8715. THINGS ARE DIFFERENT NOW #198

198. LES LIAISONS 
DANGEREUSES

It's only now as I look back that

I realize how dangerous a lot of

this was  -  the fact was that I

was not really clear on what I

was doing. In Elmira, I had an

Elmira College friend named

John Berry  - somehow,

somewhere, we connected.

Wives too. He was the

absolute and complete

opposite of anything I'd

ever consider being. A

regular white wine and

cheese guy, as was his wife,

and they traveled. I mean

'travel' travel, like Turkey

and Italy, Germany and the

Rhine. Stuff like that. Then

he'd come back with a

zillion stupid photographs.

Worthless; the usual touristy

crap, yeah, but he'd go on and

on bragging about it. Not a

single original view or

imaginative set-up. I'd say,

'OK, nice, John. But all this

shows to me as the viewer

is that you've been somewhere

and I wasn't. These are mundane

and ordinary 'place' pictures.'

Turkish guys and their laundry

and pipes. Italian soccer fools

grinning. That's the kind of

stuff he only and ever showed.

We never got rancorous over it,

and I really think he 'understood'

what I was saying, but it just

never computed. We simply

 thought differently. There

was, a long time ago, a real

composer, from Elmira, his

name was Charles Tomlinson

Griffes, or something. He's

famed and you can find him.

Woodwinds, light classical.

Anyway, speaking of the Brie

crowd, John was in the local

Griffes society, for what it was  -

clarinet or oboe or one of those.

Elmira people had very little to

get puffed up over, but people

like Mark Twain, and this

Griffes guy, they got a big run

for their money out of them.

John was in that society for

keeps, I mean social and stuff.

Over at the Arnot Art Museum

they'd have recitals and cocktails.

I never went, couldn't abide it,

but he'd always wind up telling

about it. I'd say, 'See, just like

your pictures - telling me about

someplace you were and I wasn't.'

You know how some people are

just too tightly wound and you

can sense that and somehow you

realize they've probably never

taken an extra breath in their life.

Never snuck in an extra mouthful

somehow of air. He was like that.

His wife was worse. They both

liked soirees and the dress-up

too. They've moved here (he

had something to do with the

local college) from Indiana

(funny story), in a big rental

box-truck, into which they'd

driven their Mercury Capri,

up the ramp, or somehow,

and then packed boxes all

around it. When they got

to Elmira, his story went,

they unpacked, and the car

had lost paint, right down to

the bare metal, in about 15

spots where the boxes had

been touching the car. A

real mess. The car-paint,

auto-body guy said it was

called 'chafing', and that the

corrugated cardboard boxes

were as good as sandpaper

for doing that. Really abrasive

over all those miles and travel.

He told John he should have

known that, it was 'that' obvious.

The car took an entire repaint.

That sort of sums up the whole

John Berry scene.

-

I'm not saying John Berry

was 'dangerous'. That's not

my point at all. It's just more

that I was putting myself in

'harm's way by exposure to

such people. If I had any reason

at all to 'fall', that would have

been the easiest way to do it.

Become like John. Erudite,

learned, a couple of degrees,

properly snobbish. My entire

point had been to remain 'away'

from anyone and all of that.

Yet, here, a few years later,

this exposure was mixing me

up into an entire other class of

beings. I had a kid, about 5 years

old, which meant school, and all

that school crap (thankfully, my

wife did all that), in addition,

and foolishly, in my opinion,

she'd gotten involved locally

with one of the churches,

some handicap-assistance

group, lunch distribution,

programmed, again with

the church. It was enough to

make me scream. I wanted

nothing to do with anything,

and that sort of still stays,

even now. People are a pox,

and their organizations and

clubs are worse. It all sure

was a twisted road to walk,

for me. I'd sworn off doing

other's biddings a long time

ago, but that seemed all I was

doing. I didn't know it either,

but it was all just beginning.

I should have flipped out and

fled a long time ago. The life

I was messing with wasn't me,

and I should have flagged it

early, lit some flares, and

jumped overboard. But I

didn't. My loss. It's called

life, without the artistic

or creative part. Just the

workday load, over and

over again. Tell me again

about those pacts with

the Devil  - what were

the rewards?

-

It's a petty part of life to 
think that something like 
this can have been 'dangerous' 
while around me people of 
the world were starving, dying 
and being killed. Yet, think of it 
as a finished product : it was 
mine, in fact, rationally, it was 
a 'Me,' and I held every right to
finish or perfect it as I saw fit. 
I did not want back into or
even just 'into' that sort of
world at all. People there 
seemed, in Elmira I mean, 
oblivious to everything; unlike 
NYCity, there was no undercurrent,  
no groundswell of anything else 
going on. People just barely made
muster, and that satisfied
them. Even with the college
there, outside of getting the
Cuban national party-newspaper
(of which I've written in a previous
chapter somewhere) dropped there
each day, free, numerous copies,
there was no political activity;
as if the Vietnam War was still
not spitting its people out, ragged
heaps of Vietnamese clinging to
helicopters and rooftops as 'we'
Americans pulled out, leaving
our disaster behind us. Ask
John McCain about all that.
How in later years it all got 
mythologized into all that
'America's Noble Cause' and
beau geste coloration, for the
simple sake of bullshit and murder
alone. (Yes, veterans, go visit
your dead. Memorials to folly
now abound.)  -  No one at
Elmira, it seemed, college OR
place, really gave a hoot. The
Arnot Art Museum held its
soirees, and had its archaic
artworks hung  -  collections 
of old medical paintings, 
Egyptian birds and British 
Empire explorers sitting in 
portrait. It's all still there,
but that entire 'entertainment'
thing has now been taken 
over, after they ripped out the 
center of town and tried 
resuscitating it, the 'Samuel 
Clemens Performing Arts 
Center.' Another big hoo-hah 
of lameness. So now that's 
where the comeback acts and old 
music groups arts-fetish types 
have their fund-raisers.
-
Every  so often, we'd leave Elmira,
but wherever we went it was the 
same. The only bright and vital 
spot was Ithaca. Cornell University.
That too was 'Winter'. That's how 
I remember it; always flecked 
with snow, half white, all those 
looming towers and buildings.
At least when you got there, you
felt you were 'somewhere.' It
was cosmopolitan, as my friend
Paul always put it. Numerous
other languages  -  people from
Turkey. France, England. All
those varied tongues and foods.
There was still some turmoil 
around militants, socialists,
those who read and vocalized,
Black Power cats, crazy feminists,
when all that was just beginning.
All cool stuff. Ithaca itself is like
a two-parter, way up the hill,
overlooking everything, is this 
large, rambling, university section
filled with strange young student 
types, hippies, lifers, eccentrics.
Back then, bookstalls and cafes.
(Now again it's all changed  - the
usual corporate names and chain
eateries and crap, and nary a
bookstore to be seen; but the rest is
all the same. This was just a few
months ago. I don't know what
has happened to people's brains.
Fled, I guess. Or got all 
stupid-tattoed
up instead.