RUDIMENTS 848.

RUDIMENTS, pt. 848

(way more surprising than ever)

I always feel like my

country is gone; that

land we used to have in

grade school. There used

to be a Thanksgiving

picture each year, I can

recall, posted for decoration

and all, of some Pilgrims

in their pilgrim dress, and

a few tame Indians, walking

along through the snow,

with a couple of dead turkeys

and things hanging down as

the people in the photo were

supposedly trekking to their

first Thanksgiving. That stark

narrative is seldom heard any

more, and everything else has

overtaken it. America of that

ilk is like an old burnt match;

a stick left, maybe, but the

top is all spent and burned.

No one talks much of that,

it all having been supplanted

by football and beer and calories

and desserts - every well fed

American now knows more

about their local supermarket

then about about anything

historical or old. 'Finland?

Isn't that the fish department

at Shop-Rite?'

-

I don't know why we should

keep faith any longer with any

of that. Democracy is dead, or,

rather, say 'representative

government,' is dead. Any of

the old reasons and reckonings

by which the American ship

of state once floated have been

gutted - only idiots rule and

only idiots follow the rules too.

If I had said that, or any part

of is, back in like 1957, to any

Americano-deco suburbanite

McCarthy bloomer, I'd have

been taken away. Back then,

in spite of the rigid fealty paid

to those old tales, everyone still

hewed the line, did their lawns

and driveways properly, had

their obligatory swooshy-new

car or cars, worked their job,

stayed quiet, and made no

waves. They all bought that

story-line like they bought

the Bible storyline and their

local religions. Troublemakers

had names, and were taken

care off. Speaking out came

with a risk. You just DID your

Thanksgivings and you did your

holidays; the right way, and the

one way. There were no doubts

entertained. Commies. Reds.

Beatniks, Weirdos. That's what

the 'others' were. Now? You can

say and do whatever you want,

and there are no further

developments : effectiveness

is gone, it's all froth, and

now one gives a damn anyway.

It's ruination and thievery

on parade. One can walk down

the street with your ass-crack

showing, and grab at your tool

while you're talking. It's cool

-

It was all so bogus, then, too,

but in a different way; it could

make you palpitate. The 1950's

bore no relationship either, to

what had been before. Back in

the 1840's and through the

Civil War years, the country,

or this part of it anyway, NYC,

was so caught up in the total

atmospherics of the slavery

crises, the fugitive slave stuff,

the new territories, all that

John Brown and Kansas-

Nebraska stuff, Harpers Ferry,

etc. there were guns everywhere,

canings, beatings, hangings and

mob death. People got shot for

trying to collect slaves that had

runaway, and sell them back

south, for good money, and

people also got shot for NOT

doing that. It was a real quandary,

with both sides represented too,

in family and business feuds

and such, right in the middle

of Manhattan - raids, torchings,

people burned out, disappeared,

killed, sent away on ships, taken

in chains off the streets, even if

they were legal - black, and

legal, that is, if that phrase

worked back then. For such

a 'Land of the Free,' America's

always had a real problem with

freedom - doctors taken out

for doing abortions, slaves

taken out for slavery, by a

hundred different means. We

were simply born too late for

any of this and anyone reading

this now has only the most

scant idea of the political and

social climate by which people

once framed their issues and

lived their lives. I don't even

know if there was much

choice involved. There were

a few places I knew of, those

that had played roles in many

of these situations. The Children's

Orphange Asylum, which had

been burned out because it held

Negro kids, during the Draft

Riots of the Civil War days. The

corner at something like 18th

and 19th streets at Eighth Ave.,

where there had been a huge

shoot-out, battle and carnage

of local people rioting and

destroying whatever they could

find, breaking into rich people's

homes, lighting fires, etc., until

finally militia was called out and

just began slaughtering people.

There were a few locations with

famous hanging trees, where

Negroes, slaves, or those then

sympathetic to that cause, were

hung, after being pierced and

stomped as well. You couldn't

much take a stand about anything

back without someone having at

you one way of the other. It was

very dangerous time in which to

live. The sanctions of Freedom

and all those guaranteed causes

were of a very tendentious nature.

Yet, at least, people had guns and

long rifles, and could shoot back,

and kill and maim in turn. It was

a bad time, with insurrection in the

streets and turmoil in the homes.

Those sickening holidays, as we

know them now, didn't even

exist. Thanksgiving? Christmas?

What are you talking about?

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I can't stress too much how

different, and how tenuous, all

that was, and how lucky we

were to have it, somehow, all

survive, even though in the end

it all turned out to be garbage

anyway. I think it's all coming

back to that, and real soon. I

don't think the American fabric,

right now a tattered and a

threadbare cloth anyway, will

withstand the tugging it's about

to get. We are falling apart, and

the closeness of insurrection is

surprising. Way more surprising

than you'd ever imagine.