RUDIMENTS 904.

RUDIMENTS, pt. 904

(Coryland)

As I think back now, I

wonder whatever happened

to tonsils. In my day, every

kid had their tonsils out, and

anyone still with their tonsils,

by 5th grade was a real solid

exception. Up and down my

block, everyone I knew was

tonsil-less. Like the 'appendix'

(what sort of word was that,

used in a literary sense? To

show some sort of added on

extra?), no one knew what

any of this was for. The

few renderings I ever got

of tonsils were quite vague

and without meaning. In

the same way, kind of like

ulcers - which every proud

and striving businessperson

had or sought to have - I

guess no one gets them

anymore either. Beats me,

but I do wonder about the

general consensus of things.

It seems like nothing is ever

straightforward and is more

than half crap. Back when I

was studying Geology, at

Elmira College, we had this

crazed professor who went on,

each class, over and over, with

great alarm, about how by 1990

we'd be out of oil and sunk in

deep doo-doo: no fuel for cars,

way-expensive prices, long

gas-lines everywhere. He

bolstered it all by citing the

programs then in effect -

there was a time when certain

cars, depending on odd or even

license plates, alternate days,

or Tues. vs. Weds., could not

purchase gas, and had to wait

for the correctly assigned days;

there were sales limits too. All

that crazy stuff. AIDS was going

to kill everyone who has sex (?)

eventually, we were doomed,

ad infinitum. It all got pretty

sickening to me. No mention,

for some reason, was ever made

about too many people, excess

population, killing off the bottom,

depletion and ruination of water

supplies and reservoirs and their

availability through over-development,

cutting of timber and forest, etc.

No one ever talked about the

threat of an asteroid smashing us

(today's big topic), methane gas,

global warming (today's big topic

also). It was all let to pass, until

those newer items took center

stage. That was mid 70's. Now,

50 years later or whatever, people

still drink fuel like water, fly all

over the globe of their own

self-serving interests, but yet they

wail and scream about today's hot

topics - without knowing any of

the ins and outs and realities.They

all do the same stuff today, but

the topics have changed and they

instill instead a faulty idea now of

'Nature' for kids, by monumentalizing

it and teaching it as a museum piece,

since they go on ruining the rest.

Anyone, in any case, with any

true spiritual sensibility and

foundation - not just mouthing

it - would realize that life is,

in itself, more important than

we are, and it sustains and

recovers and repairs itself, over

a sense of time that surpasses

our feeble lifespans. The sound

and fury WE make can only ever

be destructive. Humankind, at

these levels, has nothing GOOD

it can do. It is incapable of that.

-

We now have epidemics of death,

in different ways - terror, bombing,

self-sacrifice in the silly claim of

'martyrdom' for selfish purposes

(express elevator to Paradise?),

drugs and sedatives, angst, what

we are now told is bullying, names

and syndromes with initials, which

need treating and corralling as ills

in order to keep society functioning.

I won't even mention vaccinations.

Who wants to keep society functioning?

Therein is the key question : look

at it carefully. The ones who want to

keep it all functioning are the real

terrorists! the control authorizers who

wish to lord it all over others, while

they defame and belittle. While they

abuse and defend Evil. There was a

certain stupor across the land once,

which at least kept things dull and

tempered. That's gone now - all

replaced by a manufactured frenzy

of assault and battering with foul

ideas, sex and gimmickry, isolation

and compartmentalization. A form

of worship at the desk of the Devil.

Stupefaction in Coryland, let's call

it. Wailing for prayer and wailing

for Dad, all mixed together so that

the real destruction is never seen.

-

I knew a boot-black on 23rd street.

I called him that because I liked the

old word. He's probably dead now

over 30 years, and I'd bet he was

buried in his leather apron too. He

wasn't really a boot-black - which

is near a term for a shoeshine guy,

which you can still find around. This

guy was actually a shoe-maker, with

the Black Cat thing in the front window,

a row of turned-in and left boots and

shoes for cheap sale, in nice shape.

Rows of shoelaces on a rack, a vice

of the sort shoemakers' workbenches

have, the belt sander, the long hammers

for hobnails and heels, the stool and

the bench. It was all of a part of

another world entire, and one that

talked to you, if you let it, and stayed

quiet, and stopped your infernal yap.

The guy didn't say much, but he talked

when asked, and when started. Like

priming a pump, you had to get him

rolling slowly, a bit at a time, until

it caught. In the warmer months,

at the corner by the library at

Fifth Ave., and 42nd, there are

still three or four 'bootblack' stands,

manned by very diligent black guys

always people at their work, with a

few standard-issue business types

with important shoes getting them

done. I often pass, and watch. And

inside Grand Central Station too,

at the Lexington Avenue entryway

corridor, all-weather, indoors, right

near the Joe Coffee stand (used to

be anyway - they've got another

name now, but I can't remember it),

there also a shoe-shine stand, almost

perfectly traditional and regal, with

the same sort of dignity always going

on. What's weird about these,and what

gives them power and weight, is that

the 'throwback' idea is, in actuality, a

terrible thing - using the standards of

subservience and 'bondage' in doing

the bidding of others for pennies;

but it's past all that because these men

give it all a dignity that surpasses

any of these feeble connotations.

It gives a weight, and a quality,

to things that one can never find

in cheap living. The baits and habits

of a Coryland of the Mind are long

put away once a person reaches a

true realization of things, as they

are. Tonsils or not, I'd really be

ashamed of myself to be seen in

that land's company. Back when I

lived in Columbia Crossroads, in

Pennsylvania, there actually was

(is?) a town/place named

Coryland right nearby. A breeder

there sells English Sheepdogs.

Nice place to visit, but I'd

sure hate to hate to stay.