RUDIMENTS, pt. 570
(eat this, before it melts)
Before I die I intend to write
(eat this, before it melts)
Before I die I intend to write
a book entitled 'Living.' It's
to be a book all about conceits,
what are called 'conceits,' as in,
'You don't mean that, you're just
doing that to look good....' Or
'to look like....' However you'd
wish to have it phrased. My
opinion is that the majority
of things people do are done
for reasons like that. Lacking
the foundational block of
'authenticity,' let's say. Any
reasoning for this, I would
imagine, is based on poor
upbringing (on my part);
for the way I am viewing
the world here reeks of that
disdainful 1950's poor-boy-in
front-of-the-TV outlook that,
back in my day, was considered
all perfectly correct and a right
upbringing. No one owns up to
that now. Gunsmoke and James
Arness are what gave us Bob
Dillon; certainly not 'Dylan'
Thomas. Zimmy's always
been a liar.
-
'Perhaps there is one book for
every life. One book with the
power to reflect and illuminate
that life; one book that will
forever inform how we navigate
the little strip of time we are
given, while also helping us
to clarify and catch hold of its
most vital moments.'
-
A few chapters back I made
mention of a place called 'Pizza
Time.' Before that, in the most
pure of 1960's fashions, it had
been an A&W Root Beer stand,;
one of those car-hop places that
infiltrated from California. You'd
pull in, under this long awning
thing they had, and each car spot
had a speaker box. You'd give your
order, as it went, and they'd come
out with your stuff on a tray, and
the tray hooked over the top of
your opened or half-opened car
window. The original intent,
a la California, was probably
to have some gym-skirted
little hottie on roller skates
tend to your car and order, but
it never got to that here - to
my knowledge. It was just
high school kids, girls mostly,
who'd do all the needed effort.
The entire perspective was a
bore, mainly because the sorts
of local people who went here
were in no way the sort of
characters that, I'm sure, the
original - sun-prone, optimistic,
garish and exhibitionist -
designers and planners of
A&W had in mind. It was
simply two different worlds:
the California misfit crowd bore
no resemblance to the Jersey
hard-tack crowd. One wanted
truffles and wine; the other
wanted nails.
-
Once again it all got me to
thinking (I used to do a lot
of that - and still do); this
time it was about the great
divide between so many
different sorts of reality, and
what people think. Anyone
stumbling into A&W with
their Jersey, or Avenel, car
could only be reacting to what
they'd seen of such things in
fantasy-land versions on TV.
The 1960's input of something
like that into Avenel was, at
base, a ludicrous imposition.
Any drive-in movie would have
had the same sort of wired and
connected call-boxes, for sound
and command. It was like a new
electronic servant; a big-deal
new idea of slavery again with
this time the idea being some
California babe on skates at
your beck and call. It's so
funny to think now how it
all went with wires. The
current 'wireless world' we
have now - making all this
old-vision stuff laughable,
was unthinkable then. Phones
had chords. Record players
had cords (and chords too,
I suppose).Everything was
somehow still tethered to
reality while only glimpsing
a minute idea of what a
version of some alternate
future night be bringing them,
('Uh, I'll have two burgers,
a fries and a shake. Bring
me that'). Without a cord.
-
So, what's Reality anyway?
What's virtual? What's real?
Is every person, really, at
heart, a slaveholder? Or
wishes to be? Can you tell
me you are here and I am,
as well, there? How so?
Here's a story to exemplify:
Here's a story to exemplify:
This girl who is spending
time at someone else's
house for a few days, sets
out a little photo of her
dog. She places it on the
nightstand. Her host says,
'Why? Your phone has
dozens of such pictures of
Pepper, your dog. Why do
you need this one?' She replies,
'The point of the phone isn't
to be a picture of Pepper,
while the point of the picture
of Pepper is to be a picture
of Pepper.' Physical objects
possess richly specific,
intrinsic characters, and can
be repositories of meaning in
ways that a powerful portal
to the entire world cannot
manage...The world right
now is a sickness; the price
of God is contagion.
-
I don't know where any
of this leaves me, yet I
understand that I live in
my own deep woods where
little is cut, nay, nothing is
cut and all things are wild
and overgrown, and that's
how I live and get by for
that is how I prosper and I
do so love the profusion.
All the men and all the boys
who were in my past -
seminary kids at 12 or 13 -
they seemed to love nothing
but sought out limits and
rules. Twisted vines grow
twisted roses? No, not so
specifically as that.
-
We each have our posts and we
each have our poses - and, as
I began here, all is conceit.
-
When I first came out of the
seminary, that was the weirdest
time for me; I landed nowhere
except back home, and for me
then a 'big' exploration was
Main Street Woodbridge.
Figure that. There were things
going on around me that I
could only surmise, with an
outsider status; no one ever
really taken me in. I had
conflicts nearly immediately;
the local high school was like
a dead field of negativity to
me, yet I was forced into that
straitjacket. Again, the world
is a disease, people are its
bacteria, and the price of
God is contagion.
-
This new-crap, modern.
-
This new-crap, modern.
A&W idea was all about the
pressed metal that made up the
car-hop awnings and the parking
areas. Stamped and crimped,
the pedestals were set up in
the opposite way from the
usual; to signify modernity.
The conceit' here was some
sort of George Jetson world
a'building where all things
would be better, and wilder,
and more efficient, with people
coming and going just to do
your bidding and where each
person was a Master, and a
slave too in some disingenuous
world of no values or concerns.
The pedestal beams holding up
the awnings were in reverse, and
that was the extent of the entire
idea, along with the heavily
wired order-call boxes. Those
beams (the conceit being the
'Modern') were narrow at the
bottom and fat at the top, with
that gradual and reverse taper
that brought George, Judy, Elroy,
and Jane and Astro too, out
to serve everyone else their
huge window-platter of
nothing. Right next to it,
somehow, was the old world
beckoning, while it died
of strangulation - Mary's,
Hilltop, just sitting - and
across from it the bizarre
hallucination too, of an
ice-cream drive-in with a
monstrous cone standing
on its roof.
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