the rix mix

Times Square on New Year's Eve has never attracted me. Of the stuff you do when you're young just because, that had zilch appeal, & it was only a short train ride away.

New Year's Eve isn't a significant night for me. It was when I wasn't old enough to stay up until midnight or go out - then it had an allure. I took myself off the road on New Year's Eve so long ago I don't remember when, but I was coming home from South Brunswick on Route 1 in light traffic & then encountered all the chain restaurants at closing - Bennigan's, TGIF, Chi Chi's. You can't drink if you're driving, which takes away most of the point of partying, but you have to figure everyone else on the highway is in the bag. So if I couldn't walk or take a train, I didn't go. A couple of Eve's all I had to do to get to a party was go down a flight of steps, turn right, & go up some steps. That was ideal.

I remember as a high school junior, my friend Tom had gotten the phone number of a girl in Union, the next town, we called her on New Year's Eve, she had two friends over, her parents were out, & there were three of us including Danny, so we leaned on my older brother, who had nothing much to do, to drive us over there. It was about two miles away & he agreed, with the warning that he might not be available to pick us up since he planned on drinking a six pack & digging his new jazz record. We decided girls were worth the risk. Had a good time, innocent chips & soda, records & playing with dripping candles stuff, our hostess' parents weren't upset when they came home. I suspected the little party was prearranged between the girls & Tom, although nobody ever copped to it. My brother did pick us up very late, amused. I sort of dated one of those girls for a few months, sweet, Catholic of course. We had to end it because it was an impossible long-distance relationship; 5 miles to her house & we went to different high schools. Had fun making out when we were together. I've had a couple of those kinds of things since then.

Extraordinary political year. Many big images, but an odd small one, too. The first night of the Repug convention, a delegate, man with a "funny" hat, a doll of (now President-elect) Obama gripped in the jaws of an alligator, obvious reference to an old racist joke. Unselfconscious, uncomprehending, not even angry or arrogant. The hat was who he was, what he was, & what he would always be. Had he been asked about the hat, he would've claimed (or feigned) cluelessness. Even at that late date, after the amazing Democratic primary campaign, the spectacles of Obama's crowds & speeches, the unity of the Democrats, Obama's popularity with independent voters, he probably believed completely that it was impossible for a black man named Barack Hussein Obama to be elected President of the United States, much less be elected by a huge national majority, no matter what the polls were indicating. I wasn't so sure myself because of people like him. But that man's candidates lost. He did vote with the majority of white people. But he was on the losing side all the same. I suppose he kept his racist hat, maybe shows it to his pals & has a laugh, & says, "Hey, I was on TV."

Labels: growing up, holidays, THE election