Exactly. There are so many avenues of logical, practical thought that lead to this conclusion that it must be a mass psychosis thing someone will write about 100 years from now.
I'm going to try something here, this just occurred to me and it makes me nervous.
Sometime in 1984 I saw Lou Reed. I didn’t spend money on ANYTHING and it was a big deal for me to buy a concert ticket. I can’t say I was excited or looking forward to going, it was more that I was determined to go. I rode in from Wilmington on my motor cycle feeling self-contained, the tight fitting flight jacket defined where I was, who I was. The bike slid easily around the traffic, not much different than if I’d been the only one on the highway. I listened to my breath, aware of the wind and the sound and the vibration, it was a warm night, a breeze cleared the smog and the lights sparkled on Wilshire Boulevard.
My seat was high up in the balcony. It was a big place, the main floor was full but there was only a scattering of people upstairs. The view of the stage was okay, I could have moved closer but it wouldn’t change anything much so I stayed. I stood during the concert, I didn’t wiggle or tap my foot, I just listened. His stuff is best when I let it roll over me. I don’t know what he played, he made some joke about being known for his ballads. I don’t remember the show, I just watched it.
The concert ended and I didn’t feel like going right home so I stopped in a bar somewhere in Manhattan Beach or Redondo Beach, something I never did. It was a small place but they had a dance floor and a dozen tables. There were a few people at the bar and a couple of girls dancing together on the floor with their purses and drinks off to the side. I sat down at a table, the waitress took my order and brought me a rum and coke, I sipped it while I watched the dancers. Buying a drink in a bar is a waste of money and I knew I wouldn’t buy a second. They were okay, mid-twenties, sun tanned, California, they weren’t paying any attention to me.
A woman came in by herself and sat down at a table, we worked it out through face language, a raised eyebrow and a nod toward the floor, a shoulder shrug and an accepting nod, I’m pretty sure she started it. We danced to four or five songs, nothing aerobic, more a lope, comfortable, easy, a lot of roll in it, like I’d dance to a Robert Palmer song.1
She said she had to go and I offered to walk her to her car. I was being polite, let’s go back to my place and shoot some dope is a pickup line without legs and I’d noticed this little kernel of truth long ago. It was a compliment if that was what she needed, what had brought her there, if it helped. And maybe a thank you. She said she’d be alright and left.
I sat down to finish the last of the rum water; the girls were paying more attention now, throwing glances my way, they’d needed to be shown first. I didn’t need any of that proving myself shit and I couldn’t have lived up to much of anything anyway so I pretended not to notice. I left and on the way home thought about my best friend being a voice coming off a vinyl record. (“You can help, but not you guys……”).
I was glad I had gone, it was something.2
1. These songs are of the type I would dance to in the style to which I’m referring. It’s the way she danced and I could do that. There is a reason for them being R Palmer songs I’ll not get into here.
youtube.com
youtube.com
2. There’s a tail to this story. It was nice to have had some contact with a human and this worked on me some in the following days. There was an ad on the radio about a dating service, they had an office fairly close to Mom’s apartment. A little spark of hope led me to stop in their office a couple of weeks later, just to see what it was all about is what I told myself. A very nice interview, some pressure to sign on the dotted line and fork over some money, which I did not do, of course. It was a wistful thought going nowhere.
Robert |
