The Skeeter Daddle Diaries

I was over at a friend’s house up on the North End, looking at his newly crafted cigar box banjos. I know what you’re thinking … and yes, I do have friends on the North End. And no, these cigar box banjos weren’t some thrown together in a drunken afternoon cheeseballs masquerading as musical instruments. They were objets d’art first of all — and first of all they were musical instruments, from the tuning pegs to the piezo pickups that allowed them to be played through an amp, which gave my buddy’s slide blues a nasty growl. You’d think you’d landed in a late night bar on the Lousville waterfront next to the Ohio River in 1920.

I’m forever amazed at how many folks are out there, just out of sight, doing their own thing, not for remuneration or accolades, just for the sheer joy of it. Folks who never joined the Arts Associations, folks who work with woods and metals and found objects and cigar boxes and whatever else comes to hand. My pal told me the story of a local artist at a la-de-da soiree asking what he did after crowing about her own artistic achievements so he mentioned a few projects he’d completed recently. “Oh,” she said dismissively, “you’re a crafts person.”

We so-called artists like to draw a distinction between art and craft. As if they’re inescapably discrete and inviolably separate. It’s a boring argument, trust me, like arguing religion, fit only for adolescents and morons with an ideological bent. But I do know this: there are people like my cigarbox buddy who apply a spark of creativity to everything they touch. They probably can’t help it, it’s as natural as laughing. The old adage that something worth doing is worth doing well rolls off their imagination slightly differently. If it’s worth doing, it’s worth doing with p-zazz.

My own definition of an artist — and it’s the same for a craftsman — is a person who creates their life. In their own image. Meaning, with their own imagination. They make the world around them. They create. They don’t do it so they can say at some party they’re an artiste. They do it because there’s no other way to do it. And when I’m fortunate enough to be around them, they’re an inspiration. Those cigarbox banjos — they belong in a museum. But meantime, they got some blues waiting to come out, stuff that will make a toe tap, stuff that will make you smile, stuff that will make a guy like me want to try to make one myself. It’s about all I can ask from art.

Almost all us old farts that use a computer these digital days are basically self taught. The student becomes the teacher. The blind, of course, are leading the blind. Most of us think a computer is a mail shortcut — we open it up, check our e-mail (mostly jokes and political rants), maybe forward a few, then go back to CNN or Fox News on the TV. Some of the more adventurous of us learn to download photos or music, maybe catch some internet news or use Google, but really we barely dip a toe in the oceanic vastness of what is someone’s Brave New World but certainly not ours.

We’re just tourists skimming the surface of a planet we don’t know how to land on, whose language we’ll never learn, whose inhabitants won’t notice us beyond the mosquito buzz we generate as we hover over a Mac or a PC or a smartphone. Meanwhile the world below is morphing before our eyes, but we have no clue and Wikipedia and Google aren’t much help.

Even the kids don’t really scratch deep. Oh, they learn a smidgeon of a complicated program for a job, Photoshop say, or Publisher, but beyond their current needs, the complexity is too overwhelming to retain if it’s not repeated day after day. The world is moving too fast now to keep up.

Maybe it always was. Gramp had to learn to drive the new fangled tractor, then he had to learn how to fix the danged thing. Most folks couldn’t change a tire much less tear down an engine. The computer goes blue or malware invades its brain, we’re adrift without compass or GPS in a forest at night, hopeless and helpless.

And totally dependent. We’ve become the children of the machine. It’s a loveless bargain, but … they’ve closed the orphanage and there’s no going home now.

The South End Grange has been shrinking faster than our old growth nettle forests, which may be a meaningful correlation … unless you’re of the mindset that thinks science is a hoax foisted on you by us radical liberals hiding here on the hedonistic head of the island. Membership keeps declining and it’s harder and harder to recruit the agrarian-minded now that the family farm has gone the way of Eisenhower Republicans and McGovern Democrats. Desperate times, of course, call for desperate measures. Who you gonna call??

The South End String Band, of course. Which is who the Grange called for its loco-ly known high powered PR Machine. When old time fiddle music seemed poised for extinction, they brought it back from the precipice, dressed it up as South End Roots Music and made fortunes on CD’s, T-shirts and memorabilia before offering shares on the Chinese stockmarket. Obviously they had the savvy to save the Grange from the dustbin of history.

Following a four hour brainstorming session at the Mabana Yacht Club’s exclusive Pilot House Lounge, the Band emerged into the early afternoon sunlight with a Plan, one deceptively simple, almost painfully obvious and no doubt destined to serve as prototype for marketing strategies at the Harvard School of Bizness and the Phoenix School of mail order agricultural degrees.

Cannabis. The New Pharming. The most lucrative crop in America, bigger than corn, bigger than soybeans, bigger even than medical nettle. And for the past half century, the only crop on the South End. And now … LEGAL. Welcome to the 60’s, y’all! Agriculture is King once again and the Grange and the lava lamp are both coming BACK!!

So dust off those bellbottoms, bro, unpack those tie-dyes, sister, turn on the blacklights, dude, clean up the hookahs, Alice, cause the South End String Band is playing a Strange Grange Ganja Gig Saturday, Nov. 1. Come on down and join them in a return to the Age of Aquarius. The Past was nothing but Prologue and the Present is nothing if not Psychedelic. The South End: where the 60’s met the Sound. And the Sound is the South End String Band!!

A few of the Boyz were gathered at the South End Brewery’s Tasting Lounge this week, what Hophead, the brewmaster, refers to as the Test Lab. Try out some of his 10 gallon experiments on us layabouts and see if our finely attenuated palates approve before going into full bore production. Heavy Nettle IPA, Habanero Hefeweizen, Sinsemilla Stout — they all made it through our rigorous if hazy sampling regimen before hitting the consumer market with our rave review seals of approval.

Gary the Growler was opining over his Honey Nettle Lager how Pabst Blue Ribbon had just been sold to the Russians. “This is what it’s come to,” he lamented, peering into his glass with its frothy head as if consulting a liquid oracle. “Budweiser sells out to the foreigners and keeps a red white and blue can like we’re too stupid to see patriotism as an advertising ploy and now Pabst is bought up by the communists while they’re annexing pieces of Ukraine.”

“Business as usual, Gary,” Randy sniffs cynically. Randy’s van sits outside the taproom front window.     DON’T ROTO-ROOT IT      LET RANDY DO IT
Randy fell on hard times as a plumbing sub contractor when the housing bubble burst. He makes ends meet with pick-up jobs, clogged drains, kitchen remodels, toilet repair, but most afternoons he’s down at the Tasting Lounge licking wounds and foam. “The people who run this country would sell their grandmother for a buck fifty.”

“But Pabst Blue Ribbon, man,” Gary is saying. “That’s as American as apple pie. Maybe more American. My first beer was a PBR.”

“The beer that made Moscow famous,” Randy says, shaking his head and sipping his pint knowingly, a man who knows the game is rigged and not in his favor.

Hophead pours me a dark Heavy Nettle. “Don’t worry, boys,” he announces cheerfully. “This brewery is staying right here on the South End. I guess since we’re at the end of the island at the far edge of the continent, we’re the last beer in America.”

Randy shrugs. “If you think the South End is still in America, I guess. Some folks don’t. Me, I don’t know what America is anymore.” I raise my glass. “Drink up, Randy and cheer up. This isn’t the last beer. Not in a long shot. Next one’s on me and my capitalist cronies.”

As a roving cultural sociologist, I’m trained for acute observational situations, some not for the squeamish. Recently I have been traveling, plenty of airport time, and over the past week I have tuned in to public cellphone etiquette in a deep way. In a nutshell, there is no etiquette. Down on the South End folks have a cellphone but it hasn’t been surgically implanted. Yet. For the frequent flyer, it has ….

I used to be annoyed when perfect strangers stood next to me and shouted into their wireless devices. Nowadays I enjoy eavesdropping and even making commentary. Better they move off, not me. A lot of the boys like to chat while in the bathroom. Empty a bladder and catch up on the office goings-on. I suspect a lot of business is conducted with an open zipper. This may actually be what experts call multi-tasking. I hate to think — and I’ll spare you as well — what goes on behind stall doors. But it might go a long way toward explaining the economic downturn. Not to mention Apple’s sales successes, no doubt the result of phones dropped in the toilet.

Stewardesses now have to demand certain passengers turn off their phones. Apparently the cellularly addicted think it is not only an obligation to use their cell, it’s a constitutional right. Mark my words, you will see an upsurge in air marshals wrestling I-phones from furious passengers soon. To be disconnected for the length of a runway take-off is tantamount to ripping I-V drips from the terminally ill. The medical terminology is woefully behind, but Cellular Anxiety is real and it’s epidemic. On landing, every hand goes to a purse or a pocket. That first phonecall is better than a 12 A.M. shot of Jack Daniels for an alcoholic. It’s as if the entire airplane had breathed a collective sigh of relief now that 4-G widthdrawal is finally over. They’re fully connected once more. The nightmare, mercifully, has passed.

“Hi. We’re sitting at the terminal.” The world welcomes them back from the Void. All is well. All is right again. They’ll need to confirm this many times, but the healing process is at their ear. Speed dialing for health. The hive is buzzing happily.

Folks often ask why is it us artists don’t start a co-op art gallery down here on the South End the way most places with an overabundance of aesthetics and egos do. Truth is, we have considered it. And more than a few times, rejected the notion. Personally I love the idea of a joint venture with my fellow artisans, but … well, let’s be brutally honest here, we’re mostly a clueless lot fiscally. Whatever side of the brain controls creativity, it’s not the same side as the side that manages finance, money, business or advertising. In fact, I suspect if we ran a CAT scan on most of our brains, that area would be dark, almost as if aliens had stolen it.

Put a few dozen of us together, say, in a meeting to decide how to organize a co-op art gallery, and let me tell you, it’s an anarchist agenda right from the get-go. Maybe we just don’t get much beyond how many of our watercolors the wall space will hold. Forget leasing the building, forget who manages the sales, forget who sits the place open.

Then you got the issue of who can be IN the co-op. Everybody with a brush and an easel? Or do we jury in the members? And how much for dues? And what commission if anything ever sells? And how do you work the payback for sitting the store? And bylaws … oh yeah, gotta have rules and all that arguable rigamarole!

Ten minutes into the organizational meeting and you got total chaos. Artists vs.craftsmen. Volunteers vs. the Big Names. Rule makers vs. bohemians. Capitalists vs. hedonists. Believe me, you need to carry a weapon. Hopefully you won’t need to use it, but it’s best to be prepared. You think art is a spectator sport, you’d be at risk.

So yeah, we’ve flirted with the notion of an Art Co-op. About as likely as a Sunni-Shi-ite dance studio, you ask me. That’s why we pay galleries a 40-50% commission. To save lives, if nothing else — and probably worth every cent.

Sheila’s Salon was abuzz last Wednesday over a newspaper article Rhonda brought in. “Did you girls know the Equal Rights Amendment never passed?”  Ronald, magenta locks thrown back by his horse laugh over by the shampoo sink, hands full of Mrs. Amundsen’s blue curls, snorted, “Oh my, now the cows are out of the barn.”

Rhonda asked the room what exactly did this mean?? “Are we second class citizens? Can we vote? I mean, what the hell?” Mrs. Amundsen’s discomfort at the sudden heat of what had been an enjoyable conversation about the wonderful summer weather was palpable, at least to Ronald, but nevertheless, he gleefully added fuel to the fire. “Oh, honeys,” he said in mock sincerity, “haven’t you heard the news? You’re the weaker sex, darlings. We he-men can’t just hand out equal rights like bon bons, now can we?”

Sheila, worried that things were soon going to be out of hand, tried to throw cold water on Ronald’s hot jibes. “Of course we can vote. If they’ll let Ronnie’s husband vote, for heaven sake, they’ll let anybody vote.”

“Whoa there, girls! No need to make this personal. I didn’t have a vote on the Amendment when it failed. I was still at my mother’s breast.”

“She probably should’ve bottle fed you, Ronald,” Rhonda fairly shouted. “I just can’t believe, in the 21st Century, we don’t have equal rights. I mean, we got civil rights passed. Slavery’s over, I thought.”

Mrs. Amundsen was picking at her pink vinyl cape nervously, muttering, “My my my now.” Even Jenny Fowler, the hot yoga instructor of the cool demeanor, was growing agitated. “Are you sure it didn’t pass? I mean, why wouldn’t it?”

Revolutions grow from small events. Later, when heads are rolling down the chute, no one will remember — or much care — that Sheila’s South End Salon might have been Ground Zero for the superstorm that overshadowed the Great Recession and the Oil Wars. A woman scorned, once she realizes, well, Lord help the rest of us….

The little house to the north of us is going up for sale soon. The last couple of decades, it’s been a rental.  All kinds of folks lease it and since it’s about the cheapest rent on the South End, cheaper even than the rent for a converted chicken coop a mile up the road, we get some interesting neighbors.  Once we had a glassblower, we’ve had veterinarians, school teachers, a gay couple, a Navy guy, the milkman (twice) and plenty of others.  I suppose it keeps life interesting for us … but mostly it’s a steady stream of transient neighbors, some good, some not, some we barely met or saw.

Our shack was originally built by Pearl … and her daughter Ruby built the house now for sale.  Ruby was a burlesque dancer in Seattle and Gomorrah, eventually came back to the South End and taught ballroom dancing in Stanwoodopolis in the early 40’s.  We have a 5 foot high full size Art Deco photo of Ruby we found in the wall of the shack Pearl built that we keep now in our bedroom.  It’s a bit risqué, but hey, history is history.

We were over at the house next door awhile ago today.  They’ve got the old wellhouse torn down and we were staring down the 110 foot well hole, hand dug, 3 feet in diameter.  All of us thought it had collapsed some 30 years ago … but no, it had 6 or 7 feet of water down there, catching debris and unsuspecting mice and wayward children.  I suggested they maybe cap it off a little more securely than the old plywood, the rotted cedar door and the wheelbarrow turned upside down over the hole.  But then, who am I, the building inspector?

We’re considering buying the place.  A lot of money.  But if someone else buys it, they’ll cut the trees and build a McMansion up on the hill for the view.  Might be okay, might be it changes our own view.  Hard to say.  If we buy it, what do we do with the house?  Rent it?  Use it as another studio?  Tear it down?

We’re considering, what you call em, Options.  What’s our privacy worth.  Do I need to mow more lawn.  Do we need more gardens and home improvements?  And … what are we gonna do with that well?  Right now it’s a big hole in the ground.  Could be we end up with a mortgage that’s the same thing….

I got more than a couple of friends who think the economy — the world economy, no less — is on its way down the toilet. Huge debts, large deficits, the Federal Reserve printing money like it was Charmin — they see a Fiscal Armageddon on the horizon. Depression, unemployment, then the collapse of civilization as we know it. They’re wondering if it’s time to buy a gun. Or an arsenal. They’re wondering if they should buy Chinese currency or a year’s supply of food and water. They’re wondering what to do with their money that will keep them afloat when their neighbors drown.

I remember one of my dad’s pals, Malcolm, building a bomb shelter in his basement. Great guy, Malcolm, salt of the earth, a family man, just taking care of his family down in Northern Georgia near the foothills of the Appalachian where we lived. He took me down into his basement — I was all of 12 years old — to show me the shelter that would keep his family alive after the communists attacked us with nuclear weapons, an event he saw as inevitable.

He had water tanks and shelves full of canned goods. He had gas masks and a propane stove. He had flashlights and a ton of batteries. “Electricity’ll be gone. Maybe forever,” he told me. There were bunk beds and a portable toilet. It looked like Motel 6 had mated with a Goodwill. It really didn’t look like a home for months of subterranean living, unless you were gophers.

In the corner by the door Malcolm had his hunting rifle. “For food?” I asked, thinking maybe a dinner of radioactive deer might be the way to go. Malcolm picked up the gun and gave me a ‘serious’ look. “No, Skeeter,” he said solemnly. “Your dad didn’t plan for what’s coming and … well, when you all try to come to our shelter, I’d have to stop you. There’s only room for us.”

Now, I wasn’t the sharpest kid on the block, but I took his meaning pretty quick. “You mean you’d shoot us, Malcolm?” Malcolm set the rifle back in its spot and nodded. “I have to protect my family first. That’s the way it is.”

It’s real hard to like a man who tells you he’d kill you, whether you’re 12 or 64. The world after a nuclear war, and probably an economic Armageddon too, would be filled with Malcolms. They see the bleakest future and the darkest side of human nature, I suspect because they find it in themselves. Me, I’m not interested in either. But I’m always glad to know who to avoid, catastrophe or no.

I got a couple of friends who live back off the blacktop down a dead end dirt road, a place they could be left alone in peace and quiet. They’re pretty typical South Enders, grow their gardens and plant orchards, live in co-existence with nature and the nettles. An angry God didn’t kick everyone out of the Garden … or so it seemed.

No, sometimes He just sent neighbors instead. The new couple didn’t like how dark their new property was once they’d moved in and the winter monsoons pulled the shade. At first they tried a little pruning, mostly on the southern side where my pals lived. Mostly my pals’ trees, not the seasonally affected couple’s. Well, mistakes happen, my friends thought, probably just some small confusion concerning property lines, no big deal.

When pruning didn’t let much extra sunshine into their place, the new folks cut all their trees … and a few of the adjoining neighbors. My friends’ old cedar was felled while they were out working so imagine their surprise finding a favorite cedar laying in their yard. Words were exchanged. The new couple claimed the trees were on their property, they’d even moved the old survey markers to help prove their contention.More words flew, but post-logging, and those trees would only take 100 years to grow back. My pals hired a survey anyway and their neighbors served them with summonses. For trespassing on their newly expropriated property and also for harassing their kids.

Lawyers were hired, money began to leave faster than trees, a judge asked the couple why they’d filed a suit against one of my friends after the other was acquitted for lack of any evidence, and the husband testified, “because he lives there.” Case dismissed, money lost, peace and tranquility too. The husband put his own non-survey stakes in this week and now my friends wonder what’s next???

There are people who will take an inch, then grab for the mile. The law is an expensive remedy for those like my friends without much money. I don’t advocate taking the law into our own hands, usually, but there are folks who could use a little frontier justice, who thought maybe if we were this gentrified they could take all they wanted while Law and Justice took its own sweet time. They don’t know the South End. But they will shortly.