Gotham Diary:
Play
Although I don’t believe in parking children in front of the TV, or imprisoning them in some sort of rolling toychest, it’s always wonderful to see a child playing by itself, wrapped up in things — and the homelier the things, the better. Megan had the idea last week of assembling a batch of safe found objects in a colander, and I did the same thing this week.
For forty-five minutes, Will examined, chewed on, and banged the following miscellany of items: a shortish but venerable wooden spoon; a mushroom brush, and a brush for combing silk from ears of corn; a knob of brain coral; an empty jelly jar with its lid; a crystal kniferest, in the shape of a barbell, that had never been used for any purpose until yesterday; and a 2/3 cup measure. Scratch the measure: I’d needed the night before to make a vinaigrette, and I hadn’t put it back. In the past couple of weeks, Will’s ability to sit upright for as long as he wants to has firmed up nicely, but there were a few tumbles, all suffered in good humor, brought on by some very basic physics lessons. The lidded jar was at first too large to deal with, and occasioned some frustration; Will was not about to allocate both hands to handling it. Eventually, though, he managed to sweep it into his arm. It was his favorite thing.
In the afternoon, Will found the these rudimentary toys too boring to contemplate. Done that! After a bit of mild fussing and whimpering, I took him out onto the balcony, where we’ve stuffed a garden chair with pillows, so that he can lean into the back of the chair and survey our patch of Yorkville and beyond. Sometimes, his gaze is fixed on the ironwork of the chair, which he grips with the firmness of a racing driver, but yesterday it was very clear that he was watching the traffic on 86th Street. What else to do in this weather?
Later in the day, I prepped dinner, setting the table, shucking corn, seasoning the steak, and popping some vegetables into the oven — and then I went out. I walked up the street to the new (consolidated) Barnes & Noble at Lexington Avenue, descended to the Events space, and attended a reading. I mean to do this sort of thing all the time, but I forget, or I feel too busy at home — the usual excuses. But I really wanted to see Jennifer Egan, and I wanted a signed copy of her great new book, A Visit From the Goon Squad. Announcing that this was the last reading of her tour (what a relief that must be!), Ms Egan told us that she had decided to read from a chapter that she hadn’t read from before: “A to B.” This is the more or less conventional social comedy cut from a book that the author describes as a record album, and it was great fun to listen to. Afterward, I surprised myself by asking the kind of question that an author would like to be asked (“Can you tell us something about the PowerPoint chapter?”) and was thanked for doing so when I got my signature.
I was home within seventy-five minutes of leaving, but the reading injected a strong second current into my thoughts during dinner, one that I couldn’t share with my family, both about the book (A Visit From the Goon Squad is a grave book) and about the literary life, such as I’ve glimpsed it. I wasn’t entirely distracted, however. At the end of dinner, Will took to slapping the table, and I took to echoing him. He did not think that this was silly, but he did not find it irritating, either. I wish that I could describe the look of sizing-up that he gave me throughout our impromptu game. But I probably don’t have to.