11,995. RUDIMENTS, pt. 776

RUDIMENTS, pt. 776

(pizza, american style)

I always felt 'this is how

to do it.' Basic bullshit,

done simple and simply

done. For me it was living

in a single house, with

whatever the old tile

was on the walls and

the simple bathroom.

It always drove me

crazy when I'd see those

others - people totally

redecorating, wanting

to have a new kitchen

installed, counter-space,

new cabinets, bathroom

vanities, retro ceiling fans.

That all made me heave.

It had nothing to do with

real life at all and only

served to obfuscate the

purposes and reasons

for what we all were

supposed to be living.

Talk about side-road,

off-the-track, detours.

That kind of thought

could ruin a person's

life; off-track it

totally.

-

Back in the 1970's anyway,

that was mostly suburban

stuff; the geeky kind of

things people did who had

no solid connection to

anything real anyway;

except maybe their cars

or families and homes.

Grass, entry lanterns, and

the rest of all that. Country

folk, and Elmira folk, didn't

much have those concerns;

certainly not the space-cadets

who lived in the deep parts

of nowhere. That Jennings

guy, if he ever had a cathedral

ceiling room with open rafters,

he'd simply be thinking of who

or what he could string up there.

Poverty and want and anger are

all pretty basic and they usually

go together. I'd come back, here

and there, to visit home, or see

NYC, and all I'd notice, around

Avenel, would be all these

previously marginal types all

of  a sudden getting pretentious

and overdone about home

improvements, marble counters,

bamboo floors, etc. Things that

were so foreign to anything I'd

ever known or cared about that

I couldn't even find a genesis

for how it took place. Where'd

that strange disease get started?

-

Where I was living then, right

up through the raw countryside

and farmlands, all the way up

to Ithaca and the Finger Lakes,

it was poor, fringe stuff. Like that

barn with the clown-face painted

on the side. Every sort of run-down

building, farm, barn, or house,

had 10-year old for sale signs

on them. Hand-painted. Having

a real-estate agent was exclusive

stuff; the big, fancy farms could

do that, but mostly out in the

deep nowhere they didn't do

that. They'd just hang a sign,

and say, 'C'mon over, we'll talk.'

Any fanciful notions about

redecorating or doing the rooms

over was way out-of-focus stuff.

Over in Colonia NJ, for some Falk

guy, my brother-in-law at the

time was selling real estate. He

was always ready, whenever I

visited, too make the case how

I should move back, show me

houses, talk it all up. I used to

ride around if he had something

to show me. I'd see all sorts of

'desirable' houses of the day,

back then, but nothing held my

attention. There was one house,

on Dewey Drive, in Colonia,

that we got interested in, but

it was all pre-improvements

and they sort of didn't wish to

sell it as-is unless we had

promises and plans for

fully updating the old place.

Why that was their concern

was beyond me, but that's

suburban NJ, I figured. That

 sure was an odd one. We let

it go; knowing we didn't really

want to move back anyway.

That was 1976. We went to

California instead, to check

that out. That's when that

Chinese girl screwed up the

house-sitting and watching

our dog  -  written about in

the previous chapter.

-

If I drive down Dewey Drive 

now, I can't really even locate 

which house it was  -  someone 

has, truly, done it over. The house 

I looked at just isn't there any

more. The 1920's version of 

a vertical and stucco house, 

cramped, poorly window'd, 

and with an old, stucco finish 

has been  replaced with some 

modern wonder.  Ugly as all

get-out;it probably has a

revolving mirror in each

bathroom; talk about 'vanity.'
-
No matter any of that, that was
all New Jersey stuff and at that 
period of my life I was very far
removed from it. I kept learning
funny things, more and more
amazing. Perhaps you remember
the cranky father-in-law over
at Warren's house  -  the guy
who told me about the tarring
of the road for the WPA project
that kept so many of these farmers
alive back in the Depression, the
same guy who used to rant on
about the TV always being on and
the heat and wasted power it
generated. He told me, one time,
way back, in those parts when 'pizza'
was something new to any of them,
-  (he'd also looked me over one time,
quizzically, and said 'We don't
get so many Eye-talians up here')  -
that when they were first introduced
to it, a few of those farm guys, they
learned of it as pizza PIE. Being 
farm-boys,  he said, 'when the
guys ever ate pie, we always
put ice cream on it, a big dollop
of vanilla. Se we did. It tasted
terrible and started melting too.
We just all said, 'What is this crap?'
That's how he got introduced to
pizza, America style, I guess.
-
Funny things like that used to
keep me in good stead, up there.
As I said, I'd initially arrived in
a 1962 VW, which ran fine, and
I kept it a good while; having
removed all the seats except for
the driver's, I'd drive around 
everywhere and keep it filled up
with firewood. Anyway, when
it was still a regular car, no one
up there had much seen one, and
it was a huge novelty  - except
the kids kept calling it 'Herbie'
or a 'punch buggy.' I couldn't
for the life of me figure that
out, until someone later told 
me it was a Disney movie or
something. 'Disney movie?
We don't see much of that in
these parts...'  I should
have said that.