RUDIMENTS, pt. 735
(too many desperate measures)
You know how you see people's
hands? As people talk, they often
use those hands to emphasize or
maneuver, as it were, the words
and expressions they're using.
That's how I always knew there
was more than one world; by
the way the Spirit catches things
and has people trying to grab
and move invisible things, as
they speak. I had a friend once
who always insisted to me that
a person could not do more than
one thing at a time - Jack meant,
to clarify, that a person's mind
could only have one thought
going at any one time. I always
disagreed with him on that point,
and as two rather dim-witted
guys, we'd go out to the back
of the Inman Avenue house, and
walk to the tracks and just stand
there arguing this stupid point.
We argued about a million things,
in philosophical-argument ways.
Not anger, just the yes or no of
the premise, as if we were standing
in the rotunda of some college or
university. Oftentimes it just went
stupid - like the one time, after
this long belabored argument that
people could only think one thought
at a time (I disagreed), Jack comes
back to me, on another subject, and
says - 'Have you ever been driving
somewhere, and then, along the way,
suddenly realize you don't remember
the last five minutes, nor how you
got to where you were?' I said, 'Yeah,
Jack. And thanks, you just proved my
point. Your mind was racing along
with multi-thoughts going on all
at once, while it also was calmly
driving along, oblivious to you.
My friend, you were doing about ten
things at once. Reading road-signs,
thinking about your girlfriend,
and your lunch, and where you'd
left your jacket, and what was
in the pocket, and where you were
were headed, how much gasoline
you had, and what you were
you had, and what you were
going to do upon arrival.'
-
I started this with people's hands,
by which I meant to say, they are
trying, all the while, to grab and
form the mental formation of
the words they are using. It's
fairly magical. People's hands,
of course, are too - everyone's
got some sort of different thing
going with hands - long and light,
short, stubby, thick, slender, nails
and cuticles, even the twists and
shapes of fingers. I know, by this
late stage of my own life, two
or three of my fingers have
weird turns and bends in them,
at the end joints, and my nails
have grown hard and long. I
don't think much of my own
hands, piano BS or not, but they
sure have grabbed and twirled
and turned a lot of thoughts and
words in their day. Maybe that's
something maybe not.
-
The idea of those smudge pots,
you know, they've always stayed
with me, like hands, as a guiding
image. I always felt to be the human
equivalent of one of them : always
on, always throwing light, trying
to call to and guide others, out of
danger, around obstacles, with
my flickering little flame and my
wisp of smoke curling, acting as
lighthouses to the blind - to
use a testy image. (Always
reminds me, it does, of the
Association For the Blind
mission/house on w23rd). The
idea of the smudge pot in my
own case would be how it was
self-fueled. Not like the ones
along the roadway, which were
tended to by highway workers
and construction guys. This was
all different; my own sacred
little precinct of self, putting
out an energy and a light of
its own.
-
I always hated it when people
stole from me - it happens;
ideas, images, the whole bit.
I never slap back, but it's a
slap to me. Like death without
retribution. Oh well, I forgive.
-
I had something I wanted to
say; about that damned movie
again, but I petty much forgot
it all, never having written it
down during the time the
thoughts were passing
through my head, running
the clock out, as it were. There
was a 92 year old guy once,
already way confused, old,
senile, watching a football
game. The team made a
touchdown, and they played
it again on instant replay,
and he thought they made
another. I always thought that
was funny, except I forget too.
Where I heard it. Or maybe I
didn't. Time though is funny.
There's like fast time and slow
time, different sensations; some
times are like forever, when
you're awaiting something -
and other times everything is
fleeting fast as can be. No
matter what we end up calling
it, I always figure it all does
converge and eventually - to
use a musical term - elides.
We end up with very little of
what is left, as our own. If
time is like an ocean, and
we're supposedly walking
through it, that just got me
more confused about the
movie scenes. They sort of
overlapped but no one ever
seems to have given a thought
to what happened in between
the times the movie tried
commanding. There's a whole
big rest of the other world
out there. A movie never
accounts for that. And making
a 'literary' connection to a
movie - I was never able
to do that. Once a screenwriter
person gets their hands on
anything, it's never the same
again. A film is propaganda.
A piece of writing is not. It
becomes propaganda once the
local hack interjects his or her
own filmic concerns into it,
chopping scenes, altering,
changing dialogue, adding
character and the 'abiding' love
angles and interests. It's all crap
by then, and shouted too loudly
from the rooftops for sure. They
tried filming American Pastoral,
a wonderful Philip Roth book,
and destroyed it; same with
stuff by Bernard Malamud, and
many others. You can't have
the touch necessary for film,
once you get rolling, come out
of literary work. The Twain
do not meet (Ha. Even if it is
'Tom Sawyer' and 'Huckleberry
Finn' getting filmed). Film most
often deals with cliches. Bad
literature also deals with cliches,
but bad literature's cliches don't
translate well over to film. Too
many desperate measures. I
can never see the reason why
anyone would willingly give
themselves over, visually.
It's probably just a quirk of
mine - a person who, before
computers - had a huge
pen and pencil callous on
the end of my middle finger,
right hand, writing-grip. It's
gone away now, some 27 years,
but it used to be good. There's
still a mis-shape there, but
nothing I can tell about. I
even had it in the typewriter
days, but somehow something
about the computer factor got
rid of all that. That's the same
way, sort of, as film versus
read. 'Read' dies, as people look
at visuals. It would have been
much easier for me, yes, even
me, to have written and evoked
those weird Belmar streets than
to ever try and film whatever it
was that was supposed to have
been filmed : sentimentality,
cliche, false emotion, bad
characters, poor action. If
you watch Goldblum in
that sobby scene where's
he supposedly playing the
piano, it's pathetic. He's
playing at playing a piano.
At the end of the sequence,
the funniest yet easiest part
is when he ends the scene
by just slamming some notes
with his right hand. Oh damn,
he's good. Film can only
show you the subterfuge
and the fakery. I could have
written the whole town up
nicely, and chucked the
story. Like the Bikers, it
was unnecessary. And,
again, that factor of time?
Between-spaces time?
Fast or slow time. It's
like physics, or magic.
Other worlds exist.
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