Tales From the Crib Read Online Free PDF

doing?”
    My guests laughed at Zoe’s story. “There’s a church in Schenectady that plans to replace their stained glass with their proceeds from the show.”
    Kara from the agency asked if congregants might shy away from confession if they fear they’ll be recorded.
    “Maybe people will behave better so they won’t have to confess and risk being caught on hidden camera,” Zoe said.
    “I’m not religious, but it seems more than a bit tacky to turn a spiritual ritual into entertainment for others,” Anjoli said.
    “This is why Jews don’t have confession,” Aunt Bernice chimed in. “Who needs the whole world knowing your dirty laundry? Better to just feel guilty for a bit, promise to nevah do your bad deeds again, and go about your business.”
    “That’s not why we don’t have confession,” Rita snapped.
    “You think Talmudic scholahs were thinking about reality TV when they voted against confessionals?”
    “I don’t think they voted, Rita.” Bernice pursed her lips with victory.
    “I’ve got to tell you, I don’t think people are going to watch a bunch of faces they can’t see,” I added.
    “Sure they will,” Zoe agreed. I didn’t love everything Zoe did professionally, but I adored her, and therefore accepted some of her harebrained schemes. I proudly mention her cute sports ball bags, but typically don’t let people know about her failed endeavors, like the handbag designed to look like human testicles—hair and everything. Truly gross.
    The discussion of confessions was a segue for Anjoli to tell one of her favorite stories about herself—the time she was banned from Ceausescu’s Romania for illegal trading of Kent cigarettes for crystal. Apparently Kent refused to export to Romania after some falling out over taxes. The people, however, were hooked and loyal to Kent brand smokes. There was also some scuttlebutt about Anjoli’s affair with the goalkeeper for the Romanian national soccer team. “So I told the guard that simply carrying forty pairs of men’s Levi’s did not make me a smuggler,” she regaled. The story went on for twenty minutes before my friends from the agency declared that Anjoli was hilariously outrageous and they wished their mothers were more like her.
    “Thshe was defnnnntly a trwipp,” I spat.
    “Jesus, Lucy, what happened to your face?!” Zoe cried.
    “A chaleyre!” Rita pretended to spit on my mother’s hardwood floor.
    “There’s no evil curse on our Lucy,” Bernice said.
    “Whath?” I noticed spit shooting out of the right side of my mouth. I picked up my cane and hobbled to the mirror as fast as I could. One eye was open too wide and the right side of my face looked frozen.
    “She’s having a stroke,” Zoe panicked. “Get a cab. We need to get Lucy to the hospital.”
    “I am?!”
    “Let’s go,” Anjoli grabbed her purse and headed toward the door. “The hospital’s across the street.”
    As I used my cane to hobble across the street to the hospital, I wondered if something was wrong with the baby. “If I’m having a stroke, will the baby be okay?” I asked my mother.
    “All is well. Your body is in perfect harmony. You are a vibrant, healthy soul encountering a momentary health challenge. You are releasing disease and embracing health,” she said in a hysterically calm voice.
    Zoe chimed in. “A stroke won’t affect your baby,” she said so assuredly I believed it. Then I caught a glance of myself in the reflection of a window.
    “Holy schlit!” I looked like Mary Jo Buttafuoco after Amy Fisher shot her in the head.

Chapter 5
    As it turned out, I was not having a stroke, but rather was mysteriously stricken with Bell’s palsy. No one knows for sure whether it’s a virus or a hex or what, but this wretched thing paralyzed half of my face. I’d never really appreciated how much I move the muscles in my face until half of them quit working. In the hospital emergency room, Anjoli brought me a bottle of mineral water from