RUDIMENTS 849.

RUDIMENTS, pt. 849

(the carryover rings of Mars)

It wasn't curiosity that killed

the cat, but a simple lack of

follow-up that did it in...When

I used to visit my friend Jeff,

at w87th street, I most often

also stopped in this little place

called The Mysterious Book

Shop. It was just a hole in

the wall really, but famed

and prestigious too - all the

sorts of things I'd never have

thought about for mystery

books. I never even liked,

and seldom read, mysteries.

They were too foolish for me,

carrying no real content except

for the miserly 'squirm-factor'

which those sorts of readers

sought. We used to joke that

every other person who went in

there was probably a murderer

slinking about, or a person who

knew how to evade capture; a

real 'mystery' person. I think

the place is still around, at

some other location. They

made a few moves over the

years. As I recall, the logo

for this one was a very simple,

black, silhouette of a pistol.

Our conversations would always

drift into the concept subject

of mystery books, who read

them, where and why. The usual

stuff. I myself got them all

mixed up - always - Agatha

Christie, Miss Marple, Dorothy

Sayer, Lord Peter Wimsey, Dashiel

Hammett, Inspector Clouseau,

it was all the same for me, and

mostly a non-entity. I had no

clue what I was even talking

about, but that had never

stopped me before, and as

it went with that category,

'Mystery,' who even knew

what it was? The whole thing

was so 1940's.

-

As I recall the story, Jeff's father

had made a bunch of money after

he introduced a concept of store

called 'Paperback Exchange' -

something whereby people joined,

turned in their book when they'd

completed the read (cheap and

pulpy stuff, a la mysteries then),

and got another book for it. It went

on and on - I don't know how any

money was made, except by joining

fees (?) because the rental for

space had to be enormous, and

there's really only a small and

finite number of people who would

even deign to care about this. But,

he did it and it apparently worked.

I was told. Jeff had that sort of head

too, a wise-man way of figuring out

how to turn a quarter. I never had

that at all. The thing about books

for me, and it was always a problem

and still is (no, I don't do e-books,

because I annotate and scribble in

margins, and don't have the e-quipment

anyway), the kinds of books I read,

I never, ever wanted to give them up.

I never considered them 'disposable.'

This whole exchange-book racket

seemed to rotate around the idea of

disposing of books.

-

It need be said here that wherever I

went, in any of this, I was way behind

the others. I suspected numerous of

the Studio School kids were just

otherwise wealthy and privileged, out

slumming, at 'artist' for maybe a year

or two. They had and kept uptown

addresses, their 'homes' - and others

often went to Connecticut or Vermont.

The fact was seen by how often it

was necessary for me to say, in

response to something and past the

point when I could no longer hide

it, that 'No, I've never been to The

Prado,'...or to the Tate or to the Louvre,

have never seen Versailles, nor

anything by Gaudi either, in Barcelona.

All that stuff keeps you way behind

the proverbial eight-ball, and travel

that's a basic currency for others

remained un-doable for me. I

guess that's why I stuck to the basic,

brawling, Jackson Pollock type of

wild-men instead - Jim Tomberg

sorts. They'd just as soon knock

you down than have to defend the

lack of those experiences and places

I mentioned. Ed Rudolph too. I always

considered them the more real

and the stronger. 'Pretentious' went

right out the window and the Devil

be damned. Somehow, over the years,

art - like poetry too - had been

given over to the 'precious' faction,

considered almost sissified, aloof

and austere. I don't know how that

all started - there was a time when

to be an artist meant work and meant

strength : mixing one's own pigments,

preparing surfaces and canvases, the

building and stretching, carrying

and hauling paints and easels, all

those hours outdoors, watching and

painting the harbor, the ships as

they rolled in, etc. In so many more

ways it was 'mans work' morseso

than not. Funny, as I type that, I

am reminded that the first 'female'

artist I was ever taken by for her

work, was Berthe Morisot, about

1865 and from that time. Very

splendid work.

-

By contrast, at the Studio School

there were females all over. And I

loved that too - they were spirited,

strange, sometimes vivacious, and

sometimes morose. The dark, foreboding

types, and the cheerful, pleasant types.

I found myself delighting in that array,

having favorites and keeping others

aloof; though I loved seeing them all

and watching their ways and manners;

how they talked and gestured, how they

carried themselves. It was fascinating.

And fascinating too to see them work,

and to see their work. Much more

deliberate and pointed at it all, they

were way into the careful aspects

of art; whereas men were more

slapdash and bold about it all. At 18,

to see a female(s) in the late-20's

operating already to her fullest,

was a wondrous, splendid, thing.

I realized I'd grown way too used

to mothers, pushing shopping

carts while babies wailed.

-

At this point, my mind was the

broadest thing on the planet. I

was living in far-off space, and it

was all still expanding and billowing

out. Un-staked territory, with still

undefined borders and conclusions.

The rings of Saturn? Pshaw on them.

I had the carryover rings of Mars.

That's how far away I was from the

basic plane of reality that most

others followed. I went around

like some cat-burglar in a mystery

title, sliding between windows, alleys.

doorways and rooms. I can still do that,

sometimes, but to little avail. All that

I see now is far worse than what used

to be, which was, in its turn then,

far worse than what used to be.

Maybe, within the concept of

diminishing returns, one past the

next, those imagined Martian rings

too diminish into nothing, one after

the other, less, and then less again.

Until we're in another realm entirely.