39. WARREN

39. WARREN

The barbershop set-up was basically

a mis-en-scene for old guys to sit

around and endlessly get updated.

About stuff, but about Pennsylvania

stuff, specifically. It was like 'who

else would give a hoot' about the

things they mentioned  -  deer head

counts, and milk-fat quotas, and if

Pingry was 'scratching' Mrs. Kobel.

Yep, 'scratchin' was the word they

used for having sex. I heard it a

hundred times if I heard it once,

and I've never heard it anywhere

else since, except in my re-telling.

Never figured that out. So, anyway,

there I was, back in Warren's '65

Ford Galaxie, which, if you've ever

seen one, was a weird year  -  just a

squared-off box of a car, really no

design finesse at all. A real

come-down from the softer-looking

and easier on the eyes, '64 Fords.

I never could figure out, also  -  all

my life, not just here, since like 1959,

why Ford used the word Galaxie for

their car and not 'Galaxy.' Or they

used both. Something about it just

always bothered me. I was in his

car and we were driving back, from

East Smithfield this was, and I'd

never really had a real, short,

regular guy's haircut since I was

like 12. All shaved now too. I see

photos of me then, working the farm,

and I look like I really AM 12 all

over again. But skinny as a runt.

All these Pennsylvania farm guys

had farming muscles, not so much

like a body-builder gets, but a

strongly formed muscle pattern

nonetheless. I, by contrast, even

doing my best Popeye, just look

like some working-worm in a tee

shirt, showing off nothing. Nobody

ever said anything, but it felt odd.

And I didn't like that haircut none

either, because you had to keep after

it. Like every three weeks or so you'd

just need another. That was a real

pain in the butt, making return trips,

and I soon just gave up on that, except

I can't remember what I did to keep

short or shorter hair. It was all against

my ethos and my principles anyway.

I wasn't growing fond or happy.

-

The funny thing, too, was that, every

time I sat there in this stupid dumpy

porch-fake-barber-shop, I was stewing.

And all I could ever think about was Mr.

Novak's place, back in Woodbridge, up

Hillside Avenue, on my bicycle, off

Rahway Ave., to where I'd ride myself

once or twice a week for piano lessons

in his really nice brick house up the

top of that hill. The setting was a little

bit the same. You see, all these guys

had daughters, farm daughters, young

and growing ripe. When I took piano

lessons, sometimes I'd have to be

sitting there waiting for Mr. Novak 

to be done and ready for me. I was 

like 10 or 11, and he had a really

attractive daughter, about maybe 

16 or 17. Lots of times I'd be just 

sitting there gazing out, watching 

her hanging clothes outside, in the 

yard, on one of those clothes-hanging 

things people used to have, made of 

wire and plastic cord, sort of square  

-  looking something like a weird 

and large TV antenna stuck into 

the ground. Anyway, she'd be out

there hanging clothes, and I'd just 

be gazing out, at her, but just gazing 

too. It was magical, but I was just 

a kid and so it didn't matter much. 

Well, this barber-shop guy was 

like that too  - a few daughters 

around, doing yard things, and 

I'd just be watching while I waited.

All those dead animal heads on 

the wall sort of kept a person in 

line. Know what I mean?  Just 

think, all the way to the middle 

of Pennsylvania, for this? That's 

what I'd be saying to myself.

-

The other funny thing  -  and this

took me some real time to realize  -

was that these  Pennsylvania country 

people, from all of what I saw, really

did live a complete and finished life

away from all intellectual considerations.

Not a book nor a paper to be found of

anything that was not about farm work,

sports, hunting, or any of the other

usual stupid pleasantries that keep 

people relegated to the plow. Maybe

a travel magazine here or there. Every

so often there'd be a family seemingly

just a notch up, above the other in 

social stature, but that too meant 

nothing, except maybe a travel 

magazine or something just a

smidgen unordinary. I could 

never figure out how a person 

could live a live with no intellectual

pursuit, of any sort, even if it was 

archaeological gems and minerals, 

or something. Warren and I, all 

we ever talked about was cars, 

farm stuff, milk and cows. Never 

even talked about women or stuff.

A very quiet, relegated to nothing,

world. I had a hard time to realize

how rural America, if this was any

indication at all, was such a no-place

in the head, just a big, empty room.

They never entertained doubts about

anything at all, or ever talked about it.

Here I'd spent my previous near ten 

years, at least, racking my brains

into every contortion I could do, 

reading, writing, trying to find things 

out, and these dumbos were just talking

me downhill with them, to a fake barber

shop no less, just to keep some sort of

ephemeral happiness. Supposed to be

anyway. It all just made me shake me

head and, once again, start reappraising.

And, man, was I tired of that.

-

Warren had an old father in law who 

sometimes stayed with them  -  a big,

talkative old guy, a little angry and a

little sarcastic. But nice. We'd talk, 

he'd ask a few questions about me, 

and then he'd go on, like I was saying, 

about the old days and the road crews 

and the paving and all that. The one 

thing I remember best about him  -  

he had a real thing about the TV 

being on. Just HATED it! Had a 

round-out knock-down fit every 

time. It wasn't that he ever watched 

it either, but it was the others, and

all the kids in the house, whom he'd

go at when it was on. He'd start 

ranting about the little idiot modern

people who don't know how they're 

wasting good money away on crap.

Then he'd say to "Feel it, feel the TV,

see how warm it gets, anything that

makes heat is going to cost you. 

Anything that can generate warmth 

like that just isn't worth having."

For him the relevant and relative 

factor was not content, but the HEAT

that the television produced, and the

useless cost of producing that heat.

I sometimes wanted to turn on him

and say, 'Then why'd you wire the

damned house up then, why? Why

didn't you just leave things well

enough as they were back then?'

Never did have the gumption.

-

Sometimes I ate with them.

They ate good, but on farm time  -  

see, the farmers' thing was the big 

meal is in the middle of the day, 

called 'Dinner', and everything 

stopped for it at about 1pm. All 

chores were down for that point, 

all the morning work over, the 

creamery truck had come and 

gone, the cows were out, and 

there was a good slot of time to

eat, about like 1 to 2pm, before 

everything started up again for the

later afternoon and evening chores.

A lot of times, too, there was a 

half-hour snooze time in there,

allotted, for a nap in a chair or

something. Afternoon TV time

went with that too. It all gave 

a whole new meaning and reason 

for junky daytime TV, but these 

folks all reveled in it.

38. COLUMBIA CROSSROADS

38. COLUMBIA CROSSROADS

It's a bit like a bargain, this life:

'Now! Two days only! Take

advantage of these special

offers!' And then you move

a pencil, you take a step, and

it's over. I never knew much

what people were thinking,

country people I mean, when

I lived among them. They'd

look at me, drawn strangely

to them, evidently, and just

peer. Big city boy! Crazed,

wild hippie! Out there, there

seemed no original thinking

at all. It was whatever the

media drummed into their

heads  -  that's what they

went by. It was annoying, and

very quickly. I arrived there,

for instance, with a 1962

Volkswagen Beetle, the

Wolfsburg-built one, the

one with the  -  that year's

manufacture  -  the little

Wolfsburg badge built into

the chrome strip running

down the front. It made for

something different, that badge,

broke up the design line just a

little, and added a dash of color.

None of it meant anything to

these folks. It was as if they'd

never ever before seen a real

Volkswagen, the most pedestrian

and boring car there was, and

of which there were probably

a hundred thousand on any

street around where I'd lived.

Yet, all they ever referred to it

as was 'Look! A Herbie!' or,

'He's got a punch buggy.'

Something like that  -  media

names of cartoon VW-like cars

or whatever. I never really knew.

It was just pretty idiotic. Did I go

around saying, about their daughters,

'Look, a Barbie.' No. Not even 'Look,

there's a Ken!' All shamefully stupid,

but multiply that by a thousand

and you get an idea of the extended

and plain uselessness of much of

that thinking.  I'd not realized it

was so widespread  -  this was an

entire countryside of these sorts

of people, perambulating around

with all their dense opinions and

shadowy imaginings. For one, I

was nothing like the portrayal of

me they were running with. I was

never any sort of real hippie. I was

way too smart for that. And I then

figured they should have known that.

So, to placate these vicious hordes,

and to avoid a lynching perhaps, I

allowed myself to be taken under

wing by by neighboring farmer-guy,

a really goosey, loose-limbed Irish-

Dutch guy named Warren Gustin.

He took me in, I worked farm

chores for and with him  -  about

35 cows, twice a day, milking, manure-

spreading, tractors, mechanical stuff,

haying, planting corn, harvesting.

He had a family, about 5 kids, a wife,

a decent enough really old house and

a brand-new barn. His youngest kid,

Danny, about 6, had -  a little before I

arrived there, been fooling with matches

and set Warren's old, in-use barn on fire.

It burned to the ground. The locals,

from 15 miles around I'd bet, had what

was termed a 'barn bee'  -  meaning

that for any number of weekends

or days it took, they built him up

another, brand-new barn. I'd

arrived there at nearly the very

end of that, and, since they were

to be neighbors, pitched right in

with the final stages of finishing

up the new barn  -  shingles, roofing,

etc. No real clue what I was doing,

but I went to it anyway. It was a

way to break the ice, show that

myself and my own wife and kid

were real people and not just some

bizarre freaks not to be trusted or

dealt with. It allowed me to size

up the others  -  the wise-guys,

the cranks, the tough-boys, and

to see who I'd be really having to

convince or deal with over things.

It was, after all, to be my (our)

futures there to contend with.  I

soon learned who among them

was fair and who was foul.

Keeping it all to myself

then, too. Most of the men

were maybe ten or fifteen years

older than me, just hitting forty

perhaps, forty three. Or they were

the very old  -  crotchety, old and

wizened old farmer-men, tough as

nails, coarse and old-style to the

core. Some of the families, in the

big, old farmhouses, were

multi-generational, so you'd get

all the age levels together. The old

guys were the best. You have to

remember that back then, in the

years I'm talking about, these were

Depression-era guys, farmers, who

had lived through dire poverty and

the lack of most everything. The

only thing that had saved them and

their families, if you listened, was the

Government-assistance work that

tided them over. They'd go on like it

was yesterday when the WPA put

them to work "right here, running

electrification wires and some of

the poles to each house so that we'd

all have lights and power. We'd

get something like 6 bucks a

week from it and doing our own

chores, eggs and milk and such.

These roads them days was all dirt.

The Government sent trucks in, put

us all to work  -  we'd be walking

along with shovels and picks, and

two or three dump-trucks with us,

filled with pack dirt and hot tar and

we'd take the tar cans and spread the

liquid tar over the new dirt and stone.

Not so bad a job of paving as you'd

think  -  and it made the difference.

Now the milk and eggs boys could

get their trucks up off the mud and

outta' the trouble, and even the horses

and buggies went better. Why hell,

we all did." That was just the way

they talked on and the tales they

told. It was all good stuff  -  like

they really never did have any

bad experiences, leastways not to

tell about to me. I always figured

they were just as much probably

sizing me up as I was them, seeing

to what I reacted or listened to, or

said back.

-

My wife got on good with all the

ladies. Really simple stuff  -  church

stuff, bake sales, what they called

'Ladies Aid Society' meetings and

meals. They'd throw these big

lunches for the working-bee guys.

Having an infant kid helped too,

ladies all love that mothering stuff.

She even was presented with the

'Youngest Mother of the Year' award,

actually two years, maybe even three,

in a row. It was big stuff. She was

18, then 19, and the rest. Not that

the young kids around there weren't

fornicating  - believe you me. They

rooted around like sows and hogs,

but I guess they never got pregnant

young, or maybe the church didn't

recognize them, or ostracizing just

kept them away. Never knew, never

cared. The award was like a floral

bouquet and a sash and stuff. Really

hokey. Even funnier, no one ever

asked about the Daddy here, young

or old. Which in this case happened

to be me, but I never got no flowers.

-

I use to get a kick out of the wives of

this bunch  -  ladies, farm-ladies, all

bright and ripe, like butter commercials

themselves  -  bubbly, fleshy, almost

sensual to the eye. It was something,

And of course, just looking, you knew

what they were thinking sometimes

too  -  it got funny, and it got strange.

An outsider, a young-man, newcomer,

oh! Whooie! Religious or not, that

thrumming patter of sex was always

present, and everybody knew it, just

never confessed to it, I guess. There

weren't any Catholic Confessionalists

around anyway, these were raw and

simple Baptist folk, and the local

Baptist preacher was this little

pathetic guy named Wallace McKnight.

No one would be confessing anything

much to him anyway. I remember

one time, at one of the thrown

luncheon spreads (they'd come with

them right to the worksite, on

big long tables), one of the ladies  -

her last name was Guthrie, nice,

wilder type than the rest, sort of  -

she caused a ruckus that never

healed. A few of the ladies never

again spoke to her, in my time

there. Somebody had brought a

large tray of pastries, cruellers or

whatever they're called, and one

of the ladies said something about

them, that they were too large, and

too hard. Something like that  -

anyway this Guthrie lady, having

my eye the whole time, says 'Oh

Wee! Long and hard! Just the way

I like 'em best!' It was like the

whole place had just fallen off

a cliff. Ladies glared. No one

spoke. Reverend McKnight,

present as usual, always giving

benedictions about this or that. I

do swear I think he swallowed his

prayer and quite near gagged.

Warren himself told me later that

his wife, Barbara, had sworn to

him she'd never speak another

word to that Betty Guthrie woman

again in her entire life. Me? I

witnessed all this and was just

cracking up inside.

-

I worked for Warren, sidework,

for long more than a year, working

for 'milk and meat'. Meaning, no pay,

in money. Just whatever milk, dairy

and foodstuffs I'd need for my own

family use, he'd supply. Modestly I

mean, and within reason. It worked.

I'd be up at 5:30 am, walk out to get

the cows, set 'em all in for milking,

we'd do that, clean the chain drop,

spread manure, tractor stuff, etc.

Then, by eight or so, I'd jump in

the school bus I'd gotten a job

driving. Something like 20 bucks

a day, I really forget  -  winding

dirt roadways up jagged hills, old

dumpy trailers in the woods, end the

big-deal homes around too. Anywhere

there were kids around; they'd wait,

I'd drag by and get them and bring

'em all of to school, and then reverse

the whole process about about three

pm. Plus, for forty-two hundred bucks

a year, I'd been contracted to clean and

take care of the local schoolhouse  -  K

to 6, just another bunch of ratty, messy

farm kids. It all sucked, but it was a

living.

-

One day, as I started to say, early on, 

I just let Warren convince me to let 

him take me to one of those local 

yokels around  -  there were a few 

of them  -  for a total, real guy's

haircut and clean-up. I hated it, but I

went. It was a sort of trade-off for him

letting me go, with his car, to Towanda 

for my school-bus driving license test. My

own car was pretty marginal, and we 

didn't want that to tip the scales against

me in any way, nor my appearance It

all worked, and I got the needed license.

Pennsylvania has this system where

people can be Justices of the Peace.

Like Town Clerks and stuff  -  they 

notarize things, witness wills and such,

process motor vehicle stuff, accept

tax payments. Sell insurance, marry 

people, etc. Pretty much once you 

can hang that sign out front of your 

house, all is cool. Warren's buddy 

here was one of these, way big-time, 

crazy man. He had an office built onto

the side of his house for the JP stuff 

(Justice of the Peace), and in addition, 

he sold Amway Products, nearly

shoving them down your throat, had

like a hundred dead animals heads

on his sitting-room and 'den' walls,

and was, in addition, a barber, with 

a little barber-shop thing going on

on his porch. Which is where I ended 

up  - maybe four other guys, and Warren,

and me. Just sitting around, it seemed

endlessly, waiting for haircuts. This 

guy cut and talked; snipped and talked; 

cut a little more and talked. Picked his

crotch and talked; I mean it was all

pretty horrible. Five guys worth of

horrible. And of course, they'd seen 

me coming in. Thank God Warren 

fronted for me : 'What the gangbusters

ya got there now, Warren? Does that

get a name?' Blah, blah, yet again.

'Yeah, the name's Gary, I'm am idiot 

and an asshole; you can abuse me 

and call me names, make fun of me 

all you want, because I'm here to take 

it. Oh, and by the way, your wife

thought I was great, and way better

than that guy sitting next to you.' 

No, I didn't say that, but I should 

have. They all deserved it.

37. SAYRE

37. SAYRE

There was a town up that way,

on the way to Elmira, named Sayre,

PA. It was a nice enough old shunt

of a town; a double-compound of

nothingness and small houses, a

settlement without means, just a

place. The 1970's up that way did

that to lots of places. It just seemed

as if money had run out, credit was

really tight, and asking for it was just

as treacherous as not having it. I was

fortunate  -  fortunate in the sense I

mean that it was never cool to be

indebted, but it kept me alive for

a while  -  in somehow getting a

bank officer at the time of mortgage

for the old farmhouse, who also

extended to us the option of

maintaining a stream of 30-day

notes or 60-day notes, for the

duration, in whatever amount we

wanted  - as long as we paid the

due-dates and debts back. It was, as

a kid of 22 or so, a really strange

introduction to the ephemeral and

magical world of banking and

finance. Nothing ever was changed

because of the situation  -  if it got

bad you could just ask for more

money on the next note so to put

a repayment for a better increment

back on the old note. All you were

really doing was rolling things over -

their money, their extension, and

your life. As long as you found a

way to repay, even if it was with

their own money back to them, you

could stay ahead of the axe. Farmers

were doing it all the time, to tide

themselves over for the Winter, or

until some crop came in, or for the

roof they needed. Rural economies

were really funny things, I found out.

Like a paper kingdom of nothingness.

And the guys at Troy Bank and Trust

were really good at it. Or they could

have been shysters, drawing me into

a lifetime of false debt in their 'employ.'

I was (fortunately) always able to make

it work, and, after a few years, was gone

from there anyway, but I knew farm

families whose entire way of life was

wrapped up in that. But they always

had decent cars, a new snowmobile

or two, food and fuel. I guess all the

bank cared was that they got their

$12 or $14 (my random numbers

here) interest out of you each

month. Troy, PA, and Sayre PA,

were pretty much the same sorts

of towns, Sayre being about 15

miles or so to the east. Along Rt.

6 in PA, or Rt. 17 (now called the

'Southern Tier Expressway'), which

ran the border east to west between

Pennsylvania and New York State

lines, most people lived like that.

Depressed area, really down on its

luck, especially in the 70's, and

then brutally flooded in '72 with

Hurricane Agnes on June 23. It

was all like Paradise, but Paradise

with a drawbridge that had gotten

washed away. The moat was open,

and lots of people fell in and drowned.

These bank lines of open credit were 

all many people had, and I begrudged 

no one their chance at surviving.

-

I only knew three or four people 

in Sayre. I did a screen-door 

installation job or two there. 

That town, for whatever it was, 

always seemed like the perfect

setting for The Music Man  -  

an old-line Americana play 

about some snake-oil type of 

guy who blows into town 

ostensibly to raise cash for the

town to have a band and 

instruments  -  it's a long 

story. But, right in the

middle of the town there 

was this great bandstand. 

Sayre was, right there, 

perfect for the 1880's, a 

veritable still-life of frozen 

town. I would sometimes go 

there and just sit for hours, 

mesmerized by my own thoughts.

Under the wooden rooftop of 

that bandstand, unused as it was, 

I could swear my mind flew, 

just traveled far away. Things 

still lived, all that old brass and 

drum corps music was yet hanging 

in the air, the corny optimism of 

little flags and stars and stripes 

banners still fluttered. People 

parked their wagons on the dirt 

and grass, leaving the horses 

behind, gathering excitedly, 

pleased to see one another

once more. Coy girls glanced

at nervous boys across the lawn.

Bloviators talked on, speaking

aloud, at length, to the assembled

town crowds, in the open air. Once

I got started, there was pretty much 

no way I could be stopped  -  all 

this painting of fantasy-times with 

my mind just went on. I think 

that's how the crazy-people 

maybe do eventually get lost, 

just frayed out into their 

own imaginings, to the point 

that they begin talking and 

interacting with them and 

not the real world  -  if that's 

what it is. 'Real' being, at

this juncture, just really 

pretty subjective.

-

Sayre had a neighboring town too,

Athens. Stephen Foster attended a

music a music conservatory there,

Athens Music Conservatory, or

something like that, and there are 

a few plaques around the site. The

rest of both these towns is pretty

shot  -  old-line tired and beat, no

real money. There's a big hospital

complex in Sayre, right at the town

square and bandstand area, called,

as I recall Robt. Packer Hospital.

It's large, and probably employs

many of the townsfolk and keeps 

them from going under  -  the

usual food-service and attendant

jobs. It's a teaching hospital, which

is why I got familiar with it. My 

wife needed an operation, in those

early 70's, some internal stuff, and

they would properly do it for free,

and give you the needed care, if

you agreed to become the person 

in the operating arena whose 

operation all the medical students

and interns and such, watched.

Some people would never do it, 

but my wife, with my assent too,

had no problems with that, and the

price couldn't be beat. So that's how

I became a Sayre steady for a 

period of time while she was there.

-

Just more to the east yet, is Towanda,

 on Rt. 6  -  which is a beautiful road, (was 

then anyway), that  cuts right thru this 

midriff of PA, as the 'Grand Army of the 

Republic Highway'. There are  markers 

all over it along the way. More on 

that later. Towanda is a town

with the right of way of this Rt. 6

coursing through it, all twisty and old.

Large old Victorian homes, in certain

spots, hugging the streets. In the 1970's,

yes, it still belonged, as well, to another

time and place  -  heavily tree'd, nicely

shrubbed and covered. That's all gone 

now, like the rest  -  tress have been 

hacked down, people want light and

space around them, not shelter. When

you begin doing that stuff it doesn't take 

long for things to change downward. 

Nowadays, all the good old stuff is gone.