9186. THINGS ARE DIFFERENT NOW, Pt. 330

330. NOT TOO MANY

DOGS AROUND

I always loved crummy

things, materials and

places slightly breaking

down, upon which 

both the evidences

and the appearances

of time are clearly

shown. Like old paint

on an old car  -  not

the kind that's cared

for, just rather the

kind that's allowed

to break itself down,

dis-color, fade and lose

all luster, show spots of

thinness and rust. In

effect start 'becoming'

something else. We

each wear our mileage

in the same way. We

enter a middle-ground

of becoming that which

we had not been before.

And, like things, so

people: that's what

endears me to people,

or, I guess, makes

them endearing to

me. However

you'd put that; I'm

not here to fight

grammar. I love

people who can

accept their breaking

down, and walk

boldly with that. In

1970's New York, it

was probably then the

heyday of falsity :

fake faces and lifts,

elderly women who

somehow insisted they

retained the right to

try and look 12, or 18,

or 25. Always a real

bimbo-failure, and

who cared? It was

just the times, and

then later, much,

those crazy years

of Botox and facial

lip fatteners (I forget,

but that had a name

too), it always got

pretty grotesque and

unsightly, I thought.

But, money went

around from money

trees for some, and

they went at it,

doing what they

wished. It made

for a weird visual

environment, even

though the fashion

pages and the geeks

adored it and showed

each other up and off.

The entire city was

trying it  -  the

infestations of

demolition crews

dismantling all of

the old world, and

leaving us nothing

but one-plane flat

glass and plastic,

everywhere. I loved

ripply glass with

eight-over-eights,

or however the

hardware guys

phrased that. Those

old windows made

all the difference.

It's one thing to

try and update  -

people OR buildings,

but the complete

destruction of

something, which is

what it really ended

up as, that was another

matter entire, and not

a good one.

-

As real as New York was, 
that's how fake it was on 
its way to becoming. It
was in the air  -  a 1960's
bit of churlish foppery.
Ties, beards, clothing,
shoes, women's styles,
everything was well 
on its way to being
'performance' and
not earnest living.
Show-biz. Like now,
where the end result 
is people worrying 
more about where their 
corn or cantalope is
grown and by what 
means, than about the 
item itself. Once the 
docks, piers, ships 
and haulers, for real
 stuff, not today's form 
of plastic fork and 
Chinese shoes and 
hats, coming in, were 
gone, it was only a 
matter of time for it to 
become a sort of 
'ahistorical' island-Limbo 
of the lost. Confused, and 
with a weird sort of overt 
self-absorption that then
tries to cover for the quite
ridiculous un-naturalness 
of what New York City is 
now. Nothing generated, 
but everything proliferated; 
a sterile island filled with 
millions of waiting faces that
need food and humor to 
remain in place, at all times. 
Back then it was all underway,
 just not yet so noticeable. 
R. D. Laing, the 1960's and 
'70's own hip, psychological 
analyst writer, would call it 
insanity, and he was right.
No longer with anything 
grounded, everything flies 
loose. Everyone had their 
'origination story', half of them 
made up, which became 
one of the trademarks
of New York humor too.; 
mostly a Jewish thing, 
a real Woody Allen type 
of nervous trait. That's
where the religious folk
stepped in; at least they
were 'grounded.' I loved 
it all. The big, Friends
Meeting House at 
Stuyvesant Square,
back then was the best.
-
I knew one or two

people who were, or

who I considered and to

be 'secular Christians.'

Having myself just

fallen all out of that

Catholic seminary

routine with all that

magical thinking

and rigors of this

and rigors of that.

They amused me, but

held me up with an

interest too. On Ninth

Street, there was a

place called Menno

House, where the

Mennonite people who

were in New York City

for a long-term of

subway preaching and

street-corner proselytizing ,

in the manner they did it,

would stay. I don't know

what it is now; it's still

there but looks a lot better.

It was always humble 

and quiet. They kept a

little library room that 

allowed a person to go in

and just stay for a bit.

They kept a meager little

library, mostly of their 

own stuff, but there was

also the usual: Devotional

stuff: My Utmost for His

Highest, which was like 

an old re-write and 

commentary, daily on

verses from the Bible 

with this Oswald

Chambers guy's own

thought and lines, by this
guy who'd died of a
burst appendix years 

back. Not that I read it 

each day, but whenever 

I was there, I'd catch up

on a few. It was like

sitting around in the 

main lobby of the Chelsea

Hotel, on 21st street,

but entirely different.

As different as is order

from disorder. One place

was sanctified and

right, and the other 

place was mainly some

mad, crescendo nuthouse:

bizarre basket cases living

out their days accompanied 

by cats, sex booze, or pills.

Not too many dogs, though

they were around too. In

that lobby, everyone was

too strange or disoriented

to actually even know that

you were there, and the

only devotional found there

was one to self. One of

Chambers' maxims was

'Stop listening to the

tyranny of your individuality

and get emancipated out

into personality.' I was

never sure about that, 

but these Chelsea Hotel

lobby creeps sure seemed

to have landed  hot and 

heavy on somehow onto

both of them : individuality

AND personality too.

-

I always took that, sort

of, as an attack  -  veiled or

not  -  on what an artist or

a creative person was about.

Was Chambers inviting us each

to fall away and abandon

our own 'oneness' or

singularity, through some

age-old chestnut of 'we're 

all the same and all as 

one, together.' If so, why? I 

really hated those sorts of 

broadened-out and 

fairly useless, wide

generalizations. 

It always sounded

all too much like some

Beatlesque hippie-dippie 

love-in claptrap. If that's

what 'religion' thought

of us each, just part of

a whole, I wasn't ready 

for that, call me wrong 

or right. I hated being 

blanded-out to nothing.

I always thought 'God'

liked character.

-

So, you had 'Shadow of

the Almighty', that one

was by Elizabeth Elliot.

And that old bugbear,

the 'Chronicles of Narnia'.

All that C. S. Lewis 'Mere

Christianity' verbiage. I

always considered them 

as secular books and

not really Christian, 

from my view anyway  

-  they never brought 

out the shield or the 

sword; the one

Jesus said he was 

bringing. Or the fire 

and torment. Everything

was too happy and 

glossed over. Not that

copy-cat Catholics had it

any better : they had

'Limbo', this crazy 

concept of between 

places, waiting it

out, as it were. A real

suspended animation 

of half-being, that they

at least pretended to 

believe in. They had 

no clue that the 

Buddhists had done 

it one better with 'Bardo,'

their place wherein 

the unsettled and still 

homeless souls wandering 

were able to be. It too 

was an entire and 

other place, outside 

of all recognized 

boundaries and forms 

of being, and just as

conceptual too. 

Why couldn't either 

of them just say 

they really hadn't 

a clue and were 

just hoping for 

something. I'd heard 

of Bardo Pond  - 

which was like a 

lake or a conceptual 

body of water-being 

that they had to 

cross over before 

(Buddhists) they 

gained re-birth, 

or I'd heard of 

Brigitte Bardot, 

which at that time 

some men would 

have considered 

Paradise, but I'd 

never really gotten 

the jump on Limbo, 

except as a mad, 

sad dance craze 

from about 1961. 

Boy, the world 

was way too 

perplexing 

for me.