8487. THINGS ARE DIFFERENT NOW, #139

139. WITHIN

Back in seminary school,

the early 60's, maybe 1964,

one thing that always stuck

in my brain  -  formative

time stuff, like being 12

or 13  -  was men's

deodorant. I could never

figure that stuff out  -  not

so much the why of it, that

was plausible if not silly,

but the concept itself and

how anyone would ever

come up with the idea,

and the names. Yes, I

know all this reads now

as strange and silly, but

look at it from my own

young perspective  -  world

opening up, adults and

parents and the stuff they

worry about. It caught

me up in numerous fields

too, which you'd never

think of: language, words,

science, social assumptions.

And the whole idea, back

then, of society  -  what

exactly were we aiming at,

what sort of society was

all this meant to bring us?

First off, after I checked into

it, 'aluminum sulfate' or

somesuch was the effective

ingredient  -  the skin and

body reacts so severely to

it that your body, in the

affected area, actually

recoils  - the sweat glands

pinch themselves shut for

five or 6 hours  - so,

whoopee, your underarms

don't sweat! Wow that's

great. If I cut my nose off,

my nose won't run either.

What monstrous edifice

of clang-gangling thought

ever came up with that

concept? And then they

name it Right Guard?

What's that supposed

to mean? Or suggest?

Is there a 'wrong' guard

here being superseded?

I think not. And then, in

an even weirder use of

word and concept, a

competing product to

this is called 'Arid'.

Arid? As in dry? No

moisture? Like a

desert? And then, that's

not enough, they run

a product next to it, a

bit stronger, I guess,

for the extra-sweaty

types, or maybe just

for liars, who sweat

anyway, called 'Arid

Extra Dri', yes, using

that spelling. I had to

gasp as I sat back and

to figure out the theme

of all this new living

-  America was for sure

headed somewhere; some

fantasy dream-scape of

the ad-man's imaginings,

millions of people being

led by their noses to the

edge of some sort of as

yet unknown cliff. And

everyone sure seemed to

be enjoying the ride :

in station wagons with

panoramic glass roofs

and George Jetson parking

garages taking the place

of Fred Flinstone rock-yards

and stone quarries. It all

fit to a tee.

-
I knew it probably didn't 
really matter much, but the 
formula and the equation of 
the situation, to a kid like me, 
had some real meaning, and 
was not superfluous in any way. 
It was as if all this was so obvious 
I was unable to believe no one 
else saw or reacted to it. It just
seemed wrong. The seminary
had a little store, for stuff like
that, and everyone was always
so fussy about it all. It was
already queerly female : all
that cleanliness stuff, showers,
and worrying about your clothing
and odors. This was a seminary,
for Christ's sake, (no pun 
intended), I'd think to myself,  
not a finishing school. My own 
little Eton or something, all
those starchy, queer boys. It was
a struggle for me, at all times to
clarify the situation, for myself,
make it straight, make it right.
I tried to read my way out.
-

I read Heart of Darkness,

by Joseph Conrad, in about

9th grade  -  on my own. It

wasn't a seminary-mandated

course read in any way, but

they had it in their library. I

was voracious in my reading

habits. I got all caught up in

that book, especially after

learning that Conrad had

some specific ideas in the

writing of it : his own native

language was Polish, but he

wrote the book in English,

and it was published in

Blackwood's Magazine,

serialized in three parts,

and then as a book, by

Blackwood Publishing.

The seminary just so

happened to be in

Blackwood, NJ, so

that conjunction of t

hings made it special too.

And then I learned that,

to mimic the dense of

the jungle and all

that hacking away

through the thick growth,

he used himself a very

difficult and 'dense'

form of language

and structure. The

book portrays an Africa,

wild and primitive in

its ways, and seen and

explained through white,

colonialist eyes, etc. Not

that I myself noticed any

of that or was affected by

it  - I just liked the very

senseness of time and place

of which I was just writing  -

but in 1975 an African

writer caused a big furor

over  book for just that

reason, saying it should

not be considered great

at all and should, in fact,

be dropped from the

reference lists about

African continental

writings. "Can nobody

see the preposterous and

perverse arrogance in

thus reducing Africa to

the role of props for

the breakup of the

European mind?"

Heady stuff. "Offensive 

and deplorable; blinkered 

with xenophobia." Chinua

Achebe, from Nigeria. I

admit, back then, to never

even giving a thought as I

read the book to the sort

of viewpoint Achebe was

putting forth. To me, it
wasn't anything about nations
or colonialism  -  and I guess if
that's the level at which Achebe
took it, or the only way he could 
'read', as an African, as he was, 
that was his dealing. Not for me.
It was some grand psychological
symbolism to me, a novel, from
another mind and another
language and way of thought 
entire, and ti spoke to me of the
dark forces within each of us, or
within me anyway, and those dark, 
advancing powers that try to tame 
and overtake the individual who 
possessed it  -  a real heart of 
darkness, a stark struggle within.
Say what you will about Conrad, and
about Heart of Darkness, and all the
rest. That was it for me.

-

From all that, five years 

later I'm sitting in some 

weird basement on 8th Street 

still reading. There was a

bookstore right up the street,

and another around the corner.

My world was made, and set.

Back in the old days, English

aristocrats used to take the

Grand Tour' of the continent 

to experience all of the supposed

antiquity of Italy and Greece.

I did the same fr myself by

rutting down in New York City.

It was all I ever wanted, and all

I'd ever dreamed about  -  the 

doing and the being there. 

It was mine. My own dark,

African continent of the mind

turned real and tangible. They

all faced abroad. I faced within.