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The Show Must Go On 12/7/2010 12:09:10 PM
Question: What’s the level of prophecy when 90-minutes prior to your first book reading the lights go out? I’m talking NYC Con-Ed—the people on the corner will have new baby next August—blackout. I’m just wondering. Can anybody read the writing on that wall? Oh, right, we can’t see the wall. Wait, it gets better. Just as we were plunged into darkness, I had stepped from the shower. That’s right; T-minus ninety minutes to a living room full of people and I can’t even dry my hair. Ever try applying makeup by flashlight? I probably looked like the sideshow act from Ringling Brothers. Circus-like moments continued as I attempted to arrange h’orderves from a darkened, rapidly warming refrigerator and scrambled for candles, including the stinky ones you avoid lighting when entertaining. In between, to keep from going over the edge, I texted with Melisa, a friend who lives in South Carolina where they have working electricity. As I hoped, she texted back the calm words of wisdom I needed to hear: Bad dress Rehearsal equals great show.
I have no clue if that’s true, but I was going with it. Fifteen minutes left on the clock and no sign of light, I decided to get a grip and get on with the show. The candles became ambiance, I wasn’t serving anything that required an undercooked warning, and electrical current is irrelevant to removing a cork. My only real concern was the maze of brick steps you must conquer in order to make it to our front door. It’s not always a bad thing, keeping trick-or-treaters to a minimum and totally dissuading Jehovah’s Witnesses. My daughter’s boyfriend pitched in, providing a personal escort from the driveway up. As guests were delivered to my living room, another positive perk occurred to me: nobody was leaving without a torch-lit guide.
As it turned out, we didn’t have to take it that far. Eventually power was restored and the reading got underway. For a while I thought we might avoid the whole thing, just a room full of friends catching up, swapping gossip, and chatting about their lives. Then the other friend, the one with electricity, called wanting to Skype in on my moment of truth. Great. No way out. As we fine tuned Melisa—kind of like the scene from Willy Wonka where the kid dives into the TV—I retrieved the ARC copies of BEAUTIFUL DISASTER. I’d purposely stashed them in a dark corner of the study. It was easy to do, considering. There was appropriate fussing, everyone offering kind words about the book, my friend, Mary Beth, gushing, “Oh, it’s so thick!” I’m not sure if she was impressed by the page count or worried that this might be a cover-to-cover reading. I’m guessing it was the former since Mary Beth was BEAUTIFUL DISASTER’S very first Facebook friend. Of course, everyone was munificently gracious as I took a seat and turned to the pre-selected text. I remember thinking, it’ll be fine. I know these people, the ones sitting in front of me, and, more to the point, the ones on the pages of BEAUTIFUL DISASTER. At first I bumped along, reading way too fast. My tongue felt like it had been stung by a bee. My mouth was wicked dry, but I figured that was a good thing. It kept me from accidentally spitting on the pages. In the end, the reading was okay. There was no magical moment where divine intervention intervened, channeling Maya Angelou through my voice. It will take practice, though I believe I’m prepared for the unexpected thanks to a faulty transformer on Queen Street. This morning, thinking about last night, the experience didn’t seem terribly different from other rough drafts that required revision—including the one that became the book in my hand.
