he loved to readeveryone ought to read

if he walked about without a book between his handsunder his eyes he felt odd unbalancedhis perceptions skewed  peering at his surroundings rather than taking them in in determined peeks  random bright revelations      

reading informs

                 it reminds us entertains us stomps on orthodoxys toes  denies dogmawhistles  

otherwise life is unexamined an ignorant life

                                               despite apparent ignorance which today seems to enjoy its unwavering salutary fans

he was reading A Confederacy of DUNCES how fuckin appropriate

                                                                           John Kennedy Tooles 1981 posthumous Pulitzer Prize winner Toole gassed himself in his car outside Biloxi Mississippi in Sixtynine things to do while in Mississippi

while walking he read

                        I would like to know what the Founding Fathers would say if they could see these children (he was watching television) being debauched to furthur the cause of Clearasil. However, I always suspected the democracy would come to this . . . A firm rule must be imposed upon our nation before it destroys itself. The United States needs some theology and geometry, some taste and decency. I suspect that we are teetering on the edge of the abyss.

Toole ceased revising DUNCES in Sixtyfive

walking reading he laughed sardonically  ironically  then he spat aloud Joe Fridays Dragnet bit Just the facts Just the facts ma’am and imagined Joe spinning in his grave at the toutingthe whining of Fake News of Fake Law and Order

of real Cruelty and somehow vindicating Debasementfeeling better for themselves at the expense of Others

Toole wasnt necessarily prescient 

the 60s werent quiet

Nixonian weeds were planted they were cultivated and enduring they inevitably one day would unfurl like miserable orchids their scent a stench permeating the atmosphere admirers Lotus-Eaters lotophages breathed deeply and sighed resisters retched and wiped awful tears and sting from their eyes before their senses rallied and they regained their footing  

abject shock takes its toll

who was he when he looked in a mirror  a book clutched in his hand  

did he look like act like talk like the manchild who represents the American presiduncey to the eyes of a bewildered world

no

   but then that man didnt read  or let alone could walk and chew gum at the same time

1519,  Reggae Friday,  29  6. 18

0944,  Saturday, 30  6. 18

935 days remaining or less

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