Book from my youth

So I have a book [from] 1948 called “I Can’t Sleep”; it’s a bunch of funny anecdotes about insomnia. My sister gave it to me. She’s three years older and growing up, maybe from the age of three to about thirty…I hated her with all my heart…we never saw eye to eye…she hated me too so it was kind of mutual…

So I graduated college in the mid ’90s and my life went to shit…I got into a horrible marriage and that ended like fucking horrible, and during that time my sister and I became close because I needed somebody to talk to and my parents are of a generation that don’t understand divorce at all.

And so my sister being a librarian was like “hey I’ve got this book”…so she sent me this book about insomnia and I was kind of reading it, and I don’t honestly care about what is in this book at all but every time I read it I found it very comforting that the sister who made my life hell gave it to me. And I’ve always used [it] every time in my life that I’ve had a hard time; I’ve reached out to this book and read something and thought “oh yeah, tomorrow will be better”.

Exhibited by Chad Goodrum

Transcript edited by S. Golland