Staring at a blank Word document and thinking back on a generally pleasant, comfortable childhood, local writer Cindy Stockton wished her family was a little more fucked up.

“This would be a lot easier if I had some deep, underlying trauma caused by my dysfunctional family that’s been haunting me for years,” Stockton said. She explained that she would have much more to write about if her parents, siblings, and relatives were not so unconditionally loving and supportive.

“If only my mother was alcoholic, my father left us for another woman, and my brother killed birds for fun,” Stockton continued. “I’d probably have written three novels by now. But of course I got stuck with a happy, cohesive family who took a nice camping trip to the Adirondacks every year and played Monopoly together on rainy Friday nights. Why couldn’t my grandpa at least have been just a little bit sexist?”

Stockton went on to bemoan the fact that her family has been so encouraging of her writing career.

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