7982. THINGS ARE DIFFERENT NOW, #10

10. MONOPOLES AND 
SILVER FOX

I don't know what to tell you; I never

know what to tell anybody. My life is

as dumb as a cinderblock, so don't 

look to me, except perhaps to tell

you where the best free parking is or

something like that. Here's an example

of how I think  -  I'm pretty certain

it will show how how, in most ways,

I'm just stuck in a pliant ditch of

not thinking as others think: All 

around us now they're putting up

these 'monopoles'. They are tall,

singularly tough-looking power-line

towers slowly replacing those old 

1920's steel things that look like

Erector Set towers. The old is old,

and these newer ones bear the 

presence of a totally different 

time and place. All that is as it 

is, I neither care the need for 

them or the practice of accepting 

them (hideous, gross, awful).

My point is, when I myself see 

one of these things, my first 

thought, right away goes to the

mechanical physics of them. The

roundness. At the bottom, they are

pretty large-circumferenced; a big,

round bottom, so to speak. That 

is placed onto the ground into a 

concrete holding structure, prepared

and pre-dug. I always wonder the

mathematics of the relationship

ratio  -   what is the ratio of the

bottom, round, to the very top, 

round? Is it a fifteen-to-one step 

down? Ten-to-one? Five-to-one? 

I can never tell. At what point does

the tip-factor override the stability

factor? How broad have they 

figured out that the bottom must 

be to properly support the graduated 

height, in storms and winds, etc., 

and who and by what means was it 

all figured? Computerized programs? 

Real-world experience?  I'd love 

knowing all that.

-

Is that sort of thinking different? I 

don't know. If there are others who

read this to whom that same line of

thinking initially occurred, I'd actually

like to know that. I have trouble at

time focusing or landing in on the

'essentials' of what I see  -  I mean the

appearances and realities of them. I 

figure you're just supposed to see 

things like these, accept them, and 

not try to think them through  -  so 

that, over time, they just become part

of the fabric of your life. I remember

being a kid and seeing those things,

as if they were giant monsters traipsing

all over the landscape. For the longest

time I couldn't figure them out, and it

was only later, after learning about things,

and the Tennessee Valley Authority and

Rural Electrification and things like that,

when I finally realized that a grand, huge 

and interconnected power-grid had been 

placed over everything, in some strange

and almost secret format, to step up

and step down and transport electrification,

for people's toasters and televisions and 

all that goofy house stuff we just take for

granted. Without that grid we'd still be

lighting fires, in a sense. Those big, 

marching figures carry themselves to

all sorts of places  -  over hills and 

valleys, down and up, towers along 

rights-of-way torn and mowed and 

cleaned through everything we have.

Of late now, it's monopoles; so I guess

the beat goes on.

-

You see, out in the real world I'm 

kind of helpless. Not yet used to 

things, as crazy as that sounds. I am 

hesitant in situations where I have 

to interact with others, or be

introduced to others, get my 

'point' across. I shy away, as 

much as I can, from that sort 

of thing. It all just doesn't much

work. Or so I say anyway.

-

Yesterday I made mention of that

barn and the 5 cars that were left 

there, the Mercury Turnpike Cruiser 

specifically. It was all kind of dreamy, 

like a sequence you can't quite put 

back together the next morning. I

used to always refer to all this as my

'Ruritania'. A far-away retreat. It was 

only a bit amusing then to realize how

these left-behind automobiles messed

with that concept. Like having a delivery

truck full of apples pull into the Garden

of Eden to make a delivery. Here were

5 leftover cars, sunken into the soil and 

just rotting away, each probably 5 years 

past their last use. Mercury, Corvair,

another Mercury, Ford, Chevrolet, and

then, in another location about 300 feet 

away, a couple of trucks. I was surrounded

by cast-off, leftover steel; iron-age monsters

cluttering up my Eden. What would I do?

Well, I'll tell you. We used them for target

practice. it began with cans and bottles 

set up on the tops of the car, and then cars. 

From a distance, firing at them, eventually 

windows were shot out, and holes in the 

facing sides became fairly prevalent. 

We'd shoot from farther away, and then 

closer up. Idiot stuff, the way time is 

somehow passed in the middle of nowhere. 

Who'd have ever thought we were making

 a statement? Blowing the Industrial

Revolution to smithereens! If only. It

was all unsaid, and all my occasional

visitors got to shoot. Eventually, yes, 

when rubble just became nothing more

than rubble, it was all carted away. One 

car at a time, dragged off to a local wrecker.

The trucks? They just stayed there.

-

A far cry from Walden Pond then, you night

say. But, not really. My intensive eyes were

open and ready at all times for each bit of

awareness and knowledge I could get : there

were mysteries everywhere. Weird objects

in the evening fields  -  deer, running bears,

foxes, whatever. One by one our geese and

ducks began disappearing -  only after a while

did a nearby farmer drive over to tell me there

was a silver fox they'd been seeing, sunning 

itself often on a not too far off tree stump.

The fox that had been feasting on our geese 

and ducks. The fox that these farmer guys 

were intent on eradicating. Which they did,

in short order a few days later. One less

Summertime fox, and a nice silver-fox

hide for someone. (They skinned and sold

it for what to them was a satisfying and

happy sum). I plinked dead cars. 

They plinked live foxes. What's

the difference there?