RUDIMENTS, pt. 1,206
(win some/lose some)
I have often thought that
America was made up of
nothing more than millions
of scurrying, know-nothing,
idiots, raging around between
antipodes of un-reason and
ill logic. And I still do. Note
that I wrote 'ill logic' and not
'illogic,' for they are vastly
different things.
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One harsh item for me to
defend, about my self, is the
penchant to review all things
in light of a more-distant past
that I then propound somehow
as having been wiser and more
sensible - a false dichotomy,
a dead proposal, yes. Yet, I
clearly state that it is NOT a
simple nostalgia for the past.
In and of itself, such a nostalgia
is a false and paltry thing. It's
been endlessly trued, for sure;
think 'Countrytime Lemonade,'
and the slogan 'Pepperidge Farm
Remembers...'. Those both are
examples of the egregious rants
manufactured by stupid-suited
ad-men wallowing in their own
drivel, then trekking home to
their approved-station homes and
atmospheres, by which they have
already soiled the fabric of the
America they create. Politics too
is in that same realm. Politics
now is simply 'creating' an
atmosphere for tinkers and for
maniacs. No longer philosophical
governance.
-
In this vein, and probably also
within the realm of my own,
rather stupid, self-consciousness,
I found this once, (by Maxwell
Geismar, in writing about
Mark Twain/Samuel Clemens):
"He was obviously more sensitive
to, and more affected by, the
baseness of humanity than
humanity was. A good man is
hurt more by badness; a loving
man is more vulnerable to hatred;
an innocent man (like almost all
artists in a special sense of
'innocence') is more betrayed
by evil." I've always held that
Evil is more prevalent in this fallen
world than Goodness or Grace has
ever been, and its present state,
to my mind, only bears this out.
This is, truly, a Devil's kingdom.
-
I sometimes sat at the counter
in the Villager Restaurant and
just mused. The counter-waitress
there, 'Tre,' was a friend, some of
the people coming and going had,
over time, become nodding
acquaintances. The little resataurant
had paintingsa for sale on the walls,
the kind of Greenwich Village art
that once went with the territory -
street art-fairs, the well-organized
twice-yearly Greenwich Village
Outdoor Art sale - a sort of San
Gennaro Festival for the brush and
color crowd (also called 'Bridge and
Tunnel?') - outsiders coming in to
sip and dine and get their supposed
fill of some bohemian ethos which,
if you read the magazine and papers,
just oozed along the streets of the
famed 'Bohemian' capitol. It was
nothing of the sort, of course -
made up more of cranky dowagers
who painted flowers and horse-faces,
or quirky and gay old gents in their
splattered berets and equally-splattered
attentions to reality. Spring and Fall,
they all crept out of their lairs, maybe
too with a high-ball or a gin-fizz to
act as companions in their ersatz art
loneliness. It was this crowd from
which varied magazines would pick
a few sights and photos and then
vamp on with some dumb article
about the 'pleasures' of the Village.
-
What always struck me most funny
about all this was how, in light of the
same fantasy that the magazines and
media peddled - pools, cars, garages,
fancy clothes, modern conveniences,
medicines and wonder-drugs and
diets - their at-the-same-time page
by page glorification of the sights
and sounds of this supposed Bohemian
encampment of 'street-artists' and
Village non-conformists overlooked
the very-obvious (post McCarthy era
too - Joe, that is, not Charley) fact
that what they were actually glorifying
was the complete opposite, in theory :
The dregs of existential rotundity, the
alcohol and nicotine-stained over-jackets
and smocks of rebels; folks bent on
ignoring and belittling every other
aspect of 'right' America, which they
detested. Cars. Suburbia. Manners.
Correct opinions. Tame sex. It was
all pretty hilarious and yet only
underscored the shit-stained stupidity
of the country that church, school,
and society taught. Such an obvious
lie.
-
Sitting at the Villager Restaurant, I'd
often see the same local-area, w.12th
street, people. The natty, chubby old
gay guys, sauntering in with their
little dogs; the overly made-up and
ancient old females, slowly entering,
with a cane of a head-wrap, bracelets
and jewelry. They'd each sit singly,
not much mingling, while they dined,
almost privately. Quite often enough,
some of these same people were the
antiquated street-artist/hobbyists who
displayed their wares on those art-says:
Their strangely cliched views of Paris
or New York, their oddly soft and yet
twisted dog and cat portraits, the
faces of the young, the scenes of
parks and buildings. Also, back in
those days, the prevalent assumptions
of what was 'Art' also included many
cubist-style or 'abstract' style body
portraits and scenes. It all made for
curious confusion and dilettante
gawking by all those creeps from
Parsippany and Troy-Hills, in town
and slumming for the day.
-
So, I figured these, being the same
people, living local to the heart
of the Village, Sheridan Square,
etc., represented some very peculiar
yet vibrant underside of American
society to which, yes, I was
attracted. It had to be better than
the normal crap offered. Throw
in a soupcon of philosophy,
books, artistic endeavor, and
sneer for the rest of the country
hanging on the other side of the
Hudson (hello NJ!), and a person
might really have something.
Voila! Here is am, some 58 years
later maybe, in the rabid hills of
NE Pennsylvania meeting the
complete opposite sort of person.
Randy, let's say, from two or
three chapters back. The guy
lives in a rental, Honesdale, no
car, walks everywhere, sneers at
the world, won't bicycle because
of his hip-replacement, gets his
checks monthly, survives, watches,
comments, enjoys his days. About
owning a vehicle, his comments
are to the effect, 'No way! I can
walk. Gas prices are insane, you
gotta' get insurance, maintenance,
keep it somewhere, and, up here,
with all the hills and up and down,
you end up needing new brakes
once a year!'
-
Outside of the hills and brakes
comments, sounds like any
New Yorker shouting down
the everyday world!
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