new age babbit
Jim would be the first to admit it. He's a lousy husband, father, businessman, employer, citizen, human being. That's ok. It's easy to overlook those flaws because Jim has one other redeeming virtue.
In Ithaca, New York Jim is a player.
Yup, or yessureebob or whatever hick town convention of affirmation you choose, ole Jimbob has the capital or, at least, the access to capital, to set things in motion. There are people around town who depend on Jim for their livilhood. Insurance men, bankers, car dealers, carpenters, plumbers, electricians, wee little clerks, dharma bums, business associates, bitter old men, guys who have been wronged by Jim, guys who are suing Jim, guys who will never step into another business Jim starts, other guys who will kiss Jim's ass and try to sell him a new computer application to run the next poorly managed, understaffed, underfinanced sprocket business Jimbob sets up. (Jim doesn't really deal in sprockets, of course. If Ez gave away too many details, Jimbob might know we're talking about him, Jim Curon, not the dowdy Everyman Jim thinks we're describing.It's gets rather complicated during a hatchet job on a private citizen even if he's a universally recognized fool --at least around Ithaca, New York.)
Jim is the product of two separate developments. First, the two hundred or so year pathetic evolution of the modern bourgeiosie from its origins in Europe to its post industrial, consumerist, politically impotent incarnation in 21st Century America. . Secondly, the marketing and subsequent product development of Buddhism in the United States. Yep, you see, Jimbob is a dharma groupie. Since his early formless tree hugging days, Jim has been enamored of the easy morality and intellectual slipperiness of California Buddhism. You know, the Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsburg school of Buddhism where you blow smoke out your ass and call it wisdom. (After all, Jack Jerouac was the perfect salesman for American Buddhism, an amoral, solipistic, hedonistic, drifter/drifter. Does Ez betray his distaste for the lot? Live with it!)
This is how it goes, at least here's Ez's attempt to dissect the origin of Jimness --
like cutting jello with a laser, haha.
As an endproduct of bourgeios inbreeding, Jim exhibits all the typical signs of narcissistic disturbance. He's selfish to a fault, totally focused on his own needs and the endless pursuit of the latest model Blackberry. According to the Buddha, however, it's all illusion --maya. Nothing really exists, nothing really matters, it's all an illusion. Follow so far? Add to this consciousnessness soup the modern bourgeiosie's penchant for slipping out of any kind of accountability, personal responsibility, what have you --and you have Jimbob, new age babbit. If all these other people in the universe are really just illusions, fuck them. In Jim's mind, that means he can screw them, con them, cheat them, walk all over them, undepay them, and, ultimately, bore them with impunity. (Ez doesn't know if there is anything like perfect impunity but that's another issue.)
Well, why do you think they call him Satan?
Anyway, Jim is the kind of scoundrel that always lands on top. Which means that someone else lands on the bottom. Here's a for instance. Jim borrowed a lot of money and opened up a giant amusement park on the edge of town. He suckered a lot of people into investing their hard earned money and time in franchising all the rides, carousels, cotton candy booths needed to float Jim's fun park. (Of course, Ez is playing fast and easy with the truth --the truth being less than literal.) Then, Jimbob proceeded to mismanage the place, screw the staff, literally and figuaratively, con a lot of people into slapping fresh coats of paint on Jimbob's financial sinkhole, until the day of reckoning when the money ran out and the last antique carousel horse was sent to the glue factory.
At which point, admidst the deitrus of his failed business empire, the howls of his creditors, the pain of his partners and employees, Jimbob opened up a Buddhist retreat center. Buddha babbit, dharma devil, man around town.
That's just one of the 100,000 stories in the naked village.
Comments invited at: ezrakidder@gmail.com - Peace, Ezra at 4:04 PM
