DROP ME AROUND THE CORNER

In her memoir, Bouvier details her difficult relationship with her father.

Most teenagers just want to fit in, but with a dad like Ernie Steingold, author Bouvier had little chance of that. Ernie was a bodybuilder, showing off his body in unbuttoned shirts and skin-tight jeans around their Burbank, California neighborhood. Even worse, he dropped Bouvier off at her high school in a self-customized GMC van. Initially only embellished with a few silver dollars riveted onto the doors, eventually more silver dollars, brass figurines, and safari animals crowded its entire surface. Assuming single parenthood after the death of Bouvier’s mother, Ernie could be fun, keeping cookie jars stocked with junk food and giving his three children great freedom. But under his care, Bouvier, as a baby, sank to the bottom of a swimming pool initially unnoticed, and Ernie accidentally broke some of her teeth giving her an angry slap with rings on his hand. Bouvier struggled as a child and teen to define herself. Motorcycles were her passion, but she had several serious accidents. Bouvier tried joining the military, working in a pewter factory, attending college to become a forest ranger, and joining a possible religious cult. She hoped to stay connected with Ernie after she moved away for college and then left permanently, but he was more concerned with his own romantic entanglements. Still, he walked Bouvier down the aisle when she married. The book creates a nuanced portrait of Ernie, who’s self-absorbed and intermittently kind. But in her own portrayal, Bouvier struggles to unify her experiences and memories into a cohesive whole. Descriptions of aimless partying as a young teen are evocative; at an illicit Ventura Beach campout, Bouvier and her friends “drank some Johnny, which tasted like diesel fuel.” She’s rarely able to settle on a particular lens for viewing her life, however; the author gives equal weight to minor events, such as friends she only knows briefly, and major life decisions, like becoming a nurse. The book includes many photographs, including the GMC van in different stages of customization.  

An interesting but diffuse portrayal of a father-daughter relationship.