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seemed to stump him. He paused for so long, I had to quickly rescue us both (not to mention our future children) by proposing more directly myself.

    California, 1984
    We went together to L.A., and it seemed that my metamorphic escape was complete. Philadelphia was virtually in another country, and Ma’s early morning phone calls had to stop because of the time difference. I managed to act in occasional plays, but mostly got roles in small movies and guest appearances on sitcoms.
    It’s hard to look me up because I couldn’t settle on a stage name. Before I met David, I was foolish enough to try my maiden name, von Moschzisker. This seemed to irritate people. The z is silent—if you ignore the schz and make it a sh sound you can come close to being able to pronounce the name unassisted, but still: Susan von Moschzisker? That girl didn’t stand a chance.
    My married name was not an option—the Screen Actors Guild had a Susan Morris, and they said they’d get us confused. When my agent put her foot down about von Moschzisker, I tried being Susan Wheeler Duff, using my two middle names. Even that seemed excessive, so I finally shortened it again, to Susan Wheeler. This turned out all right, although I kept worrying that people might check and think I was padding my résumé, claiming false credit for jobs that Susan von Moschzisker and Susan Wheeler Duff had done.
    Just when Susan Wheeler began to hit her stride, our daughter, Eliza, arrived, swiftly followed by twin sons, Ben and Sam.
    Twin sons came as a bit of a shock. By the time Ben and Sam were born, David’s series was over and he was traveling more for work. I think I may have had a mild but undiagnosed case of postpartum depression or something—I was terrified of accidents and didn’t want to be alone with the children. So I was uncharacteristically glad to see Ma when she came to meet the new babies. Ma’s visits were usually not in response to an invitation, and mostly fraught with tension—she’d spend a lot of her stay trying to convert me to whatever her latest religion was. Or she’d hand us an itemized list on her way back to the airport of what should have been in the guest room:
A lamp by the bed
Pleasant, interesting reading material
A full-length mirror AND a small hand mirror to check the back of one’s head in the bathroom
A television or AT LEAST a radio. With a clock.
A telephone, preferably with its own private line and answering machine
Fresh water, flowers, and a bowl of fruit
A mini-fridge to store extra food, in case the fruit is not to the guest’s liking
    But that visit when the boys were infants was truly remarkable. Ma loves babies and seemed more than happy to pitch in. She did all the grocery shopping, held one twin and entertained Eliza while I nursed the other, and generally made herself so indispensable that when it was time for her to leave, I completely surprised myself by asking her to stay another week.

    Sherman Oaks, 1992
    It’s important to give credit where it’s due. All that kindness without the comfort of a mini-fridge.
    It quickly became clear that having two acting parents was not ideal for children. I really loved mothering, and David was the bigger earner, so it seemed natural for me to give up auditioning for sitcoms and embrace my inner Susan Morse, especially after our Sherman Oaks house was destroyed in the Northridge earthquake in 1994. We abruptly decided to move our headquarters to more solid, familiar territory in Philadelphia. This was David’s idea, and I agreed, partly because Ma and Daddy had moved to Florida a few years before and were not showing any signs of returning. Eliza was five, and the boys were two. Adolescence was around the corner, we knew L.A. was risky for teenagers, and we just couldn’t imagine them having their childhoods in New York. David loved my old stomping grounds in Stone Mills, a walking neighborhood on