Rob Delaney: "A Heart That Works"

One reason that I have questions about the NYTimes Book Review is that the critics can overlook a book like this. How could it fail to qualify among the "top 100" books of 2022?

And then a reason I have trouble with the current Prince Harry interviews is that I recall Delaney's book, and I think hand-wringing about Camilla's media conduct seems so, so trivial.

Rob Delaney had a child who was one, and he began to lose weight. The child had alarming pouches of skin; a doctor quickly confirmed that a tumor was growing next to the child's brain. Delaney's wife went to a separate room and began screaming; Delaney himself thought that he could magically solve the problem. (The parent will fix the child by assuming the child's burden; God will arrange a body-swap so a cosmic error can "get redressed," a patch can get stitched over the hole in the universe.)

Many would shut down, but Delaney was a writer and observer, so he made notes on the ensuing horror story. He became angry when friends would mention, "Oh, I lost a grandparent recently." ("Really?" he'd think. "Well, that's *supposed* to happen.") Delaney looked to gore-spattered cinema for comfort. He liked "Hereditary," and he especially liked "Ten Cloverfield Lane." In "Ten Cloverfield," a young woman believed that her captor was insane. (The captor had alluded to apocalyptic visits from alien beings.) At the end of the movie, it was disclosed that, although the captor really had been insane, in fact the story about the alien beings just happened to be true. The heroine was fucked from the beginning--fucked, regardless of her decisions. This made Delaney giggle--and he saw, in the details, a little metaphorical story about his own life.

Delaney grew impatient with friends who would quietly ask, "What can I do?" He valued friends who didn't ask but instead just showed up--friends who washed dishes, and distracted the extant healthy children, and tidied bedrooms. Delaney also gave his admiration to one caregiver who shouted and smashed glass objects when she heard about the failures of chemotherapy; Delaney thought that this was the one "correct" reaction, the only sensible reaction, to the story he had to tell.

Finally, when Delaney decided to pull a last plug, he endured comments from bystanders who believed there was "really more to do." He valued the doctors who wept with relief when they heard of the decision: "I'm so glad you are not going to put your son through more pain."

Delaney has worked with the writer Sharon Horgan, and I can see a similar fondness for dark humor in Delaney's work. Horgan memorably has one character trying to poison another character (but the poison finds its way into the bowels of an innocent dog). In Delaney's memoir, as a parent cradles her dead child, loud house-painters are singing along to Bieber next-door. One parent has to walk to the window and ask these painters to shut the fuck up. You can't invent a detail like that.

I thought Delaney's book was blunt and courageous -- and I also thought he had earned the right to write a memoir. I hope to look at his show, "Catastrophe," in the next few weeks.

How to Host a Baby

-You have assumed responsibility for a mewling, puking ball of life, a yellow-lab pup. He will spit his half-digested kibble all over your shoes, all over your hard-cover edition of Jennifer Haigh's novel Faith . He will eat your tables, your chairs, your "I {Heart] Montessori" magnet, placed too low on the fridge. When you try to watch Bette Davis in Hush Hush Sweet Charlotte , on your TV, your dog will bark through the murder-prologue, for no apparent reason. He will whimper through Lena Dunham's Girls , such that you have to rewind several times to catch every nuance of Andrew Rannells's ad-libbing--and, still, you'll have a nagging suspicion you've missed something. Your dog will poop on the kitchen floor, in the hallway, between the tiny bars of his crate. He'll announce his wakefulness at 5 AM, 2 AM, or while you and another human are mid-coitus. All this, and you get outside, and it's: "Don't let him pee on my tulips!" When...

The Death of Bergoglio

It's frustrating for me to hear Bergoglio described as "the less awful pope"--because awful is still awful. I think I get fixated on ideas of purity, which can be juvenile, but putting that aside, here are some things that Bergoglio could have done and did not. (I'm quoting from a survivor of sexual abuse at the hands of the Church.) He could levy the harshest penalty, excommunication, against a dozen or more of the most egregious abuse enabling church officials. (He's done this to no enablers, or predators for that matter.) He could insist that every diocese and religious order turn over every record they have about suspected and known abusers to law enforcement. Francis could order every prelate on the planet to post on his diocesan website the names of every proven, admitted and credibly accused child molesting cleric. (Imagine how much safer children would be if police, prosecutors, parents and the public knew the identities of these potentially dangerous me...

Raymond Carver: "What's in Alaska?"

Outside, Mary held Jack's arm and walked with her head down. They moved slowly on the sidewalk. He listened to the scuffing sounds her shoes made. He heard the sharp and separate sound of a dog barking and above that a murmuring of very distant traffic. She raised her head. "When we get home, Jack, I want to be fucked, talked to, diverted. Divert me, Jack. I need to be diverted tonight." She tightened her hold on his arm. He could feel the dampness in that shoe. He unlocked the door and flipped the light. "Come to bed," she said. "I'm coming," he said. He went to the kitchen and drank two glasses of water. He turned off the living-room light and felt his way along the wall into the bedroom. "Jack!" she yelled. "Jack!" "Jesus Christ, it's me!" he said. "I'm trying to get the light on." He found the lamp, and she sat up in bed. Her eyes were bright. He pulled the stem on the alarm and b...

Liars and Saints

Search This Blog