Amy Stuber’s flash fiction story “I’m on the Side of the Wildebeest” distills a familiar modern dilemma into a crystallized moment. On a road trip, a mother contemplates a very different childhood for her kids than the one she had—one in which technology, the constant deluge of information, and the threat to the planet create anxieties that are harder to escape. But despite these anxieties (or maybe because of them) we feel the sweet gratitude for a moment that is good, one we know will become a memory that warms her for the rest of her life. It’s like bearing witness to the creation of your own memories, regardless of the time. We had a lovely discussion with Amy about storytelling and parenting in the times we’re in.
Erin McReynolds: I love that you’ve captured a moment that could have happened at any time since the invention of the car, a family road trip, but the family is contending with very modern anxieties: identity theft, climate change, even a world-ending super volcano. What hopes do you have for this particular family?
Amy Stuber: The characters in this story are very much based on my family. When my kids were little, I got carried away with thinking of these “big futures” for them: ivy league, book deals, scientific discoveries, that kind of thing. Now I’m a little more focused on them finding a kind of steady or at least recurring peace and happiness that’s not reliant on mutable things (appearance, climate stasis), moments of either peace or abandon: like wanting the daughter to smoke and drink in a foreign city, wanting both kids to have those “fuck it, things are just good right now” moments. Moments to sort of knit together and carry around.
This story started with me fixating on the idea of my daughter becoming a teenager as I approach fifty and all the weirdness that swirled around aging for both of us. In particular, I was obsessing a little about how women are so often trained to define themselves based on others’ reactions to the superficial: do we look good enough, are people responding to us in the right way, are we getting enough attention, etc. And as I was trying to come to terms with what that entails as I age, there was my daughter: just on the edge of all of that, just starting to receive that gaze.
I was simultaneously angry with myself for caring about the loss of some of that attention for me and fearful for my daughter—hoping so much that she would navigate all of that better than I had in my teens and twenties and hoping that the world had evolved enough to see her as more than an object. This was right in the midst of the Kavanaugh hearings, and I’m sure that spurred some of this as well.
That is all at the core of this story for me, and the identity theft and climate change kind of made sense in that sphere of ideas because all of those things are about losing a version of yourself or a place and not having control over any of it, about recognizing that but finding bits of escapism or okay-ness where you can.
EM: The narrator tells us, “There’s definitely a cruelty to the fact that my children’s childhood is this doomsday prophecy of climate change, micro-greens, ugly hybrids, and Trump, while mine was bell-bottoms, Twinkies, skateboarding, Soul Train, and only a shadowy sideline concern about possible nuclear war.” I remember movies and pop songs were filled with references to nuclear war, plus pollution, etc. so these threats were always there, but in this fantasy, trivial sort of way that, especially if you were a kid, made them exactly that: “a shadowy sideline concern.” As a parent and someone who’s worked in education, do you think the way modern kids demonstrate and deal with these anxieties is different from the way we did?
AS: I think the key difference, and you hear this all the time, is just the increased access to information. My son checks the news app every day multiple times. I had to remove that news app from my daughter’s phone for a while because it was stressing her out so much. There’s this hypervigilance that comes with the constant alerts and rapid stream of information, and I think that creates a sense of anxiety for all of us, kids especially.
When I was in my early twenties, pre- everyone having a cell phone, I used to take these really long bike rides out in the country, and there was just this amazing luxury to that time away from all reachability and contact. We don’t have that now. So, yes, while “99 Luftballoons” and The Day After and lines at the gas station loomed over my childhood, there were also some zones of separation from reality that many kids could create (depending, of course, on circumstance, and I know this construct relies on a certain level of privilege).
I’m not trying to do some nostalgic “back in my day” thing, but I do wish my kids had that kind of respite and space and detachment from the flow of information. But for them there will never be a world in which they will not think “Oh, I can just Google that.” Also, while they are so fortunate in many ways, I feel incredibly sorry for them growing up with these utter doomsday scenarios about what the world will look like in twenty or fifty years and a current President who is too ignorant to even acknowledge this as a threat.
I’m happy to be loosely part of the group of people making stuff that might give someone out there a minute of “yes, I feel like that sometimes, too.”
EM: Yeah, you can see artists trying to work through those very real threats in the resurgence of speculative fiction and sci-fi centered around climate change—what exactly might happen, and who will we be afterward? On that note, what are you responding to most often in your stories?
AS: Motherhood did something weird to me. I guess it does to everyone, but my version was this: I went from being a somewhat self-destructive risk-taker to someone far more fearful and reticent. And the general angst and worry of parenting against the backdrop of our current climate situation is entirely terrifying, so I usually don’t feel the need to project into some post-climate-catastrophe future to create tension. I feel like we’re there already in a lot of ways. We’re seeing situations right now that are affecting where people can/should live and whether people have access to the resources they need.
So while there’s a lot of post-apocalyptic “cli-fi” that I like as a reader (Edan Lepucki’s California is the first thing that comes to mind), that future version of things is not really where my mind goes. I’m often trying to create something beautiful and resonant but also a tiny bit escapist.
In real life, I like humor a lot and gravitate toward odd, funny people, and I’m trying to get that part of myself and life a little more into my writing lately, because I think we need an antidote to all this worry—but it’s challenging!
EM: What are you thinking about lately?
AS: I hope it doesn’t sound cliché to say so, but I’m thinking a lot about representation. I know the publishing world still has a long way to go, but it’s changed so much for the better in the last thirty years. It’s amazing to see writers of color and LGBTQ writers being so deservedly amplified. I mean, I know there are still the Dan Mallory stories where you think “only a white man could get away with that,” but then there’s Bryan Washington and Tyrese Coleman and Tommy Orange and Paige Lewis (I kind of hate starting to list writers because then I will look back at this and think “what about ____?!?” so I’ll stop there). But I love getting on Twitter and just seeing how things are opening up and broadening, and I think this is often best represented in the world of literary magazines, especially some of the smaller ones, where things are super current and less dependent on mass market sales.
I’m also very into photography and music and have often used photos and songs as prompts both as a teacher and in my own work. I love coming upon a photographer or musician whose work I don’t know and then letting an image or a song or an album filter into or inform a story. Most of my stories grow out of repeat listens to particular songs or albums. Oh and I love TV. That’s not very literary, but it’s true—everything from shit shows like The Bachelor to good ones like Better Things. And what I watch sometimes informs my work—in terms of ideas and settings—sometimes almost as much as what I read.
EM: TV is so good right now! I love Better Things but I can’t decide if [Pamela Adlon’s character] Sam is raising strong, confident young women or total narcissists—they’re so awful to her, I find myself yelling at the TV. What’s your take, as the mother of a teenage girl?
AS: My daughter would kill me for saying this, but I jokingly/lovingly call her Max (the eldest daughter on Better Things) sometimes, like if she’s yelling at me in a certain kind of way. The way Sam’s kids act kind of speaks to how many of us parent these days: a little too involved, a little boundary-less—really different from how I was parented (like the “throw them in the playpen while we smoke and clean and drink coffee” method). So I totally relate to Sam and to the kids. They are kind of awful sometimes but also—to me, at least—sympathetic and very much reflections of the time and place where they live. And side note: why the fuck has it taken so long for there to be a nuanced, believable, funny, sad, everything woman this age on TV?
EM: I know! I wish Sam had been on TV when I was a way more malleable twentysomething in need of a role model; she’s harder to mimic now that I’m full-on neurotic. What are you working on at the moment?
AS: I’m always trying to write a novel, but I just don’t know if my brain and attention span work that way. I’m pretty easily distracted. But I am trying to do a novel based on a story I published in Copper Nickel last year—it’s a multi-generational thing, and if I describe it I’m afraid it will sound generic, so I won’t.
I have a completed collection of stories that I’ve sent out to small presses this year, and I’m also working on a collection where each story is inspired by either an author or musician who has just made me think a lot over the years. (I recently published one of the pieces, “Edward Abbey Walks into a Bar,” in Joyland, and “Dear Joy Williams,” which was in Split Lip’s second print issue in March.)
EM: I loved “Dear Joy Williams”! In your post about that story you write “I was coming out of a few non-writing years and the mindfuck of parenting young children when I started rereading all of her books in some attempt to crack myself back open.” I relate to that so much; when I am in a non-writing spell, I crack myself back open with Amy Hempel.
AS: Thank you, and oooh! Amy Hempel is one of my all-time favorites. Hempel and Jayne Ann Phillips seem kind of like the mothers of flash fiction. I just read Hempel’s new collection, and the title story “Sing to Me” accomplishes a remarkable amount in a few hundred pretty simple words.
EM: Do you mind if I ask if and how you make a living while being an artist? How does the balance work for you?
AS: I work full-time in education administration, and I’ve had this same job in slightly altered forms since 2002. As far as writing goes, working full-time means I write during little five-minute breaks here and there or on weekends or in the evenings or in Notes on my phone while I’m taking a walk (that’s actually the way I’ve started nearly every story I’ve written in the last year).
Like almost every writer I know, I’d love to be able to just write in long stretches on weekdays, but that does not happen. I feel pretty lucky to have a full-time job that allows me a little flexibility. I will say that it took me a solid ten years after having kids to find the head space to even think about writing while also working full-time.
I also went through a long period where every time I started writing, I would just think “who cares?” And then I slowly started to get back to being able to focus and commit to different stories. Last year I felt this intense push to produce and publish so I was very manic about all of it, and it was exhausting. This year, my goal is to read more, take more in, and try to be sure writing actually feels enjoyable and I don’t feel this clock-ticking panic about “success.”
EM: I hear you. I’m in an awful, lingering “who cares?” period right now. It’s hard—when you’re bombarded with crazy, intolerable headlines all day, every day—to follow an idea as simple as a mother trying to take in a complete moment with her family on a road trip. And yet it’s just as important, isn’t it, telling small, true stories about the sweetness and sorrow of being human?
AS: Maybe I’m wrong to make this about gender, but do people who identify as female tend to worry about this more? I think “who cares” comes from a place of “do I matter enough” and “is my story worth telling,” and historically, there’s definitely been a hierarchy in terms of what voices get the page space. But, yeah, there’s also this sense of “the world is burning, and we have monsters in control, so why am I writing a short story?” It seems really self-involved and maybe like not the best use of time [but] I feel kind of compelled to keep writing, even if doing so sometimes feels silly and vain.
I do think art provides respite for people, and, particularly for people who’ve felt marginalized, seeing something familiar on the page can be absolutely life-giving. I’m not lumping myself into that or trying to claim that in any way, but I’m happy to be loosely part of the larger group of people making stuff that might give someone out there a minute of “yes, I feel like that sometimes, too.”
I push myself past the “who cares” a lot by trying to stop thinking about what I’m going to do with what I write and [instead] write because it often makes me feel better. I’ve struggled with anxiety, depression, and addiction, and writing has been the one thing to take me out of my head or make sense of whatever I can’t seem to escape in my brain. Even if it’s sometimes frivolous, it’s also been good for me. There’s really nothing like being right in the middle of composing something you feel truly excited about.
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Amy Stuber’s fiction has appeared in The New England Review, Ploughshares, The Colorado Review, Copper Nickel, West Branch, Hobart, and others. She has new work forthcoming in 2019 in J Journal, Joyland, Pithead Chapel, Hobart, Split Lip, and Wigleaf. She serves as a flash fiction reader for Split Lip and works by day in education administration. Find her on Twitter at amy_stuber_ or online at www.amystuber.com.