University of Central Florida STARS Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2004-2019 2014 A Look to Burst the Brightest Neon Hearts: Attempts Eric Fershtman University of Central Florida Part of the Creative Writing Commons Find similar works at: https://stars.library.ucf.edu/etd University of Central Florida Libraries http://library.ucf.edu This Masters Thesis (Open Access) is brought to you for free and open access by STARS. It has been accepted for inclusion in Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2004-2019 by an authorized administrator of STARS. For more information, please contact [email protected]. STARS Citation Fershtman, Eric, "A Look to Burst the Brightest Neon Hearts: Attempts" (2014). Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2004-2019. 4669. https://stars.library.ucf.edu/etd/4669 A LOOK TO BURST THE BRIGHTEST NEON HEARTS: ATTEMPTS by ERIC FERSHTMAN BA, University of Central Florida, 2009 A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in the Department of English in the College of Arts and Humanities at the University of Central Florida Orlando, Florida Fall Term 2014 © 2014 Eric Fershtman ii ABSTRACT A Look to Burst the Brightest Neon Hearts is an inquiry, via constellation of stories diffuse in structure and subject matter, into the various (and really weird) phenomena comprising contemporary American existence. Cumulatively, the stories seek to: (1) kick up, like bottom feeders searching biogenous sediment, an underlying value system, and (2) explore how language both breastfeeds and like, weans this value system—e.g., what dark matter is it that tethers bromances to reality TV? Quantum mechanics to pop music? How can a country be responsible for both the world’s highest incarceration rates, and OKCupid1? These stories also explore various American conceptions and embodiments of love, plotting out a strange attractor2 of cultural reflection and refraction. 1 Created by the dudes, Harvard men all, responsible for SparkNotes—SparkNotes, people! how’s it happen that you go from study guides to online dating? what’s the guiding principle? and like, why’s the Author’s profile so neglected? What’s he doing wrong? (clears throat) Where were we? Oh. Yes. OK. SparkNotes was itself later sold to Barnes and Noble. It’s this we’re driving at. This sort of thing, teensy startups (run actually by members of elite institutions) that sell out for big bucks, is a lovely example of a distortion of that classically American ideal of class mobility, and “pulling oneself up by one’s own bootstraps.” And too, when you consider the product, the fact that SparkNotes is most often used by high school/college students too lazy to read the actual book that the SparkNotes is meant to supplement, you might think about the complex interplay between the contemporary culture of convenience (the Author’s dependence on Wikipedia for ALL of the above a pretty concrete case-in-point) and the country’s deeply rooted Calvinist heritage. Or, you know, whatever. 2 Culture’s a dynamical—constantly morphing; effluviating variables like it’s consumed some rancid crabmeat—system. It’s just got to be significant that strange attractors, those structures which describe the chaotic, or seemingly randomized, behavior of dynamical systems, are often Möbius-like, twisting and weird but unbroken loops. iii “You’re probably doing your own thing right now. Not really sure where you’re going but doing all the things you need to to cover all the bases. This is good, don’t slip up, there, but remember to enjoy the ride. Don’t go so fast that you missed the gains of the journey once you’ve gotten to your destination.”3 —L Jahi James, October 28, 1988 – July 2, 2011 3 From a handwritten note addressed to himself, unearthed five months after his death. iv ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Where O where to begin! Family? OK! Parents, sister, little brother, step-siblings: Thank you for allowing the occasionally irritating and oft-silent heterophenomenonological existence of a certain pale and lanky Author to impose on your own respective existences! This dense hot collection of atoms is forever grateful! DWL members, Madison Bernath, Brendon Barnes, Sean Ironman, Dianne Richardson, Allie Pinkerton, Nick Rupert: you’re like, the absolute brightest constellation, winking pulsars in the sky-fabric, twerking electrons on the quantum grid, navigating with the Author—and more often than not tugging him along—the cosmic wash of this program! And to Jamie Poissant, Terry Thaxton, Jocelyn Bartkevicius, thank you thank you thank you for not just putting up with the bullshit and baggage, with moods and neuroses and questions and weird emails and more than occasional awkwardness, but, for real, for believing in the work here attempted. Lou Mindar, for being, or for so consistently pretending to be, the fella this indecisive Author would like to be someday, the standard candle by which the light from distant galaxies is measured. Andrew Forbes: thank you for looking at some of these stories when they were just so much primordial stew. If all you people were somehow constituted in a smartphone/tablet app, the Author would with great zeal head for Best Buy this instant and purchase a smartphone/tablet on credit (or maybe a monthly payment plan, if that’s an option) and download you so hard! v TABLE OF CONTENTS DUMPSTERS ................................................................................................................................. 1 ARE YOU FROM/ARE WE? ...................................................................................................... 13 BEFORE THE HURRICANE CAME AND RIPPED US ALL APART .................................... 35 BRUCE’S LIFE ............................................................................................................................ 47 GRIEF #1 ...................................................................................................................................... 87 DESOLATION ROW ................................................................................................................... 89 MAJESTIC CREATURES ......................................................................................................... 110 A LOOK TO BURST THE BRIGHTEST NEON HEARTS ..................................................... 134 GRIEF #2 .................................................................................................................................... 168 LITTLE SUNS ............................................................................................................................ 175 GRIEF #3 .................................................................................................................................... 201 SMART ART .............................................................................................................................. 209 LOOKING FOR LANDON TRUJILLO .................................................................................... 420 APPENDIX: READING LIST ................................................................................................... 458 vi Our heads, they pound! vii Our hearts, they ache! viii Shine a light, kid. ix DUMPSTERS —On 18th somewhere I don’t know. Front of 693 sorta near Atlantic but going the other direction. The route’s toward Commercial. —693’s the one you worked at? Well what time was it? I heard things we’ll just say it like that, quote-unquote things about that store. —What things? —So this was early in the morning you said? You said you and Ronnie and Bugballs did the overnight ahead of inventory? —You just heard me say it. I just said that right here, right in front of you. Hey. What are you writing. And like what things about 693. —I’m writing your story down. You said it was a weird thing. —What things about 693? Jesus why is this like pulling teeth with you? —693. Only that everybody’s fucking everybody. Only that somebody’s fiancée fucked that same somebody’s employee in the bathroom in the back by Produce. Only that you all can’t get your shit together. That every, well the past few inventories you all’ve been nearly a hundred grand off. It’s a dead-end store I guess. —Yeah. —Yeah? What do you mean yeah? —Fuck what do you think what do I mean ‘yeah’? I mean you’re right. I mean it’s shit. Yeah. Can I get back to the story or…? 1 —You’re the one who. —The bus. Early morning to set the scene. Think about the sun in the morning like that. Like it’s just like barely you know? Like it’s soft. Anyway there were two people on it when I got on, a dude dressed like the Grim Reaper with a six-pack in his lap and— —What’s the six-pack of? You remember? —I don’t know it’s that important? Say Magic Hat. Say Number Nine. You need a pen? No you know actually say Pabst Blue Ribbon. —This one’s…yeah. This one’s done I think. Thanks. PBR you said? The philosopher’s beer. Wittgenstein of beers. —Other person on the bus is a girl, a teenager, probably fifteen sixteen. The fuck Wittgenstein of beer?...The girl looked ’bout it. Small jean skirt where her legs were basically popping out of it, and a white top that stopped a few inches short of her belly button, and that you could see she was wearing a pink-push up bra through it. Her tits all pushed together. Little stud in her belly button too. —… —What are you writing. —Keep going, I’m listening. —I wanna see what you got so far. How you put it. —Just some notes. You’ll see when it’s done. —Just let me see let me look…‘soft and innocent