12,300. RUDIMENTS, pt. 872

RUDIMENTS, pt. 872

(spin that roulette wheel again)

One odd thing that's

always been about me  -

since I returned to life

anyway, after the coma

and stuff  -  has been the

effect I have upon

electricity. Yes, that will

need some clarification.

But. If you have a radio

or car-relay thing or

some switch or appliance

that's working perfectly,

just put me within proximity

to it and watch what happens.

I'm serious : Headlight

dimmers, sensors, garage

door openers and the like.

I get around them, they

soon begin going flooey.

It bugged me for a long

time. It was an annoyance.

Large or small, didn't matter.

I could crash-land a lunar

rover, running remotely,

just by stepping onto a

Nasa control room. I told

it to the draft guys, when

they finally nabbed me and

started their questioning,

but it all meant nothing to

them. They thought I was

nuts  -  which was fine by

me since, cumulatively, it

all went into why I got my

4-F deferment for, why,

for being nuts! I went from

being a criminal to an outcast

in ten minutes, never even

realizing there's a difference

between the two. Actually I

told them that and a lot more

too, which obviously worked.

A guy asked me once, 'How'd

you get that, 4F? Usually you
can't get that unless your

missing an arm or a leg.' I

blew him off by then saying...

'Uh, got hit by train once?....'

Actually, the draft board guys,

when I presented some doctor

note about the train injuries,

they said 'That was a long 

time ago, (it was like 9 years

then); we don't care about that,

we care about now.' Jerks. I

felt like saying, 'OK, yeah,

like the French weren't in

Vietnam getting their ass

kicked in Dienbienphu, 

1954? You suck-heads are 

still fighting that one.

-

Anyway, back to electricity.

One time, my friend and I

happened to walk in, along

with his 10 year old son,

to a pizza place, and it had

a juke box in the corner, large

sized, on the floor. I bet the

kid a quarter, while we were

waiting, that if I got up and

walked over to it, and touched

it, I could get it going and we'd

hear music. I got up and started

walking towards it, and it came

on! Surprising even me. The

kid was floored. I let him keep

his quarter. (I found out later,

but kept it to myself, that

these juke-box things most

often have a self-regulator on

them, to entice people, where,

if they're not played for fifteen

minutes or so they randomly

turn themselves on and play a

tune. Which would, of course,

account for why I'd not had to

select a song myself for it to

play). Anyway, it was funny,

even if it was actually the 

opposite of the bad effect I 

usually have upon such 

implements.

-

And, one further thing, and not to

toot my own horn, but after the

train accident I remained prone

to a lot of weird things. I read

some stuff about that electrical

sensitivity effect, and actually

found some weird material about

it, but it was all clothed in that

psychic, extra-sensory tone which

threw me off   -  the point was

the 'such people' are more active,

in terms of psychic energy and

electro-magnetism being generated

to alter the spaces around them

and recreate the positions and

activities of atoms and the

energy patterns of the unseen

world lying just outside of our

conscious realm. According to

them, I was a walking, psychic

energy field. Yeah right then. I

tried it once on the subway; told

the token-booth guy I wasn't going

to pay and if he objected then I'd

shut down the entire entry-kiosk

and turnstile operation just by

touching it.  I forget right now

if he let me through or called

the cops. It was long ago.

-

It was so long ago yet it seems

like yesterday! Have you ever

had that happen? For me, I do

feel like I'm walking backwards.

I had a discussion just the other

day with some guy named Rodney,

the caretaker or groundskeeper,

in some cemetery I was in. He

came over to talk with me and

see the dog  -  nicest guy, said he

was 50, and it was all bothering

him. He lit up a cigarette (you don't

really see that too much anymore)

and as we talked he was puffing

away. Responding to all his words

about his new, age '50' and how he

didn't feel he fit in any more, didn't

like the world as it was, sometimes

just got away, by himself, on his

motorcycle, to the Poconos, etc.,

etc. (4 daughters, and a wife. I told

him I could sympathize, I guess).

Anyway, I told him it all got easier

and how, at 70, I simply enjoyed it

and took it all in stride and how I

felt like I was just walking through

my own past, whether backward

or not I didn't know, and how

that wasn't so bad. He said he liked

that idea, and would start using it.

We were both both standing there

in front of a newly-installed

memorial stone over a grave

that had previously been there

for many, many years, with just an

an old, brown-stone marker and name
and date; (see photo). He said some

group just paid for that new marker,

and it said 'here lies......who was

the man-servant (slave) for life

of......'  -  which name it turns

out is one of the big-deal rah-rah

names of one of the families

who founded this place in the

1600's. Ain't that bewitching!

We both got a good chuckle.

-

All these founding families around

here, all those God-fearing founders
of Woodbridge,  and their quite 
normal secrets dead with them,

always amaze me. If this place was

built on holy ground  -  the blood

of those early soldiers and dead

Royalists over in the Episcopalian

graveyard just one churchyard

over  -  those early families have

a lot of it on their trail. Streets and

plazas and ballfields named after

them too. If I was one of those

pudding-head softees now who

get all offended and sensitive

if they find a stain in their 

undies, I'd start a movement to 

have everything named Freeman 

around here removed. Isn't all

that funny anyway. A last name

like Freeman, plastered all over

the place around here, with a

slave-holding grave, and poor

Jack even got to use THEIR last

name! Freeman! Hey, Mister  - 

spin that roulette wheel again.