I took aa trip. It had been such a long time since I flew\naway to see a friend. This pandemic shut the world down and took away my\nchoices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It was a wall of everyone has to do what everyone else is\ndoing. In fact, it was the law. Or very close to the law. And it was considered\nthe moral thing to do. Behind a mask is someone who cares, so if you don\u2019t have\na mask you don\u2019t care.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Maybe it is, maybe it was the right thing to do. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
But discussion about whether it was or not was\u2014is\u2014silenced. Repressed,\ncensored, shut down, deplatformed and shamed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I took a flight and followed the federal law to wear a mask\non the plan in in the airport. I wore it the whole way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And when I landed, I was so happy to see the friends and\nfamily that I had come to see.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We walked around this new-to-me town.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It was beautiful. I enjoyed the shops and bought some things.\nWe found a used bookstore that looked more like a headshop.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And in the back, I met a lovely gray-haired woman whose last\nname was Cassady.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Famous beat author Neal Cassady\u2019s daughter was selling books\nand showing memorabilia. She was delighted that I knew who her father was. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Oh yes. The beats are very important to me. These people who\ntook the road less traveled. Who went against the conformity that engulfed the nation\nin the 1950\u2019s and sucked the marrow from the bones of life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
They got together and had conversations about forbidden subjects\nand tried unthinkable things. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
And they wrote. They wrote and found ways for others to read\ntheir words<\/p>\n\n\n\n
They opened up the minds of America and the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What would they have thought of my trip? How is my current\nsituation similar to theirs?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There was a whole world war that America had just come\nthrough when these guys were making the scene. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The man in the gray flannel suit was the ideal for them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Except it wasn\u2019t. In\na 1958 Esquire article Kerouac writes<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201ca sinister new kind of\nefficiency appeared in America; maybe it was the result of the universalization\nof television and nothing else (the Polite Total Police Control of Dragnet\u2019s\n\u201cpeace\u201d officers), but the beat characters after 1950 vanished into jails and\nmadhouses, or were shamed into silent conformity\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What options did them\nhave? What options do we have now? I know there are a set of people with extended\nunemployment checks and their loved ones\u2014or not\u2014sitting at home thinking of\nwhat to do next.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The beats would be looking\nfor life and a new style of American culture.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
How would they tweak this?\nI\u2019d like to think of what Neal, Jack, Allen and Lawrence would look at what possibilities\nare here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And of course I found\nwhat I\u2019d forgotten I knew while on the road.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I think I want to get on\nthe road more often. And I want to read all the beat books again.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I took aa trip. It had been such a long time since I flew away to see a friend. This pandemic shut the world down and took away my choices. It was a wall of everyone has to do what … Continue reading