Hey, Kiddo: How I Lost My Mother, Found My Father, and Dealt with Family Addiction

Jarrett remembers his grandmother’s foul mouth and sometimes violent temper, and the nightmares he had over it. In one, his grandparents’ severed heads attacked him; in another, a little duck-shaped chair he had when he lived with Leslie came to life and bit him. However, he juxtaposes these nightmares with fun memories of a trip his family took to Disneyland (including Joe getting on Shirley’s nerves by joining a line of hula dancers).

Not long after that trip, Joe and Shirley decided it was time to explain to Jarrett that his mother was suffering from heroin addiction, and had been out of touch because she was in jail. In panels framed in deep black, he tells the story of his mother’s past: She was only 13 when she started using, and fell into a desperate pattern of petty crime to support her habit, even stealing Shirley’s wedding ring.

Jarrett was heartbroken to learn why his mother had been away, but knowing also helped him to understand better where her behavior was coming from. He trusted his neighbor Pat with the story, and Pat proved himself to be a true friend, listening sensitively and swearing never to tell anyone.

The chapter’s ending collage shows Jarrett’s early comics (muscly superheroes) and a course description for a Comic Art class.

Time jumps forward a little, and we see an eighth-grade Jarrett off to take classes at the Worcester Art Museum, supported and encouraged by his grandparents. At the museum, he took a life-changing comic book class with a teacher called Mark, who introduced him to legendary underground comics like Raw and American Splendor and “taught us how to use nib pens and draw with a brush like real cartoonists” (147). He also discouraged Jarrett from using a Marvel guide for formulaic comic drawing, instead urging him to follow his own style and his own line.

Meanwhile, Leslie left the halfway house and got a waitressing job. Joe and Shirley were doubtful about her ability to stay off of drugs, and they tried to keep some distance between her and Jarrett. Their fears turned out to be all too well-founded: They discovered that Leslie was back on heroin when they ran across an article about her overdosing on a public sidewalk in the local paper.

Disillusioned, Jarrett became angrier and angrier with Leslie, and started to hate visiting her at the halfway house where she’d gone again. His outside life had lots of fun moments, too: His friend Pat coaxed him out to dances, and his family liked to laugh together. However, he began to feel self-conscious about his unusual family, and ashamedly remembers dissuading his grandparents from coming to his eighth-grade graduation, as they weren’t “real parents.” Their feelings were badly hurt. In the end, he apologized, and they were in the audience when he left middle school.

The collage at the end of the chapter shows an honorable mention certificate for an art contest, a newspaper article about Jarrett, and a video tape for a homemade show called “Dude’s World.”