front cover |
THE THERAPIST
20 pages, 5.5"x3", black and white.
(click to read the whole thing)
A few years ago, my then girlfriend and I were scanning the back page of the Village Voice to see if anyone would pay money to study us in some way. Unfortunately most of the ads required that you either be on a lot of drugs already, or be willing to start taking some. But then we found one seeking "couples for a study of communication" which promised $40 plus some free therapy. Yee ha! It turned out to be an endless series of workshops where we would watch tapes of people fighting and then some timid grad students would unsuccessfully try to get us to talk about our problems (using devices like passing a paperweight around to show whose turn it was to talk). Eventually we got the $40 and continued slowly breaking up without professional help. Later, I found myself living alone and eating at the diner a lot, where I started thinking up a story about some kind of lonely mad scientist. But what kind? I suddenly remembered where the couples workshop took place—a psychology wing at NYU called "Millhauser Laboratories," whose halls were full of old refrigeration equipment—and the answer was clear.