Failure Is an Option

by H. Jon Benjamin

  Anyway, I thought it was funny, and they ended up passing on our deal. A win-win in my book. And a win for my brother-in-law’s father. But a loss for my writing partner, who I still feel I owe money to for souring any prospects with that network for some time. But we will always have that one night in Boca, when hope was alive and we were young and they were old and money meant nothing (to me) and Chinese food was $3.99.

  As a quick addendum, in keeping slightly on message, I’d like to offer a side story in the spirit of confused grandmothers and Jewish jokes. Maybe my reputation for unfortunate phone pranking precedes me, or maybe it was just an unusual coincidence.

  When my grandmother Sadie was alive, I would frequently speak to her. At least once a week. She lived alone in the Bronx after my grandfather passed away. She was an incredible woman. Small, sturdy, almost indestructible. Even in her nineties, she lugged groceries up the steep hill to her apartment complex.

  One day, she called me and asked me if I was feeling better. I said, “Why do you ask?”

  “Because you were so sick the last time you called, Jonny.”

  “Grandma, I haven’t been sick in over a year.”

  “Well, you certainly sounded it,” she explained.

  “Why?” I asked.

  “Because you sounded all stuffed up and asked me if I was alone and what I was wearing, and when I told you I was in my housecoat, you started to breathe heavily, and I kept saying, ‘Jonny, are you all right?’ But you kept breathing heavily, then moaned and hung up.”

  “That wasn’t me, Grandma.”

  “Then who else could it have been?”

  CHAPTER 14

  Prince Edward Island (and How I Failed to Take a Walk in the Woods)

  As I previously mentioned, when I was twelve, my parents sent me to that 4-H camp, mainly because my friend was going and his family had horses on their small farm in Westborough, Massachusetts, making him a horse guy and someone who actually wanted to go to horse camp. I, on the other hand, was allergic to every land animal imaginable. I couldn’t even have a hamster in my house or I would break into hives.

  My mother also had a phobia of dogs. Whenever a dog came near she would turn into a statue, unable to talk. This would make for interesting scenarios when neighbors would come by, walking their dogs. It was always a one-way conversation.

  Neighbor: Hello, Shirley!

  My mom: (Frozen glare.)

  Neighbor: How’s Howie doing?

  My mom: (Frozen glare.)

  Neighbor: Ummm, hi, Jon.

  Me: Hi.

  Neighbor: Well, nice to see you, Shirley.

  My mom: (Frozen glare.)

  Neighbor: (Muttering.) Jesus, what a fucking jerk.

  Eventually, the dog owners in my neighborhood became aware of her phobia and learned my mother wasn’t some monumental asshole or some KGB agent who spoke no English sent to destroy America. Anyway, as you can glean, animals were not our thing.

  Horse camp? I was dreading it. I knew it would be a week of me wheezing and missing my phobic mommy. But imagine, to learn how to ride a horse! That’s the stuff of warriors and princes (and peasants and serfs). The camp was about a forty-minute drive from my house, and I got dropped off with my duffel bag and met up with my horse friend. At the time, he was really into girls and he immediately starting rating them during the introduction meeting in the main cabin, as all the campers were gathered.

  For him, this was the pinnacle of excitement. An overnight camp with horses and girls. For me, this was a nightmare. An overnight camp with horses and girls. I bristled at the thought of meeting girls, with labored, allergic breathing, even though there’s nothing sexier than a good hearty wheeze to impress a woman. The first task was to head to the stables to meet the horses and get a basic sense of what the daily regimen would be. Wheezing ensued as the counselors introduced us to all the horses that I would hate riding for the next week. After, we went to the main hall to have dinner. With a semiobstructed airway, I tried to get my food down. I knew I would spend my time at this camp exclusively with the camp nurse.

  Then, suddenly, out of nowhere, there was a muffled scream, then from across the room, a girl, maybe about thirteen years old, stumbled from the bathroom, her hands held up over her head with blood running down her arms. Counselors escorted her out quickly. We all just sat there in silence. No one knew what was going on. For a long time, we sat, until an ambulance arrived, the flickering red lights filling the room. Finally, the camp director came in and announced that a girl had cut her wrists in the bathroom in a suicide attempt. It was a bit stunning that he didn’t at least play it down a bit. Horse people don’t mince words.

  He invited any camper to call their parents to pick them up in the event they did not want to continue based on what had happened. My friend sat there stunned. A few kids got up and headed for the door. I looked at my friend, took a shallow breath that made a high-pitched heeeeeee sound, and got up to leave. I drove home with this strange feeling of relief, shaded by the tragic circumstance of a girl, who, out of nowhere, at some remote 4-H camp, cut both her wrists.

  Maybe she hated the thought of going to horse camp more than me, or maybe she was just troubled, but either way, her actions set me free. I hope she is okay, but to this day whenever I see a horse, I think of that girl.

  When I was in my late thirties, I wanted to take a trip with Amy before we had our baby. She was about six months pregnant, and we both felt we needed one last fling with freedom before we were saddled with the excruciating pleasure of raising a child. She wanted to go to Mexico, to the beach. I had never been. I was slightly uncomfortable with the idea of Mexico. I was sure it was great, but I have an aversion to “great.” Everyone I know had been to Mexico and enjoyed it, therefore “Why go?” It’s like a compulsion to reject norms. My feeling is why go to a luxury resort, when you could go to rural Minnesota and tour a packing house or to Peaks Island, Maine, to go to the Umbrella Cover Museum?

  It was almost winter, so naturally I suggested the most inopportune place: Nova Scotia. “Are you sure you want to go to Nova Scotia off-season, when Mexico would be perfect?” she said.

  “It’ll be more interesting,” I answered.

  We flew to Halifax and stayed at a small B & B situated on a promontory overlooking a quiet harbor. It was one of those bed-and-breakfasts where people are friendly and everyone eats breakfast together. Because neither of us is friendly, this was extremely awkward. The next day we decided to leave Nova Scotia altogether and take the ferry to Prince Edward Island, an even more remote province.

  The ferry to the island was enormous, and there were only about four people on it. And when we docked, things looked pretty barren. A guy with a Billy Gibbons beard sat behind a picnic table selling wooden clocks shaped like Prince Edward Island itself. You couldn’t even get a bottle of water, but you could buy a homemade clock from a Canadian hillbilly. (No offense, hillbillies.)

  We figured we would head to town and grab lunch before we went to our inn. There were two things open: a fish restaurant and a knife factory. We ate at the fish restaurant, which was empty. The waitress told us it was off-season. Things pick up again in May, she said. After lunch, we strolled over to the knife factory and bought a bread knife. Then we went to our inn, which, like everywhere else we had been on this trip, was located on a quaint harbor. (No offense, quaint harbors.)

  The next morning, we planned to head to a national forest and take a walk. We’re not very outdoorsy, but there wasn’t much else to do unless we wanted to get daywork at a sawmill. We filled a backpack and headed in the car to the other side of the island, intent on embracing our isolation. It might not be fun, but we would give ourselves over to the solitude of nature.

  We pulled up and looked at the wooden placard that marked the trails. A huge expanse of forest unfolded before us. We chose the one-and-a-half-mile loop. I me
an, we wanted outdoor adventure, but a very small amount. We zipped up our jackets and plunged into the deep Canadian wilderness.

  As we made our way, the forest grew quiet, and trees canopied us from the light. We walked through in silence. About fifteen minutes in, we were doing relatively well, although I could sense a mild level of dread. There was a definite forced peacefulness, like a grimace and a teeth-clenched “Isn’t this a nice walk?” As we turned a corner, I saw it, only a few yards in front of us, looming in the center of the path. A sizable brown clump. A whopping pile of animal dung. And this was not some ordinary pile. A massive load. We approached it slowly. It was still steaming.

  “This looks like fresh bear shit,” I said.

  I saw her face go ashen. Diplomatic, I repeated, “This is definitely bear shit.” (Note: I have no idea what bear shit looks like.) Somehow I’d forgotten then that bears attack people and that this might alarm her, who, remember, had a baby in her, but more to the point, I was distracted by my mortal terror that a bear was near. Her look turned to horror, and our peaceful walk suddenly shifted in tone.

  She started striding ahead down the path, murmuring incoherently. Her fear exacerbated my fear, and I ran ahead, senselessly babbling out ideas of what we should do if confronted by a bear. She quickened to keep up with me, taking heavy breaths and exhaling loudly and rhythmically. We looked like we were in a speed-walk race. She sounded as if she were in labor. I eventually stopped talking, and we walked together at this clipped pace, staring straight ahead in a full state of panic.

  Everything went away except the primal instinct to survive. The last thing I remember saying was: “Don’t run. Just walk fast.”

  Suddenly, I heard something coming from behind us. I didn’t even want to turn around. I was certain this was it. Who would the bear take first? Would I sacrifice myself to save my girlfriend and our baby? The sound grew louder. Instantly and without fanfare, two teenage girls in jogging shorts swept past us in a split second. They smiled and waved hello. My girlfriend and I looked at each other blankly. We walked the rest of the path and back to the car.

  Amy wanted to leave the next day, a day earlier than we planned. I could only comply. On our way home, I bought a wooden clock from the hillbilly as a keepsake of our island journey. When I look back on that trip, I wonder why I wanted it to be that bad. Maybe when you set your sights very low, you can’t be overly disappointed. But we will always have that shared experience of sort of possibly being potentially attacked by a bear. That stands out more than some great trip to some eco-resort in Cozumel. Plus, I still have that bread knife.

  CHAPTER 15

  How I Failed as a New Father

  The moment when I decided to ejaculate I knew that there was a possibility of future fatherhood. But I was playing the odds. I think it was not the best gamble: an inverted Russian roulette, if you will. Anyway, it was a boy, and I cried when I found out. I was at the O’Hare airport when Amy told me by phone. That’s why we named him Sbarro. I admit I was, at best, confused by the notion that I was to be a parent, but comforted by the fact that millions had done poorly before me.

  Our son was delivered by C-section, and my first thought as I entered the OR was Why do they not have an entrance where you don’t have to walk by the disemboweled body of your partner before crossing past the partition? I know people record their births, but there is a reason nobody records their C-sections. Amy, with the help of much medication, seemed unaware that her insides were draped like dirty laundry on her chest, which is a good thing I suppose.

  When my baby was shown to me by the doctor moments later, my mood was already ruined by the sight of internal organs. My girlfriend kept complaining she was cold, and I imagine it was because her entire lower half was splayed open. Anyway, I don’t want to grouse too much, but just a quick revamping of the entryway would have really changed my first-time-father moment. From there, it went downhill.

  First misstep: I did not spend the first night in the hospital with my girlfriend. The baby is kept in a nursery separated except for feedings, so I figured I would go out to dinner. Oh, and it wasn’t purely selfish (the dinner part), since I was going home to pick up fresh clothes for her, but it was worth getting admonished by the bartender as I ordered a glass of red wine.

  “I just had a baby.”

  “Congratulations, when?”

  “About four hours ago.”

  A sour look crossed his face. “Oh, well, what are you doing here?”

  He didn’t seemed pleased with my “getting some clothes at home” answer and peered at me as I sat masticating roast duck. I was like Henry I, checking quickly on “just another male heir” and then back to the banquet. I have fond memories of that duck, though.

  Second miscalculation: when driving your partner home from the hospital with your baby in a used car in midwinter with poor heating, don’t say, “I need to stop at Duane Reade to pick up my medication.” Also, after she says no, don’t argue that it’s on the way. And don’t stop. But I did. I have high cholesterol. It was being treated with medication. It was pretty much on the way home.

  I will say that I was highly underprepared to be a father. It is difficult for a narcissist to focus his attention elsewhere, and so I didn’t. During the first few months, I did spend a lot of time with my son. And I know from research that in those early days, it is important to provide reassurance, so our days were mainly spent at a newly opened video game bar in the East Village, reassuring me.

  This childcare haven was generally empty until the neighborhood schools got out at three thirty, so I would have a good five hours of playing system link Halo with my baby watching. It takes a village to save Earth from the Covenant. I neglected to tell my girlfriend that our newborn was primarily being reared indoors to the sounds of assault rifles. But look, that sound is not far off from the echoed sounds of a mother’s beating heart, so I was mainly providing aural consistency.

  Third misstep: The park, in NYC, is basically a second home for child-rearing. A good part of early childhood is spent in parks. And a community forms among those who populate the parks. It’s where moms and dads and their children form early bonds. It is also where early petty resentments develop. The park is a breeding ground for parents to judge other parents and develop private animosities toward them, the caregivers, and the children.

  The first and easiest target, for me, was the toddler with the electric-powered car (at least it wasn’t diesel), driving around recklessly wearing the Ed Hardy onesie and sunglasses. Sunglasses on toddlers are wrong. Adult accoutrements on babies are wrong. The act of even partially dressing toddlers as adults is creepy, unless you are dressing them as your favorite occupation, like a chef or an airline pilot or a coal miner. I think it would be refreshing to see a baby dressed in coveralls with soot on his face.

  But this kid was just an attention seeker. Toddler douchebags are a puzzling group, mainly because they don’t know they are douchebags yet, which just outwardly fuels their douchebaginess. It’s an interesting conundrum, because adult douchebags are also mostly clueless about being douchebags, and that’s in essence what makes them douchebags. They think their loud boorishness and ostentation is just a sign of confidence and good spirit. But the smug look on the face of the kid who gets put into an electric-powered mini Hummer may just as easily be the confounded face of a toddler, not necessarily the look of someone who is prodigiously indifferent to the poor.

  But it is more likely an indicator of early-onset douchebag. I mean, how could you ever not end up cravenly wanting more, when, at five, you’re already driving an electric Hummer?

  The park is also a forum for public judgment on how children are raised, and many are not shy about sharing opinions. I wasn’t immune to this. I mean, I judged a five-year-old just for driving a toy car. I judged parents for being overly precious about their babies. I judged parents who spoke harshly to other people’s childre
n. I pushed theories of parenting that I knew very little about. In the case of the Scandinavian couple who left their child in a stroller outside a bar in New York City while they went in to drink and defended it as a cultural norm in Scandinavia, I openly supported the couple, because of my wanting to do that here in America.

  So, imagine how others judged me. One afternoon, I had brought my baby son to the park near our apartment. He had just started to crawl, so this was a huge uptick in excitement for our time together. Prior to this, there was the watching my baby lie and the watching my baby eat. Now, with this new skill, there was the watching my baby crawl. It’s not a huge thing, but weeks and weeks go by where very little happens, so even slight changes make a big difference in the day to day. I took him out of the stroller to let him crawl freely and got myself in a sturdy position to watch.

  Soon, I struck up a conversation with a young mother who was there with her own baby. After a few moments, another woman approached and asked, “Is that your baby?” She pointed to my baby, who was sitting next to a tree, perched up, moving his mouth in a chewing motion.

  “Yes,” I said.

  “He’s eating dog shit,” she said.

  I looked over and, yes, there was a dark brown material in his mouth. So many emotions flowed. I ran over and discovered that, yes, the dark brown material he was eating was the aforementioned dog shit, or maybe human shit, but definitely shit. So this was the moment when my baby was eating shit.

  I used my finger to clear it out, but there was no determining how much had been eaten. Time was blurry at this point. Could it have been a whole log? Is more shit worse than a little shit? What is the protocol for baby shit-eating? Is it considered healthy in some cultures? Like do ashrams practice shit-eating as a way to develop stomach flora? Sweaty and panicked, I looked over to see the two women looking at me, both like, “How could you let your baby eat shit?”