Footnotes, he said again, then, footnotes on the afterbeat! That just about sets it up, young soldier. Hey, man, I’m beginning to see this whole thing already, but hell, I’m not surprised. Hell, I know good and well that if there was such a thing as a literary comp artist, the Bossman would spot him if he showed up. I bet it didn’t take no time at all for him to realize that Hortense Hightower had sent him one.
Then he said, You noodle and doodle and jive and connive to my segue and here I come with my rawhide stride and my sporty, syncopated limp walk just like along any patent-leather avenue mainstem anywhere on the circuit, chitlin or caviar, transcontinental or intercontinental.
So there you go, young soldier, right on the money. The dancing of an attitude! Now, that’s saying something. Talking about not just what you say, but what you do and how you do it. That’s who you are. That’s your personal fingerprint, no, footprint, how about that, footprint in the footlights (thanks to Hollywood). After you’ve gone.
So what’s all this got to do with them blues you get in the planetarium? It’s what you’re stomping with, young soldier. And when you trip the light fantastic at them you really mess with them, because then you’re carrying on just like they ain’t even there. Hey, then the softer you tip, the faster they fade away! Man, that’s worse than thumbing your nose at them, because then you’re carrying on like they ain’t even there.
Man, when you start riffing on them breaks like they’re clause after clause and chapter and verse after chapter and verse of the Emancipation Proclamation, while treating all that border-to-border and coast-to-coast U.S.A. dissonance and cacophony like it’s sweet honey in the rock, you’re taking care of some business, and I’m talking about taking care of the nitty-gritty like it’s all fun and games and one feast day after another! What you talking about, young soldier, what you talking about?!
Footnotes, he said again then, that’s really pretty slick, young soldier. Footnotes! Right on the button from the get-go. Footnotes on insights and outlook. That’s exactly what riffing the blues on the afterbeat is all about. Walking that walk, like talking that talk. Because walking that walk, which ain’t straight and narrow, you’ve got to zig as well as zag. But don’t zig when you’re supposed to zag. And don’t be tapping when you’re supposed to be tipping, especially when you’re supposed to be tipping on the q.t., which I don’t have to tell you has as much to do with politics as poontang. Talking about signifying, young soldier. So let’s tell them what I’ve been showing them lo these many years on the boards here, there, and elsewhere.
So let’s roll, young soldier, he said.
Then before I could say what I was going to say about getting back to him as soon as I could spare the time, he said, So now just go on and find your classroom groove, and get back to me and let’s see what we can do about your Thanksgiving and Christmas breaks. Hey, how about me getting you all up here for Christmas? Anyway, whatever schedule we come up with, as far as I’m concerned this thing is already under way. As I’m calling to tell the Bossman and Old Pro and old Joe as soon as we hang up.
Hey, now, talking about some terpsichorean riff signification. Man, we got it percolating on the afterbeat already.
XXXII
Castle or city-state, my old long gone and now also long since last heard from but still best of all possible college freshman and sophomore year roommates imaginable used to say, Castle to castle, stone walls with or without moats (or beanstalk with or without keeps) no less than chapels whether perilous or beneficent, the second law of thermodynamics always applies. Entropy, my good man. There you have it. That’s the goods, my fine fellow. My estimate of the situation, as any elementary school trip to the planetarium should have long since made all too obvious. Elementary, my dear Watson, elementary indeed. Your notorious snark by any other terminology is still a bojum!
Thus if you miss the fun of the safari as such, what with all the standard deluxe equipment and provisions, sine qua non, you’ve missed the point! You’ve missed the metaphor! There is entropy, my good fellow, and there is metaphor, and if you miss the implications of the metaphor, you’re stuck with clichés, which most certainly should not be confused with the blisses of the commonplace! Which so often turns out to be precisely what luxury is really about after all— nay, first of all!
Moreover, he also used to like to say, arching his ever so subtly academic brow as he used the transitional device I never heard another freshman or sophomore use before or since. Moreover, as our very own La Bohème of Greenwich Village, NYC, U.S.A., said long before the publication of her ever so fatal interviews, “Whether or not we find what we are seeking is idle biologically speaking!”
So heh, heh, haay, roommate, he would go on in his mock penny dreadful villain’s voice once more, clasping his archcriminal hands and rubbing his insatiably avaricious pawnbroker’s palms, his eyes and nostrils narrowing satanically as if he also had a satanic tail to wag as he pounced!
It was ever thus, roommate, and so it will ever be—not only biologically speaking, but also geologically speaking, not to mention speaking in terms of third-grade geography after that field trip to the planetarium.
Anyway, so much for the all-American pursuit of the all-American melodramatic climax. After all, there is also the no less American soap opera, with its movie star good looks across the board and deluxe fashion and shelter magazine perfect town and country
