RUDIMENTS

RUDIMENTS, pt. 29 (Making Cars) One of those ancient guys, I forget who, wrote, 'Live your life as if you were already dead.' I always lived mine, in that light, full-tilt boogie anyway, or as much as I could do  that with very little money. I really forget who it was  -  Marcus Aurelius, in his 'Meditations', or maybe in a book by Boethius entitled 'the Consolations of Philosophy.' I used to read that stuff, but, frankly, back then it made very little import or sense to me, more just like drudgery. Round-about 2007, when I began taking the train each day to  Princeton, I began re-reading a lot of that material from years before. It made better sense, but the problem was the way some train-madman or another was always intent on interrupting me. Passengers, or even conductors. Especially the little, extra Princeton-shuttle train I had to take to get over to campus  -  that had a conductor who really liked to yap. I

RUDIMENTS, pt. 28 (Making cars) Nowadays, oh though I try, I just feel that everything has gone to decadence, to a real sorrowful waste of time. The only way I seem to have of recouping my own sense and sensibility  -  other than my quite very small circle of on-hand friends, which is perfectly OK by me  -  is with my tending to get lost, and I mean way-lost -  in my own writings, harangues, and, in general, work. Which I do, steadily and in quiet. It's fifty years right now since I lit out from home, for that final time. New York City bound. That almost sounds like a historical era, a span of time to be marked. With something. But I don't know what, except perhaps a  gravestone. That'll come soon enough,  so no matter on that account. What I regret the most is the loss of that old world I lived in. It was so soon gone, and certainly fifty years ago I had no inkling how swiftly the world I was then inhabiting would be  transf

RUDIMENTS, pt. 27 (Making Cars) Another thing about Vermont  -   back then it was almost another country. A real enclave, where a person really could just dissemble and go back to the Earth. Deep, lush woods, pine forests, running and gurgling waters. Shacks and cabins. One time, nearly in the middle of the night, (this time was Summer), in the way-out middle of nowhere, I got stopped for a seemingly ten-mile long freight train just rumbling along. I shut the car off, and simply got out, to wait. This trainman guy, with a lantern and the whole bit, comes slowly walking over to me. I was going to be real friendly and all, just talk and go with the flow, and instead of talking right off, he puts his hand or fingers to his neck, or something there, and out comes this weird, metallic, robotic voice! I freaked! I'd never heard that before and was completely taken aback  -  deep, dark night, train rumbling by, this weird guy with a lantern, hi

RUDIMENTS, pt. 26 Making Cars On most every corner along the lower east side, back then, that Summer of '67, there was some sort of bus or truck or caravan-looking vehicle. The plates were usually, if not New York (only sometimes), than California, or Oregon, Idaho, New Mexico. A lot of weird places for old downtown NYC. Vermont was also often represented; that was sort of a national east-coast 'Free State' that carried a lot of respect. If you were running with Vermont plates, locally, it meant something. I remember my first trip to Vermont. I was awed; I mean knocked over as soon as, the instant as, we crossed the border. I can still vividly remember the transformation. Somewhere from the Northway into the area of Bennington, there was an entry point  along some pine woods, and hillsides. I swore, and still do, that at that simple border crossing everything changed instantly. The sky went to an immaculate, deep, clean blu

RUDIMENTS, pt. 25 Making Cars Running cars, and motorcycles too, with well-pressed, highly-tuned engines, there's a lot in balance. Especially in earlier models where the variables run higher. Cars of the pre-computer era had a different tuning factor, the mixture points and accesses were different -  carburetor, jets, etc. But, no matter, that's not my point. Rather, I wanted  to point out how I found a similarity to that with the world of ideas. - Running a hot car is all about efficient cooling. The same thing goes with a motorcycle  -  those of my experience have always been air-cooled. The temperature and cooling factor, the idea of heat build-up and fighting that, was important. You wanted air-flow, air hitting the engine, and in a water-cooled situation (where a coolant 'jacket', as it were, of liquid flows around the engine), you needed a sort-of fan-controlled air flow directed at the radiator, etc. All well and go