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Selected Shorts
Romance of the Summer
01:00:06
Host Meg Wolitzer presents three works that reflect on the allure—or not—of summer. In Massimo Bontempelli’s “The Miraculous Beach or, Prize for Modesty,” translated by Jenny McPhee, a hot summer in Rome produces a magical moment. The reader is Hugh Dancy. Essayist and humorist Samantha Irby could do without summer, thank you, and makes “A Case for Remaining in Doors”, performed by Retta. And Denis O’Hare reads a baseball classic, W.P. Kinsella’s “The Thrill of the Grass.”
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- [00:08]
Meg Wolitzer
Keep things up in the company of actors Hugh Dancy, Denis o' Hare and Retta. Coming up right now. Selected Shorts Falls in love with summertime. It's me, your host, Meg Wolitzer. Stick around and I just might compare thee to a Summer's day. You're listening to Selected Shorts, where our greatest actors transport us through the magic of fiction one short story at a time. Wintertime is great for everyone who loves sweaters and soup. Spring and fall are perfect for those who like change, in that they can watch the earth expand and contract respectively. But summer, oh, summer. From long, long days to watermelon seeds, to reading at the beach, to the jingling bell of the ice cream truck, it's a season that casts its own particular spell. To me, summer always meant sleepaway camp. When I was 8 and my sister was 11, she and I went to a camp where we were so unhappy that we joined a group called the Homesick Club. This involved sitting on a hill and crying as we talked about the things we missed at home. Our dog Max. Watching Gilligan's island and Bewitched. Our mom, Spaghetti.
- [01:22]
Samantha Irby
Our mom.
- [01:24]
Meg Wolitzer
Years later, I went to a camp that called itself a summer arts workshop. I acted really badly there in experimental plays, including one called Hurry Up, Please, It's Time, based on the work of T.S. eliot. This predated Cats, by the way. I played Hollow Man 3. And I and the other two Hollow Men, all of us 15 year old girls who came shuffling out on stage tied together with rubber straps, got to say the line. Headpieces filled with straw. Alas, it was the best summer of my life, the best experience in my life so far. And I wrote a novel inspired by that place called the Interestings. I feel like a lounge singer and now I'm supposed to wait for applause and say, yeah. And it goes a little something like this. When I think of summer, I think, yeah, yeah. Headpiece filled with straw. But I also think of green grass, an outdoor theater, deep friendship, and a kind of excited freedom I'd never felt before. It's very likely that you have your own indelible images when you think of summer. So in this hour of selected shorts, let's envelop ourselves in the extended aria of the summer stories on the show will take on some of the season's most recognizable rituals. Beach trips, cool down sessions and pastoral delights of all kinds. In one story, as a city melts down, a romantic pair finds their own private escape. In another, a writer resists speeches in favor of her AC unit. And in A third, an aging man leads a quiet revolt on the ball field. Our first story of summer and romance is by Italian author Massimo Bontempelli. This story, brought to us by the writer Giampa Lahiri, appeared in the Penguin Book of Italian Short Stories, which was edited by Lahiri herself. Bontempelli was a war correspondent who at the age of 40 was went a bit avant garde and created a series of micro novels he titled La Vita Intensa, or the Intense Life. This summertime fever dream of a story will be read by the dynamic Hugh Dancy. He appeared on Broadway in Venus in Fur and in series including the Path and Hannibal. And now Hugh Dancy performs Massimo Bontempelli's the Miraculous beach or Prize for Modesty. Translated by Jenny McPhee.
- [03:45]
Hugh Dancy
At the first threat, people began to stay off the streets of Rome. Then, after a few days, a generalized fear took over and the city itself began to empty out. Seized with fear, hour after hour, the citizens of Rome stormed the train stations and shoving their way onto train carriages and had fled. Far away, the richest people glutted their cars with oil and gas before bolting out of the 13 city gates and kicking up dust headed to the most distant cardinal points. And so it was for 10 days. And then suddenly the train stations were deserted. And throughout Rome it was only the peddlers carts that raised any dust. The peddlers built, being afraid of nothing. At that point, no one was left in the metropolis. Only a few heroes and heroines stayed to watch over the city. At midday, the heroes roamed imperiously through the streets. Jacketless, they allowed the sun to whip their silk shirts to shreds while vainly regarding their reflections in their belt buckles. When seeing each other on opposite pavements, even without knowing one another, they smiled proudly, confident that from Laterano to Monte Mario, From Vallejuilia to St. Paul's their supremacy would last undisturbed and uncontested. For at least two months. The heroines didn't go out in the sun. They each waited inside for their heroes to return home with when they would dry their sweat and iron their silk shirts. The women went out only at night and exercising their wily ways, they would flick flirtatious glances with their stray cat eyes behind their companions backs. Since I adhere to the laws of nature and love the heat of the sun in summer, the heat of the stove in winter, I was among those heroes who hadn't fled the city during the summer summer onslaught. The heroine chosen to dry my sweat was called Aminta this was once a male name. But my girlfriend's father did not know literary history, and 18 years earlier, trusting his own ear, he had imposed that name on his newborn daughter. The priest who baptized her didn't dare inform the father of his innocent error. Amynta, at the first heat of summer, conceded immediately to the excellent reasons I had used to convince her that we should stay in Rome instead of departing for the mountains or seaside. And so the first eight days of the heat wave passed easily. On Aminta's pale face, I never once detected the slightest indication of regret, repentance, disrespect, or desire. I was therefore astonished when, on the afternoon of the ninth day, having returned from my rounds on the blazing streets and a minter after a jubilant greeting, approached me where I'd sunk down upon a couch in my study, and placing a hand on my shoulder, said suddenly, darling, you must give me a small present. You must have a beautiful bathing suit made for me. I felt my brow furrow. My disparaging masculine soul became muddy with suspicion. I stared at her grimly. What for? Aminta? What has come over you? Aren't we divinely happy in Rome? Are you thinking of leaving or perhaps going to the beach? Oh, I have explained to you again and again that. No, no, no, she interrupted. Her eyes, her brow, her mouth, her whole body laughing. I didn't mean that at all. Yes, we're very happy here in Rome. Who would dream of leaving? I simply want a beautiful bathing suit. In order to have a beautiful bathing suit. And once you have it, I will put it on. When? Every so often. For a little while. Every day. And then? And then after a while, I will take it off. That's it. That's it. I swear. She was so transparent. All suspicion vanished from my soul. I kept quiet for a minute in order to give greater weight to the words I was about to utter, then declared, very well, all is fine. Yes, darling, go ahead and have a beautiful bathing suit made for yourself. She clapped her hands and jumped for joy, then tenderly kissed all of the sweat off my face in gratitude. Over the next few days she was very busy. As for her research, studies, attempts, doubts and resolutions regarding the construction of her bathing suit, I wasn't privy to her secrets. She went out a few times during the day and stayed in her room for long hours with a seamstress. She wouldn't allow me to know a thing. She wanted to surprise me with an unexpected masterpiece. Her face was full of happiness, day and night, preoccupied with my virile thoughts. After A few days I'd almost forgotten about her feminine pastime. But on Wednesday morning, when I took off my jacket before heading out, Amintas said goodbye, then added, when you return in an hour, it will be ready. What will be ready? Oh, the bathing suit. Really? Yes. Hurry back and you'll see. It's absolutely marvelous. When I returned home less than an hour later, a sliver of suspicion was still trying to insidiously act upon me. Was it possible that this little story concerning the bathing suit marked the start of a campaign to get me to take her to the seaside? I went into my study, where I heard her voice coming from the other side of the door to her room. Don't come in. I'm ready. Sit down on the couch. Okay, I won't come in. Okay, I'm sitting on the couch. I stared at the door to her room. When it opened, a great light entered the study, and at the center of that light, Aminta stood wearing her bathing suit. My heart skipped a beat. Aminta came towards me. She seemed to be lit up, propelled by all the light in the sky, trembling in ecstasy. I didn't move from where I was. Amynta stopped in the middle of the room. It was truly marvelous. Pale rose silk draped down from her throat, accentuating her breasts, then gathered around her hips in a band of tiny pleats, flaring into a short skirt that didn't dare graze her flesh, the undulating hem quivering suggestively. Layered on top of the minuscule skirt's pink material was a flounce of acute triangles, their color emerald green. Amintus stood in the middle of the room. In the light cascading from her eyes, the pale rose of the silk bathing suit changed from minute to minute into a thousand mother of pearl reflections. The green of the flounce suggested a swarm of shiny scarab beetles flying across a sunset. Amidst that effusion of tender colors, the white of her arms and legs became even paler. On her feet she wore two small green satin slippers. A minter was laughing with all of her soft flesh, with her entire green and pale rose bathing suit. She laughed and shook like a plant in a garden, and the room was filled with the scent of paradise. I didn't have the courage to move. Aminta was happy to be alive, her laugh sounding like silver bells flying out the window and rushing up to heaven. Aminta sat herself down on the carpet in the middle of the room, her arms behind her and her white legs crossed, her torso reclining backwards and stretched out as if she were offering herself up to God. Her gaze landed on me. I still hadn't moved, and I held my heart in my hands. At the sight of my emotion, she was touched with affection and and gratitude. Still trembling, I approached her. I sat beside her on the carpet and gently took her hand. I caressed her whole body with my eyes. Then I timidly touched the pale rose silk of her bathing suit with my forehead. Aminta's eyes, full of smiles, were swelling with tears of affection. They contained a message for me. In a trembling voice, she said, you see how beautiful it is. With no need to go to the seaside, I felt the entirety of her innocent soul pressing against me. I was overcome by love, and I too now searched for something simple to say to her. With my cheek resting on her cool arm, I whispered, your modest desires deserve a prize. She softened and once again laughed joyfully. But when I didn't join in, she stopped laughing and looked at me expectantly. Something fluttered in the air and touched me. I saw that she also had felt something. Her shoulders instantly trembled and she said, what is it? How beautiful. The whole room filled with a kind of light breath, which then immediately disappeared. All around me I saw a flickering light. This too passed before my and Aminta's eyes, then fled away. Oh, how fabulous this is. Aminta murmured. She was sitting at the edge of the carpet and I was further back, almost behind her. A strange, sweet murmuring sound reached us. Fading at her feet, I saw that she was listening intently. The ground murmured again, while before our eyes, everything in the room vanished into a light mist, infiltrated by blue shadows and silver flashes. By now the murmuring coming from the ground had become regular and frequent. It originated far away, swished nearby, and died down at her feet. The murmuring then became prolonged. One coming close seemed to expand. Suddenly she let out a cry and drew back her feet. Look. Look. She cried. I looked. Her green slipper was wet, as was her foot, up to her ankle. And again, again the gushing increased. The sound of tiny waves arriving at the edge of the carpet continued pushing at her feet and alongside her legs. Fearlessly, she leaned forward, plunged her hands into those waves, then lifted them out, dripping with water.
- [16:18]
Meg Wolitzer
The sea.
- [16:19]
Hugh Dancy
The sea. The silver and blue mist around us filled with light, and the carpet burned like sand. Aminta dived in, outstretched, her breasts extending over the edge. Then she came back up, the wet silk clinging to her chest, her nipples erect. I stared at her, ecstatic, and listened to the sea which had come to visit us. Suddenly a bigger wave reached me and I felt the water rising as far as my calves. I jumped to my feet, alarmed. Aminta, I'd better go and put on my bathing suit too. Yes. She cried. There's one in the bottom drawer of your bureau. But hurry. And both of us were very happy.
- [17:24]
Meg Wolitzer
That was Hugh Dancy reading the Miraculous beach or Prize for Modesty By Massimo Bontempelli Translated by Jenny McPhee so is it a heady little fantasy or a fever dream? Those little apocalyptic hints are hard to ignore, very Death in Venice. But then again, the infatuated couple in the story creates a new world together, while the real world carries on somewhere without them. I think all of us have entertained a selfish little reverie somewhere along these lines. Mine? Well, there's a lot more air conditioning involved, but the principle is pretty much the same. Which brings me to this point. Summer is hot. It's sticky, it's sweaty, it's full of melted popsicles and sand in the pants. That's just to say that it is not for everyone. And in our next piece, the writer Samantha Irby playfully dissects the great American romance with all things June. Irby's funny personal essay collections include We Are Never Meeting in Real Life and Quietly Hostile, and she's worked on TV shows including Tuca and Bertie. Even when she's irked, Irby's voice is bright, sparkling, and full of character. And so you'll understand why we thought of Retta, of Parks and Recreation and Good Girls fame to bring her off the page. This performance at the Getty center in LA marked her selected shorts debut. And now here's Retta with Samantha Irby's A Case for Remaining Indoors.
- [18:56]
Samantha Irby
Wouldn't you rather be dead than hot? I am 100% over people pretending that open mouth breathing in 1000% humidity while being burned to a crisp by the sun is the jam. I prefer winter, when everyone has to be bundled beyond recognition to survive, or fall, when you can wear something nice without sweating it sheer in the punishing heat. Too bad I can't afford to pack my one bag and move to the Arctic, because the minute I start seeing bare arms and booty shorts, my sad kicks in and my happy doesn't return until in September, when, thank goodness, I can cover it up with a scarf. It is a cloudless 72 degrees in Chicago today. The sun is blazing in the sky. I closed the blinds when I finally woke up around 1:30 in the afternoon. Birds are chirping sweetly in the streets. I shut the windows and people are crowding the streets in droves, celebrating this long awaited break in the dreary gray spring weather. I assume. Like I said, I shut the goddamn windows and blinds. I'm going to take a shower and order grocery delivery, then maybe stare at the wall until it's time to go back to bed. If I went outside, I could walk down the street to the beach, stroll along the lake path and get bit by a dog. Suffer through an awkward conversation with someone who lives in the neighborhood and who I would then be forced to avoid until the end of time. Watch children beating each other with sticks while enjoying the fresh air. Soak up some vitamin D and also harmful UVA and UVB rays, get the perfectly acceptable to wear again tomorrow clothes I'm wearing all sweaty and gross. On the flip side, in my apartment I can eat the rest of this box of cereal dry by the fistful, look at people outside without having to smell them or listen to their opinions, organize my ketchups, writing song lyrics for my easy listening band. Queasy listening words like Outdoor Music festival are why I am so glad Summer in Chicago lasts approximately seven minutes One summer I walked by these dirty hipsters at Division Festival dancing in a large gray puddle and thought miserably. I hope you guys catch something incurable. I was instantly burning with hatred for these people dancing with their mouths open in a shallow pool of urban toxic waste and the band they were dancing to wasn't even that jamming. I hate summer because 1 it's hot. 2 everyone feels the need to do everything outside. And while I would rather be dead than participate in any outdoor activity, barbecues or romantic walks or looking at trees or living, I really wish you and everyone else would do everything else in the privacy of your homes too. I never have to go outside again because one my boyfriend, the television is inside. Man, I fucking love tv. And I don't mean educational programs on PBS or crackly documentaries about important historical figures. I mean, I know all the cast members of the Real Housewives of Atlanta, past and present, and all of their children, pets and significant others by name. I once walked blindly past my own sister on a sparsely populated train platform in the middle of the afternoon on a Saturday. But I could tell you who won Survivor the last few seasons without even googling it. Television has forever been my unwavering companion and trusted friend. Every bad day, every breakup, every inexplicable 2am awakening, television has been there for me through all of them. I would trade every deadly hornet sting and itchy eye causing spring bloom without hesitation for the warm glow of my Samsung for the rest of my life. 2. Are there enough blazers in my Closet? Years ago I decided I was going to be a jacket person. I'm not sure that it was a conscious decision. Like I didn't just wake up one day and throw out all my long sleeve shirts, but I remember finding this insanely well cut cropped denim jacket with a military collar and cinched waist and the first time I wore it, I didn't take it off the entire day. At some point the next morning, stumbling around hungover and bleary eyed trying to get my shit together for work, it dawned on me that I could just wear that jacket again. I already knew it looked good and anyone paying close attention would just assume I'd changed the T shirt I'd worn underneath. So why the fuck not? I put that jacket on every single day. If Michael Kors could wear the same uniform every day, why not me? Now I have all kinds of jackets. Leather ones, tweed ones, twill ones, the works. And you would not believe how many pajama pants you can get away with wearing to nice places if you just slap a sharply cut blazer on top of them. At home, I can gaze lovingly at my closet and organize my jackets by color, by material, by the likelihood they would ever see the outside world. I'm sitting in my crib right now, listening to this Gretchen Polardo record from three years ago, ripping sheets of toilet paper off the roll I keep on my desk because buying boxes of Kleenex feels like a waste when allergy season is about to destroy my life anyway. And I'm wearing a jacket, a black pleather motorcycle jacket I got for sale on ASOS that has a little fringe on it, but not so much that I look like I'm going to an Aerosmith audition later. That's the thing about being an inside person who enjoys the occasional wardrobe splurge. You gotta be cool with modeling it for the cat and hope the delivery dude from a part pizza company assumes you just got home from work and were so busy writing checks and taking important calls that you hadn't had time to shrug it off before opening the door, even though you both know deep down that you haven't left the apartment all day and only put it on because it's a shame to let an $80 coat go unworn. 3. Food just tastes better inside. White people love picnics so much, in fact, that they'll stop just about anywhere to have one. Why everywhere you look, someone has turned a bus bench or statue or filthy curb into an outdoor cafe. You dudes just stop and bust out your wicker baskets anywhere, huh? I know my people love a summertime cookout as much as anyone, but we don't just set up a three legged grill in the alley next to the dumpster as soon as the winter snow melts, you know, and throw our chicken on it. We organize. We plan. First of all, we need to know who is going to be responsible for the potato salad. You can't just let that one lady from work you invited to be nice bring hers. It has to be a known potato salad from a vetted and reliable source. I can't even commit to going to a white person's house for dinner in the summer. I unless we have specific plans to do something that requires four walls and a roof while I pretend to be picking at their homemade tabbouleh.
- [26:22]
Hugh Dancy
Yeah.
- [26:25]
Samantha Irby
Because guaranteed I am going to walk in the house and be greeted with hey, let's eat this out on the patio. And by patio they mean the little scrap of cement at the base of my back stairs that only holds one chair. So have fun balancing this floor flimsy paper plate on your knees while you sit on the bottom step. And good luck with the flies hovering around because we're right next to the trash. LOL. Fuck that. 4. You can daydream about things in a catalog you are never going to buy. Without fail, I get the IKEA catalog every single year. Let me remind you that I currently live in a space that contains this many things. A full sized bed, a television on top of a television stand. A stack of magazines next to the bed that I used to hold, a small fan and my BiPAP machine because finding a bedside table was too much work. A desk that I ruined with a broken bottle of nail polish. A large air conditioner currently sitting on the floor beneath the window. A table my friend's dad made that I keep in the dining room to hold wine bottles and and plants. A stainless steel shelving unit that serves as an open air concept pantry. A dresser whose bottom two drawers I am terrified to open. A bookshelf I have inexplicably moved six motherfucking times. And one chair. There's other shit in there, you know. Laptop, house phone. I no longer remember the number two prosperity candles I got from the occult bookstore, but they don't count since those are things that go on top of other things. Suffice it to say I have no reason whatsoever to be comparing backsplashes. I have been a renter my entire life. My Home improvement joy is firmly grounded in novelty items like matching clothes hangers and interesting dish towels. Affordable splashes of color and beauty that can liven up the space, crumbling at the corners and painted like a prison cell. But catalogs are a miracle because you can design your very own dream house with none of the risk or expense. I'm like a little girl with my post it notes and red Sharpie. I want the farmhouse sink and this marble countertop and a butcher block island in the center of the kitchen. These brass concepts in the master bathroom. Definitely some track lighting in the family room. And oh, wouldn't this leather sofa look amazing in the den? I could spend an entire weekend locked in a 500 square foot studio apartment circling armoires in the Crate and Barrel catalog that will never see the inside of any place other than my brain. I like to pull all of the Bed, Bath and Beyond coupons out of the Sunday paper and stick them in a drawer for the day I decide to stop living like a trash person and buy sheets with an impressive thread count. One of these days I'm going to move to a place in which a footstool might not look out of place and I'm going to need that 20% off. Okay, 5. Your space, your rules now this is assuming that you haven't made the fatal mistake of trying to be inside at some place other than the one in which you live. People who don't understand that my writing process consists of staring sullenly at my computer, waiting for the jokes to come, willing myself not to get up to reexamine the contents of the almost bare refrigerator I just took stock of 10 minutes ago, often asked if I liked to write in coffee shops I used to, especially before I caved and got a high speed Internet hookup in my casa. Sometimes I'd roll down to the heartland to pick out a bowl of vegan chili and soak up their Internet. But my favorite bartender quit and they took the black bean nachos off the menu. So bye. There are a handful of coffee shops in Edgewater that feel cozy and relaxing, but the problem with that is that I am never cozy or relaxed. Even with headphones on. I could never get over the idea that someone was watching me, that they knew I had a deadline or draft due. And instead of putting my head down and working, I'd spend the entire time glancing around wondering what everyone else was working on. On defeated and deflated. After multiple days sulking home with my work undone, I finally called RCN to come connect whatever wires I needed to get the fastest possible mature lesbian porn on my phone. I could make my own tea. Better yet, I can smoke a bowl and drink an entire pitcher of Crystal Light and finish that butthole essay in my nicest house jacket and take as many breaks as I want and no one is going to steal my seat when I get up for a cookie refill or cause me to break out in a sweat when my battery is at 7% and the nearest outlet is in use. I won't get sucked into watching a young man artfully arrange his latte and scone just so for the gram. No eavesdropping on conversations about bands I've never heard of and am too uncool to understand. No nervously asking an irritated barista what Sumatra means. Just me and the cat and the bags of Lipton I shoved in my pocket at work. Because buying an actual box of tea in real life feels like a ridiculous, unnecessary thing. It's fucking perfect. Brb. Gotta go pee.
- [31:54]
Meg Wolitzer
That was Retta performing A Case for Remaining Indoors By Samantha Irby hi, I'm Meg Wolitzer. You see, even though this is our summer episode, we were committed to presenting perspectives from naysayers too. Though from the sounds of it, you could probably lure Irby out of her lair with the promise of some really good potato salad. I'm in agreement with Samantha Irby on Heat. I remember as a teenager asking my friends that time honored, thought provoking Socratic question, which would you rather die from overheating or freezing? I was and am firmly in the freezing camp. Heat is the worst. And like Irby, I also love the indoors. Which I want to confess is part of why I accepted the job as host of this show. Because, as you might imagine, I am indoors right now. Really indoors. There is no window here for sunlight to shine through. The walls are carpeted, and this room may be small, but it's cold. I think Samantha Irby would approve. When we return, devotees of America's favorite pastime break the curse of AstroTurf. You're listening to Selected Shorts recorded live in performance at Symphony Space in New York City and at other venues nationwide. Welcome back. This is Selected Shorts, where our greatest actors transport us through the magic of fiction, one short story at a time. I'm Meg Wolitzer. As we listen to stories that revolve around the pleasures and pitfalls of the summer season. I hope you're at least on the porch or fire escape drinking some lemonade. Or maybe you're contemplating a getaway or a road trip or a beach day yourself. Well, hey, don't go without us. You can find all current episodes of our podcast and our risque sister podcast, Too Hot for radio@pledshorts.org or wherever you get your podcasts. And hey, subscribe so we won't just be another case of summer love. Now let's hear a story by Canadian writer W.P. kinsella. Kinsella was a novelist and short story writer whose subject was often baseball. After you hear the story, you won't be surprised to learn his biggest book was Shoeless Joe, which was later adapted into the film Field of Dreams. This piece is a longtime Shorts favorite, and every new reader brings a little something different to it. The reader here is the fantastic Denis o' Hare. O' Hare is known for series including American Horror Story, but he's also a dedicated stage actor who won a Tony for the original production of Take Me Out. If you know that show, you know Ohare's character has a long romantic speech about baseball, which feeds directly into this story. And now Denis O' Hare performs the Thrill of the Grass by W.P. kinsella.
- [34:53]
Denis O'Hare
1981 the Summer the baseball players went on strike the dull weeks drag by. The summer deepens. The strike is nearly a month old. Outside the city, the corn rustles and ripens in the sun. Summer without baseball, a disruption to the psyche, an unexplainable aimlessness engulfs me. I stay later and later each evening in the small office at the rear of my shop, now driving home after work, the worst of the rush hour traffic over. It is the time of evening I would normally be heading for the stadium. I enjoy arriving an hour early, parking in a far corner of the lot, walking slowly toward the stadium, rays of sun dropping softly over my shoulders like tangerine ropes, my shadow gliding with me, black as an umbrella. I like to watch young families beside their campers, the mothers in shorts grilling hamburgers, their men drinking beers. I enjoy seeing little boys dressed in home team uniforms, barely toddling, clutching hot dogs in upraised hands. I am a failed shortstop. As a young man I saw myself diving to my left, graceful as a toppling tree, fielding high grounders like a cat, leaping for butterflies, bracing my right foot and tossing the first, the throw true as if a steel ribbon connected my hand and the first baseman's glove. I dreamed of leading the American League in hitting, being inducted into the hall of fame. I batted.217 in my senior year of high school and averaged 1.3 errors per nine innings. I know the stadium will be deserted Nevertheless, I wheel my car down off the freeway, park and walk across the silent lot, my footsteps rasping and mournful. Strangle grass and creeping charlie are already inching up through the gravel, surreptitious, surprised at their own ease. Faded bottle caps, rusted bits of chrome, an occasional paperclip, recede into the earth. I circle a ticket booth, sun faded empty door closed by an oversized padlock. I walk beside the tall machinery green board fence. A half mile away. A few cars hiss along the freeway. Overhead, a single engine plane fizzes lazily. The whole place is silent as an empty classroom, like a house suddenly without children. It is then that I spot the door shape. I have to check twice to be sure it is there. A door cut in the deep green boards of the fence, more the promise of a door than the real. As children we cut in the sides of cardboard boxes with our mother's paring knives. As I move closer, a golden circle of lock, like an acrimonious eye, establishes its certainty. I stand my nose so close to the door I can smell the faint odor of paint, the golden eye of a lock inches from my own eyes. My desire to be inside the ballpark is so great that for the first time in my life I commit a criminal act. I have been a LOCKSMITH for over 40 years. I take the small tools from my pocket of my jacket and in less time than it would take a speedy runner to circle the bases, I am inside the stadium. Though the ballpark is open air, it smells of abandonment. The walkways and seating are cold as basements. I breathe the odors of rancid popcorn and wilted cardboard. The maintenance staff was laid off when the strike began. Synthetic grass does not need to be cut or watered. I stare down at the ball diamond where just to the right of the pitcher's mound, a Single weed, perhaps 2 inches high, stands defiant in the rain packed dirt. The field sits breathless in the orangy glow of the evening sun. I stare at the potato colored earth of the infield, that wide dun arch surrounded by plastic glass. As I contemplate the prickly turf which scorches the thighs and buttocks of a sliding player as if he were being seared by steel. It stares back in its uniform ugliness. The seams that send routinely hit ground balls veering at torturous angles are vivid gray as scars. I remember the the ball fields of my childhood, the outfields full of soft hummocks, brown eyed gopher holes. I stride down from the stand and walk out to the middle of the field. I touch the stubble that is called grass, take off my shoes, but find it is like walking on a row of toothbrushes. It was an evil day when they stripped the sod from this ballpark, cut it into yard wide swaths, rolled it, memories and all, into great green and black cinnamon roll shapes, trucked it away. Nature temporarily defeated, but nature is patient. Over the next few days an idea forms within me, ripening, swelling, pushing everything else into a corner. It's like knowing a new wonderful joke and not being able to share. I need an accomplice. I go to see a man I don't know personally, though I have seen his face peering at me from the financial pages of the local newspaper and the Wall Street Journal, and I have been watching his profile at the baseball stadium two boxes to the right of me for several years. He is a fan, really a fan. When the weather is intemperate or the game not close, the people around us disappear like flowers closing at sunset, but we are always there until the last pitch. I know he is a man who attends because of the beauty and the mystery of the game, a man who can sit during the last of the 9th with the game innings ago and draw joy from watching the first baseman adjust the angle of his glove as the pitcher goes into his windup. He, like me, is a first base side fan. I've always watched baseball from the first bass side. The positions fans choose at sporting events are like politics, religion or philosophy, a view of the world, a way of seeing the universe. They make no sense to anyone, have no basis in anything but stubbornness. I brought up my daughters to watch baseball from the first bay side. One lives in Japan and sends me box scores from Japanese newspapers and Japanese baseball magazines with pictures of superstars politely bowing to one another. She has a season ticket in Yokohama on the first base side. Tell him a baseball fan is here to see him, is all I say to his secretary. His office is in a skyscraper from which he can look out over the city to see where the prairies roll green as mountain water to the limits of the eye. I wait all afternoon in the artificially cool, glassy reception area with its yellow and mauve chairs, chrome and glass coffee tables. Finally, in the late afternoon, my message is passed along. Seen you at the baseball stadium, I say, not introducing myself. Yes, he says. I recognize you. Three rows back, about eight seats to my left. You have a red scorebook. You often bring your daughter? Granddaughter, yep. She goes to sleep in my lap late in the evenings, but she knows how to calculate an era. She's only in grade two. One of my greatest regrets, says this tall man whose mustache and carefully styled hair are polar bear white, is that my grandchildren all live over a thousand miles away. You're very lucky. Now, what can I do for you? I have an idea, I say, one that's been creeping toward me like a first baseman when the bunt sign is on. What do you think about artificial turf? Huh? He snorts. That's what the strike should be about. Baseball is meant to be played on summer evenings, on Sunday afternoons on grass just cut by a horse drawn mower, and we smile as our eyes meet. I've discovered that the ballpark is open to me. Anyway, I go on, there's no one there. While the strike is on, the wind blows through the high top of the grandstand, whining until the pigeons in the rafters flutter. It's lonely as a ghost town. And what is it you do up there alone with the pigeons? I dream. And where do I come in? You've always struck me as a man who dreams. I think we have things in common. I think you might like to come with me. I could show you what I dream. Paint you. Pictures suggest what might happen. He studies me carefully for a moment, like a pitcher trying to decide if he can trust the sign his catcher has just given him. Tonight, he says. Would tonight be too soon? Park in the northwest corner of the lot about 1am There's a door about 50 yards to the right of the main gate. I'll open it when I hear you. He nods. I turn and leave. The night is clear and cotton warm when he arrives. Oh my, he says, staring at the stadium turned chrome blue by a full moon. Oh my, he says again, breathing in the faint odors of baseball, reminder of fans and players not long gone. Lets go down to the field, I say. I am carrying a cardboard pizza box, holding it on the upturned palms of my hand like an offering. When we reach the field, he first stands on the mound, makes an awkward attempt at a wind up, then does a little sprint from first to about halfway to second. I think I know what you brought, he says, gesturing toward the box. But let me see anyway. I open the box, in which rests a square foot of sod, the grass smooth and pure, cool as a swatch of satin, fragile as baby's hair.
- [45:54]
Hugh Dancy
O.
- [45:57]
Denis O'Hare
The man says, reaching out a finger to test the moistness of it. Oh, I see. We walk across the field, the harsh prickly turf making the bottoms of my Feet tingle to the left field corner where, in the angle formed by the foul line and the warning track, I lay down the square foot of sod. That's beautiful, my friend says, kneeling beside me, placing his hands, fingers spread wide on the verdant square, leaving a print faint as a Veronica. I take from my belt a sickle shaped blade, the kind used for cutting carpet. I measure along the edge of the sod, dig the point in, and pull carefully toward me. There's a ripping sound, like tearing an old bed sheet. I hold up the square of artificial turf like something freshly killed while all the time digging the sharp point into the packed earth I have exposed. I replace the sod lovingly covering the newly bared surface. Protest, I say. But it could be more, the man replies. I hoped you'd say that. It could be. If you'd like to come back tomorrow night. Tomorrow night would be fine. But there will be an admission charge. A square of sod. A square sod 2 inches thick. Of the same grass. Of the same grass. But there's more. I suspected as much. You must have a friend who would join us. Yes, I have two. Would that be all right? I trust your judgment. My father. He's over 80, my friend says. You might have seen him with me once or twice. He lives over 50 miles from here. But if I call him, he'll come. And my friend. If they pay their admission, they'll be welcome. And they may have friends. Indeed they may. But what will we do with this? I say, holding up the sticky back square of turf, which smells of glue and fabric. We could mail them anonymously to baseball, executives, politicians, clergymen, Jenna. Reminders not to tamper with nature. We dance toward the exit, rampant with excitement. You will come back. You will bring others. Count on it, says my friend. They do come, those trusted friends and friends of friends, each making a live green deposit. At first a tiny row of sod squares begin to inch along toward left side center field. The next night, even more people arrive. The following night, more again, and the night after that there's positively a crowd. Those who come once always seem to return, accompanied by friends, occasionally a son or younger brother, but mostly men my age or older, for we are the ones who remember the grass. Night after night, the pilgrimage continues. The first night I stand inside the green deep door, listening. I hear a vehicle stop, hear a car door close with a snug thud. I open the door when the soft sound of soled shoes on gravel tells me it's time. The door swings silent as a snake we nod curt greetings to each other. Two men pass me, each carrying a grasshopper legged sprinkler. Later each sprinkler will sizzle like frying onions as it wheels a silver sparkler in the moonlight. During the nights that follow I stand sentinel like on the top of the grandstand, watching as my cohorts arrive. Old men walking across a parking lot in a row in the dark, carrying coiled hoses, looking like the many wheels of a locomotive. Old men who have slipped away from their homes, skulked down their sturdy sidewalks, breathing the cool grassy after midnight air. They have left behind their sleeping gray haired women, their immaculate bungalows, their manicured lawns. They continue to walk across the parking lot while occasionally a soft wheeze, a nibbling breathy sound like an old horse might make, divulges their humanity. They move methodically toward the baseball stadium which hulks against the moon blue sky like a small mountain. Beneath the tint of scarlet the tall light standards which rise above the fences and grandstand glow purple, necks bent forward like sunflowers heavy with seed. My other daughter lives in this city, is married to a fan, but one who watches baseball from behind third base and like marrying outside the faith, she's been converted to third base side. They had their own season tickets 12 rows up, just to the outside side of third base. I love her, but I don't trust her enough to let her in on my secret. I could trust my granddaughter, but she is too young. At her age she shouldn't have to face such responsibility. I remember my own daughter who only lives in Japan, remember her at nine, all knees, elbows and missing teeth. Remember peering into her room, seeing her asleep, a shower of well thumbed baseball cards scattered across her chest and pillow. I have been able to tell my wife it is like my compatriots and I are involved in a ritual for true believers. Only Maggie, who knew me when I still dreamed of playing professionally myself, Maggie, after over half a lifetime together, comes and sits in my lap in the comfortable easy chair which has adjusted through the years to my thickening shape just as she has. I love to hold the lightness of her, her tongue exploring my mouth gently as a baby's finger. Where do you go? She asks sleepily when I crawl into bed at dawn. I mumble a reply. I know she doesn't sleep well when I am gone. I can feel her body rhythms change as I slip out of bed after midnight. Aren't you too old to be having a change of life? She says, placing her toast warm hand on my cold thigh. I'm not the only one with this problem. I'm developing a reputation, whispers an affable man at the ballpark. I imagine any number of private investigators following any number of cars across a street city. I imagine them creeping about in the parking lot, shining pen lights on license plates, trying to guess what we're up to. Think of the reports they must prepare. I wonder if our wives are disappointed that we're not out discoing with frizzy haired teenagers. Night after night, virtually not a word is spoken. Each man seems to know his assignment. Not all bring sod. Some carry rakes, some hoes some hoses, which when joined together, snake across the infield and outfield, dispensing the blessing of water. Others cradle in their arms bags of earth for building up the infield to meet the thick living sod. I often remain high up in the stadium, looking down on the men moving over the earth, dark as ants, each sodding, cutting, watering, shaping. Occasionally the moon finds a knife blade as it trims the sod or slices away a chunk of artificial turf and tosses the reflection skyward like a bright ball. My body tingles. There should be symphony music playing. Everyone should be humming America the Beautiful. Toward dawn I watch the men walking away in groups like small patrols of soldiers, carrying instead of arms the tools and utensils which breathe life back into this arid ball field. Row by row, night by night, we lay the little squares of sod, moist as chocolate cake with icing green. Where did all the sod come from? I picture many men in many parts of the city surreptitiously cutting chunks out of their own lawns in the leafy midnight darkness, listening to the uncomprehending protests of their wives the next day, pretending to know nothing of it, pretending to have called the police to investigate. When the strike is over, I know we will all be here to watch the workouts, to hear the recalcitrant joints crackling like twigs. After the forced inactivity, we will sit in our regular seats scattered like popcorn throughout the stadium, and will nod as we pass on the way to the exits, exchange secret smiles, proud as new fathers. For me, the best part of all will be the surprise. I feel like a magician who has gestured hypnotically and produced an elephant from thin air. I know I am not alone in my wonder. I know that rockets shoot off in half a hundred chests, the excitement of birthday mornings, Christmas Eves, and hometown double headers boils within each of my conspirators. Our secret Rites have been performed with love, like delivering a valentine to a sweetheart's door. In that blue steel span of morning just before dawn, players in management are meeting around the clock. The settlement is imminent. I've watched the stadium covered square foot by square foot until it looks like green graph paper. I have stood and felt the cool colors of the grass rise up and touch my face. I have studied the lines between each small square, watch those lines fade until they were visible to my eye only, and then not even to them. What will the players think as they straggle into the stadium and find the miracle we have created? The old timers will raise their heads like ponies as far away as the parking lot when the thrill of the grass reaches their nostrils. And as they dress, they'll recall sprawling in the lush outfield of childhood, the grass as cool as a mother's hand on the forehead. Goodbye, goodbye, we say at the gate. The smell of water, of sod, of sweat, small perfumes in the air. Our secrets are safe with each other. We go our separate ways alone in the stadium. In the last chill darkness before dawn, I drop to my hands and knees in the center of the outfield. My palms are sodden. Water touches the skin between my spread fingers. I lower my face to the silvered grass, which, wonder of wonders, already has the ephemeral odors of baseball about it.
- [57:27]
Meg Wolitzer
That was Denis O' Hare performing the Thrill of the Grass by W.P. kinsella. I have to say I've never been a baseball fan, though everyone in my family is. My husband wrote a book about a minor league team. My 93 year old mother still talks about the car ride she shared with Keith Hernandez of her beloved Mets. And one of my sons when he was a young child asked me, mom, what's your favorite baseball team? I said, I didn't have one. Then he said, okay, what's your second favorite? Well, as you might imagine, I don't have a second favorite baseball team. But I do appreciate the elegance and beauty and sometimes the nostalgia of the game. Which is why I responded to the story and Denis o' Hare's reading, and to the indelible images of those pieces of sod being carried one by one onto a deserted field. All that sensual seasonal imagery has left me in a poetic state. So, listener, shall I compare thee to a summer's day? While I know thou art lovely, thou also art somewhere far away from my air conditioned recording studio. So for now I shall but imagine your warm and sunny countenance whilst I position myself directly in front of the vents of my American Standard. I'm Meg Wolitzer. Thanks for joining me for Selected Shorts. Selected Shorts is produced by Jennifer Brennan and Sarah Montague. Our team includes Matthew Love, Drew Richardson, Mary Shimkin, Vivienne Woodward, and Magdalene Robleski. The readings are recorded by Myles B. Smith. Our programs, presented at the Getty center in Los Angeles, are recorded by Phil Richards. Our theme music is David Peterson's that's the Deal, performed by the Dierdorf Petersen Group. Selected Shorts is supported by the Dungannon Foundation. This program is also made possible with public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts, with the support of Governor Kathy Hochul and the New York State Legislature. Selected Shorts is produced and distributed by Symphony Space.
- [59:32]
Denis O'Hare
Sam SA.