Clay's Capers Childbirth Pt 1.

The white plastic stick displays +.

We are excited and like a few other things in life it's a brick wall. If you are a parent you are this side, if you are not a parent your on that side. Helen Keller's teacher Anne Sullivan could nevermake you understand.

Agatha and I begin the journey with joyful tears. The next day the whole process begins.

1) Choose a OBGYN...wait a minute Agatha wants a mid-wife to deliver the baby.

Clay firmly declares, "umm. I am not to sure umm that I am comfortable with that umm idea...dear"
Agatha, "well there is a terrefic program at LICH hospital. Urban Baby highly recommends it. I have talked to 12 mothers since we learned about this last night whao all had incredible experiences. I am making an appointment.

The following week...we nervously meet outside the hospital to meet the mid-wives. Our appointment is with Debbie Pasties. A sixty year old ex-hippie with brassy curly hair well past her shoulders reminds me of "mother" ,night bird dj from FM, Eileen Brennan. Her most notable role was the crass sargent in Private Benjamin.

We sit down across from her. She is artificially warm. She is kind and thorough when answeing Agatha's questions. With me quick and annoyed.

Later that evening as Agatha foreshadows the events of the birth with Madame Pasties. I express my concern. What if there is a medical emergency. I was hung up with the question of what malady would cause her to turn over the delivery to a doctor.

I know that every birth is unique, but there must a list of maladies whether personal or as a professional standard that demand the attention of s doctor, no?
I decided the next day that I would set up an appointment with Sargent Pasties and ask her.



clay

Germ Warfare

How in the hell did this happen to Mason! In this fight, odds on favorite should have been a heart attack. His dad and uncle both dropped dead at 50 from a heart attack. Mason had quadruple bypass surgery at 42. Although he quit smoking, he hardly watched his diet, never exercised. How in the hell did Lou Gerig's disease find him.

Back in 1999, Mason was diagnosed with a popateal aneurism reached capacity. He did not act on the diagnosis. The cardiologist did not automatically admit him to surgery. Mason was told to take care of it soon. When the vessel's capacity was compomised, he was rushed to the hospital. He was offered two options by the attending cardiologist. Bypass surgery or new technique which involved laproscopically inserting a stint in the blocked artery. Dad made that decision on his own. Mason said, "Shoot the stint."
Here comes the irony...the attending cardiologist was not Dad's childhood friend Arnold Wildenstern, but Oscar Bizet. Bizet wasn't just another doctor in the practice. No, he was the son of Laverne Bizet. The woman Dad sought refuge from his fraudulent marraige to my Mom, Tallulah...their affair wiped out not only his own marriage, but also Lavern's.

Let's take a moment to look at this. Here in Oscar Bizet care is the man who wrecked his parents three decade marriage. Mason's down for the count and it's up to Oscar. Will the round end? Will Oscar call the fight? Will he employ the deadly winning combination, a serum that causes slow, painful, humiliating death?. Oscar is both the opponet and the referee.

Oscar had always been an oddity. He grew up in the neighboring trailer at Camelot Trailer Park and as Ralph Stanley used to say the walls were so thin that the two of us dreamnt the same dreams. He was a fiercly competitive teenager. When he lost anything, he would completely loose his shit and expel his rage to anyone who crossed his path. I had the unfortunate opportunity to be his doubles partner once, my athletic abilities were an embarassment to me and the good folks of Hill River. in fact, i was awarded "most spirited"(100% strike out average) in baseball, "most christ-like"( 0 points average per game) in church league basketball. And let's not forget loosing a early race car video arcade game to a blind friend of mine. At some point during the match he forced me to stand behind the base line and hold my racquet behind my back. Somehow even this minimal amount of presense caused us to loose. The tongue lashing that I recieved from him resides in the crowded pejorative memory chamber of my mind to this day.

kaintock

The Dixie Voice:Wending Its Way To The Top

Lawrence Creek. He's the editor. He and his family
were self proclaimed machas at my temple and in the community. His grandfather Frank Creek managed Camelot Trailer Park from a early model caramel colored Lincoln Continental. Residents literally sat in the back seat amongst discarded Krystal boxes and rags to sign their leases.

Frank tried to stop my dad from being bar mitzvahed at the
last minute...that was before my grandmother took Frank
Creek down a few notches. Suffice it to say,
Dad was on the bima on the designated time.

Larry, grandson of Frank, was picked on by everyone I knew. He was the classic smart alek-y kid with thick glasses that made you angry whenever he entered the room.
His reincarnation from book smart nebbish to
media mogul would occur years later in the promised
land.

At that time, he was probably in his late 20's and he
had started a jewish paper in Hill River that was
mostly political "zion this zion that" with the
prerequisite listing of social events like births, bar
mitzvahs and confirmations. There was a well established
society trade called The Shank Bone which was the
Dixie Voice's competition. The Voice had minimal
advertising while the The Shank Bone was chock full of ads
from every Hill River jewish owned business from metal scrap
yards to the prominet jewish attorneys and dentists.
It was all society. I was actually in it several times for various dances and party. There would be a blury black and white of me and my date...with the caption, Clay Kaintock escorts Bunny Ravitz to the "Showboat Formal etc. Dismal days
The Shank Bone was run by a family named Blitzen.

In the 90's, Larry went to Jerusalem trying to
promote his paper and he came across a noted Jews for
Jesus rabbi.The rabbi asked Larry if he
knew the Blitzens of Hill River. For the Creek family, this
was a biblical moment on par with parting of the red
sea.

It turns out that for two decades the Blitzens were
secretly practicing Jews for Jesus followers. I cannot
express how much scorn was generated in the
Hill River jewish community, especially from all the
merchants who had been paying for ads for years. I
mean drug dealing, interracial marriage, homosexuality
all paled to this offense.

Larry did not even have to write an article about it
in his paper. In a community like Hill River the tongue and
the telephone are a stronger media than papers, radio
and TV combined. The Shank Bone was kaddish that same
month.

In fact the Blitzens were literally forced out of
town. They had a daughter a year younger than me who
was divorced by her husband because of this deceit.

Clay