RUDIMENTS, pt. 1,204
(never rebound, pt. one)
I've got nothing to live up to
anymore, and I try to reside
in some form of G-d. It's pretty
simple : you respect what you
can and let the rest go. But it's
lonely out here too. I was talking
to a friend today; we were going
on again about his pet turtles.
I didn't even know the guy
until about a month ago, and
now when we see each other
it's best-friend banter and how
the hell are you. He used to have
long hair, like me, and resemble
more a bum (like me), but he did
get a hair-cut and a beard trim of'
sorts. That's how this started, with
someone from the market next to
where I sit while my wife is in
the market, coming out, and then
thinking I was him (since he most
often sits here too). When he realized
the mistake, we laughed it off and
then 'Randy' showed up anyway,
apologizing to me for having just
had his hair cut-off and trimmed.
I said, 'What do I care, it's all OK.
Sometimes lately I think about
doing that myself.' We've all been
friends since that day - Randy,
the supermarket guy, and the
liquor store babe there too, and
whoever else comes out. This
ain't no Princeton crowd, mind
you, but the talk is cool, some
expletives do fly, and I kind of
enjoy my peek behind the
curtain, so to speak.
-
The one thing that's missing, and
thank goodness for that, is that
stupid self-consciousness of the
super-aware : swinging wide and
out of the way of everything so as
NOT to offend. By contrast, these
people swing for the fences, each
time - saying what's on their mind,
and not much caring where that
homer lands. It's all a real-bit
refreshing, like being young
again. The pluck and stamina
that's been drained out of this
country by the usual social-weasels
we get running around now is more
than made up for by statements of
the obvious. Which never offend
me. 'Swamp-ass' or not.
-
Back when I was in New York
City, much of the attitude that
went into the national reputation
of the 'New York' type had to do
with exactly that. Stevedores and
longshoreman and butchers and
bakers and any tramp on the street
with the 'youse' and 'dose' stuff,
the direct and go-fuck yourself
stances of the tough and gritty,
and now it's been replaced by a
solid coterie of stand-out country
types who will pretty much tell
you the same stuff, 60 years later
and too bad if you don't like it;
while NYC has been re-stuffed
by legions of top-drawer fakers
with snooty attitudes and sublime
aspirations of 'self,' who would
never tell you the truth, or say
anything not 'approved' first, or
authentic to them. The last twenty
times I was in Manhattan I couldn't
stand the freaking place because of
all that and what I saw. Like a
death-dance of a thousand cuts,
one sliver after the other was
taking the heat and light and
fervor out of the entire city to
the point where not even an
F. Scott Fitzgerald ancient
moment could redeem it. All
that was once glorious and
revered and old about the place
and its legacies were gone like
Sylvia's hymen the night after
the wedding blast. (As if that
was ever true anyway). I can
remember, back in the 1980's,
being in NYC with a visiting
friend from California. After
a half-day's walking around,
he turned to me and said,
'What's with this place,
everyone looks ill.' I thought
it was a funny comment, even
though at first it threw me,
but what he'd meant to say,
coming as he did from a
climate of light and mirth and
what he called 'Sun-happy
people,' was how affected
everyone seemed by their
hostile environment. The
1980's was, what, 45 years
ago, let's say. Now that
same sickness, as I saw it,
has all been internalized in
the usual NYC mind, and
the rest of the place given
over to the bleacher crowd.
The whole city's a K-Mart
Blue Light Special.
-
The ensemble of noise and
attitude I get now - mostly at
these once-a-week market meets -
is as real and authentic as any of
that old 1960's Manhattan talk
was, most nearly except for the
references maybe. But that had
to do more with the crowd I
would mingle with more than
a general ethos - which was,
yes, scatological, rude and direct.
To go from, say, Wittgenstein,
Hegel, Heidegger, and Kant,
art, and David Smith (sculptor),
to cows and farming, guns and
alcohol, in 50 years is a pretty
remarkable downward trajectory,
I'd admit, but at least the air is
clear. And I can actually prove
an overlap, for better or worse.
-
At this late stage of living, I don't
really much care where people
stand on niceties. They can all
go jam it. What's more important
to me are the evidences of a
certain forms of authentic and
real selection about the stuff of
living. Even the best, most elite
mass-mob of NYC effete have
by now thrown in the towel and
instead affect the attitudes and
the choices of the 'approved' ways
only. Along the chattering streets,
the slobs mass, and - amazingly -
inside the expensive townhouses,
the flip-side mob does the same.
Everyone's got their sold-out self
with which to embody today's
stupid concepts of what's right
and what's wrong. Half the stuff
one used to say is now considered
so blasphemous by the proper
'soup and sup' crowd (while they
then tramp on the streets over
the bodies of the delirious) that
thought-police are rampant.
-
So....where was I....the people
here, a real salt of the earth type
crowd of toughs (people always
used to say that about my father,
all that 'salt of the earth type'
stuff, that I grew inured to the
meaning. It's basically one of
those things called a 'backhanded
compliment' - which in my book
isn't truly saying anything good.
In the biblical New Testament
sense of St. Peter, being chosen
by Jesus as a leader, but also
being the dullest and most
doltish of those twelve men
selected as sidekicks. Go
figure). Whatever it is, that's
where I am now. The babe I
mentioned, (Swamp-ass) had
an LBI (Long Beach Island)
cap on yesterday, a new one
too - which surprised me. I'd
have to guess she July-vacationed
there or something. It's a Jersey
resort beach town place, and
seems an odd destination, but
she also let drop, 'When I lived
in Connecticut,' which also
surprised me. I never went to
Long Beach Island, my entire
life, and have always hated
that beach-crowd crap, and
their ridiculous, white-oval,
LBI car-parking stickers.
You'd see a lot of them
cruising around. They can
have it; Hey! look at me, now
giving away a place I've never
even been to. So, I guess
this liquor-store girl's been
there, and dug it. Usually,
I can tell a fake a mile away.
This girl 'ain't no fake.'
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(Part Two to follow)
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