RUDIMENTS, pt. 459
(black-eyed susans along the way)
Shenanigans, and DDT?
The purpose of life is to
seek life's purpose? To
find the right answer is
not so important as the
right question? And -
most importantly - the
words of Wittgenstein,
in various forms : 'Whereof
one cannot speak, therefore
one must be silent.' Or, put
another way, 'What can be
said at all can be clearly
said; of that which eludes
utterance, best say nothing.'
-
This was not anything like
with what I grew up. I
had to fight my way out
of that bag, forging another
direction. I sought sublime.
Probably where there was
none. And when I say
'sublime,' I really mean
that - higher plane stuff.
Not the banal kitty-kat
crap they foisted off at
you most everywhere you
went. That was Sunday
school meeting in
Heaven stuff.
-
I remember waking up
one day - just a normal
day, of no special consequence.
I guess it was two different
days, in actuality. My friends
were abuzz. I had no idea
what was up, 'He must
have been sober, couldn't
have been drunk.' Some guy
named Ernie Kovacs was
dead, I guess in a car crash?
I had no idea, and who cared?
Who was that person? (Well,
he was from Trenton, Hungarian
parents, peaked as a TV guy
about 1957, early comedian).
I immediately wondered why
anyone would care about
something like that. Some
years later (I guess I'm
telescoping time here)
this actress named Jayne
Mansfield underwent her
own car death, leaving a
party or something, and
having the top of her head
ripped off as the car went
beneath the rear of a truck
(which had slowed to a stop
following a mosquito-spray
truck!). Bim-bam-boom,
everything right down the
tubes in an instant. Again
though, my own reaction?
Who cares? Why does it
matter? The bells toll and
all that, but NOT for me,
thanks. Then I had to sit
back and try to think, why
did so many people care
about nothing so much?
-
My crazy friend Frank
was telling a joke - he
was never very good at it,
he rolled 'into' jokes way
too obviously, gave too much
away. One has to maintain
a certain semblance of both
surprise and removal, creep
up on the joke more than
simply tell it, in order for
it to work. He tried, but it
was always a failure. I said
to him, 'Frank, listen, don't
worry about it. Let others
tell the joke. You just laugh.
And, oh, did I ever tell you
about what the Jewish rabbi
said when one his students
turned Quaker? The Rabbi
said, 'Some of my best
Jews are Friends.''
-
Like anything else, it's
all in the approach. I
spent too many dreary
and early years of my own
time having to listen to the
pain and drudgery of the
small talk of small places,
and I swore I'd write it
all off as soon as I could :
'Age of Majority,' they
used to call that. I never
knew what it meant, and
I think it was for 18 years
old. Not sure, never followed
up, nor did I ever understand
'majority' of what? Typical
adult bullcrap. As far as I
could see all 18 ever was
going to mean was a rifle and
an enforced uniform to go
kill gooks. Yes, I said 'gooks.'
That's how unenlightened
1966 was by comparison to
today, when you can't hardly
say anything. Back then
everybody said whatever
they damned well pleased,
and THEN they killed. No
more; (unless maybe when
it's in a rap song, then it's all
cool and allowed and accepted).
That was all another thing I
swore off, early on - the draft
and all that Selective Service
Lewis Hershey crap - he was
the Draft Board head, a real and
true jerk. He represented 1966
America in the same devious
way that J. Edgar Hoover did,
wearing dresses and all, in the
50's and the rest, as FBI head.
There was a whole load of them,
back then, to whom I tendered
no respect at all, and, in fact,
was kind of hoping to just be
able to piss on their graves.
Hoover. Agnew. Hershey.
Robert Moses. There were a
bunch of names on my list.
Not one of them deserved
this country they
were running.
-
I always tried to get past the
deadening effects of all that.
Bye bye, New Jersey, I'll be
travelin' on, That was a song
once. What I did, once I realized
nothing was ever going to add
up, was head out to the Turnpike,
one of them Carteret buses, right
outta' town. I never looked back,
and I can still remember that vast
field of what I called Black-Eyed
Susans - a wild, Summertime
flower - that greeted me out the
bus window in the interminable
traffic jam that was the interchange
of the Turnpike exiting, onto
Route 3 or whatever it is that
goes into the Lincoln Tunnel.
Man, they were beautiful, all
those endless flowers, scary,
but beautiful too. Just kind
of swaying in the Summer heat
while nothing else was moving.
They had a cool name, by my
reckoning anyway. It all instantly
added up to something to me,
moreso that had anything else
ever before. Like some little,
goofy, Romantic-writing era
hero, I was setting out to my
own new world. Thumbing
my nose at all I'd left behind.
Shenanigans, I was ready for.
DDT, that noxious bane of
Avenel and suburban places,
the Black-Eyed Susans had
escaped it, evidently, and
so would I!
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