RUDIMENTS, pt. 28
Making Cars
A lot of things are few and far between :
funny phrase, that always was. I can't say
I ever heard it much until once I myself,
here and there, began using it - and then,
as usually occurs, it seemed to be everywhere.
Some things are just like that. My mother,
for instance, she was always saying this
curious phrase 'ten to one.' Like she was a
betting betting veteran or some street-running
numbers racket, horse-race girl. The illicit
Queen of Bayonne, always mouthing some
race-track phrase I could never figure out.
'Go to the supermarket, get me a jar of Clover
Honey. Ten to one they'll be out of it, then
just get the Shop-Rite brand.' Huh? (Clover
Honey was a brand name, as I recall). Or,
she'd say, 'Oh, they said they'd be going,
but ten to one they'll never show.' Curious
as all get out. To me, ten to one was like the
time lunch was over, that was it.
-
After I got hit by that train, and mostly came
through recovery OK, I'd get headaches, major,
killer headaches. I mean, blitz headaches, the
kind that would break my head in two, split my
eyeballs right apart, tear my forehead with
some infernal fire I couldn't put out. OK, that's
one thing, but the weird part of it - and you
could set your weekly calendar by it - was
that it was on Friday, at about 11 in the morning.
Without fail. Every Friday, on schedule. I'd
come slogging home from school, already gone,
already wasted, already with a split head. They
used to just let me out on Fridays, whenever I
needed. We just lived down the street, and I'd
just walk home. My mother had this plastic
mask thing, lie a Zorro mask, except of 1950's
clear plastic, filled with a blue water. She kept
it in the freezer, and brought it out on Fridays.
I'd slip it on over my ears, like a Halloween mask.
The biting, crazy cold brought some relief, and
then I'd just fall asleep, or pass out, more like it.
Usually about 6pm I'd wake up, and all would be
over and well again. The mask, back into the
freezer, and, I suppose, back into a regular life.
At 9 years old, a kid doesn't make much sense
out of things like this. What did anyone know
anyway? Certainly not my parents; they were
just glad I was alive, I suppose. Or I hope anyway.
Eventually one of the doctors sent me away for
tests - 'brain-wave tests' they were called - that
in itself was eerie, Twilight Zone stuff too - and
the prognosis was that I had spinal fluid leaking
out my ears. What? Excuse me Mr. Doctor, but
what did I just hear? To my recollection, no one
ever did anything more about any of that, and
in a year or so it was all over. The headaches just
stopped. Thank the Lord for that. (I did have a
bunch of ears growing out my spine, but - OK,
not really).
-
Life lessons? Yeah man, I've got plenty of those.
The main one, I guess, is don't get in front of a
moving train. They're unforgiving. But, larger than
all that, one of the things I took with me was how
there are so many useless people who can't keep
out of other people's business. Even as a newly-
ripened kid I noticed that. Then those people
usually become the political types who take over
all the positions from which their own neurotic
impulses get empowered so as to be able to
screw everything else for other people. Don't
do this; can't do that. The first 8 tears of school,
pretty much, elementary stuff - all that's
banged into your heads, outside of numbers
and letters, and how to write a freaking 'business
letter' heading (?), which are different from the
kind of junk you're supposed to write to your
Aunt Jane and Uncle Harry with. That's the
'social heading.' Yeah, this stuff really once
used to matter. Those 8 years, as well are spent
drilling into your head the usual social-science
propaganda about how great this country is,
how important those documents are - the
Constitution, the Declaration of Independence,
the Bill of Rights. It's all a bunch of tired
horse-crap but the teachers' organizations
and the sorts of dolts they hire as teachers are
all too willing to promote this junk, while they
fleece the public. While the politicians they,
in turn, promote with their skilled propaganda,
take office to rob and filch, all the while restricting
others by stupid-ass laws, right down to the
most simple of personal matters. They never
tell you that just about every third person in
this stupid country works for some level of
Government, state, local, municipal, legal,
enforcement, rules and regulations, enforcement
or policing. Everyone taking home big, fat
paychecks from the public tax dollar, living off
the public good, milking the bones of the
milk-cows in the pasture dry. You see, that's
called State Socialism - and it's the complete
opposite of what those documents just mentioned
are about. This entire country is a huge farce,
but they'll never tell you that in school. No
wonder I had Friday headaches. Ten to one
it was all caused by this lame crap I had to
ingest. Life lesson #2, beware of he mouthing
forked-tongue bullshit platitudes. Or she,
now that it's all equal.
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