RUDIMENTS, pt. 63
Making Cars
Sometimes I felt as if I was a sentry,
Making Cars
Sometimes I felt as if I was a sentry,
looking way out ahead to see what was
to come; other times I just felt ambushed,
sacked from the rear. It was both a time
of intimidation, and a time of opportunity
too. The funny thing was, I was so far
on the fringe of things that I really knew
little of what was going on and remained
mostly unaffected by the outside world.
That's a sort of enviable position - and I
guess I still think that. But what's not
enviable, and this I know, is to simply go
along as a complete lunkhead without any
ideas, ideals, or education, even if by self.
If the ideal remains an image, that doesn't
automatically make it imaginary.
-
I knew what it was I was after, what I
wanted, but I had no idea, nor guidance,
of how to get there. I was born with nothing,
and was just slopping along with little to
go by. There are people born with all the
connections needed to fire up the mill -
it's all already there: The father with the
right connections, who happens to know
so and so who knows so and so, and whose
influence just happens to be in the same
endeavor-field you're after. Next thing
they know, they're in like flint (that's a
typical misnomer some guy I used to
work with always said, one of many -
landscraper for landscaper - same idea
but wrong; pacifically for specifically.
It goes on). He used to mean 'in like Flynn,'
I'd think, which was probably a movie or
something; but he always said Flint. I
guess that would work in Michigan. With
that set of chances (of which I had none),
comes education too. Learning and schools.
People get awfully proud of that stuff, where
they've gone and what they've paid for.
It's OK to learn stuff as you go along,
on your own, scribing and scraping, but
there's a bit lost in only self-educating.
I always tried to keep a good solid mix
of that, but did always dislike schooling.
I disliked even just sitting in a lecture hall
having to listen to someone propound. At
a certain level, I was born with enough
innate knowledge about things - I think
I really did come fully equipped. The rest,
well, frankly, it was easy enough to make
up. That's what education is anyway.
-
Looking back if I had to stack up my 1967
me against the 1987 me of two decades later,
I'd probably have been drawn in and duped
by those Afghani guys from the previous
chapter, and without much of the discernment
needed. I'd have probably fallen for their
scope of things, and one way or the other
gotten implicated or killed - if not over
ideology, then over the simple politics of
dumb revolution, or maybe by missing
around with the female who was always
too-present. As Fats Waller used to put it,
'One never knows, do one?' As it turned
out, I was glad for how it turned out. It seems
a person can never be too careful about things;
there's always something lurking, an inter-
connection that you might not know about.
Once, my friend, trying to be heroic, blew
the whistle about some corruption he knew
about, in old Newark City Hall; purloined
some papers from a desk and all and turned
it all in on this guy. Problem was, as it turned
out the guy he was squealing on was the
cousin or something of the guy to whom
he was giving the information. Family came
first, and all that happened was the corruption
got buried, and my friend wound up doing
some time for pilfering through the desk.
Goes to show.
-
I walked straight ahead, like the writer
I was sure I wanted to be; using my head
like a steno-pad for a brain and recording
or noting every little detail I'd see, for later
re-telling, on paper, in some form. What I
missed, in my way, I made up, using the
enhanced embellishment to shade the tune
to a nicer sound. I always felt I was born
with all the information, and education too,
I'd ever need, as if it all had come with me,
fully-equipped, into whatever LaLa land this
was. There's only so much you really need;
the rest is vocational fluff, like learning to
sole shoes or fly a plane. If that's what a
person wished to do, then I let them. I never
stopped anyone from doing whatever they
felt up to. A few times that caused trouble,
but so what. And once or twice (I ain't lyin')
I had to stop a girl or two from doing what
they'd thought they'd be doing with me
because I knew it came with strings attached
and I really didn't want them along for my ride.
Sounds crass, but that's the way I played it.
Emotions get funny, real quick.
-
One time, I was up in Carl Shurz Park - that's
way up in the east 90's, right there at Gracie
Mansion. It's real nice there, elevated, over
Hell's Gate, as it's called, right where the East
River merges treacherously with the Harlem River.
The currents are really harsh there, conflicting
with each other, eddies and swirls, and in the
old days (it doesn't matter much these days
because ships and boats under engine power
can just slough through it) the sail ships and
other craft were often lost there, or floundered
or wrecked because of the roughness, so the
Dutch or someone like them, the maritime
folks, they named it Hell's Gate - and I
crossed paths with Robert Morganthau. He
was already pretty old, like in his mid-80's or
something, and he was and had been the
District Attorney or whatever for Manhattan
for a long number of years - all sorts of
convictions and cases to his name (his son
has the same post now, but he's a Jr., I think)
[I just looked him up, he's at present 93 years
old, the original guy, not the Jr.]. Anyway,
this old guy is an original NY name, he was
elderly, and had two assistants helping him
along as he slowly walked. The Morganthau
name is solid, old-line New York and has with
it a lot of tradition and lineage. Most of which
I'd don't know really, but seeing him like that
was a knock-out stunner, like seeing Aaron
Burr himself or someone like that - still
traipsing along the surface of old New York
City, filtering and re-telling whatever he could
of the old information that was running and
settling all though his system and brain. I
probably don't really know what I'm talking
about on this - it's more an intuitive feel
that hit me good, and doesn't much work in
the re-telling because at base there's not really
anything there. But that's the way it's always
been with me; I snoop and sniff and always
end up coming back with something that I
can later work with. He passed right by me,
we smiled, he nodded, and alongside us, the
crazy, roiling river ran.
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