Thursday, September 25

Vet.

I talked to a long-haired hippy not-altogether there Vietnam vet today. He lives in my apartment complex, and I've said hi to him before, but never initiated conversation. He's locally famous for wearing pajamas wherever he goes, and he walks everywhere. He also almost always has earphones in his ears, attached to an iPod I would presume, and seems to completely be tuning out the world. I've seen him in the office, at the pool, out walking around, in Walgreens (a drug store... what do Brits call a convenience store with a chemist at the back where you can get some groceries, toys, gimmicky things, some tools, fill your prescriptions, and so on? There must be those types of stores there. They're about as large as full grocery stores usually, but as I mentioned the product composition is different. You can usually even get bicycle innertubes, live bait, and motor oil there! And many are now open 24/7, for when you NEED your drugs at 3:30 am).

Anyway this guy is friendly but doesn't listen to anything you say, and says things on his own which are completely off the wall, and he gets a bus route map for Sonoma county every time he visits the apartment office (how many does he need?). But today he looked me (sorta) in the eyes and said, "No one's in command of those guys. You know that right?" I played along and first said, "Hey, where are your headphones?" He didn't seem to understand, so I elaborated, "You earbuds? You're always listening to music. Left them at home today?"

He had an inscrutable look on his face and said very lucently all of a sudden, "I - I have ringing all the time. You know, in my ears. All the time. I listen to music really loud because I need some relief sometime. That's what happens when you go into the army, see? You get a sergeant who is supposed to make all his men wear... those things... earplugs in your ears when you're on the rifle and artillery ranges. Well my sergeant, he, he said he was ordered to give us the option but then he looked us over as we stood in our lines and said, "but I don't believe in these things. Hell, war is loud, you sonsabitches. The way I look at it, you're entitled to wear this 'protection', but the whole idea of protection is for faggots. The way I look at it, anyone in MY command who needs protection for their little ears is a goddamn faggot. And I don't want any faggots in my command. But the Army makes them available for the little girls I guess so they won't complain later. So do whatever you want." I'm somewhat paraphrasing him, who I'm sure was paraphrasing the sergeant after all these years, but the gist of it is clear enough.

So now this poor, disaffected man who can barely hear and has severe tinnitus in both ears for the rest of his life, day and night, lives as best as he can, despite the institutional cruelty built into the system. "No one's in command of those guys," he said. I remembered that and asked him what he meant. He said when Dick Cheney is the Vice President and Bush the most powerful man in the world, and everyone all the way on down the line does what they say, what possible hope is there for fair or humane treatment at the bottom of the ladder? Then he laughed and said some catch-phrase from the Howard Stern show (apparently) and half-skipped across the street to god knows where.

9 comments:

Unknown said...

Someone else who sees the world as it is, although it's fucked with his hearing. He sounds like an interesting guy, although I imagine the world at large sees him as an eccentric.

His comments about Bush bring Rousseau to mind. Maybe, with the US elections on the horizon, at the moment everyone is that little bit freer of those chains, but it's a cycle. The man was right.

Metamatician said...

Yep. That's why I will be stuffing the ballot box (if I could) for Obama, even though swapping out an evil President for a better one won't change the basic power structure of America or the world's elite at large. But it's something.

America, for better or worse, leads the rest of the world, and our financial crises become those of the world, our instability leads to wars and 'cleansings' like Darfur breaking out more than they already do. As de-facto rulers we have to do the best job we can, and the President does have some influence over that by the way he (only "he" for now unfortunately) presents himself and the speeches he gives.

The military was have been just as corrupt and the financial power-brokers just as conniving during the Kennedy administration, but for whatever reason, people in other countries (barring the Soviet Bloc naturally) liked Kennedy, and thus generally liked Americans and what the country stood for. Now because of Mr. Bush they are extremely skeptical. Perhaps, perhaps a progressive move like electing Obama will help starting swinging that pendulum the other way again.

The USA needs "the world" as much as the other was around. The financial markets of London, Paris, Frankfurt, and Tokyo are all inextricably intertwined with Wall Street. We're all in one big global boat and some more faith and trust between nations would go a long way, in my way of thinking, in eventually restoring consumer and borrower confidence: people want to see that the whole edifice is solid before they go spend frivolous money on shitty Chinese goods or an overpriced home. If Western Europe, democratic Asia, and the US could all become buddies again, then we could get financially healthy and get back to doing what's important: Fighting the damn Russians!

Metamatician said...

Nice way to work in Rousseau there, by the way. I'm impressed. I thought you were going to discuss Thomas Paine and John Locke next. :)

Hans said...

It was nice of you to try to talk to him. I feel so bad for him!! There are a lot of war victims. I'm feeling pretty bad right now, knowing the Vietnam Vets didn't get treated well. My generation and I haven't done anything to help. Screw the war and the goverment - those poor souls thought they were helping, but it's just a big game and now they know it. It's awful the way some of them suffer. When I was at the California Veterans Home last week, I learned that they have a building for the Iraq vets coming back with no legs - damn Busha and his henchmen and all the other power mongers that ever lived.

Unknown said...

Sometimes I'm not sure if America realsies it needs the rest of the wrold. Or maybe it's only the Republican-voting sector of the population that doeasn't. Still, I don;t know if you all realise who the rest of the world is holding it's breath. Is there any significant number of people outisde the US who think it's be a good thing for the world at large for McCain to get in?

You never know, it may come back down to fighting the Russians at the rate they're going.

I'm not knowledgeable enough to have moved on from Rousseau. You'll just have to stick to being impressed at my mention of the one philosopher.

Metamatician said...

One thing I haven't heard in any of these debates from any of the candidates is any concern over how the world views this country. Both sides seem arrogrant or blind over the fact, reiterating that we need to do what's best for our national security and economic growth. In that way we're like Imperial Russia, isolationist and self-important.

Of course every nation has its own survival and prosperity as its primary goal, but layered onto that is usually a concern about, 'ok, now how to do interface with our neightbors? Trade with them, ignore them, invade them?' America seems as always to think it operates in a vaccum, the way Apple Computer does, and that if it does a really good job it will be strong and things will take care of themselves. After all, look at the way the country (and Apple) were formed - a rebellion and a mini rebellion in a garage, respectively.

This is admirable in a way, but naive in many others, especially in the 21st century. Isolationism might have worked during the long build-up process that gave us such a tremendous economic infrastructure and engine, but it was necessary in the two world wars to become aware of threats oversees and see the benefits in having allies.

And the world today is smaller than ever, and economies especially are more intertwined. Yet our politicians (who only reflect the views of the majority of their constituents) still act as though this were the 19th century in many ways, or the 80s for Apple. Apple is learning - they are not so closed and proprietary as they once were (they now use Intel chips, for example, and the iPhone doesn't run on an "Apple network," they use AT&T or other carriers). But the country, unlike that company, is slower in getting the message.

It's an international world now. We have a disproportionate amount of the wealth and technology and R&D still, but that's lessening, and unless we rebuild lots of bridges burned in the last decade, and also reach out diplomatically to the developing world instead of talking to them condescendingly and then dumping rice on their heads, and unless we match actions like trying to catch Bin Laden (my theory is he's hanging out with Waldo) with things like going in (WITH the UN) to Darfur and stopping the genocide their, anything we do internationally will be seen as cynical and opportunistic, for our own purposes.

Truman and Eisenhower understood all this when the Marshall Plan was put into place to rebuild a war-torn Europe after World War 2. It was a phenomenal idea - help the people you just defeated? Make treaties with them? Give them aid? But look at the alliance the West built to keep the world from going Stalinist (I won't even say communist because a communist state shouldn't be a dictatorship). And it worked!

This current administration seems to have forgotten that entire lesson in trying to act unilaterally in the world. I think McCain would be more of the same, and most importantly the message it would send (even if he did, say, make actual better policy decisions) would be terrible - guess what, we're not even changing parties! So it's disheartening not to hear, especially from Democrats, the message that apart from all the substantive issues, there is the real issue of restoring our image as well. And the only way you do that is by admitting mistakes and making a 'regime change' of our own.

It won't be a panacea for the troubled economic times ahead, or for a wobbly Pakistan, a nuclear-hungry Iran, or a newly aggressive Russia. These all have to be dealt with too. But it's a lot easier job with the UK, France, Japan, and the rest of our "allies" actually acting like allies and helping out. You bully your friends at your own peril. We don't so much need Obama for his policies or skin color or anything else as much (IMO) as a sign that things will be different than they have been, and at least go back to the Clinton era when things were done with UN approval and the global economy was growing like crazy. Some countries and religions will always hate the USA or any democratic power, but if we acted less brazen and at least got our FRIENDS back, then our enemies wouldn't seem to lurk in every other bush.

Pun intended retroactively.

Metamatician said...

Still impressed about Rousseau. Don't downplay it! You have to act as though you have a philosopher at hand to cite for any given occasion. =)

Hans said...

Just have to mention that the Truman/Eisenhower days were the good old days for me. It was The Innocent Age, i hope not the last of them.

Metamatician said...

I wish I'd lived during the heady post-war years sometimes and had that innocent childhood you did - but ours wasn't bad either, except for the scariness of the Cold War hanging there in the background all the time. I liked the 80s even though lots of people despised them. Every decade/era is what you make of it I guess, and what your particular circumstances are.

Plus, it's a pretty 'glass half empty' way to look at things, but the more innocent your childhood and the more sheltered you were from the seedy elements of adult life, or extreme poverty, disease, discrimination, or whatever, the further you have to fall when that shelter is breached. I fell out of the nest pretty hard - I guess like Mulder I wanted to believe. In Santa Claus, Magic, God, whatever.

I guess I still feel really betrayed by life and the universe for being so empty and devoid of answers to anything. Some people at this point run back to "parents" of some kind - become born-again, for example. I can't do that, can't forget what I've seen and thought and come to know.

Now I can only try to forget the whole thing, forget life being any kind of Disney product complete with moral and happy ending, forget about getting the princess who fits the glass slipper, forget everything kids love and put my mind and energy into something, like finding the beauty that IS in the world, then taking pictures of it and writing about it in a way that shared it with others. Maybe I can comfort others in my position.

Thanks for contributing, everyone. I like good conversations. :)

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