Ask the Author: Paula Bomer

This month, Paula Bomer gives us Second Son, a raw story about motherhood, marriage, and birth order. Today we talk about tennis, living in New York, and men in the delivery room.

1. How are you coping now that the US Open is over? Did you enjoy this year’s open?

Haha. Tennis. Whenever a Grand Slam ends, I feel forlorn. Empty. I dedicate two weeks of my life to watching a Grand Slam, and afterward- nothing. It just feels wrong. It”â„¢s so cold turkey. I feel like the loneliest person on the planet. You should have seen me last night trying to watch the Mets and some pre-NHL stuff. I had the most stricken look on my face.

2. You write about motherhood in really remarkable, unexpected ways. How did Second Son come about?

Well, first, thank you. The Second Son came about one day when I was sitting in my house where I sit and drink my coffee. Both my sons were off at school and I was listening to the song “Bertie” by Kate Bush from her album “Aerial”. I started crying uncontrollably and realized, I”â„¢d never have them back. That my sons weren”â„¢t little anymore and I”â„¢d never have their little selves back. Then I wrote the story in a flood. I had to edit it and put it together over the course of a month or so after the initial flood and it was very painful. I faced that story with dread, which is the way I work in general.

3. When Edie’s in the delivery room she doesn’t want her husband in the room, a detail I love for its honesty as much as its brutality. Are men ever any help in the delivery room?

I think some women find men helpful in the delivery room. I”â„¢ve seen documentary style movies of couples together doing the whole Bradley method thing and whatnot. It wasn”â„¢t the case when I gave birth, but I”â„¢m sort of old fashioned in that regard. I also didn”â„¢t make my husband walk around in one of those suits that have a fake pregnant belly so we could bond or whatever. Nor did he ever say “we”â„¢re pregnant”, because I was pregnant and he wasn”â„¢t. Anyway, that got a little ranty- sorry! Also, my marriage was ass at that time, so that may have something to do with it.

4. Is the second son ever loved as much as the first?

I think second and third and fourth (and so on) children are as often loved as much if not more than the first as not. ParentsӉ㢠relationships and feelings for their children are endlessly varied and complicated, which in my mind is one of things that makes life so beautiful and tragic.

5. Do you enjoy living in New York? How did you get there from South Bend?

I”â„¢ve lived in Brooklyn for twenty years and no longer have any appreciation for it, which is a weakness of mine. I hate being so ungrateful because I have a nice life here, but I spend as little time here as possible. Generally, that means I”â„¢m here only six months of the year. I left South Bend at fourteen and never really looked back (except when writing, of course). I moved to New York after graduating from Boston University because the man I loved still lived in Boston and I couldn”â„¢t stand running into him. It truly was that random–I knew a few people here and stayed. I still find it bewildering that I then made a life here.

6. What is your writing process?

My writing process is that I try to write. Sometimes it goes well. Often it doesn”â„¢t.

7. Are you working on any book length works?

I have one novel in outline form and a few short stories halfway done (my favorite form- I would die to have Alice Munro”â„¢s career) and two finished novels that I occasionally send out here or there. One is a vicious satire on parenthood and the other is a quiet book about the end of Communism in Germany seen through the eyes of a middle aged woman who was a true believer.