I used to go over to Jack and Karol’s house
on
of Haitians living in it. When I worked at IBM,
I would ride my bicycle to work by their house.
They were gone by then. Karol worked at
Eagle Army-Navy Discount Department Store
and had to take a lie detector test to use the cash register.
This was before she got her degree in English from
Farleigh Dickinson. But it was after I was stationed at
a SAC base in
en route to
a VW hatchback station wagon. I showed them the ILS
I maintained, and the TACAN. I took them to
the NCO Club for dinner. I was an airman first
with over-four-years service.
A buck sergeant. The buck sergeant of
American letters. Charles Willeford was
a master sergeant. He was eligible for
the Old Solders Home. In fact,
he used to write about characters
who expected to die there.
He died in a tract house
in
He wrote me that Theodore Pratt told him
Hell, I haven’t run out of things to write about in Parker,
where I am a senior fellow at the Point and Shoot Institute (PSI).
So much pressure. Philip Wylie said he read Time magazine
to keep abreast of the biases. This was before television.
I have TV and the Internet. The lunatic-fringe and the mainstream.
An embarrassment of riches. I have Morning Joe. Used to have Imus.
I have MSNBC. Olbermann is gone and they moved Ed Schultz
to past my bedtime. Lean forward. How about stand, and in the evil day,
withstand. I stood, and in the evil day, withstood.
I created a new paradigm. Now I’m doing
the mop-up work of normal science.
Fleshing it out. Tell an agent that. Tell an editor.
Kerouac said, “Issues—I’m talking about sin.”