David a dit ca

Who would have thought I would be getting a chance to meet my favorite living writer? I was still working that silly temp gig in DC when I learned that David Sedaris would be in  an anglophone books store here in Paris this evening.
I knew he would be promoting and reading from his new book, but I had read that in early November, and it hasn't stayed alive in me the way some of his other books did. For those of you whom have yet to read Squirrel Seeks Chipmunk, all the protagonists are animals.  It is amusing to see the categories of behaviors we all associate with animal grafted effectively on to portrayals of real people you might encounter at your local super market--anthropomorphizing at it's funniest. But it's also quite depressing as he touches on some of the worst tendencies in the human existence-- betrayal, deceit, despair, rationalization--sometimes all at once!
Nevertheless, hoping against hope that he would not just read from his new book, we weary Anglophones packed in to the Village Voice like so many sardines. I really wanted to hear something from  Me Talk Pretty One Day or Holidays on Ice--both feeling topical given the season and city. Sadly, I wasn't in the same room with him for his reading, instead I watched him live on a closed circuit TV right by the signing table. He read the title story and recounted the book naming process he outlined for me on the The Jimmy Kimmel Show and then again on the Daily Show making the experience more like a movie when I've read too many reviews and seen too many trailers. Thankfully, he read next from his personal journal and I have posted a short wobbly video of those below.

And then I got to meet him. He kind of treated me like I was at the dentist office, or as though he were Santa Clause. His tone wasn't condescending but accommodating in a familiar professional way slick with many shinings. It was only off putting in the least because it made clear that there was a He and then the rest of us.  I asked him to sign a copy of Naked and an insert from the New Yorker to hang on my wall. I think I'll frame it.
During the brief question and answer period that followed his reading David asked if we would tell him jokes and although I thought of many better ones after on the RER out of Paris, I could only come up with dead baby jokes at the time. He said that when he tried to tell a joke to someone and they stop him and say they've already heard it, that he feels punched or slapped. But being on a 58 city tour and having heard jokes at every reading we shouldn't feel accosted if he's heard ours.  The dead baby joke format is simple and crude. He said he'd heard most of them and even if he hadn't, once you know the equation they're easy to decipher.
ME: What's the difference between a pile of dead babies and a Camaro?
DS: I don't have a Camaro..
ME: In my garage!
DS: I've modified that joke.
ME: How?
DS: What's the difference between a Camaro and an erection?
ME:What?
DS: I don't have a Camaro.
He said it in this wonderfully creepy voice too.
"I couldn't be happier that you said that," I responded honestly as I deposited my new treasures in my bag. David asked me where I was from. I mentioned Cape Cod and of course he was familiar. I asked him in French if he had vacationed there. He said he had not, but that he had visited it for one day when his sister Gretchen was graduating.
It was weird for me to hear the name of someone I had read about from the person who wrote it. When he said her name a little part of me jumped up and said, oh--I know her! But I don't actually, just as I didn't actually meet David. But I did pay 14 euros for a book I once owned to have signed by his stage persona, a fair deal--as I could easily pay more than that to spend time with a person and only get sex. I by contrast got to meet my favorite author David Sedaris, practically a national treasure and he had just told me that he had an erection. I don't mean to create a false dichotomy, but I'm fairly certain he doesn't have a Camaro.

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