Worst. Person. Ever. (32 page)
“Okay, okay. Probably not a bad idea, even if it does make me look like a Gumby.”
“What’s a Gumby?” asked Emma.
“Just a character from an old TV show, sweetie,” said Fi. “But don’t worry, you’ll never have to watch it, or any other TV show, because TV is crap and the people in it are dreadful and I will work myself to the bone to ensure that both you and Kyle find careers as far away from TV as is possible within the constraints of civilization.”
“Okay, Mum, sounds reasonable.”
“Speaking of civilization, Raymond,” said Fi, “you’ll be happy to hear the nuclear crisis is over.”
“It is?”
“And not one city blown up in the end.”
“Great.” I couldn’t find the energy to muster any vitriol for my idiot species.
Emma piped up, “Shall we have some sandwiches now, Mum?”
“Excellent idea, Emma. Get them out of the cooler.”
Emma opened the cooler, removed the sandwiches and let out a small gasp.
“What is it, Emma?”
“Oh, Mum. I forgot to cut the crusts off. I’m terribly, terribly sorry.”
“No problem, sweetie. Hand them to your father. Kyle, give your father back the red spoony-knifey thingy.”
“Yes, Mum.”
“Raymond, please use your red plastic thingy and cut the crusts off the sandwiches.”
I looked at her and she looked at me.
Fucking hell.
“Yes, Mother.” And so I trimmed off the crusts.
Douglas Coupland
(pronounced KOHP-lend) (born December 30, 1961) is a Canadian writer, designer and visual artist. His first novel was the 1991 international bestseller
Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture.
He has published fourteen novels, two collections of short stories, seven non-fiction books and a number of dramatic and comedic works for stage, film and TV. In June 2014, Coupland will have his first solo exhibition at the Vancouver Art Gallery, after which the exhibition will tour internationally.
Coupland is left-handed, is allergic to sulfa antibiotics and has never purchased anything from a duty-free store or eaten a peanut butter sandwich. Being born on the second-last day of the year, Coupland was always the youngest in his school classes, and until he turned thirty he was painfully skinny, which is why there are so few photos of him between the ages of eighteen and thirty. He now looks back on those few photos that exist and wishes he’d taken more, as he was, for a short window of time in the mid-1980s, technically hot.
Does he have any regrets about his twenties? Oh sure, everyone does. Coupland wishes he hadn’t worried so much and had relaxed a little. But, like most people with this mindset, he believes that his life would have gone nowhere had he not worried so much, and that it was the worrying itself that got him out into the world, hustling his ass and doing stuff. Coupland is quite certain, however, that he had a protective coating of youthful cluelessness that allowed him to make life decisions that, upon mature reflection, are utterly horrifying. For example, attending art school and then, in the few years afterwards, having made a modest go of things in the visual world, discovering writing and deciding to become a writer. Talk about a surefire career path! And yet it all kind of worked out in the end, and we must thank nature specifically for loaning us all a protective coating of cluelessness in our youth.