then ask no fewer than seven questions, none of which have anything to do with what the other person was talking about.

Or “I know I was on my phone the whole time you were talking, but I’d still like to deliver a 12-minute, uninterrupted monologue about how everything you said was wrong.”

Second, you should know that this is not how books work. I’m writing these words long before you are reading them, so it’s not like this is a conversation. If you’re just learning this fact about how books work now, you’re probably not cut out for a career in academia. Sorry.

Likewise, if you’re the kind of person who genuinely enjoys a good conversation, you’re probably not going to enjoy working in academia either, unless you think asking “so what are you working on these day” and then ignoring everything the other person says counts as a good conversation. If that sounds like a deal breaker for you, close this book right now, place it back on your bookshelf, and immediately purchase several more copies of this very same book to see if one of them works out better for you.

“But wait,” you ask, “who are you to tell me what career I should choose?”

Good question. Although most books, including this one, feature an author biography that answers all of that, we’ve already established that books are scary and new for you, so I’ll help you out with this. My name is Ross Bullen. I’ve worked at a beer bottle factory, a small-town Renaissance Faire, and a McDonald’s across the street from a maximum-security prison. I’ve also spent the past two decades teaching off – sometimes way off ­– the tenure-track. And I can attest from personal experience that getting shafted by the Ivory Tower hurts just as badly as it sounds.

For those who don’t know, “tenure-track” means a job where you are expected to receive tenure, i.e., a job for life, unless of course you work in Florida, West Virginia, or [INSERT NAME OF LATEST REPUBLICAN-RULED NIGHTMARE STATE HERE]. The typical tenure-track career path is Assistant Professor, Associate Professor, Full Professor – at which point you can either become a Dean, a Vice-President, or Jordan Peterson (disclaimer: none of these options are healthy or endorsed by the author). The problem is that the number of tenure- track jobs has been declining steadily for the past 40 years.[2] These days, most professors work jobs with weird titles like LTA (Limited-Term Appointment), VAP (Visiting Assistant Professor), or RACCOONS (Rejected At Community Colleges Or Other Nice Schools). But the majority of college teachers are what’s known as “adjunct professors.”

The original idea behind adjunct professors makes sense: sometimes schools needed an outside expert to teach a class in a niche area, and even though this expert usually had another job, the school still paid them a stipend for their trouble. So far, so good. The problem is that once colleges realized they could hire professors on the cheap, they decided they should always do this. And although a handful of new tenure-track professors get hired each year, most people teaching at colleges in the U.S. (and elsewhere) do so as adjuncts. The typical adjunct professor career path is Adjunct, Adjunct, Unemployed, Subway Sandwich Artistä, Adjunct. Technically, tenure-track professors get paid for research and service in addition to teaching, and adjuncts don’t, but that just means that adjuncts wind up doing research and service for free (how else are you supposed to prove that you’re worthy of a tenure-track job, should one ever become available?).

If all of this sounds bad, that’s because it is. But this book is not called How to Avoid Working in Academia (although if anybody has a book like that, please, for the love of God, send it to me ASAP). It’s How to Succeed in Academia, and that’s just what I’m going to teach you to do. This book will guide you through every step of your academic journey, whether it’s finishing your dissertation on time (or at least before the heat death of the universe), applying for an academic job (by summoning the ancient Mesopotamian demon Pazuzu), or overcoming imposter syndrome (even if you’re a family of raccoons living in a Fjällräven Parka).

So, grab a seat, a nice mug of warm milk, and settle in for some good old fashioned book reading (at least until your shift at Subway starts). You’re an academic now!

How to Succeed in Academia (While Failing at Everything Else) is available now from Humorist Books.

6 Important Writerly Questions with Ross Bullen

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Attention students, administrators, and adjunct professors: Ross Bullen, author of How to Succeed in Academia (While Failing at Everything Else), is speaking. It’s the go-to guide for career academics (and a whole lot more weird and dark places) from someone who has been in the trenches of faculty life and seen it all and survived, albeit barely. We conducted this interview with Ross in a format to which he’s accustomed: homework.


1.Who are you? What are you doing here?

I appreciate that you are starting this interview with a question that you could ask to either a writer or an old man you caught shoplifting cat food from a bodega. Fortunately, I aspire to be both of those people. My name is Ross Bullen, I’m an English professor at an art school, and I live in Toronto.

2. Since “where do you get your ideas?” is a terrible question, what made you want to write this book?

I’ve been writing satire about academia for a while now. It started with angry Facebook posts before gravitating to the place where unhinged rants truly became an art form: Twitter. Eventually, I started submitting stuff to McSweeney’s Internet Tendency. After a normal-ish number of rejections (7?), I had a piece accepted. More rejections followed, of course, but once I figured out that academic satire was my niche, I had a lot more success. I noticed that a number of McSweeney’s writers were able to turn their short humor pieces into books, so I took a class on writing a book proposal with the fabulous and hilarious Caitlin Kunkel, and about a year later my proposal was accepted by Humorist Books!

3. How did you KEEP writing this book?

Cocaine, of course! Or at least it’s middle-aged equivalent: coffee and guilt.

4. Who is this book for, anyway?

Honestly, anyone who has ever been a part of academia, as a student, a teacher, a parent, or an administrator, would probably find something to love (or hate) about this book. But I’d say the audience who are most likely to enjoy the book are the extremely online set of academics sometimes known as “Academic Twitter.”

5. Any darlings you had to kill?

John Hodgman once made a list of 700 fake hobo names. I wanted to do the same thing, but for adjunct professors who sailed with the Pilgrims on the Mayflower. I could only come up with 99, so I guess that’s 601 darling adjunct professors that I had to kill.

6. What are you working on now?

I’m an English professor, so I’m always working on academic research and writing projects. On the more creative side of things, I’m starting research for a non-fiction book I want to write about a professor who taught at the same art school as me in the 1970s. He taught some really weird classes that involved things like LSD therapy, eating tiger meat, and abandoning his students on an island in the Bahamas. Remember when school used to be exciting? And kind of traumatizing? Anyway, I’ve been talking to a bunch of his former students and colleagues, and it’s been a lot of fun.

How to Succeed in Academia (While Failing at Everything Else) is available now from Humorist Books.

6 Important Writerly Questions with Brian Dunn (“Sleep, Little One”)

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Just out from Humorist Books: Sleep, Little One: Bedtime Tales for Tiny Troublemakers. With the dark, realistic, and audacious storytelling of Brian Dunn and the whimsical and haunting illustrations of Lucy Mara Budd, this compendium of frank and honest bedtime stories won’t do much to crush your kid’s anxiety, but it will make everyone involved laugh. Here’s Brian Dunn to explain himself.

***

1. Who are you? What are you doing here?

I’m a somewhat nifty guy living and writing in Phoenix, Arizona. I’m here because my new book, Sleep, Little One: Bedtime Tales for Tiny Troublemakers, is a hilarious send-up of children’s bedtime stories featuring gorgeous illustrations by the talented Lucy Budd. Think of this subversive book as the unholy offspring of Lemony Snicket and Edward Gorey. You’d be wise to purchase numerous copies as quickly as you can before children’s advocacy groups ban its sale.

2. Since “Where do you get your ideas?” is a terrible question, what made you want to write this book?

I have to push back on this because I believe “Where do you get your ideas?” is a terrific question, and it’s one I’m delighted to answer here. While I shan’t, for obvious reasons, divulge my exact recipe for creativity, suffice it to say its ingredients include—but aren’t limited to—banana smoothies, Japanese whisky, and crushed yellowjackets. Oh, and chicken entrails. Lots of chicken entrails.

3. How did you keepwriting this book?

See my crushed yellowjackets comment above.

4. Who is this book for, anyway?

Sleep, Little One is a book for any parent harboring a moderate dislike for their child. Also, for children intent on turbocharging their anxiety. Also, for the childless. Most of all, it’s for you.

5. Any darlings you had to kill?

No, they all made it through the gauntlet and onto the printed page.

6. What are you working on now?

A musical comedy based on the movie Midnight Express commissioned by the Phoenix Youth Theatre Company and set to debut next summer.

***

Sleep, Little One: Bedtime Tales for Tiny Troublemakers is available now from Humorist Books.

Read an Exclusive Excerpt of “Sleep, Little One” by Brian Dunn

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From Sleep, Little One: Bedtime Tales for Tiny Troublemakers by Brian Dunn, with illustrations by Lucy Mara Budd, here’s a story that won’t relieve little ones’ rightful and righteous anxiety whatsoever: “Thwart the Greedy Gut She-Devil.”

***

Bet you like candy. Most kids do. It’s fun to eat sweet things once in a while, like when you go out for ice cream after a Little League baseball game or a mediocre choir performance. Or maybe your mom doesn’t want you asking a lot of questions, like why she and her new boyfriend nap so long on the weekends with the door locked, so she bakes you your very own red velvet cake with cream cheese icing.

But one thing you can’t do is shove ice cream and cookies and candy down your gullet—that’s a fancy word for throat—until your stomach almost bursts. (You’re not a goose in a foie gras factory, after all.) If you can’t control how many sweets you eat, you have what we call a greedy gut. And if you have a greedy gut, you’ll soon meet the sworn enemy of greedy-gutted children everywhere: the Greedy Gut She-Devil.

  The Greedy Gut She-Devil does her work in the deepest depths of your bowels. If you eat too much candy, she’ll poke you in your belly—hard! Then your tummy will emit a low, long rumble. You’ll suddenly feel like you’ve ridden a roller coaster four trillion times. But this ride wasn’t built for fun.

As the sounds coming from your belly grow louder, anyone near you will think there’s an angry elephant rampaging through your stomach. Then the cramps will start. Oh, you’ve never felt such pain. It’s like your insides are twisting themselves into an origami crane. You might actually poop your pants, and everyone forever call you “Señor Poopy Pants” or “Squishy McBritches” or “Skidmarks McGee.”

Luckily, the Greedy Gut She-Devil goes away after only 24 to 48 hours. The Greedy Gut She-Devil is awful, but she serves a noble purpose: to prevent candy-loving kids from contracting type 2 diabetes so they have to inject their enormous bellies with fresh, sweet insulin. Know when to stop eating sweets and the Greedy Gut She-Devil will never have to twist your innards.

 

***

Sleep, Little One: Bedtime Tales for Tiny Troublemakers is available now from Humorist Books.

Read an Exclusive Excerpt of THE DAY JOB SURVIVAL HANDBOOK

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So. You’re about to embark on the thrilling adventure of white-collar life: endless emails, relentless calendar invites, terrible coffee, and mind games with co-workers and superiors. That’s where The Day Job Survival Handbook comes in. Having slogged through a parade of fluorescent-lit, khaki-coated, office park jobs himself, Matt Visconage of The Onion and UCB has written the guide to help you navigate those countless office absurdities and indignities.

But let’s say you can’t be saved… and you’re about to get fired. The Day Job Survival Handbook covers that contingency, too. Check out this GETTING FIRED BINGO card, an exclusive excerpt from Matt Visconage’s The Day Job Survival Handbook — just in time for Labor Day, cog!

Have the bandwidth for more The Day Job Survival Handbook? Well, circle back over to Amazon or Humorist Shop and they’ll get those papers over to you ASAP.

 

The Humorist Books Father’s Day 2025 Gift Guide

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What do dads (fathers, if you’re fancy) love? Jokes. Comedy. Silly stuff. Being dads. Their cute little interests. We happen to specialize in those very things here at Humorist Books, and we’ve got great Father’s Day gifts at the ready for most any kind of dad… like your dad!
For the history buff dad:
People of the Titanic, by Shawn Carlow
www.amazon.com/People-Titan…
For the dad who loves being a dad:
Langley Powell and the Society for the Defense of the Mundane, by Jeff Giles
www.amazon.com/Langley-Powe…
For the storytelling dad:
Walker, by Sam Pasternack
www.amazon.com/Walker-Sam-P…
For the brainy dad:
The Vowels of the Earth, by Matthew David Brozik
www.amazon.com/Vowels-Earth…
For the adventerous dad:
The Lobster Heist, by Erin McLaughlin
www.amazon.com/Lobster-Heis…
For the literary dad:
Limerature 101, by Lance Hansen
www.amazon.com/Limerature-1…
For the lone wolf dad:
Community Pool, by Keith James
www.amazon.com/Community-Po…
For the political dad:
Red Tie, Blue Tie, by Gary M. Almeter and Reese Cassard
www.amazon.com/Red-Tie-Blue…
For the old dad:
How to Be an Old Person, by Brian Boone
www.amazon.com/How-Old-Pers…
For the travel dad:
What Am I Doing Here? by Mike Reiss
www.amazon.com/What-Am-Doin…

6 Important Writerly Questions With… Shawn Carlow

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Shawn Carlow has written for a lot of shows you enjoy — Jimmy Kimmel Live!, Late Night with Jimmy Fallon — and now he’s written a collection of stories you’re going to really like. In People of the Titanic, he tells the stories of 30 doomed malcontents and oddballs who sailed on the ill-fated “Ship of Dreams” back in 1912. They weren’t all industrialists, innocents, and Leonardo DiCaprio, afterall.

While you wait for your copy of these (fictional, by the way) tales to download or to arrive in your mailbox, get to know the great Shawn Carlow, an agile author who pulled off nothing less than a high-wire comedy act.

1. Who are you? What are you doing here?

I’m a writer. I grew up in New Hampshire but I live in .LA. I’ve written a book that interplanetary travelers may one day study the pages of and conclude that the human race was worthy of extinction. Or they might laugh. I hope they laugh, understand why they’re laughing, and are even actually capable of that function.

2. Since “Where do you get your ideas?” is a terrible question, what made you want to write this book?

It went through a few iterations, each becoming longer and longer as time passed. Well over 10 years ago, it started as a standup joke that I told on stage about “the other heroes of the Titanic.” People usually know about the unfortunate captain who stayed at the helm of the ship, the band that kept playing as the ship went down, and the Unsinkable Molly Brown. I just tried imagining what other people could have been on board with them. A mime had to be there. And two brothers who ran a hot dog stand was a must.

Next, I thought of it maybe as a TV project broken into 10 segments.

And then the opportunity from Humorist Books came along to turn it into a book. Perfect.

3. How did you keep writing this book?

It wasn’t that hard. Once I’d started delving into this world, I found I enjoyed it quite a lot. Plus, I enjoy doing historical research and writing imaginative comedy.

4. Who is this book for, anyway?

People who like to laugh and who like history and like how things have changed, but also observing in a lot of ways how we’re very much the same.

And, listen, I don’t want to keep harping on the interplanetary visitors I spoke of earlier, but I would hope to have my consciousness downloaded one day so I could witness their reactions to my book in the distant future. Perhaps I could even win an interstellar prize from them that’s honest in a way that the Miss Universe Pageant is not.

5. Any darlings you had to kill?

Surprisingly few. The great majority of what I wrote is in there. Since it’s not one long novel but rather mini stories of the characters within, and occasionally how they intersect, I mostly just had to kill small bits where characters intersect and it didn’t make sense to the characters we’d already encountered.

6. What are you working on now?

A book of humorous short stories. My favorite story in the collection so far is about a young woman who brings her fiancé to visit her traditional grandmother — the kind who never stops feeding you — and it becomes a test of wills when it turns out the fiancé is a competitive eater.

Also, since that world has been so much fun for me, I’m partway through another 30 stories in the extremely imaginatively titled, More People of the Titanic.

People of the Titanic is now available in print and ebook formats. 

Read an Excerpt from Shawn Carlow’s PEOPLE OF THE TITANIC

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On April 10, 1912, the Titanic departed England, ultimately bound for America. It famously struck an iceberg along the way, and as the mighty ship went down, it took 1,500 people with it, most of them good-hearted, innocent people. But what of the jerks, losers, weirdos, and malcontents? They were also People of the Titanic. In this comical, fanciful— and completely hypothetical — depiction of life on the Titanic, Shawn Carlow (Jimmy Kimmel Live!, Late Night with Jimmy Fallon) brings to the surface 30 stories of doomed souls who sailed upon that ship of dreams. Here’s one such yarn. Fellow passengers, behold the Detmer Brothers.

***

The Detmer brothers, Andreas and Stefan, were German businessmen staying in second class who ran a hot dog stand on the First Class promenade deck of Titanic – the only sanctioned food stand on the entire vessel. If you were in first class, most of the grand ship’s food was eaten in the sumptuous café, saloon, or restaurant. A slightly less accommodating but still extravagant eating space awaited those in second; trash chutes served the third-class passengers, delivering the contents of wiped-off plates and leftover soup straight down to the lower decks, where the rabble waited eagerly with their open mouths and collection buckets.

The Detmer brothers were well known for their antics when preparing frankfurters, catching them in hot dog buns behind their backs or through their legs. Many a hungry passenger marveled at the magical dexterity with which they performed, while also fervently hoping that their meal would not be dropped upon the deck, which most times it was not. Tom Cruise was said to have studied old newsreels of the brothers when he was preparing for his role in Cocktail. 

The brothers have also been credited with inventing the tip jar — and placing money in it at the start of the day to make it seem like people were leaving money, even if they weren’t, because remember, it was mostly wealthy people up on the promenade deck.

The night of the sinking, the stand had been closed for several hours when the ship struck ice, but when their dark fate seemed certain, Stefan Detmer suggested to his brother that they serve warm hot dogs as comfort food to the worried passengers. And a few survivors later told of how, when the ship was in its final throes and tilting downward, the brothers were seen handing hot dogs to people sliding by and entreating them to “tell all your friends.” The futility in that gesture was obvious, but, still, you have to admire their gumption.

The two brothers’ bodies were never found after the sinking, but remnants of the hot dog stand washed up on a beach in Greenland and were used to make a memorial to the brothers that still stands in Germany. In Hamburg.

People of the Titanic is now available in print and ebook formats. 

6 Important Writerly Questions with…Dewey Lovett

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I got to talk with our newest literary breakout, Dewey Lovett, a very terrific stand-up comedian and author of the just as terrific Drinksgiving. What’s Drinksgiving? It’s a funny, twist-filled crime story about poor decision, unlikely friendships, disappointed relatives, small towns, beer, and the longest holiday weekend of the year made even longer. It’s the kind of novel you’ll read all at once because you’re so delighted and want to know what happens, and also the kind of book that would make a great host gift for whoever is having you over for Thanksgiving this year.

But let’s hear what Dewey has to say about it! Happy Drinksgiving, everybody!

***

1. Who are you? What are you doing here?

Hello! I’m Dewey Lovett! I am a comedian turned novelist. I’m here because telling a story this long and twisting doesn’t work on stage. I’ve always wished there were more FUNNY books in the world — and I don’t mean comedian memoirs! I want more funny fiction, so I did my best to write the book I wanted to read.

2. Since “Where do you get your ideas?” is a terrible question, what made you want to write this book?

To answer the terrible question, this idea came from a Thanksgiving morning hangover when I wondered ‘what could be the worst thing that happened last night?’ I also wondered, ‘why aren’t there more Thanksgiving comedies?’ At the time that this idea came to me, I had been studying the craft of longform fiction for a while, so I was ready to go all out!

3. How did you keep writing this book?

I stayed committed to writing this book because it was FUN to write. I looked forward to it after work. Also, my husband was super supportive and encouraged me to spend time writing and committing to the bit. He has also written funny novels so it felt like two flavors of support in one: husband-support and funny writer-support. I needed both. If I ever continued to feel unmotivated I just pictured how cool it would feel later to say I wrote a novel.

4. Who is this book for, anyway?

This book is for people who want an easy, fun, upbeat read. It might even be for people who don’t like reading but want to try it. It’s meant to be consumable like a beach read without the romance. Maybe something to be read on the plane ride home for Thanksgiving? It’s also for people who love reading. I hope this book makes its way into rural and girl power book clubs.

5. Any darlings you had to kill?

I had to murder almost the entire first draft and I’m so glad I did. The story was originally one omniscient POV. Now it’s dual first person and the pace and mystery are so much better! I had to make so many sacrifices that after a while I didn’t care anymore. Every time I cut a joke, I added a better one somewhere else. There was one darling my beta readers said I NEEDED to cut but I loved it way too much so I rearranged the plot around it. To be clear, that is deranged writer behavior! But it made the ending feel soooo good and I have no regrets.

6. What are you working on now?

On top of doing lots of stand up comedy, I am happily working on my next novel! It’s too early in the process to give a proper synopsis but it’s another comedy set in snowy Rochester, NY. Once again I look forward to working on it every day!

***

Gobble up a copy of Drinksgiving right now.

Be Amazed By This Excerpt of Keith James’ “Community Pool”

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Keith James is a straight-up Humorist Books superstar. After we published his first novel, the ambitious and hilarious Greg Maxwell’s Inferno: The Erotic, Judeo-Christian Modern-Day Odyssey No One Asked For back in 2021, we were lucky enough to receive the manuscript for his follow-up, Community Pool. Boldly original and trapising through multiple genres, sometimes all at once, it’s a profane, funny, and moving story about family, stature, identity, the nature of reality, changing course mid-stream. I can’t really do it justice here. You’re just going to have to read the first couple of chapters or so, excerpted here, and then buy the rest of this unforgettable and astonishing novel. Community Pool and Keith James, everybody!

***

ONE

Chubbuck. It’s in Idaho. It’s a city or a town, I’m not really sure. It’s on the southeast side of Idaho. Close to Utah. Kind of close to Wyoming. There was a guy who, I don’t know when, would load beets and potatoes and other shit onto a supply train that stopped around Chubbuck. But it wasn’t called Chubbuck then. It was just a place. Then in 1951, it became Chubbuck. Remember the guy who was loading shit onto the train? His last name was Chubbuck.

But who cares? It’s trains and a guy. Who cares about trains? No one. 

I don’t. I know I don’t. There are so many things I have to care about. To be stressed out about. Jesus, fuck. If you think I care about some guy throwing potatoes on a train, you are damaged. You have a brain problem. You have a priorities problem.

You know what I think? If a city gets started in 1951, I think that sucks. I think that means the city is a bad place. If people wanted it, they would have gotten it well before 1951. Every good city was started in the 1800s, minimum.

Chubbuck.

If you want to get to Chubbuck, you can drive. Take the I-15 north or south and get off when your phone tells you to get off. Or the I-86 east or west. I don’t care. I don’t know where you are coming from.

And if you are reading this and are thinking, “You know, I think I have been to Chubbuck,” you haven’t. If people say this to me, this is what I say: I say, “Oh, so you’ve been to the drive-in theater.” And they say, “Sure have.”

Bzzzt. Wrong. Thanks for playing, shithead. There is no drive-in movie theater in Chubbuck. You got one in Idaho Falls and one in Rexburg. Not Chubbuck. They might have been trying to be polite by saying they’ve been to Chubbuck for the purpose of bonding, but, I don’t know. You probably haven’t been to Chubbuck, so just say that. To be fair, I’ve never been to either drive-in movie theater. Seems like a waste of time.

I don’t know why I’m stuck on “ways to get to Chubbuck,” but you can also fly into Chubbuck. Sort of. You fly into the Pocatello Regional Airport, which is on the Chubbuck side of the 86. But that’s gonna be so expensive. That’s crazy. You are gonna get on a tiny plane in Salt Lake City and fly the worst flight of your goddamn life. For what? You cut an hour off your trip? Stop it. Fly into Salt Lake and drive up. 

But I don’t know. It all depends, you know? The roads suck in the winter and no one cares. Once you get past Utah and into Idaho, no one cares. The roads suck and fuck you. You’re gonna die and that’s your fault. You are gonna drive off the road passing Rigby. The hill is too steep coming down and if you are driving a rental, there is no way you have a feel of the brakes. You are going to be in a ditch. No one is going to stop. I might stop. I take that back. I’m not going to stop. Car in a ditch? I’m not stopping. You should have flown into Pocatello Regional Airport. I know what I said before, but you just gotta play it by ear and figure some stuff out for yourself.

But, whatever. That’s what Chubbuck is. That’s where I am. Fine. Okay.

TWO

At this point in time, I’m poolside. The pool is not mine; I mean it’s a community pool so I guess it’s mine. Cronke Community Center. There is a pool. Couple little clubhouse rooms. A little park with some trees. Whatever. Cronke Community Center is in Chubbuck.

I’m poolside, lying face up on my pool chair. Sunglasses off. I don’t even have sunglasses. If I buy sunglasses I will sit on them, honest to god. What’s the point?

It’s summer so this place is packed. Kids. Adults. Families. Single men. I don’t care. Everyone is walking, sitting, or running around and it’s a lot. You have to tune it all out. A few minutes ago it sounded like someone’s kid busted their head on the concrete, but I’m tuning that out.

Why? I’m staring at the sun. And I know it’s frowned upon to stare directly at the sun. And I’m not dumb, I get why. It hurts. The damage lingers. I should know, I’ve been doing this all summer. I pick the time when the sun is right over my pool chair, and I see how long I can go. Looking at the sun. That’s what I’m doing, that’s what I want to do.

What people won’t tell you is that you can develop a tolerance to the sun. If you work at it, you can go longer. At first, I was lasting a couple seconds. I mean at first I stared at the sun by accident. But then I thought, look, I’m going to be here all summer, might as well learn to live with the sun. Grow with it. Now I can go a full minute without having to blink or turn away. Today I go 57 seconds. It’s a setback, but you’re always going to have setbacks. Life beats you down for a bit as a way of saying it’s about to get better. That’s the god’s honest truth.

To be clear, I don’t have any personal examples of this truth. Life has kicked the shit out of me for a straight 58 years. Thorough ass beatings where every part of my spirit and physical body is destroyed. It’s caused me to develop big time mental problems that I don’t want to unpack because I’m too busy getting my shit wrecked. It’s like playing whack a mole, but every mole can whack you back. And, imagine if these moles also say terrible things about you. And let’s say you married one of these moles – I’m getting ahead of myself.

Life is going bad and it does not seem to be getting better. I have researched ways to end my life. I have developed a plan of action, and have made arrangements. But, I dunno. Sometimes you see an internet cartoon or some T-shirt and you say, “Wow, there is still a little color left on this painting. There are still dreams to be had.”

I look around the pool. I try to blink all the sun spots out of my eyes. Okay, so a kid did crack his head open. Looks like he is going to be fine. Lots of paramedics and concerned faces, but I don’t know. I’ve got a good feeling.

In my left hand I’ve got a Mike’s Hard Seltzer. Aside from looking at the sun, I’ve invested a lot of my time into the hard seltzer industry. I don’t work for a hard seltzer company or anything. No, I just spend a lot of time at the gas station looking at hard seltzers. Hours. Where did they come from?

I’m a Mike’s Hard Seltzer guy. I’ve had every seltzer available and Mike’s just does it right. As good as you can, which is not great, but it’s the best. I know I said internet cartoons and T-shirts keep me off the edge, but I should also tip my cap to alcohol. 

I’m on my eighth hard seltzer. Again, it’s a hot day. You have to drink these things fast or else the can gets hot and then you’ve got a hot seltzer. If you are drinking hot seltzers you have a problem. You have a brain problem. Seltzer has to be cold. The bubbles need to be painful and the coldness plays against the pain of the bubbles. Fire and Ice. If you have a hot seltzer, there is no relief. You’re just being stupid.

I try to limit my movement on the chair because my stomach hurts from the seltzers. It’s a very specific kind of hurt I only get from drinking seltzers. I don’t think we were supposed to make seltzers hard. We shouldn’t do everything we can do, if that makes sense. I love them, though.

I go into a little trance watching the sun reflect off the surface of the pool. In your head you might imagine a sparkle of light on the water’s surface, but you would be wrong. Don’t get ahead of yourself. No, the pool has got a dull thickness to it. The pool is a publicly-owned property. We do town votes on chlorine levels in public pools. Never enough chlorine. Chlorine can’t keep up with the sunscreen and piss and you’d be surprised — I was surprised — leaked breast milk. I’ve asked around on the internet and apparently its totally normal for a woman to leak at a pool. Kids screaming, crying. Who screams and cries? Babies. So yeah, we’re leaking. And there are a lot of mothers at this pool. 

If you came to me with decent odds that there is more breast milk than piss in this pool right now, I don’t know. God. I don’t know. I’d probably turn you down, but I’d think about it.

I trace the water up to where it meets the concrete edge and find myself in the crosshairs of my son Gabe’s big fat tits, wrapped up tight in a wet Hard Rock Café shirt he borrowed from his grandmother. Gabe is ten feet away from the edge of my pool chair in the shallow end. He’s bobbing up and down and when his tits get near the water they float a little. The Hard Rock Café shirt puffs out when he dips down, but sucks against his breasts when he comes back up. He dips and rocks and contorts his body so that maybe his tits will stop bobbing like tugboats, but he can’t help it. It’s physics. Gabe is trying to fight the laws of nature. It’s a fucked up sight.

Gabe is my youngest child. He is a teenager. Puberty. He’s in his awkward years and I’m starting to think they are all going to be awkward.

Gabe’s tits make him feel bad. He doesn’t like showing them, so if we’re at a place like the pool he wears a T-shirt to cover them up. I tell him, “That’s the problem. You’re not hiding these tits, you’re teasing them.” No one in my house agrees with me. I actually have no idea what my wife thinks. She’s a pretty hands-off parent. No knock on her. Just reality. 

My daughter Samantha jumps down my throat. Big time. She says that I’m not being body positive even though it is actually the opposite. I’m actually the most body positive. I’m the one saying that my son should show his tits to the world. All of Chubbuck knows that Gabe has a set of cans. Boobs. Let’s see them! 

When I say this? Fireworks. I am Hitler. “Gabe doesn’t have to show his body to anyone! His relationship with his own body is most important,” Samantha says. Sure. Fine. But settle down, tough guy. All I know is that when I walk into a locker room, I am naked before I am remotely close to my locker. I am nude, holding a newspaper, trying to make small talk. Why? Because who cares? It’s a body. We all have one. My body is nothing to brag about. I have a dick like a piece of Easter candy. I am uncircumcised, and I should have been. Someone should have intervened. It’s terrible. And I got fucked up pubic hair. But guess what? I’m still here. I’m not dead. 

The problem is that Gabe is making this a thing of mystery. Mystery gets attention. And you know, it’s strange because – well I should probably clear something up because it could be a point of confusion: Gabe is not fat. I mean, he’s not winning any bodybuilding contests but he’s not in any health danger either. It’s just, I dunno, the guy is busty. I’m not saying anyone should do this, but if you did a slow camera pan on Gabe’s body, starting from the ankles and moving up his body, by the time you got to his breasts, a record would scratch. I’ve said this to Gabe and he has taken it poorly, but he shouldn’t. It’s more like, hey, you have one part of you that is strange and bad. It’s not all bad. I don’t know. There is a nuance to this conversation that I know is required, but I just don’t have it. It’s like, some pitchers have a curveball, some don’t. Me? I am not a pitcher.

But here’s the major issue with Gabe’s tits and just Gabe in general. We are in a time crunch. This is Gabe’s last summer before high school. It’s going to be rough. He has no confidence, he’s got this curvy body, he still uses his finger to read books, and I think he’s gonna get the living shit beaten out of him. If I was Gabe’s age and we went to the same high school — it’s tough because he’s my son and I love him — but I think I’d beat him until both my hands were broken. And I was no big time jock. I was no Emilio Estevez. But Gabe would have been a low enough bar to clear. I would have seen him as someone that, hey, maybe I publicly beat him and who knows? Maybe I go one rung higher on the social ladder. You know? A lot of people are going to see him and think that.

Also, and I think it’s something you have to account for…maybe it’s low probability/high-risk, but could Gabe’s tits set off some type of hormone infused reaction from his peers? Like, you get some bully who gets a couple punches on Gabe, Gabe’s tits I don’t know, jiggle or something? Then what? What kind of fight is this? I just think, not good. Not good for Gabe.

Part of the issue is that he doesn’t have a pack. A crew. A similar species group. I watch a lot of shows where wild animals die. I got these new Bluetooth headphones set up and I go full volume on these wild animal shows. I also watch violent street fights, but the wild animal stuff relates more to Gabe. Sometimes an animal will survive only because their pack is big enough that the predator says, “If I go in there I am going to get my ass beat,” or the pack is so big that sheer odds alone are in a single animal’s favor to survive.

Gabe doesn’t have that. He is not a jock. You would think he is a nerd, but he can’t make nerd friends because he is kind of simple. Not a full blown dum-dum. Not at all. Just like, when he gets older, he is gonna need a job where they give him a list, or write down what he is supposed to do on a whiteboard. So he is not going to have that nerd pack. 

He has some weirdo aspects to him, so maybe he gets a weirdo pack, but that’s always a gamble. He’s always on Amazon buying camo and the camo never fits on his love handles right so it’s a major waste of money. 

If he’s not on Amazon he’s on YouTube just watching stuff. And he’s got his mouth open for breathing. Watching nonsense.

He — and I say this with love and also disappointment — is a dork. Just a big dork. And dorks don’t have packs. They fly solo. Breaks my heart but also makes me upset with him because I feel like he has something to do with this. He could take that shirt off and be fat tits guy for a couple hours and then we’d all move on. He would just be Gabe, a guy who happens to have fat tits. But it’s inhabited him. He is fat tits guy forever.

But you should notice when I said “we” as in “we are in a time crunch.” Gabe’s tits are a “we” issue. I’m his dad. I want to help. And unlike my wife, I’m a hands-on kind of parent.

So. What’s the plan? We go to the pool. Every day. We get comfortable with our bodies in public. We show the world that we don’t hide from anything. And, we do this as a family. Everyone goes to the pool. No excuses. Every day.

How is the plan going? Not great. Technically, everyone is going. Is it to help Gabe discover his body? No. I will say that with confidence. Everyone is going to the pool for their own reasons. Is Gabe getting comfortable with his body? No. Shirt never comes off. Sometimes there are two shirts. One time he tried to go in the pool wearing a sweatshirt and jeans and I had to get a little stern with him.

But whatever. We go every day. Same car. All together. Pool opens at 10 a.m. We get there at 9:50. Drives everyone crazy. But we have one car, I drive, and I have a very legitimate reason for getting to the pool 10 minutes early.

What are the reasons? Okay. We need five pool chairs. There are five of us. Names and my personal rankings come later, but there are five of us. One chair per person. I’m not sharing my pool chair, and I don’t expect anyone in my family to share. Do I expect anyone to use the chair at all times? Of course not. I use my chair almost at all times, but that’s because I feel a need to guard the other chairs. The other four don’t really use their chairs, but I can only imagine that one time I am not guarding their chairs, and they want a chair and it has been taken? They would make sure that my day was ruined.

Next, I need a spot that is NOT in the direct line of sight of BOTH the lifeguard and the towel kid. I’m drinking alcohol. Can’t drink alcohol at the pool. I know a lot of people are sneaking their alcohol inside using water bottles or Camelbacks, but I’m drinking hard seltzer. If you take the seltzer out of the can and transfer it to a water bottle it loses the initial bubbles. That’s why you drink seltzer! So I have to drink from the can and I need to hide the can. If I get my alcohol taken away from me, I’ll just go home. If I can’t drink at the pool what is the point?

It’s a lot of pressure on me. Everyone has said they don’t need a chair if it means we can leave a few hours later, but I don’t think they mean that. I think they are lying. I think they are all lying to me.

Everyone has to be in the car at 9:30 a.m. Everyone consists of my wife Michelle, Gabe, my daughter Samantha, and our neighbor’s kid, Ethan. Nobody ever asks, but I can rank them, and I keep the rankings updated.

Dive on in to the Community Pool right here.