I got two books going at once. I am finishing
the last book of The Anti-Master Quintet, A SUMMING UP: WHAT I'VE DONE SO
FAR, AND THE CONDITIONS I DID IT UNDER, and, following a trip to New Orleans to visit
Larry and Hazel, I started writing OLD FOLKS AT HOME, the book that will come next.
Instead of writing about Art "Home" Brew, compare art brut, I call
my hero Old Folks, in the new book. An immobilized hero novel, a wine, or beer tour
of Northwest Florida, a meditation on race. I thought about giving the book a subtitle.
A FLORIDA CRACKER'S SUNSET CRUISE.
In the navy, a chief petty officer gives
himself a sunset cruise just before retirement, in which his duties are minimal and
his perquisites and amenities at their height. Essentially, he coasts. He has earned
a free ride. He drinks coffee and tells sea stories. He shoots the shit with the
other chiefs.
A lot of what Larry and I talked about was race. Some member
of the black bourgeoisie saying, "I was born a poor black child," like
Steve Martin in The Jerk, when the closest his family ever came to the projects
was selling the real street-cred natives wooftickets.
We just laughed and
said, "Yea, right."
"Go, cat, go."
"Tell
'em, sister." Had a cook and a maid. Music lessons. Elocution lessons.
I thought, Why not put what I observe in a book. What have I got to lose? It's
not going to be published anyway. So I might as well have my say.
A Florida
cracker on a sunset cruise is not a person to be trifled with.
Is this
what they wanted? Is this how they thought it worked? Whoo-ee.
* * *
Well, one bad thing that can happen is you'll be called a racist. But I'm
already thought of as a racist. A Florida cracker is prima facie a racist.
All he lacks is a KKK hood. He probably already has a rebel flag license plate on
his pickup truck, a NASCAR decal. Big Daddy Don Garlits' Museum of Drag Racing, outside
Ocala.
Drag racing is as American as surfing. I'm an old surfer. An old body-surfer,
spear-fisherman, a face mask and a Hawaiian sling, an aqualung is for rich people,
Captain Charley, is my name Eddie Atlantic?
Jazz, jazz, jazz. Sometimes
we be playing jazz.
And sometimes we be jivin'.
When a fan said to
Eddie Harris, "I'm buying your records. I'm making you rich," Eddie Harris
said, "Is my name Eddie Atlantic?"
The fan was making Captain Charley
rich.
As my WPA Guide says, the Florida cracker and the rural black
in Northwest Florida have more in common than the Florida cracker has with Captain
Charley. I'll just update the WPA Guide, with tours, sights to see, historical
information, anecdotes and ravings.
Pictures from my point-and-shoot digital
camera, or captured on the Internet.
A KKK hood with one eye-hole in it.
The ling master. A purple wine stain down the front.
If I can only kiss my
elbow I will restore magic to the world.
OLD FOLKS AT HOME is about restoring
the magic.
Turn off the TV. Your TV will tell you a lie.
Read a book.
Then go on a trip.