feeling guilty on account of bobby vinton. i have a ticket to his concert of september 12, 2001, and i came into possession of this ticket by klepto-maniacal mistake. at a used book store i picked up a book. i remember nothing of the book save for thinking, as i picked it up, “books are going away. they will be a luxury item. a specialty interest. used book shops might have an opportunity…“ mwahmwah (that‘s the ineffable Ms. Othmar voice). i opened the book and a watercolor painting fell out. an unremarkable work, used as a bookmark. then i spotted another bookmark, this one a ticket to a bobby vinton concert in missouri on september 12, 2001, the day after 9/11. did that concert happen? or was missouri in lockdown? can i please learn to spell missouri with confidence? evidently i slipped the bobby vinton ticket into my pocket without buying the book. the book, as an object, is castrated of itsthrift-shop/used book store value. now it‘s just a book, i cant remember its title, but it is just a book without a bobby vinton ticket to make it unique.
i had just been thinking, stream-of-consciously as i approached the store, about 9/11, in the context of “man on wire“ and the imposisble tightrope walk philippe petit made between those towers. i was remembering a quote from some anonymous government source in some news paper that uses anonymous sources so often that i am certain they invent them much of the time. regardless, an anonymous government source said that had the planes hit the capitol or the white house or a number of other singular targets then “that‘s it. game over.“ s/he made it seem as if water would stop flowing in arizona and louisiana on account of a single facility in washington, d.c., being obliterated by a plane not unlike the one that clumsily skidded into the Pentagon, but which had its choice of targets that day. the vunerabilities to our infrastructure were unimaginable but most of what we lost was a couple of office buildings and those trapped inside. why do i still think about that day? why does it surface in my mind? every day, several times. i instinctively, habitually look for those towers, trying to ascertain which way is south, which way is up or down, which way i am facing or which way is facing me. each time this happens i grit my teeth, i whisper “the bastards! they got ‘em! the bastards got ‘em!“ and then i resort to sorting my location by street address or number. i still get lost, though. without those towers telling me where south is i often do not know where i am going.
did the bobby vinton concert of 9/12/01 happen? i‘ll find out later.
