WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.580 align:middle line:90% 00:00:02.580 --> 00:00:05.400 align:middle line:84% Now we move on to "Paradise--" "A Drink 00:00:05.400 --> 00:00:12.350 align:middle line:90% Called Paradise" which-- 00:00:12.350 --> 00:00:17.450 align:middle line:84% it's a story about a woman who gets marooned on this island 00:00:17.450 --> 00:00:21.470 align:middle line:84% and slowly finds out what it's like to be on an island-- 00:00:21.470 --> 00:00:23.593 align:middle line:90% post-nuclear island. 00:00:23.593 --> 00:00:25.010 align:middle line:84% Most of the islands of the Pacific 00:00:25.010 --> 00:00:29.750 align:middle line:84% have borne the effects of the 300 bombs 00:00:29.750 --> 00:00:33.090 align:middle line:84% that were detonated there in the last 30 years. 00:00:33.090 --> 00:00:36.980 align:middle line:84% And so I lived in the Pacific for only six months 00:00:36.980 --> 00:00:39.620 align:middle line:84% in the Cook Islands, but I conflated that experience 00:00:39.620 --> 00:00:43.830 align:middle line:84% with the Marshall Islands which is, of course, the hardest hit. 00:00:43.830 --> 00:00:48.500 align:middle line:84% So the details in the book are all true, which I find to be-- 00:00:48.500 --> 00:00:51.943 align:middle line:84% I find it interesting that Amazon, for example, 00:00:51.943 --> 00:00:54.110 align:middle line:84% one of the reviews said it was-- a couple of reviews 00:00:54.110 --> 00:00:57.290 align:middle line:84% said it was an interesting fantasy. 00:00:57.290 --> 00:00:59.660 align:middle line:84% We would all like to live in that interesting fantasy. 00:00:59.660 --> 00:01:02.735 align:middle line:84% Anyway, I'm going to read to you from the middle. 00:01:02.735 --> 00:01:06.020 align:middle line:90% 00:01:06.020 --> 00:01:12.140 align:middle line:84% Our heroine has just discovered what a jelly baby is 00:01:12.140 --> 00:01:15.230 align:middle line:84% and there are children that are born without bones 00:01:15.230 --> 00:01:16.910 align:middle line:90% in that part of the world. 00:01:16.910 --> 00:01:19.680 align:middle line:90% And she's in shock about it. 00:01:19.680 --> 00:01:24.170 align:middle line:84% And there's only a guy-- and there's 00:01:24.170 --> 00:01:26.600 align:middle line:84% a guy named Harry who came off the ship with her. 00:01:26.600 --> 00:01:29.240 align:middle line:84% And she's had hardly anything to do with him up to this point 00:01:29.240 --> 00:01:31.520 align:middle line:84% because he's been surrounded by island women-- 00:01:31.520 --> 00:01:33.450 align:middle line:84% you find out why that is later on in the book. 00:01:33.450 --> 00:01:36.380 align:middle line:84% But anyway, so she ends up running to him after this just 00:01:36.380 --> 00:01:39.350 align:middle line:90% to talk about it. 00:01:39.350 --> 00:01:41.780 align:middle line:84% "I'm reaching behind with both my arms, 00:01:41.780 --> 00:01:45.650 align:middle line:84% holding my arms backwards, fingering the keys. 00:01:45.650 --> 00:01:49.280 align:middle line:84% Or what would be keys of a piano stood in Harry's shack. 00:01:49.280 --> 00:01:52.400 align:middle line:84% I'm humming all the parts to a melody I once liked. 00:01:52.400 --> 00:01:53.550 align:middle line:90% Ghostly and grand--" 00:01:53.550 --> 00:01:54.990 align:middle line:84% Oh, you get two stories with this. 00:01:54.990 --> 00:01:56.180 align:middle line:90% So that's why I picked it. 00:01:56.180 --> 00:01:59.000 align:middle line:84% Anyway, "that I know--" well, shit. 00:01:59.000 --> 00:01:59.690 align:middle line:90% "I'm humming--" 00:01:59.690 --> 00:02:01.490 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:02:01.490 --> 00:02:03.290 align:middle line:84% "I'm humming all the parts to a melody 00:02:03.290 --> 00:02:07.130 align:middle line:84% I once liked, ghostly and grand, that I know will impress. 00:02:07.130 --> 00:02:09.018 align:middle line:84% I always impress when I play the piano 00:02:09.018 --> 00:02:10.310 align:middle line:90% backwards humming or singing--" 00:02:10.310 --> 00:02:11.510 align:middle line:90% Oh, she's drunk now too. 00:02:11.510 --> 00:02:13.640 align:middle line:84% "Though less in parlors than in bars. 00:02:13.640 --> 00:02:16.100 align:middle line:84% So few parlors with pianos, so few 00:02:16.100 --> 00:02:19.190 align:middle line:90% pianos unless they're in bars. 00:02:19.190 --> 00:02:20.330 align:middle line:90% I'm thankful for Harry. 00:02:20.330 --> 00:02:21.680 align:middle line:90% Harry knows the tune. 00:02:21.680 --> 00:02:23.400 align:middle line:90% He even knows the score. 00:02:23.400 --> 00:02:25.910 align:middle line:84% He knows this is a piano I'm gesturing toward. 00:02:25.910 --> 00:02:27.650 align:middle line:90% He can see I can finger. 00:02:27.650 --> 00:02:30.320 align:middle line:84% Without a piano, no one can say you missed a note 00:02:30.320 --> 00:02:33.170 align:middle line:84% or you play without feeling, mechanically like a parlor 00:02:33.170 --> 00:02:34.250 align:middle line:90% trick. 00:02:34.250 --> 00:02:36.590 align:middle line:84% Anyone else on this island without parlors 00:02:36.590 --> 00:02:40.670 align:middle line:84% would want to lock me up for the strangeness of it or laugh. 00:02:40.670 --> 00:02:43.040 align:middle line:84% People laugh at the strange first. 00:02:43.040 --> 00:02:44.990 align:middle line:90% But maybe not at jelly babies. 00:02:44.990 --> 00:02:47.390 align:middle line:84% Even Harry did not laugh at that. 00:02:47.390 --> 00:02:50.720 align:middle line:84% But perhaps Harry would have laughed at my playing the piano 00:02:50.720 --> 00:02:53.240 align:middle line:84% if I had not told him what I was doing. 00:02:53.240 --> 00:02:54.890 align:middle line:84% Perhaps the others would understand 00:02:54.890 --> 00:02:56.930 align:middle line:84% if I told them about it first, pianos 00:02:56.930 --> 00:02:59.570 align:middle line:84% being the missionary's power band, the thumping 00:02:59.570 --> 00:03:04.010 align:middle line:84% equivalent of salvation earned, those gold chords. 00:03:04.010 --> 00:03:06.230 align:middle line:84% Perhaps old ivory from the missionary's piano 00:03:06.230 --> 00:03:08.210 align:middle line:84% could be dug up, an F sharp sticking up 00:03:08.210 --> 00:03:11.930 align:middle line:84% out of the coral with the car parts. 00:03:11.930 --> 00:03:14.000 align:middle line:84% Harry has plied me with drinks and that 00:03:14.000 --> 00:03:15.890 align:middle line:90% is how I begin to play. 00:03:15.890 --> 00:03:18.290 align:middle line:90% To ply suggests I am pliable. 00:03:18.290 --> 00:03:19.370 align:middle line:90% I play. 00:03:19.370 --> 00:03:21.740 align:middle line:84% He empties the last of the bottle of scotch 00:03:21.740 --> 00:03:22.940 align:middle line:90% into a pitcher. 00:03:22.940 --> 00:03:25.490 align:middle line:90% No, a cracked coconut half. 00:03:25.490 --> 00:03:27.530 align:middle line:90% All he ever drinks from. 00:03:27.530 --> 00:03:29.900 align:middle line:84% He's scraggly-bearded now and all 00:03:29.900 --> 00:03:32.630 align:middle line:84% around him lie playing cards from tricks and games 00:03:32.630 --> 00:03:34.460 align:middle line:90% he's tried to teach his ladies. 00:03:34.460 --> 00:03:36.020 align:middle line:90% But they won't play, he says. 00:03:36.020 --> 00:03:38.210 align:middle line:90% They only want one thing. 00:03:38.210 --> 00:03:40.100 align:middle line:90% That one thing, I repeat. 00:03:40.100 --> 00:03:42.260 align:middle line:84% But my piano playing drowns me out. 00:03:42.260 --> 00:03:44.170 align:middle line:90% I am drowned."