Another Monday. Yesterday was yet another washout of a Sunday. The rain ended at some point last night when the sun had set. Mike was over and that was fun. Some in depth soul searching conversation occured. I also helped him with his laundry. I washed, he hung out to dry.
I had a dream before waking. I was walking to Maxwell’s and ran into Maurice Menares on the sidewalk outside. We both went in and things were just as they were 36 years ago. I lingered at the front bar for a minute before heading into the kitchen looking for Steve Fallon who was jokingly trying not to be found. He was talking to Maurice by the shelves where things were settled and sweated.
Then I found Julio at the back bar using a new type of register which was supposed to be cutting edge, or at least that is what Julio told me. The alarm went off soon after that and I stumbled out of bed before the sun had arisen. Lucifer bearer of light was a bit tardy this morning.
It’s Columbus Day or more succinctly, Indigenous Peoples Day. That makes more sense. It was was a plot line on the Sopranos back in the day. The indignity of the Italian Americans, upset that Christopher Columbus was vilified for his crimes against humanity. I was brought up being taught that Columbus was a hero when in actuality he was a genocidal maniac with the backing of the Spanish monarchy as well as the blessing of the Roman Catholic Church.
I saw a show at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in the 1980s with my brother Frank that had a segment about Columbus discovering the new world. It was possibly the first time I came across that line of thought, that Columbus was a bad guy. Years later, reading Howard Zinn, it was set in stone, at least in my mind.
Listening to the Slits right now. I think Dave Bell turned me onto them. Jimmy Chile heard a bit of them for the first time and liked what he heard. It reminded me of Laszlo Papp, or more specifically a girl he used to like; in what sense, I do not know but he was somewhat smitten. I think her name was Nanette, or it might have been Babette.
She was probably my age but far more worldly than me. She lived in Fort Lee with her parents, or one of her parents. She danced like Ari Up and showed me how to skank like I was in Madness. There was something about her though; perhaps a piece of the puzzle was missing. I thought she was intimidating but harmless and I was very much an innocent, if not a wimp that Laszlo tolerated, probably like the DeNunzio brothers took Laszlo under their shoulders when they were in the Feelies.
When I started working at Maxwell’s I was a barback that took over the Friday night gig working alongside Declan and Martha. Keith DeNunzio had the barback position before me. I recall giving him a ride home to Rutherford and he may have said something untoward about my brother Frank. I told Frank about it and whatever friendship Frank might have had with Keith DeNunzio evaporated. Keith called me out on it.
Laszlo was the best man at Keith’s marriage to a woman named Kim. I met them years before Maxwell’s. Kim was good friends with my Weehawken roommate William and stayed with us for a spell in the 90’s after living abroad. Other friends of mine didn’t like her but she seemed fine to me. Those other friends of mine were quite judgemental, it was all very high school.
I do have a nice memory from the summer of 1980. I was hanging out with Laszlo, Keith & Kim at Laszlo’s parent’s house. It was a beautiful summer night and the four of us went across Market St to a field and spent time, past midnight being silly and kicking a soccer ball back & forth. It was lovely and innocent.
I think I got home around 3:00 AM and was greeted by the back of my father’s hand across my 17 year old face, cursing me for staying out so late. Yes it was late, but it was such a magic night. Time flew by. No drinks, no drugs (at least not for me) just wonderfulness that came crashing down due to my father’s foul temper.
Keith and Kim divorced and Kim moved to Spain. Keith remarried to someone and I think he’s a dad. I got along with the other DeNunzio brother though it’s fleeting in that once small circle of Maxwell’s people.
A Google Gemini rewrite as a Luis Bunuel essay
**The Absurd Machinery of Memory**
Another Monday, which is to say, another exercise in meaningless repetition. Sunday was consumed by rain—that eternal, tedious baptism of bourgeois boredom. The deluge ceased only when the sun had conveniently hidden itself behind the horizon, as if ashamed to illuminate our trivialities. My friend Mike arrived. We engaged in what humans fondly call “soul-searching,” a desperate attempt to find weight in air, while engaged in the profoundly domestic ritual of laundering fabric. I washed the garments; he hung them to dry, like wet flags of a surrender no one requested.
Before waking, my subconscious staged its usual phantom opera. I found myself strolling toward Maxwell’s, encountering Maurice Menares upon the pavement. We crossed the threshold, and by some blasphemous alchemy of the mind, time collapsed: it was thirty-six years ago. I lingered at the front bar—that altar of liquid anesthesia—before drifting into the kitchen to seek Steve Fallon, who was staging a mock evasion among the shelves where grease and sweat had long since solidified into history. Near the rear bar, Julio was brandishing a new cash register, declaring it “cutting-edge.” How delicious, the human devotion to mechanical progress! Then the alarm shrieked. I was expelled from the dream into the cold room before dawn. Lucifer, the light-bearer, was unpardonably late.
Today, society celebrates Columbus Day—or Indigenous Peoples Day, depending on which hypocritical myth best soothes the conscience of the state. It brings to mind an episode of *The Sopranos*, where petty bourgeois Italian-Americans wept over the perceived slander of their beloved explorer. How sublime, the indignation of men defending a genocidal fanatic simply because he shares their lineage! We were raised to revere him, this monster who butchered under the dual banner of the Spanish Crown and the Holy Roman Catholic Church.
I recall a theatrical piece at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in the 1980s, attended with my brother Frank, which dared to suggest Columbus was a murderer. It was perhaps my first glimpse through the crack in the patriotic stained-glass window. Years later, reading Howard Zinn, the illusion shattered completely.
At this moment, the dissonant rhythms of The Slits fill the room—a recommendation, I believe, from Dave Bell. Jimmy Chile heard a passage and approved. The noise dragged from my memory the phantom of Laszlo Papp and a girl who once held his volatile affection. Was her name Nanette? Babette? It hardly matters.
She was young, yet possessed that terrifying, worldly disdain peculiar to women who have outgrown their surroundings. She lived in Fort Lee, surrounded by domestic quietude, yet she danced with the wild frenzy of Ari Up, forcing my awkward limbs to learn the skank of Madness. She intimidated me, though she was harmless enough; I was an innocent, a wimp tolerated by Laszlo in the same manner the DeNunzio brothers once tolerated him.
My entrance into the hierarchy of Maxwell’s began as a humble barback on Friday nights, laboring beside Declan and Martha. I inherited the post from Keith DeNunzio. I once drove Keith home to Rutherford, where he uttered some casual blasphemy regarding my brother. I, possessing the foolish loyalty of youth, reported the transgression to Frank. Whatever fragile alliance existed between them evaporated instantly, and Keith confronted me for my betrayal of the unspoken code.
Yet, human relations are a tangle of absurd contradictions. Laszlo stood as best man when Keith married Kim, a woman I had met long before the tavern days. She stayed in our Weehawken apartment during the nineties after returning from abroad. My companions despised her with the righteous, petty snobbery of high school moralists, but to me, she was entirely unobjectionable.
I am left with one luminous, irrational fragment from the summer of 1980. Laszlo, Keith, Kim, and I gathered at Laszlo’s family home. It was a midnight of surreal beauty. We crossed Market Street into a dark, empty field, kicking a soccer ball back and forth under the sky. There was no alcohol, no narcotics—only a pure, unprovoked joy.
I returned home at three in the morning, only to be greeted by the back of my father’s hand striking my seventeen-year-old face, accompanied by a chorus of patriarchic curses. The bourgeoisie cannot tolerate uncalculated joy. The magical night was instantly crushed under the boot of authority and foul temper.
Keith and Kim eventually divorced. She vanished to Spain; he remarried and produced progeny. I occasionally run into the other DeNunzio, though we are merely ghosts waving to one another across the shrinking, forgotten circle of our youth.