one of my pet theories of life has some corroboration from other realms. my theory, or maybe it is just an observation, is that lavishment of undeserved moneys upon someone is an expression of disdain. so, if i tipped this bartender $400 for his usual night’s works on my behalf, that would be not just extravagent but a form of disdain and condescension.

i presented this scenario to friends and acquaintances, all of whom disagreed with me. all felt that a munificent tip, unexpected and even undeserved, would be a miracle, a great thing. i, on the other hand, might return the money, or simply leave it there, in the way that apocryphal “old wives” said that one should let an insult hang unanswered, its ugliness left to twist in the wind, of its own volition, whence it might make its way back to s/he who spoke it.

that kind of vulgar display of wealth is a form of disdain, i think.

i remember during “The Gates” at Central Park, the most common complaint I heard about it was that the stink of money was overwhelming. none of the “commoners” i knew wanted to be downwind from that ludicrous manifestation of financial exhaust, which felt to some like snot roaring down a giant pair of human nostrils.

so the point of corroboration (if that is the appropriate term) came last night when, for whatever reason, the lyrics to Harry Chapin’s TaxiDriver song surfaced in my always-cluttered mind. In that song Harry is a cab driver who picks up a woman and drives her to her house. She looks familiar, she snubs his attempts at conversation, until she recognizes him and it turns out she is a wealthy actress starlet now, while Harry is a cabbie. they had been lovers, long long ago. there is conversation, he drops her off at her magnificent abode, where harry says “She handed me twenty dollars for a two-fifty fare and said ‘Harry, keep the change.'” and another man mighta been angry, and another man might abeen hurt, but another man never woulda let her go… “i put the bill in my shirt.”

now, were i in Harry’s position, i woulda stuck the bill in *her* shirt (huh huh) but i think that Chapin’s set-up to this scenario of disdainful lavishment of wealth is more provocative than mine. having known that song since youth i think it may have informed my belief that conspicuous lavishments of wealth on undeservings are vulgar and insulting, and that wealth itself can be vulgar.

…..

i should not have gone outside today. the mother’s day cultural effluvia made more of an impact on me than i might have expected. i imagined someone asking me if i talked to my mother today. no, i would say. i couldn’t find a Ouija board. it rarely surfaces in my mind but today i remembered how i was 41 when both my parents were gone. that seemed young to me. i don’t know, yet, if it really is young, except that i am a young 43, and always a little boy inside.

i know others whose parents were gone before they ever knew they existed. and that word: “gone”. that was the word my sister used to tell me. i think it must have been the word the doctor used to tell her. i’ve heard it since. Gone. “She’s gone.” if i had written President Obama’s speech last week i would have said “Osama bin Laden is gone.” Or, “He’s gone.”

Gone.

She’s gone.