11,437. RUDIMENTS, pt. 551

RUDIMENTS, pt. 551

('get back on the bus, gus, and make a new plan')

In the previous chapter,

as I finished writing about

the leather and wood of the

lawyer's office, etc., it came

to me that I'd read something

of that sort before, perhaps

in some James Joyce entry.

So, I went and looked back

and, sure enough, there, right

before me, jumped out a good,

nay, better, version of what

I'd put across, or at least

hoped to have put across.

In the Nestor chapter of

Ulysses, Joyce has Stephen

enter Mr. Deasy's office, to

get his pay for the school

teaching he'd been doing,

which is distasteful to him

- the work at the school and

and the students. Deasy

himself has become equally

distasteful. Yet, here in this

office, Stephen catalogues

what he sees  -  the items,

the photos of horses on the

wall, etc. Then, this one

description arises, of the

room itself. So fitting :

"Stale smoky air hung in

the study with the smell of

the drab, abraded leather

of its chairs. As on the first

day he bargained with me here.

As it was in the beginning, is

now. On the sideboard the

tray of Stuart coins, base

treasure of a bog : and ever

shall be. And sung in their

spooncase of purple plush,

faded, the twelve apostles

having preached to all the

gentiles: world without end."

-

Well use some consideration

there anyway; I find there to

be a connection, though it may

just be me. As in so many other

Al-things, I guess, deftly wrong.

(I notice the typing of this makes

little distinction between 'A-1,'

and Al. Whichever I have used,

you may name it).

-

As I move along in my life, this

day, of age and all its adjuncts,

creeps up on me. Around me,

people are dying; it happens

all the time. A person lags

behind and events suddenly

push from the rear. Friends

die, or  -  in my case  -  people

show up telling me of one who

died. I knew the sister, the

uncle was a judge, my father

went to the racetrack with

her father back when....and

it goes on. Do you know

people? Are we all supposed

to know everyone? Joanne

Miskinis Awad, poor dear,

now joins the limitless dead,

at 71; and I'm saddened. 

Mark off one more, but, 

hey, leave the space there

for me too, OK?

-

What's the use of youth, if

it just dies in old age? When

I was about 9, we had a bus

trip, some group I was in, a

small, creepy, marching band

troupe out of the old Woodbridge

VFW, on Pearl Street. I had

a trumpet at the time, and I

used to like playing it; I 

enjoyed the 3-little presses 

it had, buttons, whatever 

they're called. Stops? It

was good for tunes and 

changing notes. There's also

trombones, but I don't know

the difference  -  nor do I

care now  -  one has the

button keys and one doesn't.

This did. Maybe that's the

difference. I joined because I

wished to play that instrument

in the march-parades that the

legion band played in. I was

accepted, BUT, they quickly

handed me a snare drum of 

sorts and a strap for my neck:

Some canvas contraption to

hold the drum in place as we

marched, and I simply became

one of 5 or 6 drummers. It

was equally as much fun for 

me. A budding Buddy Rich!

-

Whatever Winter and Spring

that was, a lot of it was spent,

Weds. nights, I think, at what

was maliciously called 'Band

Practice.' It was more like a

screwed-over musical anarchy.

The meeting room was tiny to

begin with, maybe 20 feet,

rectangle, not square. Some

form of dimensions. The noise.

of course, resounded, and the

acoustics were maddening, and

would be, even to the deaf.

In some idea of formation, 

we'd simply march around this

pathetic room, wall to corner,

practising, well, whatever it 

was. Let's say 'Patriotic Goon

Songs' done by the inhabitants

of a young-mens' madhouse.

I don't know about 'for the

criminally insane,' but, yeah,

maybe that too. Cacophony.

Sounds a bit like a chocolate

drink, but it ain't. (What's it all

about with chocolate anyway?

I never knew  -  have never liked

the stuff in any case, and  -  go to

find out, in Arabic there's no word

for chocolate. No, I made that 

up. But the word for coffee, 

in Arabic, means wine).

-

So  -  back to the track here  -  

boys being boys (it's universal. 

It's maddening, and it's usually

sexual too) all I got from that

wayward stint as a seasonal

snare drummer is a very weird

memory. I won't mention names,

because they're not important.

Yet, I guess I mention mine, since

I'm writing this recollection.

Inman Avenue chaps! We had 

a bus trip for some parade or

another, to a place by Weehawken

called West New York, NJ. We all

gathered at the hall there, on

Pearl Street, for the bus ride.

Equipment, snacks, jackets, all

that. Puberty hits boys like a

rocket; one way or another it

worms its way into the young

man's system until the poor kid

starts babbling to himself over

pictures in a damned magazine

ad for socks, or such. We're in 

our high-back bus seats, and 

the kid next to me, a friend, 

maybe almost a year older, is 

kneeling up on the seat, facing

backwards, instead of sitting.

He's eagerly awaiting the bus

trip to begin. I say why? What's

with that? I should have known

(and  here, dear reader, so should

you have). He proceeds to instruct 

me on how the motion of the bus 

ride, if you press and remain just

right, in place, will advance the 

'boy' to that heightened state of 

bliss that comes and goes, let's 

say. Put succinctly, instead of

'going' to West New York, you'll

be 'coming' to West New York!

For this I played a snare drum in

a local, crummy, marching band?

Heavens, let's do that  again.

-

Of course, maniac that I myself 

am, I could go on and on over this,

and, in keeping with the initial

theme of 'aging' say how we

meet the dead coming, and 

going. Yet, I shan't. We were

all children once.

-

I read a book once, about 

such  things, and the chapter  -  

speaking  of one-upping boys  -

about girls in these same

situations, and in tribal settings,

the African savannas, etc., 

would make a man, let alone a 

boy, blush. Menarche, Desire, 

Menstruation, Coitus. There's a

period in a female's maturation, 

it is said, where she can start 

fires with her eyes. Only a shaman

can sense these times and ferret

out the needed impulses. Other

periods of time, she is cast with 

the matron, or she-witch of the

tribe, to be coached through it

all; but at the specific and most

major moment, she is assigned

to the shaman, and remains with 

Him for a few days, until either 

the 'fire-power' goes away, or 

something else passes off. 

And here I am, worrying about

the seats on a drummer-boy's bus?

11,436. ABRAHAM LINCOLN AND THE KETTLE DRUM

ABRAHAM LINCOLN AND 

THE KETTLE DRUM

[There are places by the shovelful 

and they are filled with people and 

pickers and soldiers and sinners and 

gents who work flat on their backs 

and with derring-do they sit out 

eternity with nothing to do dressed 

in their finery their suits and last 

dresses and clothes chosen by children

for the last of those caresses but there's 

nothing to be done for they're crowding 

the lawn and so many people have 

passed us that the land of the dead is 

ten-fold plus vaster than the mere acre 

the living inhabit - Civil War Soldiers 

cry with Mesopotamians and the 

Chinamen scowl with Egyptians and 

African princes accompany Finns and 

Germans and Greeks and Hannibal 

I see plays cards with Socrates and 

Plato and there's nothing to be done:

'it drives me crazy all this crowding 

and clamor' and all I ever wanted to 

know was 'is there a graveyard for 

vegetable pickers?' but instead they 

said a mass for this guy out in the 

fields and they threw some dirt on 

his body as it was lowered into the 

hole and the stalks covered and hid 

the grave in secret and the foreman 

had one less to count that night one 

less bed was filled and he was short 

a man I'd guess but even if he knew 

what could he do because 'they fall 

like flies in this Autumn heat' and 

that's how I learned my lessons that's 

how I figured it out  -  reading books 

on the sloping lawns watching the 

workers pick peppers looking at men 

through their junkyard lenses figuring 

out girls while the brilliant sunlight 

shone through their slim dresses and 

left evidence of (at the least) what 

anatomy was and everything known 

to mankind (I would think) was alive 

in those fields for me to see and I saw 

(benediction of self 'Veni Vidi Vici' 

indeed) what I thought was Abraham 

Lincoln in person going down for 

his eternal flat rest still raw and 

bleeding but at peace (at least once) 

with himself - and the fastest growing 

field is the field of the martyrs' yield.]

11,435. RUDIMENTS, pt. 550

RUDIMENTS, pt. 550

('cigar-chomping devil hound')

Pools of escort, I already

had. I never really went

anywhere alone, it seemed,

because I had always brought

with me everything I was

aware of, all that I had

learned. Like some fool,

protecting, beneath his

cloak, the jar of treasures

he'd bought, I operated

as if, always, there was

something to be kept

concealed. It was always

easy for me to see this

'concealment' in others :

the person who knows

they've been found out,

or seen, or their canard

exposed. It's in their eyes,

a sort of running terror.

Scientifically, in such terms,

it would be simple: 'Light

travels faster than sound.'

When you see a jet in the

sky, high up enough, the

jet is there (point A), and

you see it, but the sound for

that manifestation is back

'there' (point B), lagging

well behind the jet. That's

because the speed of light

is swifter than the speed of

sound, and the image, what

you see, is outrunning or

advancing what you hear.

It's like that as well with

malfeasant people  -  their

words, however false and

bad they may be, are

preceded by their 'light',

the image of their being,

which you see as eyes and

face undergoing recognitive

terror. To wit : they know

their own screw-up, even as

they speak it  -  but before

the words reach you the

image is already given :

Caught in a cinch, knowing

they've been called out.

-

When I was hit by the train

in that train crash in Feb. '58,

well after the fact, for the little

trial that ensued, I was 'coached'

in what to say when on the

'witness' stand. It was all very

weird; some year and a half

later, the Reading Railroad

already bankrupt, monetary

damages of some sort being

sought, etc. It all seemed. to

me, a dazing hopelessness.

To begin with, I was being

coached, as some dumbed-out

9 year old, in what to say about

what I recollected, though the

real problem was I recollected,

frankly, nothing. The only

thing, perhaps was that I

remember the resounding

wail of a train engine, the

blinding crunch of the hit,

and, really, nothing else. My

shock-manifested and mangled

self had blacked all else out.

However, 'Nothing, your honor,'

would not suffice. Thus, any

words spoken were words

put there. My speed of light,

in this case somehow inoperative,

was being supplanted by a far

slower and (disingenuous) speed

of sound. Pantomimed sound,

in fact. (I wonder now how

like local politics is this?).

-

Anyway, nothing came of it.

The simple award, to me in

'trust' until age 21, was $1900.

I guess the legal fees and all

the rest of that mess were

also paid, though I don't know

-  I don't even know who paid

all the hospital stuff, nor how

much any of that all came to.

I was so in the dark you'd

think I'd also been blinded.

But, it all stayed in my head.

We had this lawyer guy,

in Newark, some office

building on Broad Street.

Solomon Wolfman was his

outlandish name. I went

there, along with my parents,

any number of times for trial

rehearsals. It was the most

stupid stuff in the world  -

he was using conjecture,

based on his experience

and knowledge, of the sorts

of things I'd be asked (me,

a 9-year old, I repeat); how

they'd try to confuse me (?),

not that it was difficult; trick

me into saying the wrong things;

incriminating things? To me

this was all very bad  -  I

wasn't a master criminal

whose motivation for murder,

rape, and pillage had to be

hermetically dramatized.

However, being in front of

a train at a non-propitious

moment is, in its own way,

I suppose, a crime. The point

is how truth, or reality, even

in this precocious and most

foolish situation, was being

both 'created' and manipulated.

Hello, legal profession. The

most galling aspect of the

entire thing was  -  and this

drove my father crazy with

anger that day (I well recall),

over all this practice and set-up,

my nerves had settled and I'd

gotten comfortable with this

Wolfman guy  -  who otherwise,

I could sense, was a really

annoying person, a crack liar,

a manipulator, and problem as

out and out shyster too. (My

uncle, with a service job on

Wall Street, had made this

high-blown legal connection

for us  -  all the usual, 'crack

hotshot lawyer,' stuff, never

loses! My father took it all).

On the day of the trial, Mr.

Wolfman doesn't even show!

Instead, he sends some 25

year old lawyer-in-training,

new at the profession, reticent,

unassuming, non-brash, in his

place. I immediately detested

the guy, and after my father

had gotten done ripping him

a new butthole anyway, I

think he lost all interest in

the case. His light had

surely preceded his sound?

-

Things I remember? OK,

about all this, the scent

of cigar smoke lingers.

Wolfman sucked on one

constantly, in that unpleasant

movie manner  -  chomping,

pointing with it, gesturing.

With thick smoke hanging.

He even 'talked' cigar, if

such can be imagined.  A

year or so later, I'd have a

piano teacher with that

same habit; a CPA, doing

people's taxes and books,

and giving piano lessons

as well, in his little CPA

garage-shed studio set up

out back  -  a nice stone

and brick house at the

corner of Lockwood

and Ridgedale. In that

situation, most everything

was covered in a heavy,

yellowish, coating. Even

the piano keys were

yellow, not white. I also

recall leather. Real office

leather  -  the serious and

old kind, chairs and seats

and bench-seat couch like

things to sit on  -  thick 

wood and dark leather. A 

huge desk, one you could 

live in, if that was called

for. I guess maybe it was

all 1940's stuff, even 1930's.

Nothing at all like you see 

now. In these offices the

word plastic had not been

invented. I remember seeing

this odd-looking contraption,

and asking about it. It was

an Edison Dictaphone, as 

I recall it  -  a boxy thing, 

again all nice wood, etc., 

with a cylindrical center, 

and a goose neck think with

a black Bakelite ending that

fit the users mouth and lips.

The user (not me) would

speak or read into this tube

think over his or her mouth,

and some sort of ticker-tape 

and etching would take place,

and whatever was just voiced

would have been 'recorded'

or turned into a paper-punched

record and a waxen cylinder.

I think that's how it went. A

'Dictation Machine,' I guess

is what it all later turned out

being called. I suppose a lot 

of secretaries used to use them,

until outmoded. The machines.

I don't know about the secretaries.

Another funny thing, about 8 

or so years later, I remember

finding one of these is the trash

somewhere. With my scant

knowledge and memory of 

having seen one, I realized 

what it was. I brought it home,

thinking it was worth a bunch,

but it turned it to be nothing,

and I can recall it, about 1966,

out in my yard, weathered, wet,

forgotten, in all sorts of weather;

and then finally just thrown out

once more as trash. Funny, how

technology just runs over itself

and leaves its trash behind. Think

of all the cast-off phones and 

computers in mounds allover

in places like China, Egypt,

and Africa. What a world!

-

I don't know whatever happened

to Sol Wolfman; nor to his new

hire sidekick. I can't recreate

where his office was, except 

to say Broad Street, Newark.

This was all vivid and definable

to me as memory and experience,

but the logistics and actual gambits

escape me. I was to be put on a

'witness' stand, though I'd really

'witnessed' nothing. That too

baffled me, as a misuse of words,

if nothing else. If something

'happens' to you, can you still

be said to have 'witnessed' it?

I didn't think so; other things

of the instant take over  -  you

witness nothing. It's others who

do the witnessing. Go pick

on them, you cigar-chomping

devil-hound you.

11,434. HOW COME

HOW COME

How come there are no capital 

numbers like there are capital 

letters. I want an uppercase

$104,888,451,675.00 sent

my way by Parcel Post. OK?

11,433. HAPPY NEW YEAR, TOGGLE-SWITCH TOMMY

HAPPY NEW YEAR, 

TOGGLE-SWITCH TOMMY

It's the solid end of another spoiled

year. Goddamn and barumpparum.

The Devil takes the hindmost and the

cat's got your tongue. Nothing we can

do to celebrate but pack these crates

and gun the Chevy to the lake.

-

I'll go first if Patty-Cake Mary doesn't

come : her sister's OK, but she's so glum.

11,432. GOSH ALMIGHTY, WINGMAN

GOSH ALMIGHTY, WINGMAN

I hung my hat. There was no door.

I hung the the door that was no more.

Gosh almighty, Wingman, did you

see that? He's standing on the floor.

-

Encyclopedias will tell us of the

Aurora Borealis : those Northern

Lights we speak of down here in

the South. Wingman, did you see?

-

The filtered coach between us makes 

a matted head, and all those people

that I know are gone and running;

off at the mouth, not feet, instead.

Gosh almighty, Wingman, look!

11,431. RUDIMENTS, pt. 549

RUDIMENTS, pt. 549

('of thee I sing')

I want to backtrack a little

here and remark some more

on my ocean-going vessel father.

Of whom I wrote about: the days

fishing, the fish, and the crabs, 

and the rowboats and the deep

sea and the outboard motors.

In the days around 1960, he 

was maybe 35-38 years old.

Full of energy and ready to

go. We would get to these

small spots of isolated beach

and sand that he knew of,

pitch the boat, and spend some 

time on these little beaches.

Perhaps I'd swim while he

surf-fished. As we did this,

most of the time there would

be five, six, ten other people

doing the same thing, or pretty

much the same. Some kids, lots

of adults. I made do with passing

the time as I would.

-

One day we were there, on one of

these sand outposts, and among

the people fishing was a young

kid, a boy, maybe 12 or 14. I'm

just guessing. I still don't know

how it happened, in one of those

casting motions with the fishpole

and all, he snagged his own foot

as he cast, and the hook went

deep into the base of his foot.

The barbed hook. A barbed hook,

you may or may not know  -  as are

all fishing hooks  -  are made so as

to be difficult in extricating, as

that 'barb' on the hook's end is

made and designed so it will

not easily leave the pulp-body

it enters. The barb, besides 

keeping the hook in place, rips

and tears the offending tissue

on the way out. If you just pull

and tug, lots of damage can ensue.

This all sounds pretty cryptic and

dire, and perhaps it was  -  in any

case, this kid had gotten the hook

somehow set really good into the

flesh mass of the bottom of his foot.

-

A jumble ensued, of people

not sure what to do, gathering

around the kid in some sort of,

if not 'pain' then anxiety for sure,

over what had happened. I'm not

even sure where we were, and

I guess no one else either knew

the precise procedure for getting

help. Coast Guard, rescue, transport,

assistance, etc. In today's world,

I don't think this would ever any

more happen, but in 1960 apparently 

the wide-world of being was quite

different. In any case, no one gave

thought to liability, damages, law,

suing, etc. My father whipped 

out a belt knife, told the kid to

lie down, bite his (own) hand if

he had to, and he took the kid's

foot in his grip. With which

grip he (almost expertly, it 

seemed), began gouging and 

cutting into this kid's foot, and

long and well enough to unmask

and pull out the offending hook.

-

Balance need and process, please,

if you would. This youngster,

though now free of the hook, had

a deeply-carved cut and gouge in 

the base of his foot, along with

blood and the rest. The foot was

salt-water cleansed, and wrapped.

The kid was OK. My father was

thanked. The crisis moved on.

-

Oddly, this moment allowed me

a distance, a place outside of the

'action,' since I wasn't involved,

to watch all this take place. It was

all quite curious : I knew my

father's actions and ways and the

mannerisms by which he operated.

That was all normal. But to see

complete strangers having faith

enough for, or allowing, this 

sort of beachfront mini-surgery

was startling. I can remember

my father saying something like,

'Don't worry, salt water cures

everything. Make sure you keep

it in the surf here for a while.

Let it soak.' Pretty much that

was it. No exchanges of information,

identification, no police, or marine

police anyway, activity on scene.

Just a quick and almost cursory

attack at the problem with,

basically, the same gutting 

knife he used on fish. I don't

think any of this would have

happened today.

-

By the same token  - and from 

the complete other angle  -  I don't

think that anyone BUT my father

would have so heedlessly and in

a headstrong fashion, ventured 

into that situation. Knife-blade,

incision, cutting and gouging

like that. No second-thoughts,

no hesitation. I had to think,

was he foolish, unbound, crazy,

too giving, or just innocent? It's

just like a naive person to dive

into a situation such as this,

have the get get gangrene or an

infection, and be sued and brought

up on charges. Smashing headlong,

as it were, into the other realities

of people's angers and hesitation

and the sorts of stand-offish behavior

that did in, or had done in, for pity's

sake, a scant 5 or 6 years previous,

Kitty Genovese on the streets of

New York City. (If you don't

know the reference there, you can 

look it up. Let's call it 'bystander

indifference?').

-
Nothing more was much ever 
said about this; which was another 
weird thing that baffled me. I'm the 
sort of person who, after something 
like that, would have demanded info,
for follow-up and contact. I guess it's
just the way I go  -  but to my father
it just rolled right away into the
never-never land of never happened.
It's like, to me, seeing an avalanche
and never telling anyone  - all that 
stuff rolling down a mountainside, 
trees, homes and, possibly, people, 
getting rolled over and smashed. 
You sort of have to say something.
-

So, anyway, Life-lesson learned

right then and there. It did stay

with me, and has become one of

those watchword things by which

I run  -  beware naivete. Not quite

the same as the situation itself,

yet the lesson I drew from it has

always been to keep a slight remove

from others, others in bad scenes

or situations. Kitty Genovese

notwithstanding; it's always the

token naif who brings others into

their dangerous webs  -  infractions

and mistakes  -  by which the 'others'

in their zeal to help, or what they

think is help, get likewise implicated

or injured by entering another's scene.

The next thing they know, they're

on the other side of the witness stand,

looking out, being drawn deep into

some web of intrigue woven almost

psychotically by the seducer, the

problem-prone one who has suckered

them in. Learn to keep away, and

it's never worth it if you don't.

-

It sounds, perhaps, coarse and nasty,

but it's what life is made up of. One

simply has to develop discernment.

It's a personal matter. I remember

in elementary schools, #4 and #5,

having that ridiculous 'My Country

'Tis of Thee' song pounded into 

my head; we must have had to 

sing that five thousand times in 

those 6 years. Without thinking.

I look back now and realize it all 

as the web being woven, the

enticement of the psychosis of

others being used to drag us in  -

to what, for most of the boys there,

ended up as being the woven web

of inducement that ended up in

Pleiku or Hue. Sweet land of

Liberty. Of thee I sing.