RUDIMENTS, pt. 1,111
(I left just leaving a message)
I always figured if a person
wasn't 'learning' at all times,
there was little use to anything.
I know that all of my workings
always went towards those ends.
They used to talk about all the
'Mosaic' stuff, about America
being a tiled combination of
all different sorts - patterns
and colors and all - even though
I knew it was a bunch if crap and
only one of those public-relations
bullshit gimmicks to push some
wan political point along. Criminals
talk like that, and each time I ever
heard that concept, it was from the
mouth of a criminal. Anyway, you
never heard of anyone talking about
America being a center of learning
or a wellspring of information.
Everything was, by contrast, always
being dragged down or ironically
belittled, or abused or made fun
off; with a sort of smug-superiority
of the dumb taking precedence.
When Melville wrote Moby Dick,
(a New Yorker by birth, Herman
had been born in 1819 at 6 Pearl
Street, of a mix of British, Dutch,
an French nationalities. A fairly
common NY mix, back then),
the reception wasn't quite as
expected (it bombed). The
literati responded with mixed,
lukewarm reviews. Exhausted
at bringing out that 'wild Everest
of art,' bitterly disillusioned at
the reception, Melville poured
out his fevered emotions in
'Pierre' (in typical NY fashion).
It was a book that would
irretrievably damage his
literary reputation, dealing
as it did with incest, Oedipus,
and the mysteries of the
unconscious, and is about
a young man who comes to
New York and tries to earn
his living as a writer in the
'shivering cold of a third-story
room.' Like Moby Dick,
'Pierre' was ungratefully
received and rudely
condemned. Pierre contains
many autobiographical
strands, and the third-story
room is based on the one
in which Melville finished
Moby Dick.
-
As far as I ever traced it
back, that room was at what
was then called 'Dutch Street
(gone now), behind the
courtyard of the old 'Church
Of the Apostles' in the book
(in reality the South Baptist
Church, at 82 Nassau Street).
-
So, I'm probably going on too
much about nothing, but, back in
old NYC, as I first landed there
and started my stretch, all these
far-more-young things then
mattered so much; like my
own 'hazing' period as a new
arrival. Over the last 6 years
or so, any trace of that stuff
is all gone. I left NYC in an
embittered funk over the
manner it which it has (had)
been destroyed, run over,
enfeebled by capital and greed,
plaza'd and stupid-built to death
and, now, populated by weasels.
Along the way in this life, you
lose some things, and pick up
others. Why in the world do
people worship money, and
seek and stab to scratch it
out? That's all I'm left with.
-
I'm as strange and as wrecked
by things as Melville ever was;
I'd bet. Like 'My Satchel Paige
to your Bartleby the Scrivener.'
That's the faint equivalency of
today, and it's little offered.
When I first found myself in
my post-NYCity life, in
Columbia Crossroads, PA,
one of the first things I took
up with was reading Thorstein
Veblen. Amazing and cantankerous,
useless and insipid too; many
fine books to his name; he'd
pegged perfectly the insane
vacuity that was America then.
The WWI era was a perfect
calling. The Norwegian element
of his harshness was perfect.
I got to Ithaca, and, entering
the gated realms of Cornell
was like re-living some small
part of his crazy biography.
He'd been there. Actually,
he'd been everywhere,
though I had not. I jotted
something down, and I
guess I left just leaving
a message.
-
When I finally got some
dog-assed job there, at
'Columbia Crossroads,' it
was taking care of, heating,
by two huge coal furnaces,
24-damned hours a Winter's
days and nights, the 20 area
classroom local schoolhouse.
(It's now gone, and the building
itself is the indoor parts-storage
facility for the auto salvage yard
which now rings it all - which
seems about right to me as a
reflection of the American
school system, so no difference
there). Anyway, wrapped high
and heavy, back then, in my
mantle of Thorstein Veblen,
the most amazing thing
happened. Right across the
way, one dirt path over, in
a large, old farmhouse, lived
a Norwegian family; and their
last name was Thorstein! They
had this amazing 14-year old
daughter, named Sharon. She
was the coolest thing in the world
there; rambled-up, countryfied,
friendly, happy, smart, talkative,
and wise too. We became talk
friends, and she often hung
around that stupid pre-junkyard
school just for something to do.
Nothing to do with Thorstein
Veblen, of course, but all those
crazy coincidences just wiped
me, somehow, out. Norwegian.
Thorstein - as first or last name
I didn't care. Talky. Sassy. Cool.
That's a pretty dumb story, gut
there it is. Don't know whatever
happened to Sharon; and I wonder
if she knows about Thorstein?
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