Shelby and Me

In the eyes of the well-to-do Eastern Kentuckians, Shelby and me, we represent everything wrong with Appalachia. We live in a trailer. We never wear shoes. We cook crystal, we smoke crystal, and we have no teeth. I will say this, we haven't married any cousins, but that's more of a commitment issue than anything. In many ways, we are helping perpetuate the Mountain Dew soaked stereotypes sowed by Diane Sawyer. However, the thing about people from the hills being slow, stupid, and illiterate, Shelby and me, we do a damn good job of dispelling that myth. See, we don't sleep much, and television is too confined for a junkie's imagination. Instead, we stay up all night reading books. Books are perfect for us; we read real fast, we think real fast, and we talk real real fast. You've never seen a more efficient book club. If we get busy cooking one week, and we miss our reading time, Shelby and me, we feel our brain-blades getting dull. We take our studies seriously. Stories keep our minds and our mouths sharp. We may be addicts, but we are not escapists. We do not read to leave the hills. We read to bring new life into the hills. By filling our brains with new stories, we are supplying the holler with new perspectives. Reading has changed the way we speak, Shelby and me. When we chat with folks, we are not talking solely from our experiences in Glasgow County, but from the experiences of all the characters that we've consumed. Heaven help me if I have to pick one book from the thousands we've read. With a gun to my head, I guess I could narrow down the most impactful one to something from Chuck Palahniuk. A couple of single guys living in a trailer, we're basic bachelors attracted to sex and fighting and twisted humor. You know what, just based on the rate of consumption, I do have my pick. Choke, that's the one. We read it in a single six-hour push, Shelby and me. He'd read one chapter aloud; I'd read the next. I think it gripped us more than any other book, not because of how relatable sex addiction is to our own, but because it explored the fine line between self-acceptance and self-destruction. It took the transgressive and unfortunate realities of others and spun the darkness into something delightful. More than anything, that book taught us that if you hate yourself, it is okay to make someone else up. Shelby and me, we're just some rich kid from Versailles who got an English degree on his daddy's dime. We're just a guy who has a cousin who has a friend from Glasgow, and he told me what it was like to smoke meth. And I've talked to people from Harlan County and Johnson County, and I know how sad it makes them when people assume that all Appalachians are toothless cousin loving hillbillies who can't read.