Waiting for the man…the muse…the connection…the live
wire…four twenty…graduation…retirement….death…no…
I’m not waiting anymore…I’m here….now.
****
“The progress of art of all types in the West in the twentieth century
shows the evolution of an attitude towards
perception, (mind), that steadily moves away from rational,
linear, mechanistic forms of expression towards holographic,
telegraphic, organic and increasingly sensual and even chaotic forms.
The “Great American Novel” has given way to the
hallucinogenic writings of Burroughs…the journalistic satire
of Hunter S. Thompson….the cynical vignettes of Charles
Bukowski….In painting, after the French classic school, came
Impressionism, when things began to get a little fuzzy…
Surrealism and Cubism and Dada, where structures are broken
down and distorted…and, later, Abstract Expressionism, where
the notion of reality is questioned directly.
In theatre, while it was still relevant, the “fourth wall” con-
vention whereby the audience saw the acting through an invisible
fourth wall was challenged. In one Dadaist play,
an actor was supposed to fire a revolver randomly into the audience…
in music…well…one logical progression would be from Beethoven to
Varese to Captain Beefheart…
So, you see, whatever comes out of this writer couldn’t
possibly be linear…might not even make much sense…
if this was the early twentieth, I could write you “Passage
to India”….now, all I can give you….is, maybe “Naked
Lunch” or “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas….see what I mean?”
“People still write narrative.”
“Yes, but it’s mostly pulp for the mags.”
“I think you’re just lazy.”
“Yeah, well, work hard and die anyway.”
****
I really wanted to get my hands on some speed….not Meth,
hell no….but some bennies, if there still are any. …get into
a writing grove like Kerouac….
….when I was in college I wrote a paper on speed…got an
A…funny thing was, after I had finished the paper, I kept
writing…wrote three pages, single spaced…
….when I read those pages, years later, it had this line in it:
….”and attended a seminary near Boulder, Colorado”
well…four years after I wrote that, and after I
had become a Buddhist…I attended a Buddhist seminary in
Snowmass, Colorado. Boulder was actually the seat of the
organization to which I belonged at that time.
****
C’mon, folks, we’re all self medicated….in fact, the ones
medicated by doctors have a decent chance that their meds
could hurt them….specific illnesses that they have a cure for,
ok…if they get diagnosed properly…but, you know…a lot of
times it’s hit or miss….so…I say let anyone take any drug they
want….if they’re stupid, they’re going to die anyway.
****
I left Joel and just started walking. I felt good. “No, officer,
I’m not trying to get high….I’m just trying not to be low.”
My buddy, Bill, was driving in Boulder and got stopped
by the cops…he rolled down the window and the Marijuana
smoked poured out. Bill was shitting bullets. The cop came
back from his cruiser and handed him his license. “Oh, and,
by the way, Mr. Malone, it’s illegal to smoke marijuana and
drive.” After the cop drove off, Bill sat there a while.
****
My first wife left college the semester before she graduated.
she didn’t tell her parents anything…in fact, I think for a time
they didn’t know where she was. She was in a house in
Hotlanta, living with a bunch of hippies. They brought Joe
Cocker there and partied with him after a concert. My wife
could handle normal good. When the police would come to
the front door for some reason, she would always answer it.
No matter how tripped out she was, she was able to diffuse
the situation. Good woman.