I'm Not Scared of You or Anything Read online

  JPF: You spied on me?

  MOM: No. I found the evidence after you moved out.

  JPF: So you never spied on me?

  MOM: No. Never.

  JPF: Well, pot was just the tip of the iceberg. That’s typical kid stuff.

  MOM: Oh, I know.

  JPF: You were my ninth grade Sex-Ed teacher. This was a particularly difficult experience for me and I imagine for you also. How was I as a student? I seem to recall not being particularly focused.

  MOM: You were a pudgy, pubescent pain in the butt. You sat in the front and raised your hand wildly like Horshack from Welcome Back, Kotter and tried to answer every question: “Mom! I know! I know!” Also, your notebooks were in total disarray. You lacked focus.

  JPF: I don’t remember that. I remember being mortified and wanting it to end.

  MOM: Oh, yes. The hardest part for me was trying to ignore you. You wanted to show everyone that you knew everything about the subject. (Laughter.)

  JPF: What? Wow. I guess I blocked that out. For the most part I was so shy in high school. There was one English teacher (I won’t name names) who didn’t think I was particularly bright or creative. I was daydreaming all the time and he was kind of mean to me. Do you remember him?

  MOM: I know exactly who you are talking about. His inability to encourage you and see your talent was a symptom of his own lack of knowledge and sensitivity. What would he say now about your success, I wonder.

  JPF: Some of my books deal with weird and very “adult” things. Does this annoy you?

  MOM: Yes. Lots of your writing can be funny or poignant. But I cannot read some parts because we are spiritually quite different. And I have a different morality. I suppose that’s one other way you can do better.

  JPF: One of the reasons I consider you and Dad to be my heroes is that you were always looking out for the outsiders and making sure they felt less alone. I still remember that all the teenagers in Transcona used to call you “Mom.” So thank you for setting that example for me. I love you.

  MOM: Thanks, Jonny. Love you too!

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  “I’m Not Scared of You or Anything” appeared in Broken Pencil.

  “The Parable of Bryan Dong” appeared in Joyland.

  “When It Got a Little Cold” appeared in The National Post.

  “Jon Paul Fiorentino Interviews His Mother” appeared in The National Post.

  Thanks to Mike Spry, Ian Orti, Darren Bifford, David McGimpsey, Jessica Rose Marcotte, Tyler Morency, Marisa Grizenko, Adam Seward, Heather O’Neill, Jennifer Lambert, Mark Medley, Hal Niedzviecki, Tara Flanagan, Shazia Hafiz Ramji, Karen Green, and my parents.

  Special thanks to Maryanna Hardy and Brian Kaufman.

  Very special thanks to Lilly Fiorentino.

  This book is dedicated to The Thread.

  ABOUT THIS BOOK

  Jon Paul Fiorentino (author) is the author of Needs Improvement (Coach House Books), and the novel Stripmalling, which was short-listed for the Paragraphe Hugh MacLennan Prize for Fiction, and five poetry collections, including The Theory of the Loser Class, which was short-listed for the A.M. Klein Prize, and Indexical Elegies which won the 2009 CBC Book Club “Bookie” Award for Best Book of Poetry. He has written for The National Post, Walrus, Maisonneuve, subTerrain, The Huffington Post, and numerous other publications. He lives in Montreal, where he teaches Creative Writing at Concordia University and is the editor-in-chief of Matrix magazine.

  Maryanna Hardy (illustrator) has worked as an artist, illustrator and screen printer and has published her work in publications nationally and internationally. She has designed countless gig posters and chapbooks of her drawings, built and ran a screen–printing shop in Montreal, and has painted public murals in Montreal and Toronto. She has most recently exhibited her work through Gallery Pangee and Gallery Youn in Montreal. In 2009 and 2010 she collaborated with the ypf Collective on their large-scale installation at the Osheaga International Music Festival in Montreal. In November 2010, she published a book of her drawings with Conundrum Press called So I’ve Been Told. The book was short-listed for Montreal Expozine’s 2010 Best Canadian Book and was also short-listed for a Doug Wright award for Best Avant-Garde Comic Book. She lives in Montreal.