note to king feddy

your Highness,

when i was in the bathroom at denny's yesterday (a place for both visual and old factory reasons i wouldn't recommend going, by the way), i saw that they had one of those plastic fold-out "baby changing stations."

this one had been visually modified by a cultural humorist of sorts, the "c" had been crossed out to make it say "baby hanging station." which i'm sure means that we can look forward to every one of them being modded across the country by the powers of mediocrity over time -- much in the way hand dryers always have scratched onto the instructions:

4. wipe hands on pants.

always in that scroll that looks suspiciously like whatever the equivalent of a phd is in the crips.

but that's not why i write you.

i noticed the station also has braille on it, which REALLY makes me wonder what the hell it says.

a girlfriend in college had a sister that could read braille. we were standing in front of an ATM (this was in the old old days, when they were still called "transaction banks") and i had her translate what was written. it said something like, "sorry, this machine is unusable if you're blind. you have to go inside. oh, and watch that crack in the sidewalk by the front door, it's a bitch."

i've known a couple of blind guys.

one was chuck collins, the father of folk singer judy collins. he was what is called in the oil industry as a "land man" -- someone who buys and sells mineral rights in land (this would be very different than, say, a "tool pusher," the guy that moves pipe on a well -- very often from the deep south and speaking cajun dialects, these guys are more affectionately called [in a very non-racist way -- all the ones i've met are white] a "coon ass," and using the expression is the entire reason i write this parenthetical).

chuck was an interesting guy.

he didn't use a cane and thought guide dogs were a cheat. instead, as he walked down the street, he'd wave his hand in front of himself snapping his fingers.

he'd developed radar. he knew trees and curbs. he knew the distance to his house in the middle of the block (although i'm not sure how). when we'd give him a ride and drop him off i'd watch in awed fascination as he walked down the street. he could use his locator as a nice party trick where he could stand in the middle of a room, snap a few times and tell you the dimensions to within a foot or two.

he had a mean streak, which got worse when he'd drink. but he never unleashed that on me, thank god.

some genius in the military asked chuck to come speak to the recently wounded from the vietnam war, undoubtedly as part of the "blind people can help blind people (because we don't know what the hell to do with them)" mentality. he was there for about ten minutes before he made the newly dark soldier cry. he was summarily asked to leave, never to return.

my favorite trick of his was you could hand him a bar magnet and he could tell you which way was north.

we were pals. he had glass eyes and sometimes he'd let me tap on them.

but to my mind, here's the amazing psychological thing about chuck ...

i have *never* talked about him without someone interrupting with a joke. now i'll admit that when telling a story, interruption by americans is always problematic. in the valley it's chronic. around someone like stearno, it's unavoidable

but the interruption always fires off three thoughts in me in quick sequence. one is, "have you known so many blind people that this isn't worth listening to, and you need to spice it up on your own?" the second is, "do you think being blind is funny?" and then the capper, "you're so uncomfortable with both this concept and my means of telling it that you have to interrupt."

and THAT means that this is the first time i've talked about chuck collins without being interrupted.

so thanks for that, feddy. and like i've told so many girlfriends, just because you were forced, doesn't mean i don't appreciate it.

you'll need to excuse me. i have to go hang a baby now.

your servant,
b1