11,914. RUDIMENTS, pt. 748

RUDIMENTS, pt. 748

(small doses, big tablespoons)

I sat there, just thinking to

myself 'How did I ever get

to this position?' It's so tedious,

being uncomfortable. I've been

there 20 times over. One time,

when I first began working at

Princeton, the bookstore somehow

immediately hired another person,

just bumped in front of me, who

began taking over my job, and a

few others too. I'm a liberal guy,

and I wasn't (too) phased by what

I saw happening. Most of it was

lady-to-lady stuff, all of which

only later I caught onto. I was

a guy, and my discomfiture was

probably equal to theirs about

having me around. It didn't

matter, and that's not my point.

My point is I was hamstrung

from the very first by a darker

sort of happening and it all

got in the way of my clear

thinking; which is bound to

happen and bound to be bad.

It turned to deep cold January,

thankfully, very quickly that

year. I'd scamper out of there,

after six, mind you, which was

an extra daily hour  -  as usual

no recompense  -  based on

work load, straightening all

the initial forays of a newly

opened operation, walking in

the dark down the mile or so

to the little train station, where

I'd wait some more; usually

reading something and just

trying to clear my mind and

find again that clear-light spot

which they'd, by this time,

clearly muddled. I had thought

the job was going to be about

books, university level, scholarly

stuff. Their brags were good,

yes, but it didn't turn out that

way at all. The job ended up

being the usual crap commerce  -

trying ways to keep your finger

on the butcher scale to wring

out another few pennies from

a deal. Books bought cheap, in

great piles, and peddled, though

still 'cheap' by the 30-dollar

standards of the new books,

but still shystered and sneaked

through to get that extra 35 cents

or so whenever possible. It was,

alas, just another instance of

business and business people at

work. Trying to make yet another

buck from the sequestered and

darkened areas of the almost-not

legit. (I turned him onto to what

a printer's guillotine cutter was,

made the connection with a

printing-machine company in

Paterson, NJ, and within a month

there was a powered paper-cutter

installed. Remainders were to be

trimmed (the black mark at the

bottom), and then returned to the

publisher as new returns, gaining
new return prices! It worked, a

literary scam for the ages). I 
shrugged, and guessed that too
was high-culture; bookstore terms.

So at one level that was going on,

while at another level the shifting

alliances had checked me out

already  -  he's no longer here,

thank you. Fact was, everytime I

diplomatically moved (I should

have just metaphorically blown

the place up and gone ballistic),

I was hauled off to be spoken

with. Tea-time at an outdoor

Panera table, funny as that all

sounds. Injustice by committee.

Being scolded by ladies. Fact

is, I rolled over. I had better

things to do. There comes a 

time when a man reads the

evidences before him, sifts

through the embers, as it

were, and makes his own

conclusions. If it had been
country music, it would have
been named Clit Black.

-

Small doses, big tablespoons?

Maybe that should be small doses,

big lampshades. For all it matters.

For all anyone understands. For

all anyone cared. And those ladies

too are all still underway with

the same intense longings. But

without me - that plug's been

pulled and a certain sort of dirty

water (me) has drained off. I

sometimes wonder if the cutter's

still cutting? If the books sent to

prisons get trimmed? If the poppy

cock agenda of equal and same

gets traded off between all the

different factions that pass through.

Youth for nothing, and the old

for nothing at all as well.

-

What's it all got to do with

anything anyway? Not much,

because time is constantly on

its run  -  the slow trek into

the Princeton station, by the

'Dinky'  -  as that little and

single-stop train is called, goes

past, right now, 50 different

things than it did previously.

Every bit of the old that I

remember, is gone. That's how

things have always worked.

'Gone' : the morning sunrise crawl

along the backs of the post office 
annex building and the old furniture

shop and some houses and the 

unused buildings and the old train

station building itself, now a portly

restaurant while all the other things

are gone and rebuilt. They've
all changed and been changed,

so why shouldn't I have too? 
There used to be a wild and

raucous spit-fire convenience

store there, filled at all hours

with wandering students, half

drunks and half hungries, the

hungover wastrels and the

leftovers too, of each persuasion.

They've all been trimmed by the

societal madness of the same

sort of cheating guillotine cutter

that hacks through books and

sends them away. Curious how

business is always so boring

and filthy.