Memoirs — Wes Funk

Rock and Roll Saved my Life and Fat Boy

Wes Funk (1969 -2015) was a Saskatchewan-based writer, who dedicated his craft to telling stories reflecting his life. His first novel Dead Rock Stars (2008) was shortlisted for a Sask Book Award and has been used in University of Saskatchewan curriculum. Funk’s second novel Baggage (2010) has been a pick for several book clubs. A love of the prairie lifestyle, a strong belief in diversity, and a passion for music, are all strong themes in Wes’s books. In his last published work Wes Side Story: A Memoir he tossed fiction aside to tell his own life story as a gay man in Saskatchewan and as a writer with unflinching honesty.

1) Rock and Roll Saved my Life
2) Fat Boy

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Rock and Roll Saved my Life
by Wes Funk

I grew up the youngest of five siblings. My twin sister Katherine died at birth. Sometimes I miss her so much it literally takes my breath away. You may be asking yourself right now ‘how can you miss her, you never even met her.’ Well... this might sound corny and cliché, but much like many people who survive a twin sibling, I have al- ways felt as if part of me is missing. I believe she and I would have been one hell of a team, had she lived. I often picture her as being beautiful, smart and highly creative.

My sister Del graduated from high school and left home three years before me. This left me alone with my par- ents on the farm for the last three years of my high schooling. Not having much to say to my folks in those days and as a little gay boy with not a lot of friends, I spent a lot of time alone, often holed up in my attic bedroom.

I always say I was truly lucky growing up in the 1980’s. It was the last of a simpler time—there was no internet and no cell phones either. There were no iTunes, iPods, or i-anything-else. The world had not yet gone digital and entertainment was still very much about VHS, cassettes, and vinyl! Pop culture of the 80’s was fabulous! I loved every minute of it! It was the time of hair bands—lots of boys (even the straight ones) were breaking into their mother’s makeup drawers to darken their looks to match the outrageous appearances like Motley Crue, Twisted Sister and Poison. Mullets were everywhere and chicks were shaving half their heads, wanting to mimic the styles of Madonna (when she was still a material girl living in a material world) and Cyndi Lauper. I will forever carry fond memories of myself babysitting my infant nieces, all of us be-bopping around the living-room to the She’s So Unusual Album over and over. It was a time of guys strutting around the malls in the pastel shades of the Miami Vice TV series and Michael Jackson knock-off army jackets. It was a time of Boy George and Annie Lennox intro- ducing much of the planet to the flamboyant world of gender-bending. It was an era of break-dancing, moon- walking, and being born to run! It was the time of colourful coming of age movies like Purple Rain and Pretty in Pink and the iconic Breakfast Club and St. Elmo’s Fire (a show with a soundtrack that stills makes me tear-up). It was the age of the three Fs—Fame, Flashdance and Footloose.

In those days, my own walls were plastered with ripped out pages from countless rock-themed magazines—so much so you could barely see the tacky wallboard beneath them. In the evenings, I’d be doing my homework with Prince, Sting, Billy Idol, Adam Ant, David Lee Roth, David Bowie, Huey Lewis, Corey Hart and WHAM! It was like these guys were my friends. While other boys’ rooms showed off the latest Corvettes and Ferraris in shiny me- tallic colours, my walls were full of the faces of new wave and glam rock and heavy metal thunder. This is the 80’s I remember!

In 1988, about a year-and-a-half after I’d graduated high school and left home, I found myself once again living in an attic. Gay culture still had a ways to go on the Prairies and I was still very much an outcast. Not having many skills, I was working as a cook in a 24-hour restaurant and not making a lot of money. I needed rent to be cheap and managed to secure an inexpensive, humble upstairs suite in an old character house. Even though I’d been residing in Saskatoon several months by then, I was intensely shy in those days (quite unlike now) and hadn’t made many friends. I was also pretty poor and didn’t even have a proper television other than a tiny grainy black and white contraption. Again, I found comfort and solace in music, and again it saved my life. This is how I would often pass my free time— stretched out on the bed, sketching or writing poetry, and listening to the radio on my ‘ghetto blaster.’

In the late nineties and early 2000’s, I was much more established and financially sound and was finally em- ployed at a job where I was bringing in decent money. But I was desperately unhappy with my work. And I still had precious few like-minded friends. In those days, I would find hours and hours of entertainment hanging around used record shops, thumbing through countless piles of LPs, watching the human traffic and taking in the tunes on the stores’ hi-fis. Once again, rock ’n’ roll was a salvation for me. Frequently, I get asked why there are such strong themes of music and nostalgia in my books and this should answer that!