Aimee Mayo - Talking to the Sky: A Memoir of Living My Best Life in A Sh!t Show

TALKING TO THE SKY

_______________________

a memoir

Aimee Mayo

Little Blue Typewriter Press

Talking to the Sky is a work of nonfiction. Some names and

identifying details have been changed.

Copyright 2020 by Aimee Mayo

All rights reserved.

Published in the United States of America by Little Blue

Typewriter Press

The Library of Congress has established a Cataloging-in

Publication record for this title.

TalkingtotheSky.com

Subjects:

1. Mayo, Aimee / 2. Memoir Biography

3. Family dysfunctional relationships

4. SouthernRural conditions Alabama Nashville

5. Coming-of-age Heroes Journey / 6. Music Songwriting

7. Addiction / 8. Abuse

9. Mental Illness / 10. Survival and Self Invention

Paperback

978-0-578-75753-7

Hardback

978-0-578-75756-8

E-book

978-0-578-75754-4

Printed in the United States of America

For Chris, you are my everything!

Levi, Oscar and Lola I love you too much!

Acknowledgements

The list is a little long, but Ive been writing this book since before there was an iPhone, so a lot of people have helped me along the way.

Chris Lindsey, thank you for being my best friend, first reader, and my psychiatrist when I needed it. Youre my mirror and sounding board. Im so grateful that I get to spend my life with you. I love you!

Levi, Oscar, and Lola (its hard to say anything without somebody getting jealous, but here goes) Levi, you remind me so much of my dad, you got all the best parts. Youve got the biggest heart and the best hugs ever. Oscar Doc Oc youre still my guru and the funniest person I know. Thank you for making me laugh every day. Lola, youre my soulful sidekick and sweetest surprise. I learn so much from you.

You guys have asked me whens this book coming out for most of your lives. Youre what pushed me across the finish line. The realization that you watched me work on something for so long and the thought of it never coming out was more heartbreaking than the fear of letting it go. I hope seeing the struggle it has been for me, proves to you that you can do ANYTHING if you believe, work your butt off and never give up!

Mom, there are so many wonderful things about you that didnt make it into the memoir. Thank you for always encouraging me. You are such an incredible mom, and I love you more than you will ever know! Dad, you were the biggest dreamer Ive ever known.

Cory, Im glad you were my seatmate on this insane rocket ride. You blow my mind with your talent. Thanks for sharing memories and saying, I dont give a shit what you write about me.

Uncle Kelly, youve always been like a brother to me. Youre the most thoughtful and loving person Ive ever known. All of those wishes we made under that meteor shower came true. (FYI Uncle Kellys art galleryGallery 202 in Franklin, TNsells his and my moms art.)

Aunt Debbie youre an American treasure! We always say everybody needs an Aunt Debbie. I love you!

Truman, Im glad youre in my family.

Bart Herbison, thank you for telling me in that smokey, authoritative voice, Aimee, its one of the best books Ive ever read, and I read A LOT. That phone call is what made me decide to put the book on Kickstarter. Troy Verges, thank you! You loved the book in 2008 and always encouraged me. Thank you to Leah, Beth, Vanessa, Laurie and Cathi, and all of my family and friends in Gadsden, Alabama. I love you!

Melissa Mathews, Tyler Dunson, and Lisa Bolt thank you all so much for everything. Julian, thank you for learning how to make an audiobook with me. You rocked it!

Extra special thanks to Kenny Chesney, Keith Urban, Tim McGraw, Jamey Johnson, Brantley Gilbert, Sarah Buxton, Martina McBride, Tom Bukovac, and Dallas Davidson.

Thank you to Taylor and Andrea Swift for one of the best lessons Ive ever learned to believe in my dream the way I see it and to be willing to walk away if it aint right.

Thank you to Rodrigo Corral for the badass cover. My expectations were ridiculous, and you and Dasha exceeded them all. I want to thank Dee Downey Pruitt, Lee Linton, Alice, MB Roberts, Courtney Greenhalgh, Joan Rogers and David. Jennifer Medina, thank you for the clarity in confusion. You were a superhero fixing all those indentations. Dana Perino, youre a diamond that shines so bright on everyone around you. Thank you for cheering me on! Thank you to Kristin Barlowe and Jon Morgan for the photo, and thank you to Lorrie Turk for the lashes and pretty make-up!

Tanya Farrell. Youre an answered prayer- Im so glad youre guiding and helping me get this book out into the world.

Im also grateful to the memoir editor that I had my heart set on (her face was pinned on my dream board for over a decade) Id like to thank her for being such an ice-cold bitch when I met her at the Book Expo. I left the event early and walked back to my hotel, crying. Then, I got pissed off and emailed thirty literary agents, which got the ball rolling. It led me to the most talented editor Ive ever met Christopher Schelling. Thank you for answering a hundred texts just because youre awesome! Youre who gave me the best advice anyone did about writing this book trust your instinct.

Im almost positive that Im forgetting people, who I really need to thank, so thank you! Im so grateful to everyone who backed my memoir on Kickstarter you made this book real. All your names ( I hope its all your names) are listed at the end. Love and infinite blessings. Aimee

Authors Note

To youthis book took 13 years of my life and I know I never shut up about that. I think because Im trying to justify it to myselfespecially when I dont even know why I wrote it. Through the years, Ive had a dozen editors try to fix it, and every time I hated how they changed it. So, the book isnt perfect, the punctuation is still kind of messed up, but it is my heart on paper. After years of confusion, I decided to just tell it like a talk. Thank you for picking it up. I hope youre why I wrote it.

Some names and identifying details have been changed.

Contents

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Blue Horses

T HE ONLY CHILDHOOD CHRISTMAS I REMEMBER is the one that never came. I was eight years old the night the phone call came that exploded like a bomb in my grandmother's kitchen. I sat in my mother's parents' cramped living room, finishing up Daddy's presenta paint-by-numbers portrait of blue horses. I knew Daddy loved horses because every time he got any money, we went to the track. We celebrated my little brother Cory's second birthday there and stayed until the sun came up.

"Happy-go-lucky!" Maw Maw hollered. I didn't have to look up from my cardboard canvas to know she had solved the puzzle before anyone on the TV show got close. She was the queen of Wheel of Fortune.

It felt like Christmas at their housethe two taxidermy deer head on the back wall were wearing Santa Claus hats and all the grandkids' stockings hung from the gun rack. "Gimme a beer," Paw Paw said from his La-Z-Boy. He always sat there like a sleepy old shark, waiting to bite somebody's head offgrumbling at anyone who made a noise, blasting the police scanner (he called it "the radio") as it filled the air with bursts of static, high-pitched hissing, and broken voices like it had Tourette's. In map-dots like Hokes Bluff, Alabama, the scanner was big entertainment, a small-town, real-time reality show.

Jumping up, I grabbed his empty can and headed to the "The Crusher" that hung on the wall in the kitchen. I tossed the can in and jerked the leverit crunched like a fat roach. As I opened the back door to sling it out onto the screened-in porch, I was stunned for a moment by the surreal beauty of iridescent icicles hanging from the rafters above and hundreds of cans like little silver nuggets encased in ice and glittering in the milky-blue moonlight.