The reporter, he’s chomping at the bit to do this great story with the psychic kid. I had to figure a way out of it because I figured the local magicians would bust me on it and make me a fraud. Like magicians do. Magicians, they busted Uri Geller for doing it. They’ll bust me too. If it’s in the paper, you can bet someone’s going to come forward and go, “That’s bullshit.”
This is how I got out of it. I told my mom that I wanted to be a normal kid. I didn’t want to be a freak at school. I just wanted to be a normal kid. I didn’t want everyone looking at me like I was weird. She bought it. They all bought it. Nobody did the story, but it leaked. This is the good part. It leaked out and I didn’t get that press, which I didn’t want, but everyone thought I was mysterious. I got mad pussy my senior year. I was the Man Who Fell to Earth. If a chick thinks that you can read her mind or anything like that, you’re in.
If I was with a girl, when they’d leave the room, I’d go through their purse, take their license out, get their birth date, know their zodiac sign, I have all the details. Would put it back fast in their purse. They come back and we’d be doing lines and all that. Let me touch your forehead for a minute. Boom! You’re a Virgo.
JON GLAZER—COMEDIAN, WRITER, ACTOR
I was probably eight when my parents got divorced. I have vague memories of it, but I remember just crying and sitting on the steps and just being really upset and yelling, but I don’t remember the moment. It’s just all vague, but I do remember it being upsetting.
My stepdad told me about when he and my mom announced they were getting married. I was in high school. He said he was actually very impressed about how I handled it. They just told me they were getting married. I remember those first moments. I was probably fourteen and he said I just sat there quietly, just took it in. Got up from the table, went upstairs. Put on shorts and a T-shirt and my running shoes and just went jogging, but it wasn’t like I could go running somewhere and then come back. We lived in this apartment complex that had a loop. They told me they were getting married and then I just left and they watched me run laps. He said he was very impressed about how I was handling this and how I was dealing with it.
I remember when my dad told me he was getting remarried the first time, I was in the sixth grade and I was taking violin lessons and he picked me up. My mom always picked me up, so right away I’m like, “All right, okay. Something’s not right.” And then, “Hey, I thought we’d go get a bite to eat. Anywhere you want to go.” I was like, “All right, what the fuck is going on?” There was a sub shop that I liked right across the street. It was more about let’s just go there. It wasn’t like I was going to say, “Oh great, let’s go to this great place.” I just knew something was up.
We went there, but it wasn’t a sit-down place. We get these sandwiches and just go sit in his car in the parking lot. It’s facing the school across the street and I’m just sitting there very tight, eating my sub, and it’s right next to me, tight to my chest, and I felt like I knew what was coming. I’m trying to think about what is going on. I’m like, “Oh, I think I know what’s about to happen.” We’re sitting there and quietly eating. He’s like, “Hey, so I’ve got some news for you. Just wanted to let you know that Shelly and I decided to get married.” I can just feel my body just crunching, super tense and just not sure. Didn’t know how to handle it, but it was upsetting and it shouldn’t have been. It should have been like, “Oh, great. Great, good for you.” Shelly was awesome. She was so cool, but I just didn’t know how to handle it.
I did not say a word. I just sat there, just eating my sandwich. Probably not even eating it, but just holding it. We just sat there in silence and then eventually he started the car and drove me back to my mom’s. It was really fucking weird and I don’t think we’ve ever talked about it, not because we’re avoiding it, I always just forget. I feel like I have to know what he was thinking at the moment, how he felt. So weird.
AMY SCHUMER—COMEDIAN, WRITER, ACTOR
My mom leaves my dad. Has an affair with my best friend’s dad. Breaks up their family. I’m in school. We’re trying to still be best friends. Like, we were best friends. It was crazy.
Marc
People forget that when you stick your dick into something that’s nearby, the ripple effect is going to be fairly profound.
Amy
That vagina’s going to be at a PTA meeting with your wife next week. It sucked.
Marc
So the whole town was affected by it.
Amy
Yeah. She was Hester Prynne. I was like, “I love my mom. She’s my family, so fuck you guys.” Then years later, I was like, “Mom, how could you do that?”
When I was sixteen, I got angry. I played volleyball pretty seriously. I was on this club team, and it was preliminaries for the Junior Olympics. My mom was a chaperone. We had to go to San Jose, from New York to San Jose. I got caught shoplifting while at this tournament, so I was benched the whole tournament. I’m standing there with my knee pads around my ankles, and my mom’s just standing there for the whole weekend having to stare at me with hatred, but I could always stare right back at her and be like, “Yeah, but you ruined my life.”
RON FUNCHES
My dad had a drug problem for a while. I’m assuming a few, but mostly cocaine.
Marc
That’s why your parents split up, because of the drugs? Your mom was like, “Fuck this. I’m going to Chicago with the kids. When you get your shit together, give me a call”?
Ron
Yeah. He didn’t call for several years. He started to get in touch a little bit later, and he was going to Portland to work in construction, and Chicago wasn’t working out too well for me. My dad was never a positive influence for me. He wasn’t there to parent me, but he still wants to then offer advice. He wants me to be a super Christian.
Marc
When did that come around? After the drugs left?
Ron
Yeah, of course. You’ve got to always replace one thing with another. I was just getting through high school, and then out of the high school just hanging out and working at canneries, or Chuck E. Cheese.
Marc
Canneries?
Ron
Where you can beans and broccoli and stuff at a factory. Any type of frozen peas. I would just have to pick out stalks of broccoli, and put them in a chute, and avoid putting my fingers close to blades. Then one day my job was to pick out rats and snakes out of the stuff. That was the last day I went.
They would just kind of get rooted up. They’re not plucked out by individual farmers. They’re just put all together, and when they’re originally dumped they’re just dirt and rocks and vegetables and dead rodents.
I let a lot of rats go through.
Marc
You did not!
Ron
Oh, yeah. Do I look like a person that touched a lot of rats?
WYATT CENAC—COMEDIAN, WRITER, ACTOR