A Reading in Brooklyn

A few weeks ago I participated in a reading series that my friend Jack organizes.  (There's another reading on Jan 30.  Come hear me and other fine writers, including the talented B.C. Edwards.)  It took place in a sophisticated, dimly lit bar in Greenpoint.  People stood at the bar and quaffed their beers, casting jealous glances at the crossed legs of those lucky enough to get couch spots.

I really wanted to Hannah to come hear my piece, which meant that Elliot had to come too.  We  knew that he would never be able to tolerate the full two-hour reading, so she timed her arrival for just before I was scheduled to go on.

Here's roughly how they looked when they arrived:

Since there were a few friends in the audience who knew we'd just had a baby, I thought it would be fun to read something about childbirth.  This was convenient because obstetrics was the most traumatizing rotation I took in medical school, and as everyone knows trauma is the source of all great art.

I chose a passage about the first time I delivered a baby, as a third-year medical student.  The writing shuttled between graphic imagery of the event itself, and my horror that I was being allowed to do this.  It was about ten minutes long, starting with the part where I introduce myself to the laboring woman, and ending with me delivering the baby and barely managing not to drop him.

The first half of the piece was well received.  People laughed where I'd hoped they would, grew somber at the right times.  As I was reaching the climactic finale, I thought "isn't Elliot being well-behaved?"

Here's how the passage ends:

I lean forward and straighten my arms, suspending the child high in the air, level with my face; floating him above his mother’s spongy belly, balancing him precariously on my thin forearms.  I feel like a penitent stretching toward God, like salvation itself depends on this transfer.

And it’s then, there, with God in my thoughts, that the child chooses to let out his first cry.  It bursts from him like he’s been holding his breath for nine months— a resonant staccato, a Harley-Davidson in piccolo, a shrill, cat-like noise, ripped from this tiny naked human— and something cracks in my chest, my eyes start to blur and the tears come spilling out.

Somewhere in the middle of that final sentence, Elliot started crying.

It was like everyone in the bar had gotten an electric shock.  People jumped.  Audible gasps ricocheted off each other.  A swell of murmurs whooshed through the room.  I picked out a voice saying "Oh my God did he plan that?"  For about five seconds there was no point in reading, even though I had the microphone.

People always come up and shake your hand after a reading, but this time there were a particularly large number.  And they seemed to squeeze my hand harder and look me in the eye longer.  I like to think it meant the quality of the writing was especially good that night.  But I know who was really responsible.