About “We binge reruns until our eyeballs hurt”

1. What was your motivation for writing “We binge reruns until our eyeballs hurt”?

I wrote the story with a seemingly simple inspiration. We dropped our satellite television service and switched to multiple streaming channels. I re-watched multiple old programs and found myself noting the relatively young actors who had died since the shows originally aired. It was an eerie feeling to see the celebrities young and vibrant on-screen within the last decade, but also knowing they hadn’t survived. I did find myself wanting to somehow warn these people I didn’t know, who couldn’t hear me. 

2. What challenges—if any—did you have writing your story?

I struggled with finding the right POV and tense, writing this in 1st and 2nd POV and also, more directly, to specific celebrity figures. In the end, I’m not sure why I chose this plural POV – maybe to convey that we are all watching the same people that don’t know they’re months or years before their death. I didn’t name the people, specifically so readers would maybe watch closer or think of their own lost celebrities. 

3. What is your favourite line—if any—in “We binge reruns until our eyeballs hurt”?

“When the picture gets hazy and we feel sleepy, we wait for our rainbow barcode face tattoos to remind us that the day and the night are over, and all that’s left to do is tap tap at the thick glass because no one is there to adjust the antenna or change the channel.” 

4. What do you want people to walk away with after reading “We binge reruns until our eyeballs hurt”?

In that same vein, I decided before I wrote this story that I wanted to trap the narrator(s), and in some sense, the readers too, in an old school television, with all the celebrities. To convey the same sense of mortality perhaps. Answer the question “Are we all an episode away from our ultimate last show?”

Reading

1. What are you currently reading?

The Retrieval System by Maxine Kumin

2. Do you have a favourite book? If so, what is it?

A Girl of the Limberlost by Gene Stratton Porter

3. What is your favourite poet or author, if any?

Maxine Kumin

4. Do you gravitate towards reading genres outside the ones you write? 

Sometimes. I have two college-aged kids. I have read a lot of middle grade/YA fiction and books they suggest or are reading. 

Writing

1. Why do you write?

Because the stories and the characters chase me down and won’t let me escape. 

2. What do you love about being a writer?

The community of other writers. Creating something new. The creative outlet. 

3. What time of the day do you write, and do you have a writing routine?

Whenever I have a moment and an inspiration. No real routine, except routine frustration. Fill my notes app with inspiration and odd ideas when I wake up in the morning.

4. Where do you get your ideas from?

News stories. Social media. Family. Work. Eavesdropping in public places. People watching. TV watching. History. Dreams. Nightmares. Abandoned malls and theme parks. Real estate advertisements. 

5. How long does it take you to write your projects?

15 minutes. An hour. A decade. Forever. I “write” and “edit” a lot in my head, so my first drafts on paper are often a twentieth inside-my-head version. That process was fine when I was younger. At 50-something, I’m now finding I NEED to get the ideas down on paper or in my notes app, or they drift away forever. 

6. What advice would you give to other authors/writers/poets?

Don’t write for an audience or a publishing trend. Write weird. Write beautiful. Don’t NOT write because someone might criticize your words. Write for your inner child and your outer adult. 

7. What project(s) are you currently working on?

The omnipresent novel-in-progress that keeps me in available space trouble with Google Docs because I save every version, but never get it done.