The Fran Lebowitz Reader

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Authors: Fran Lebowitz
give me a transplant.” “A transplant,” I repeated. “What do you mean, a transplant?”
    “Well, if I break a nail and I have the broken piece they put it back on. But if I don’t they use someone else’s nail from the nail bank.” “The nail bank?” I repeated again.
    “Yes,” she said and began to explain further, but I must confess that I was no longer listening, for I was far too intent on my own imaginings. I left the table in a daze and remember little of the hours that followed, since my mind was reeling with vivid nail bank visions. I have finally managed to get some sort of grip on this thing and here is how it works:
    Every year there is a nail drive. Volunteer nail workers set up shop in such likely establishments as finishing schools, health clubs, secretarial pools, and Henri Bendel’s. The donor enters the room set aside for this purpose, lies down on a portable Ultrasuede chaise longue, and extends her hands. The volunteer nail worker carefully clips three nails from each hand (any more would be dangerous; any less, uncharitable) and then offers the donor a glass of Knox gelatine so that she may regain her strength. The nails are then placed in sterile containers and rushed to the nail bank. There they are typed accordingly:
    Type O—Oval
    Type A—Angular
    Type B—Bent, slightly
    Rh negative—Right hand, out of the question
    When the victim of a broken nail is brought into the salon a team of dedicated manicurists matches the victim’s type with the specimens on hand and performs the transplant with meticulous skill. There are, however, frequent shortages and it is not uncommon for a victim to wait days for a compatible type. Measures, of course, have been taken to alleviate this situation. During the annual nail drive volunteers comb the city in an effort to convince those girls too selfish to donate in life to do so in death. These girls carry upon their persons cards that in the event of their demise instruct the authorities to clip so that another might receive the gift of renewedlength. When one of these girls meets with a fatal accident that miraculously leaves her nails intact, a manicurist is raced to the scene and the procedure is carried out with dignity and dispatch.
    Now, it sometimes happens that there are two girls in need of the same type nail but only one such nail is available. In a case like this the nail properly goes to the better tipper, but occasionally both girls are equally matched in this department. When this occurs the girls are brought before a judicial body known formally as the Emery Board. The Emery Board is composed of four experts in the field: a hairdresser, a headwaiter, a doorman, and Another Woman. The board members ask the girls the following pertinent questions:
Where are you going this evening?
With whom?
Wearing what?
    The girls are then asked to leave the room while the judges confer. More often than not a decision is reached based upon the answers to the board’s questions, but from time to time there is a deadlock. In such a circumstance the girls are not without recourse, for they can then turn to the Court of Appeal. The Court of Appeal is presided over by a temperamental photographer and a dictatorial fashion editor. The Court of Appeal is a visual rather than a verbal institution and favorable judgments are awarded solely on the basis of polish. Decisions of the Court of Appeal are final. Recently, however, it was discovered that the judges had ruled against a girl who lived on Beekman Place in favor of one who resided in the West Seventies. The judges were understandably relieved when this decision was overturned, for they, too, are firm believers in that wise old adage: Nothing succeeds like address.

Digital Clocks and
Pocket Calculators:
Spoilers of Youth
    I was in certain respects a rather precocious youngster. My glance, right from the start, was fraught with significance and I was unquestionably the first child on my block to use the

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