RUDIMENTS, pt. 929
(gray lime on the hopes of a lawn)
Some things remain true to
themselves, first and foremost,
and by their own concepts. Like
the roundness inherent in the
idea of a 'circle, or, for that matter,
the straightness embodied by the
something that is straight. No two
ways about it? Or no 'other' way in
any case. Once a person can learn
to be comfortable with that, the
process of judgment ceases. I'm
thinking that's probably all for
the good. It allows the extraneous
world to set itself into its own
ways : and we get the qualities
of the places we live.
-
Some things remain true to
themselves, first and foremost,
and by their own concepts. Like
the roundness inherent in the
idea of a 'circle, or, for that matter,
the straightness embodied by the
something that is straight. No two
ways about it? Or no 'other' way in
any case. Once a person can learn
to be comfortable with that, the
process of judgment ceases. I'm
thinking that's probably all for
the good. It allows the extraneous
world to set itself into its own
ways : and we get the qualities
of the places we live.
-
When I was first moved to Avenel,
it was a different place. Not for me,
I suppose, since it just 'was' - a new
and a day-one development. But for
whichever others had already been
living there, this was the start of a
complete foul-up. It was a no-place
at all. I had no choice in the young
matter, so I was helpless there. Why
and how they'd even brought family
here I couldn't figure out. It seemed
impossible to fathom anyone seeking
to live in a sort of down-river swamp;
rife with water and mosquitoes, and
connected mainly to nothing but
the highways and new arterials that
were swiftly being put into place.
Turn left to smell the Turnpike.
Turn right to smell the Parkway.
Walk straight down the street to
the junkyards and Route One to get
hit by a car. Stand here, and that's
the prison, and those guys at work
in the farm fields are prisoners; and
guys in the towers there, as well
as those two with the rifles, they're
guards. Right here, where we
stand, be careful of the trains that
come by; this is a New York City
line. Everything else around it was
dead or dying. The big coat factory
in Rahway was by the station, and
about the only thing left along the
slowly-receding downtown at the
river, which long ago had turned to
a tidal, oily, muck. Here in Avenel,
there was a little coat factory too.
-
Just north along the highway was
Merck. A chemical company, from
back when Chemistry was a big deal.
In fact, there used to be a slogan
used in advertising, that went 'Better
Living Through Chemistry.' That old
world was sure full of promise.
Sometimes now I feel like I'm
writing my last will and testament
as that world deconstructs itself
and is blasted to smithereens.
But even back then, if you wished
to find anything old or authentic
about the location, there was
nothing. In the earlier days of
water travel, the crossings from
NY to places like Mosey's Creek
in Linden (all refineries and tanks
now), or to Elizabethport itself,
which once was a vital crossing,
there was value and importance
in the building of the early terms
of landings and settlements. But,
still none of that extended to Avenel,
and whatever Royalist pulchritude
Woodbridge may have crowed
about, with its sedentary connect
to Perth Amboy, it was all hastily
done away with after that same
Revolution was over. The rest
was like gray lime thrown on the
hopes of a lawn : Heave, and
hope something grows.
-
A lot of history is just a gross
mythology anyway. The 1770's
would make any of today's
characters gag : Fearful for
their feet in their theoretical
shoes. Their response, today,
tends to be in just making
things up, and thereby making
themselves up too- like
having a great computer,
but no content.
-
We lived right on the railroad
tracks, just next to the highway,
a straight line from NYC in
one direction, and all that NJ
Shore crap in the other. To the
east was much of nothing, and
to the west was the Watchungs
and Plainfield, etc. In and of itself,
that was nothing and no one much
much cared - but today every Tom,
Dick, and Harry all of a sudden has
a history story of the great wars and
battlements from the Watchungs,
enough now to somehow try and
make this an 'important' area,
in a congress of know-nothings.
Everything now hinges on the
narratives. If you can make or
steal a great narrative about
something, you've got the
deal. It's the 'ownership' of
those narratives that take
the important roles.
-
I guessed I was always meant
to be happy in Avenel, like the
circle of the circle. That. Simply.
The outreach of what 'youth' was
supposed to be involved all the
everyday rules, and order, and
schedules things, mixed with
obedience and silence - the only
problem was that, 40 years on,
those are the very qualities that
are made fun off, laughed at,
and socially and filmically
ridiculed and torn apart. So
what is one to do? Negate the
past, in a personal life now
proven, evidently, to be useless?
Or just turn the page and learn
the new manners of normal
debauchery? There's not much
left, either way, and the only
real thing I can see to do is to
renounce society and get as far
away from its comminglings as
one can. I do whatever I can do,
maybe, to undermine it, yes, but
from sidelines of meaninglessness
to others. If my own father or
mother came back from the dead
right now, and I, at this age I
am now, had to address them,
it would take me a very long time
to arrange the sentences and the
language to properly get across to
them - whatever they are now -
how inept and dysfunctionally
sinful this society left to me is.
That's a hard lesson to clamor
at. And awfully sad as well.
Painful parting shots perhaps,
but, from my saddle, quite
true.
whichever others had already been
living there, this was the start of a
complete foul-up. It was a no-place
at all. I had no choice in the young
matter, so I was helpless there. Why
and how they'd even brought family
here I couldn't figure out. It seemed
impossible to fathom anyone seeking
to live in a sort of down-river swamp;
rife with water and mosquitoes, and
connected mainly to nothing but
the highways and new arterials that
were swiftly being put into place.
Turn left to smell the Turnpike.
Turn right to smell the Parkway.
Walk straight down the street to
the junkyards and Route One to get
hit by a car. Stand here, and that's
the prison, and those guys at work
in the farm fields are prisoners; and
guys in the towers there, as well
as those two with the rifles, they're
guards. Right here, where we
stand, be careful of the trains that
come by; this is a New York City
line. Everything else around it was
dead or dying. The big coat factory
in Rahway was by the station, and
about the only thing left along the
slowly-receding downtown at the
river, which long ago had turned to
a tidal, oily, muck. Here in Avenel,
there was a little coat factory too.
-
Just north along the highway was
Merck. A chemical company, from
back when Chemistry was a big deal.
In fact, there used to be a slogan
used in advertising, that went 'Better
Living Through Chemistry.' That old
world was sure full of promise.
Sometimes now I feel like I'm
writing my last will and testament
as that world deconstructs itself
and is blasted to smithereens.
But even back then, if you wished
to find anything old or authentic
about the location, there was
nothing. In the earlier days of
water travel, the crossings from
NY to places like Mosey's Creek
in Linden (all refineries and tanks
now), or to Elizabethport itself,
which once was a vital crossing,
there was value and importance
in the building of the early terms
of landings and settlements. But,
still none of that extended to Avenel,
and whatever Royalist pulchritude
Woodbridge may have crowed
about, with its sedentary connect
to Perth Amboy, it was all hastily
done away with after that same
Revolution was over. The rest
was like gray lime thrown on the
hopes of a lawn : Heave, and
hope something grows.
-
A lot of history is just a gross
mythology anyway. The 1770's
would make any of today's
characters gag : Fearful for
their feet in their theoretical
shoes. Their response, today,
tends to be in just making
things up, and thereby making
themselves up too- like
having a great computer,
but no content.
-
We lived right on the railroad
tracks, just next to the highway,
a straight line from NYC in
one direction, and all that NJ
Shore crap in the other. To the
east was much of nothing, and
to the west was the Watchungs
and Plainfield, etc. In and of itself,
that was nothing and no one much
much cared - but today every Tom,
Dick, and Harry all of a sudden has
a history story of the great wars and
battlements from the Watchungs,
enough now to somehow try and
make this an 'important' area,
in a congress of know-nothings.
Everything now hinges on the
narratives. If you can make or
steal a great narrative about
something, you've got the
deal. It's the 'ownership' of
those narratives that take
the important roles.
-
I guessed I was always meant
to be happy in Avenel, like the
circle of the circle. That. Simply.
The outreach of what 'youth' was
supposed to be involved all the
everyday rules, and order, and
schedules things, mixed with
obedience and silence - the only
problem was that, 40 years on,
those are the very qualities that
are made fun off, laughed at,
and socially and filmically
ridiculed and torn apart. So
what is one to do? Negate the
past, in a personal life now
proven, evidently, to be useless?
Or just turn the page and learn
the new manners of normal
debauchery? There's not much
left, either way, and the only
real thing I can see to do is to
renounce society and get as far
away from its comminglings as
one can. I do whatever I can do,
maybe, to undermine it, yes, but
from sidelines of meaninglessness
to others. If my own father or
mother came back from the dead
right now, and I, at this age I
am now, had to address them,
it would take me a very long time
to arrange the sentences and the
language to properly get across to
them - whatever they are now -
how inept and dysfunctionally
sinful this society left to me is.
That's a hard lesson to clamor
at. And awfully sad as well.
Painful parting shots perhaps,
but, from my saddle, quite
true.
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