9987. RUDIMENTS, pt. 87

RUDIMENTS, pt. 87

Making Cars

I can recollect lots of things but

I never am sure if a recollection

is to be seen as a memory. There's

probably a slight difference in the

relational reality between the two;

perhaps akin to 'tasting' an orange,

versus just finding an old shirt still

soaked with the wet juice of an orange.

So I can never be sure which of the two

it is that I'm dealing with, though both

are real to me. Maybe a recollection is

the one done in quiet tranquility; which

the memory still throws up, its heat and

steam of the moment remembered. Over

in Towanda, PA, for instance  -  a place

I remember well and have in fact again

re-visited a Spring or two back  -  there's

an old bandstand in the middle of the

town lawn  -  it's mostly nothing now,

all the nice paint and detailing having

been removed, and replaced by a merely

'modern' efficiency, easy to be kept up,

painted, and maintained by town workers.

Seldom used. Like town trees  -  mostly

now considered useless or even dangerous,

and cut, trimmed, and/or removed for

purposes of supposed 'safety' and efficiency.

Anyway, back in the mid-1970's, this

bandstand still wielded all of its aspects

from the 1890's. Ornate curlicues of

wood and molding, very fine, decorated

panels along the top, a wonderful

center-crest and pointed vane, I guess

a lightning rod too. (None of that

remains any longer  - just now a plain

shelter with a bench wall). In my

experience of it, I often sat there and,

in reverie, was transported to 1890,

whatever : bunting, flags, a crowd of

swells on the grassy lawn, big flouncy

long dresses on the ladies, the gents

all jaunty and dapper, sideburns and

curls, looking glasses and bonnets.

Inside the bandstand, a brass band

tunes up, for marches and patriotic

songs and the romantic songs of the

day; kids twirling wheels, bicycles

on large frames, a few horses and

wagons, the entire town, it seems,

drawn out for some afternoon's

attraction : bright, dappled sunlight,

green grassy lawns, the Mayor, fat

in a top-hat, and his gentle wife,

milling about. Everyone is chatting.

It's a strange long-day afternoon. I

know I saw it, and I know I was there.

I 'recollect' the memory? Or I 'remember'

the recollection? Either way it goes,

it's my ticket to this life, and I'll

not deny myself entry.

-

Long time back, maybe 1966 or '67, I

knew this guy, and his friend. They were

completely enamored of this Who song

called 'Happy Jack.' They took great and

unending delight in the happiness and

carefree attitude presented in this tune by

some person named 'Happy Jack,' who

evidently, was bothered by nothing at

all  -  kids throwing stuff on his head;

ridicule by others, etc. He just stayed

happy and got through it all. The song

meant very little to me, inasmuch as I

was more taken with the three-minute

fierce intensity of Keith Moon's drumming

and to heck with the silly words. And

all that high-voiced, group-chorused

'lap lap lap lap' as vocalized, sort of just

annoyed me. But it came across as two

very different points of view. And one

of which I could never share. I never really

'enjoyed' anything  -  I was always trying

to fit something into its context, I guess

you'd say. How it was done, where it fit

in, what would it bring forth next. They,

however, just reveled in the howling

good time it brought forth. 
Strange to me.

-

Each of these items just related I recollect

and remember. One I lived through (the

Happy Jack routine), the other....I just

don't know. It throws me all off, any of

this. Like (only maybe) Proust's swooning

over his Madaleines  -  those pastries from

Aunt Leonie recollected. Remembered?

He breaks it all out between involunatry

memory, and voluntary memory. I'm not

sure if that's the same.

-

I never had a light moment. Sure, I make

a lot of dumb jokes and puns, but most

of that's because my mind is always

churning language. Words. Speaking of

'involuntary'  -  I can't help it. What others

saw as a good time, I most usually hated.

It seemed I could never settle in with froth,

or foolishness and idiocy, even if it was

dressed up as a real event : the theater,

a dance or a prom, a graduation or a

wedding. (To say I enjoyed funerals would

be a gratuitous slight). There always is a

distance I keep, somehow, between my

'self' and the event. I can't let it touch me.

Even  the time I went to Trenton to pick

up my seven-million-dollar check for

winning the lottery, they wanted to make

a big, happy deal out of it, and I refused.

(OK, so I'm kidding).

-

Back in the late 60's, there wasn't much of

a call for what we today term 'comedy

shows.' The world hadn't yet turned

goofy, and there was still quite a trail to

walk before we got there. A couple of

assassinations, a few beheadings, and a

few real mistakes. They all had to be

gotten out of the way first. Everyone 

was, it seemed, always pissed off about 

something and there was very little 

humor about. Lenny Bruce, at the 

Cafe Au Go Go, on Bleecker St., he got

hauled off the stage a few times, and

arrested for obscenity, just for trying 

to BE funny about things  -  things no 

one thought were funny. Like sex, or 

Elizabeth Taylor and Jackie Kennedy, 

riffs about words like 'to come,' and 

'cocksucker.' Hauled right off-stage

in an instant, and punished for it all. 

They used to send undercover cops, 

and then later just regular, dumb-ass 

Tooty and Muldoon type cops, to sit 

in on these nightclub acts, watching 

from the rear, and they'd walk up and

shut-down the act and drag the comic

off-stage. Truly unbelievable stuff.

The world was pretty frazzled, Happy 

Jack or not. I had real trouble with that, 

because although I enjoyed nothing at 

all, I did feel that the world was pretty 

funny, a lion's-roar of rip-roaring

hilarity, with things off the track 

everywhere. Within ten years. of course, 

I'd be proved right, and the entire world 

opened itself up to its own sick situation, 

and the dire humor of it all. But for right 

then, it was all a no-no.

-
So, a lot of people sure got a lot of 
things wrong. Things I remember. Sorry.
Like that whole banana-boat song fiasco, 
about 1960  -  ' Daylight come, and me
want go home.' What were people thinking, 
I wondered, with that false pidgin English
and twisted suburban romanticsm about
slave-wage owners on some island somewhere
breaking their backs to harvest and load 
bananas. There should have been cops
locking people up for that. There
weren't, as I recollect.