RUDIMENTS, pt. 817
(learning on the fly)
It's always a 'hard-tell'
when you're doing stuff
and there's no one to stop
you - which is what being
on your own is pretty much
about. Sometimes, with
mistakes and incorrect
intentions, that's how guys
end up in prison. Jails and
prisons are filled with
missionary types; just
going on and on abut
wrong things. It's a
misnomer to say a wise
man is wise - sometimes
they too are simply stupid.
It takes a catch-word and
a basin of good sense to
bring people to their senses.
That's what I've found anyway.
I've also found, lots of times,
that when I begin writing
something, all of a sudden
there it is! Right before me,
and built into what I've just
written - the catchword or
the sentence needed to pull
someone back from some
brink of infamy or other. I
just hope they get it.
-
In NYC, I used to know guys
who would stroll past a pizza
joint, and in about 100 seconds
have the place totally spec'd
out : How the cash was handled,
where it was put from the register
to the manager's office or safe.
Even more than that, they'd go in,
sit down and order something;
like anyone that you see in a
streetside pizza place - sitting
there, eating their slices. But,
their key was observation. (It
didn't need to be pizza, by the
way; this same thing went for
felafel stands, sub shops, and
the rest. NYC was famed for
rows of these things, street
after street, every food and
food-chain known to New
Yorkers, with wide-open,
walk-in street fronts). They'd
be observing the frequency
of phone orders, how that
cash came back in; the
customer traffic through
the door; how the take-out
order people who stood at
the counter positioned
themselves while waiting,
and how many there were;
the sorts of orders, and the
dollar amounts. Who cooked,
and how? What presence had
the manager? Did he or she
work the register? Was it
some dumb kid instead?
They'd look for doorways
and exit patterns, etc. It
was kid of incredible to me
to realize that such people
existed and thought that way.
-
It often felt like a movie to
me; one of those noir films
with some dark characters
mumbling into their black
coffee about their plans to
knock-over Hennesey's
warehouse. One or the other
guy would say, 'You can't
overlook anything, gotta'
know it all beforehand; this
is the most important part of
the deal. I want to know if
they have a clock on the
wall, and what time it keeps.
Get me?' The whole expanse
of old Second Ave. was
made up of these little
places - shops and eateries,
often with fumbling, old
people still running their
own place, which they'd
had since the 1940's. Why
bother with that, I'd think.
Why muss up some old
couple by stealing three
hundred bucks? There were
furniture shops, toy stores,
bodegas, record shops,
even head shops and the
rest - bakeries, grocers
and more. A person, besides,
could get themselves killed.
I wanted no part of any of
that, and just wished they'd
shut up about it all. New
Yorkers were a loathsome
bunch, at this level.
-
My first few weeks there
taught me innumerable
items of interest : There were
laundry service trucks, all over
the lower east side, for some
reason - restaurant linens,
cleaners, suppliers, laundry
services; and they all had
one look, like a monopoly.
Large, boxy panel trucks,
with a picture, on the large
sides, of a white, frothy,
waterfall, and their name,
'Cascade' Laundry Service.
I was amazed and I saw
them most everywhere. It
was a thousand degrees out,
very little was air conditioned;
people and things wilted, the
tar on the streets was like mud;
pennies dimes and nickels, it
seemed embedded in the tar
everywhere, along with countless
bottle caps. Especially prevalent,
as this was, at corners, where
people waited for lights and
crossing. The Cascade trucks
were like a welcome respite
from the intense heat : cool,
white, and refreshing. I soon
realized that, to get by, one
here had to live in one's
imagination - make the
places that you wanted.
Otherwise there was just
too much misery. There
seemed as if, beside the
constant heat, cheap noise
was everywhere. Radio
stations playing from
tinny-sounding plastic
units on stores counters
and building fronts.
Peaches and Herb. Love
Is Strange. Strawberry
Alarm Clock, Incense
and Peppermint, Curse
of Mankind. Man, I was
sure I disliked all of it.
I had never before gotten
past the idea of the imagistic
'exceptionalism' of New
York City not really being
that at all. What one hears
about, growing up as I did,
are the success stories,
the rich and famous, the
legendary; all those artists
and writers and characters.
That's all the aspirational
stuff, and, yes, I had aspired,
and been attracted to all that,
my own quest, etc., never
realizing, until I actually GOT
there too, that the same place
was filled with thousands of
pounds of everyday misery,
crass and angry and cross,
people; failures, lame, sick
and dying, elderly, those who
had to work for their survival,
at 9 bucks a day and hated it.
I found the streets weren't
paved with gold; rather mold.
And the sidewalks? They were
traipsed by marginal types
sizing up pizza joints, and
mom and pop sheets-and-
towels-and-linens stores to
see which ones they could
rob, and maybe, while doing
so, ruin some poor working
slob's life more than it
already was.
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