12,320. RUDIMENTS, pt. 878

RUDIMENTS, pt. 878

(places like sheds notwithstanding)

It took a lot of years to get

nowhere. Sometimes I think

like that, and not just about

myself either. Old towns and

country places, they too, had

they a 'personality' to bear,

could have the same things

said about them. There's this

real nowhere place up along

New York State, sort of by

Unadilla, called 'Sheds.' I

got there once, quite by

accident, and it was a scary

nowhere to be sure. The only

thing around was a tavern or two,

a highway turnoff convenience

area, and a large lot selling,

yes, sheds  -  all sizes and all

assortments. The rest of the

place was farmland, local roads,

farm service stores, and, again,

those taverns. One of which I

entered to see what the weather

inside was like. Not fun. Just

got stared down backways a bit.

It was a somber bunch, really

sorry-looking and down on their

luck. I wanted to say 'What's

wrong, fella's, crops failed?'

But I also wanted to live.

It all got me to thinking anyway

about the places and the ways

we lived. Like about poverty.

These guys were pretty busted

up, but they were buying their

drinks, whatever a beer may have

been, buck-seventy-five, then?

By the time a six-hour drinking

bunch gets done, and all the

buying for the other guys and the

backups and shots and chasers and

all that, a man stands to lose forty

bucks, just to have something to

piss out. You can't be too poor

for all that; especially if it's

only like a Tuesday, still early,

and maybe there's a trailer and

a wife and three kids up the

incline waiting to eat and have

you there too. 'Come home,

Johnny Devil, come home!'

So, who measures what's

sober or drunk. Is that then

'country' poverty? Versus

Avenel, say, poverty, which

maybe by contrast means

you can't buy those new

landscape rhododendrons

for the side lawn and go

out to two restaurants a

week, at 75 bucks a sitting,

for two. It can't be swung.

Which is the poorer?

-

I knew I never knew, nor was to

ever know. Back then was the

time, too, especially around the

Jersey parts I'd see, of weird

little western-theme restaurants;

places with cornpone names like

'Rustler,' or 'Ponderosa' or 'Sizzler.'

Everybody wanting somehow to

be Lorne Greene eating meat.

They had none of that up in those

boondocks places, but around the

Woodbridge and Edison area they

were reproducing these easy

places like rabbits, and as soon

the as one got built, so did the

next, and both parking lots were

filled. What was all that? Cheap,

stupid, frozen-over 3-inch 'steaks'

and some potato crap, maybe a

salad bar, corn and junk on the

side, a big soft-drink (they didn't

serve real booze, like cowboys

would ask for), you get all done,

maybe it 14, or 16 bucks per person.

Not a hair's-breadth of any

authenticity to it, but it always

seemed to satisfy the nitwits.

Once I'd gotten myself exposed

to something like 'Sheds, NY'

I used to get back to Jersey and

wonder how and why those local

people existed. At either location

I was unable to find any rationale

for why they should keep themselves

alive. My game was up, but I

felt it was a better game being

played, up in Sheds, than over

in Jersey. MaryLou in a cowboy

hat taking your order on a scratch

pad just didn't do it for me. Up

in Sheds, you look at a half-lit

guy wrongly, and your out back

in an instant, fighting.

-

So, what was any of it about and

what are the myriad levels of

'poverty?' I just figured that the

poor were free. People with money

have all sorts of encumbrances that

go with it, and it makes them angry

and short, always on the lookout,

trying to get over on someone,

and for sure amassing way too

much crap. Who wants any of

that, and why? Where the hell

you gonna' put any of that in

you 4x8 ground hole?

-

Poverty doesn't have any guidelines,

and it goes all over the place, in

its characteristic ways; but most

people seem to end up content.

My grandmother, back when, she

had a penchant of weird, poverty

type things. I noticed them right

off the bat. First off, she pronounced

the word 'toilet' as 'terlet.' Always.

She's talk about getting up in the

morning, and needing time to do her

terlet; which meant the usual and

washing up and straightening hair

and all. And then, if she was to be

going somewhere, she'd say, always,

that she needed one last freshen-up

and had to put some terlet-water on.

Man alive, that used to creep me

out. Terlet-water to me was from

the bowl, and probably slightly

yellow too. Excuse me ma'am,

but I'll meet you outside. And

the opposite of that level of

poor was, of course, when I

began working legal printing

and all that, the lawyer guys

would always go on about this

or that being in 'litigation.' I

learned about hating that word

real quick. What a lousy word

that was  -  why didn't they just

say they'd been hired to sue the

pants off of some unlucky schmuck

on the other side of the docket?

Why didn't those jerks just go

litigate at the Ponderosa while

waiting their $2.69 cent steak and

paying 12 bucks for it? Litigate

that.

-

In old Italian, these was a metaphor

in use  -  the words were 'La coda

di paglia.' A tail of straw, as it went,

was a metaphor for what keeps a

man from getting too near the fire.

The action, the public stance. It

meant the compromising facts

of his past life, which he would

want to have forgotten, and which

therefore 'gravely' limit his present

day possibilities. I guess maybe we

here call that 'Skeletons in the closet.'

Not the it matters here; no one seems

to care and no matter what it is the

crap newslines make a big stink for

a week while all the ballet-balancers

bloviate and fart out their sick words,

and then it's all forgotten. Back in old

Italy, that shit could get you killed.

Mafia code, Cosa Nostra. Carabinieri.

Militaria Polizia. Fascists. Communists.

Always afraid a secret will come out,

or someone will divulge something,

and a career would flame out to

smoldering ruins.  It's like a jackal,

madly running around your campfire.

That was all pretty clear to me. I liked

liked the directness of the 'push.'

-

The part of New York State where

Sheds was, in particular, remains a

vivid area to me  -  sort of a broad 

sweep maybe encompassing the 

Finger Lakes, so-called because 

they resemble, as the retreating,

(or maybe advancing), glacier 

gouged them out. the huge scratches 

of water-filled cuts that a hand of

five fingers would make were they

grabbing at the soil. Up above and

east of all that brings the Adirondacks;

so this middle ground of NYState is

a surprising, high, flatland. It's

made little mention of because in

some respects it's boring, and the

same. A lot of the Catskill-like drama

is gone from the high topography. But,

nonetheless, it's an interesting drive,

places like Sheds notwithstanding.