13,339. RUDIMENTS, pt. 1,121

 RUDIMENTS, pt. 1,121

(an old man's telethon)

I never knew the value of money.

I suppose. When I was still living

at home, after returning from the

seminary that final year, my mother 

used to go nuts about opening my

sock drawer or whatever, and finding

money  -  not a lot, mind you, but a

few twenties and some tens, balled

up with a paper clip; a coffee

container filled with change, etc. I

can't remember where it all came

from  -  I guess my dumb little jobs  - 

but I never knew how to answer either.

First, for the fact that she was goin

through my drawers, socks and shirts

and all that. I didn't care, but never

before had I to be conscious of that

either. Coming back home had made

me feel like an interloper anyway,

what with sisters and a brother

growing up around me. With all

their friends and activities I was

unfamiliar  -  things I'd never had

or faced before, Twister? Some

weird, contorting body game

played on the floor, I think? Odd

TV things I'd never seen, having

missed all those 'My Mother the

Car,'  Mr. Ed, Big Valley,' 'Green 

Acres' and even 'The Monkees,' 

I suppose a bit later. I was still 

stuck in my pre-seminary delirium; 

home TV; with early grainy, 

b/w Twilight Zones and Outer 

Limits as my outer limit. Here 

here was Batman on TV, with 

graphic POW! and WHAM! 

images, right on the screen.

I felt as if people had grown 

retarded. (I don't think one can 

do that; it's like growing backward).

-

One guy, down the street, had a

grandmother living upstairs in their

house, and all she did was make

monkey sock-dolls. Like over and

over. Not that they weren't cool,

but for like 7 bucks I couldn't

figure the purpose. Except that

all up and down Inman Avenue

ladies kept popping out new kids,

and I guess by like age 2 a sock

doll became a cool gift? They were

always the same, made of some 

brown and white gym-socks or

something, with a monkey face

that played off the red-colored

heel area of the sock. I think; or

as I recall. They were stuffed with,

I think, rags? Long, odd, legs with

stump feet that no one ever seemed

to complain about  -  stump hands

too, for that matter. I guess little

kids didn't mind all that. (That

reminds me, recently too, of a

cousin of mine saying that her

new grandkid, daughter, has

never seen here Grandmother,

some 8 months now, without a

facemask. She wonders what the

kid must think, or what the little

girl imagines this world is. I

guess don't mind that either? Like

stumpy feet and hands.

-

So, as I had started, this whole

thing about money never carried me

anywhere. Now, I've known people,

and still do, to whom 'money' is the

end-all and be-all of their existence.

Getting it, bragging it on, I suppose,

using it to accumulate all those

dumb-ass ephemerals that money

brings, or can bring  -  any of those

objects and items that are, in a flash,

as passe as day-of -the-week panties

or Chia Pets. All one is left with is

a pile of crap. Crumbling it up and

leaving it in my sock drawer was

about the best thing I could think of;

that, and buying gasoline, which in

effect turned instantly into mobility,

which, in effect, gave me adventures,

travel and place, which, in effect,

later became some of these very 

things YOU are, or have been.,

reading about. Go figure!

-

Yeah, well, that was it. It was like 

1966, late already, and I was 

headstrong. This place called

'Avenel' was already headlocking

me. I had to break loose, but that

seemed to be all I was ever doing.

Vietnam? Bad joke, mama-san. I

was on no way, shape, or form, 

to be part of that. Some guy on

Avenel Street was throwing away 

a car  -  it was out front with a

sign on the windshield for the

junkyard guy who due to come

and take it away. 90 or 92 Avenel

Street; I forget. Right across from

that old Post Office building. I went

up, knocked on his door, and simply

said, 'If you're getting rid of that 

car, I'll take it.' Just like that. He

said sure; give me ten bucks. I

did, and I got a title for a car in

trouble; but I got it home, really

just two blocks or so, and pulled

it into my parent's backyard, where

it sat for months, until I fixed it.

It was simple enough, when I

actually did it, after having to

putup with my mother's wailing

about grease stains in the driveway,

(oil leaks, actually), and some

moonshine-derelict car in the

yard like we were in West 

Virginia somewhere. Funny, the

things that bother the middle-class

suburbanites who can worry more

about lawns and driveways than

brains and information.

-

I used to just sit in that car and think;

not about anything too specific, just

stuff about the world as I wanted to

see it. I was sure determined. Not

enough money in my sock drawer 

to buy my dreams, back then. Now?

It's all an old-man's telethon.

-

I was a dreamer, yeah, but my dreams

were of writing. Here's one. I'll throw 

it in here, as a relief. I called it The

Square Root of Olof Palme (He was

a Prime Minister of Sweden who got

shot to death, in the back, while 

walking home from the cinema,

unprotected, along the street with 

his wife, who was also wounded. 

It's one of those great, unsolved, 

crimes; with one overturned 

conviction and another suspect

dead later. Mid-1980's maybe. I

was always intriqued by it, I 

wrote this crazy piece (edited 

here for foul-language, which 

I don't normally do; but you

know facebook and its 

adherents...): 'It was never

about anything really, and if 

I had to tell you wouldn't get

it : (piece-post, pell-mell,

snackinfoo! And the reddle

from Quark O'Mania province

too!). Whenever I'm in a room

filled with people, I'm an instantly

dangerous man, looking around

for the one with the gold, and

seeking to find the girl from

Mysteria Weems, Ohio, the 

old rubber town. The old-timer

near me says, 'We make nothing

anymore. This darned country's 

so far down the tubes they can't

even flush it away. When I was

a boy...'And someone else cuts

him off. 'Shut up you old bag

of crap! I'm sick of hearing you!'

and the guy walks off with the

handle of the counterpunch

cabinet that held the weekly

 list. So, we had nothing more

to do and were able to just sit

there  -  of course some fool

soon brought out a deck of cards.

Oh how I dislike people who

play cards! Although, truthfully.,

I didn't always mind them, but

no matter now. These were the

sorts of people who, the instant

they park their cars, they right

away start talking about their

daughters. 'I'd never let her go

out with a bum like him. God

knows what goes through his 

head! Then the door opened

in come Sant'Erge, the minister's

kid, and he quickly says, 'Over

here! My father's dying of the flu!'

And I ask, 'Well can't he pray for

something new? If not him, who?'

What I meant was being a minister

and all didn't he have a better in

than that? But it came out wrong,

though no one noticed. The son,

meanwhile, is all agitated and

begins yelling  -  his mother

being dead already  -  that he'd

be an orphan and didn't know 

what to do. So, I pushed him 

and said 'Man, shut up! You're 

only talking about the flu!' and 

he said yeah but he'd read

somewhere that in like 1918

or so it had killed lots of people,

and real quickly too. So I said,

'Yeah, but that was a long time

ago! Now the lines are shorter

and news travels quicker.' Again,

it didn't come out quite right. 

-

Anyway, when I actually did

check I found out that the flu

among all those 1918 people

was in reality (medial science 

now says) an endemic reaction

in a sort of stress-related mass

hallucination to the myopic,

crazed, psychic fear and the

displacement caused by the

new rigors caused from WWI

amongst a global and American

populace un-used to anything

of that nature before, and although

that may sound weird, it really

is true and documented, and a

reputable point of medical

view (see Harvard Medical;

see the CDC in Atlanta). See

whomever you'd like to see,

but don't see me.

-

Then the fire-bell tolled and

the wharf was wiped clean

with some sort of Windex-like

slime rolled over it by wheels

and a couple of hundred fish

swam up and began licking

the wood with their crazy fish

tongues, and then they rolled

over and got washed out to the

harbor again with the next

splash-wave of wake and wind

together (something I'd not

ever seen before), and the

beautiful girl on the seat

nearby was playing Hoagy

Carmichael on an old

Victrola and it all sounded

so nice I wondered how but 

I didn't say a word instead :

watching cartoon characters

take naps and watching take

naps and watching Lindy Boggs

(I think it was) eating cereal

on the rim of the edge by the

two window panes at the

shaftway  -  she ate like a 

pig but kept it all clean. And

then I remembered that dead

Mayor of Princeton  -  the

woman with one eye  -  and

I thought maybe that was

her name too, but I really

couldn't remember and 

promised myself to go 

look it up next chance I

got. (And I did, and she

was there, right in the 

Princeton Cemetery, like 

their grave-guide booklet

said). Then I saw the mutant

go by. He was lazy, good-

looking, and aristocratic,'

as my mother used to say;

but there was nothing but

marbles in that cheesecake,

and I knew it too. He was

brutish, and in reality as

as short as they come, and

with an even shorter attention

span (and my sister used to

say 'something shorter than

that too'). So let's just say,

about the mutant, 'Genius

he wasn't!' and leave it at 

that.

-

Heroes in my life come 

and go  -  Glenn Gould or

Dicky Betts it hardly matters,

and I could talk to anyone if

they'd just hold still. Long

enough for a riddle, long

enough to fish, long enough

to whittle, long enough to piss.

Whether or not it makes any

sense never matters, nor is

it ever brought up  -  and this

is the age of wonders but I

wonder if anything will last

and that does it for me. The

evergreen trees are drying up,

dead. Climates which change 

take old trees away and the

world heaves and moves in

mysterious ways  -  but I never

mind that anyway and the

truck farms grow and dwindle,

along the sides of roads farmers

sell food, not farming, and grow

no trucks; so don't go looking,

just ask anyone who knows.

Some kinds of people just

love to show off, but as for

me, I've taken a vow of shady

silence and having a nodding

acquaintance with it all. So,

I won't even point it out: In

Germany they train bears and

in ancient Greece an idiot meant

someone who did not take part

in pubic life. Now, of course,

it means just the opposite, and

how's that for banana-cake?

-

A real hoot, no?

.