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The Breaks
I'm just laying around reading this old Richard Price novel, The Breaks, and I pause like you do when you read a great writer and think about things the writer makes you think about. It may not be anything the writer actually said that makes you think, it may just be the mood the writer creates that helps you get somewhere you really had no intention of going when you reclined on your couch, propped up by pillows, you lazy bastard.
Since I got the TV this pause time created by great writers, or even mediocre writers, it doesn't matter and let's not be snobbish, would occasionally lead me not to deep contemplation but to the exact opposite, that is--watching TV.
In the past I have written things here that were inspired by stressful times and I think people may occasionally think this boy needs help, but no, thank you so much anyway, the writing pretty much helps me all I need to be helped in order not to be a detriment to society.
However, last night I found myself in deep doo-doo and I yearned for outside help. I wanted to cry out--help me, help me, help me, but my voice doesn't carry so well and so who's gonna hear it? what's the use? I am referring to the fact that I was for two hours flipping back and forth between two two hour TV specials detailing the somewhat remarkably bizarre world of Michael Jackson. I was convinced that somehow I was being drugged into submission by the Networks, who themselves had been drugged into submission by George W. Bush, I mean Lucifer, no, I don't know what I mean. I was witless. I was non-plussed. And some other things.
It is not like I eschew all things mindless. Mindless activities are good for the soul. But the Jackson story is superficially disturbing, disturbing. I don't need to watch TV to get that. No one can say for sure that I am exaggerating when I say we may be on the brink of nuclear war. I think that is disturbing, and not superficially. So in these times, when I want to be disturbed, I can simply think about current events. I do not need to think about Michael Jackson and the regrettable cirmcumstances of his life.
Thursday night (2/20) on Public TV is an advertised show I am actually looking forward to. It is a taped jazz concert featuring the entire Marsalis family which occurred here in New Orleans several months or almost a year ago. The ticket prices were way out of my league and as far as I can tell the concert sold out before the tickets even went on sale. I don't know that it will play that well on TV (I don't know if you will get how great is the youngest and shyest one, Jason on drums) but no matter, it will be the best thing going. The problem is, there is ANOTHER two hour Michael Jackson special airing Thursday night. I am weak. I have already learned this. I may need help. I may call out to you.