RUDIMENTS, pt. 781
(big time movie junket)
One of the nicer things
around Elmira, or in it
actually during the time
I lived there, (827 Lincoln
Street), was - beside the
proximity to the college -
the surprising bit of
ethnicity that was still
present. Those sorts of
little storefront houses,
with a meat market or a
deli or a pasta manufacture
in place, there, with a
storefront, sole proprietor,
on the ground floor and
the family living upstairs.
It was pretty cool, and was
the sort of thing you don't
see any more, what with
the large supermarket chains
and the franchised stupidity
stores seeing everything from
drugs to tiddlywinks, at large
markup, and calling themselves
local while having nothing
local about themselves at all.
These places I make mention
of were totally simple and
had single focus - like you
couldn't do now if you tried.
Joe's Meats, Antonio's Pork
Store, Laszlo's Dumplings
and Vegetables, Penney's
Elmira Bakery, The Rice
and Beans Shop. Etc. You
name it; and the same went
for bicycle shops, (there were
2 great little ones), book and
stationery stores, and clothing
too. To specialize in, let's say,
house-dresses, you really
need to specialize.
-
It was all unspoken, and went
with the territory. A different
ethos. America has lost all that,
for the most part, and even all
the artisan this-and-that which
you may see going on is more
hipster-ruffian stuff, dashed
with irony, than it is anything
real and sincere. Another nice
thing, which as a memory I
enjoy to this day, was the
local-ness of the fire-service.
Firemen usually end up annoying
me to no end, all that ersatz
militarism and fake-cop stuff
they put on. But in Elmira,
which was, after all, a huge
fire-apparatus town - Kennedy
Valve, American LaFrance,
meters, hydrants, fire trucks
and vehicles - the service
consciousness was different.
Spattered all throughout the
town (old city) were small,
single-bay fire stations, manned
and equipped, by men, not by
strivers. Nothing crazy or grandiose
and overdone like you see in those
towns and locations with large,
over-run fire-headquarters, excess
equipment and service, centralized
with paperwork, inspections and
all the fraud and crap that goes
with it - plus the public dollar.
The way we have it now, come
fireman convention time, or
Christmas party time, the boots
come out and they start begging
at lights, even after the tax dollar
and Fire Service charge that's
lined separately on your tax
bill. Their basically crazy with
excess, and always want more.
In Elmira, all that stuff was
pretty humble - shade trees
around the old fire station from
the 1920's or before - a fine,
old, brick-designed and filigree'd
place you'd be proud of. As in
one of those stupid, old Country-
Time lemonade commercials
almost. Did the heart good to see.
-
There's always racism in the
fire-house business too. Have
you ever noticed the whiteness?
Elmira had its black sections,
sure, but like most places, none
of that fire-service stuff extended
to them, active as members. It
too was never mentioned, but
unspoken it reigned. That was
Elmira. Out in the Pennsylvania
country, which came first for
me, 25 miles off, if you were
facing a raging fire you were
almost just plain out of luck.
The service and communication
system was lame; people were
busy, and they'd gather for you,
yes, and man a fire brigade,
but by the time it all reached
you, the cinders were already
cooling off. Once they lit up
anyway, farms, barns, and
farmhouses went pretty
quickly. Fire was such a bad
enemy, you kept it close and
tried to make it a friend.
-
Much like the Civil War
cemeteries, for which I
loved Elmira, I was part
of an old, a past, that no
longer existed, even there.
And I knew it, and was
aware of it. One of the
people at Whitehall Printing,
where I worked some, used
to tell me I looked as if I
came from another time
and place. I agreed, and
just said, 'Yeah, I do.' It
all was my way of getting
in on the joke, because
otherwise I was just afraid
of getting people roiled up.
I worked with a few crazy
guys there - not the other
time and place person -
but guys, with new families,
or girlfriends, new homes,
etc. (older, used homes, but
new for them). They'd be
buying new pickup trucks,
all happy and proud of that
too. They even had this thing
going where, on Weds. nights,
they'd come back after work,
and the foreman, who was
one of them, would open
the place and they'd project
porno films on the big white
wall in the entryway. Each
Weds. they'd show a flick
or two, get all crazed up,
and then, the next day, I'd
hear all about it - all this
super life sized projected
movie stuff. They had the
set-up so that the projected
film was like movie-house
size. Let's just say, everything
was vivid and big. Who needs
9th grade sex ed, when you
can just watch movies at age
24? I used to think, 'God help
their wives and girlfriends
on Wednesday nights,' later.
Big time movie junket...
-
I used to see forests and I used
to see trees. The countryside
there was filled with all that
and it was about as far a cry
from NYCity as I could get.
Back in the city, as I recalled.
it was about the most un-natural
place you'd ever imagined - all
cut and leveled and laid out
in a simpleton's grid-pattern
for commercial purposes only,
yet all these self-absorbed
New York types would get to
crying and babbling over a
twig or a limb. Out here, I
found, it as all different -
Nature abounded and no
one gave a care to it, except
as a killing field. All these
guys would drive around in
their pick-ups and have what
my Jersey friends and I would
call 'Easy Rider Rifle Racks'
at the rear windows of their
trucks. They'd be out riding
along like some tobacco
chewing rodeo stars or such,
and - seeing something there
scurrying along the side of the
road or up a ways on the field,
reach back, grab a rifle, and
blast away. Shooting to death,
for sport.
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