“The recipe for great art has always been misery and a good bowel movement.”
― Don Roff
Chapter Four
The Duro-Raft: An Owner’s Manual
Note:
This Owner’s Manual was written in December of 1978 about a month before
the divorce was finalized. The court
proceedings were progressing as badly as could be expected in a bitter custody
battle, and I had finally found a new apartment to live in and a schedule with
my 5 and 3 year old children. I had been
dating 2 women and was falling in love with a similarly situated Greek woman
with 2 children and an alcoholic and abusive estranged husband. This Owner’s
Manual was my holiday gift to this woman, my old and new friends and
family, and any co-worker who seemed like a person with a soul.
Introduction
(PLEASE
BE SURE TO READ ALL INSTRUCTIONS CAREFULLY BEFORE USING YOUR NEW RAFT.)
CONGRATULATIONS! You are now the proud owner of the famous
Duro-Raft, the most durable raft known to man.
This raft was invented by a man who grew up in old New Haven, along the
Connecticut shore, where many people used to live and many trucks used to drive
at night. This man had been dreaming for
a long time about inventing a Blimp-Bike, a contraption that would allow a
single person to float above the earth at a maximum height of fifty feet,
propelled merely by pedal power, wind, and a small dose of helium. The inventor felt certain that such an
aircraft, plodding along at a sleepy two or three miles per hour around such
common obstacles as trees and houses (and trucks), would do much to ease the
day-to-day pressures of that time of man.
It
was only after much frustration with the Blimp-Bike design, especially the
laziness of certain computer analysts who were supposed to build the Hydraulic
Stabilizer that he found himself open to new ideas. One evening while enjoying a fried clam
dinner with a very pretty woman who liked to squeeze French fries, he found
that the idea of a raft could possibly meet the bill. Maybe it was, after all, necessary to learn
to function down at sea level before attempting any lofty flights. In any case, through some valuable criticism
from his good friend, he began to form a more specific design for the Duro-Raft,
or his Self. It was certainly clear at
the time, and will remain so, that this is only an initial version of the
Duro-Raft, and that as time goes on, new design modifications will hopefully
cause the Duro-Raft to gradually approach some ideal of perfection. It’s very much like people, who are reminded
that…
“Life’s
greatest achievement is in the continual remaking of yourself so that at last
you know how to live.”
-W.
Rhodes
Care of Your
New Duro-Raft
Your
new Duro-Raft comes fully equipped and has much more potential than you could
ever fully expect to utilize, although you are certainly encouraged to
try. The basic care needed to keep your
raft in perfect running order is to simply respect it at all times, for to a
certain extent it has the ability to fix itself, if left to its own devices.
This
may seem incredible for an invention from the old days when things go broken
easily and then discarded, and then replaced as soon as the item went on sale
at some suburban concrete marketplace.
This
is not to say that the Duro-Raft is invulnerable; for indeed, it is ultimately
fragile yet somehow durable. This
mystery is somehow related to the special glue used during the manufacture of
the Duro-Raft. Since the glue is
protected by divine patent laws, its secrets are barred from common knowledge
at this time. It is clear though that
with a wholesome discipline of respect and proper use the Duro-Raft should
provide a life-time of service.
Some
basic tips on care of your Duro-Raft:
-
You
should be comfortable in your raft, give yourself plenty of time to become
accustomed to its specific characteristics; no two rafts are the same, and only
after a gradual period of familiarity can you become comfortable with its
specific strengths and imperfections.
-
You
should keep your raft clean and strong, and that simply means a daily routine
of basic care and strenuous usage. If
you neglect your raft, it may develop potentially hazardous leaks (certain
chemicals can also cause this…)
-
Follow
closely the instructions below in the section “Navigating Your Duro-Raft” to
ensure maximum safety and enjoyment of your raft.
-
Carefully
follow the recommended maintenance schedule for your raft, allowing sufficient
time for preventative check-ups and overhauls.
These
are only some general pointers, and ultimately it is your responsibility. And although it is certainly a durable raft,
there are no warranties at all. This
Duro-Raft is intended for extremely varied uses, and is designed to experience
a billion or more possible combinations of hardships and joys. Not even God would risk putting a warranty on
such a product
Navigating
Your Duro-Raft
Your
new Duro-Raft is certainly not meant to sit in a garage all day, although you
are free to do what you want with it.
Sadly, some people can see no use for it, and simply destroy it.
One
of the basic hopes of the inventor was that such a raft may certainly help in
the journey along the River of Life. All
of us are journeying anyway, and the current of life truly pulls us all along
no matter how hard we try to turn around and swim upstream. The current is indeed stronger than the
strongest of us, and in any case,
“The
past is a bucket of ashes.”
-C.
Sandburg
Now
if you look around you in the River of Life, you certainly can find a strange
mixture of people and vehicles. Many
people just try to get along by swimming and it is rumored that the rafts
inventor even developed the ability to swim one and a half miles without
stopping. But like many other short-term
solutions, it simply won’t work on a river that’s hundreds of thousands of
miles long.
Besides
your hair falling out, there is the added danger that without some form of raft
or boat or yacht, the swimmer will encounter certain dragons lurking below the
sometimes muddy waters of River Life.
This can be particularly burdensome on the swimmers friends, who usually
have to pull their rafts alongside and give the swimmer a lift; over a long
distance, this can become an unsafe navigational practice, as we will discuss
later. Rafts are only intended for use
by one person, although we’ve all helped those who may get capsized and are in
danger of the dragons.
Well,
now that you have your spanking new Duro-Raft sitting in front of you, where
are you going to go? Ah, there’s the
problem, you say. Here the author can
only enter some general comments based on his own experience. It seems clear that the River of Life is
truly wide and varied, and there are literally billions of places to go or
be. It is also clear that there are ways
to go that some people can feel most safe with, because they can look around
and see many travelers along that particular route.
In
fact, it even seems that no matter what route you eventually choose, that
overall there will be others headed at least in the same general
direction. Each person’s path on their
raft is of course fully unique, but Life River has many tributaries and small
streams that flow from/to it, and many people of like persuasions are sharing
their directions. It is common for
groups of people going in the same general direction to sort of band together,
and this indeed becomes complex and often creates many beautiful and, sadly,
ugly possibilities. More on this later.
It
seems basically the truth that whatever route you choose, that you can be
amongst others who are really looking for the same general thing, who are close
to what you are looking for, or maybe farther, but who share the same pull…
That
basic truth seems only basic; there are of course no firm rules or
answers. There are those people who
completely shun any contact with others in their journey, those who in fact
feel that their journey loses its uniqueness unless it is a route chosen by no
one else. If someone has been there
before, or may follow, then it becomes even more urgent to find new direction
and move on.
This
reaction may have a natural cause, though, because of some of the dangers we
encounter while journeying down the River of Life. We usually feel that there are others out
there going in the same general direction, but we often find ourselves afraid
to journey together. Most of us who have
had rafts in the past (earlier models are always less sophisticated), and have
spent good amounts of time bobbing around the river, know full well that some
others may try to capsize our rafts, and even destroy them. There are others out there who haven’t
learned how to navigate properly and who don’t give a damn about learning. Defensive driving is certainly called for, in
any case.
It
is fully up to each Duro-Raft owner to determine his or her own direction, and
once the journey begins, it is usually somehow important to keep that general
direction, although it seems good to remember that there are still many roads
that lead to Rome.
So,
maybe at this point it’s good to take a pause, and really determine your
general direction. It’s up to you, each
of you, to…
“Find
where you main roots lie,
And
do not hanker after other worlds.”
-H.
D. Thoreau
Once
you’ve sort of pinned that down, fully aware that you can change your mind at
any of life’s forks, then it may be kind of nice to find others going in the
same general direction.
BEWARE!!! DANGER!!!
NEVER
ALIGN YOURSELF IN WHAT CAN BE CALLED, GULP, A RAFT-CHAIN. A RAFT-CHAIN IS A GROUP OF RAFTS THAT ARE ALL
CHAINED TOGETHER FOLLOWING ONE RAFT, USUALLY STEERED BY A POWERFUL, CHARISMATC
LEADER. THESE ARE USUALLY VERY STRONG
CHAINS BY WHICH THE LEADER PULLS THE REST, AND THE NET EFFECT OF THIS IS THAT
YOUR RAFT IS NO LONGER UNDER YOUR CONTROL.
SURE, IT MAY FEEL SAFE AND STRONG TO BE UP AND AWAY FROM THE DRAGONS,
AND YOU MAY EVEN ENJOY THE GENERAL DIRECTION YOUR LEADER IS TAKING…
BUT
YOU ARE NOT THE DRIVER, AND SOMEDAY MAYBE THE LEADER WILL MAKE YOU GIVE CYANIDE
TO YOUR BEAUTIFUL BABIES. YES, GOD
FORBID, ONE TIME BACK WHEN THE TRUCKS DROVE AT NIGHT, A MAN TOLD HIS RAFT-CHAIN
TO SELF-DESTRUCT, AND 911 DID THAT.
(“Mothers, you must keep your children under control! They must die with dignity.”) IT IS RUMORED THAT MAY IN THE WORLD BROKE
DOWN AND CRIED: THE DURO-RAFTS INVENTOR
VOWED TO NEVER TELL HIS CHILDREN ABOUT THIS, BUT ONLY TO WATCH OUT FOR ALL
RAFT-CHAINS.
“There
is a kind of pain,
That
is very far beyond words.”
-H.
Prather.
The
river is always flowing, and the current will pull and twist your Duro-Raft,
and flash floods will up no matter what general direction you choose. But if you are headed in your general
direction, and you’re watching out carefully for those lazy drivers that just
don’t know anything about navigating, and you’re also keeping an eye open for
raft-chains, then maybe it’s time to fully enjoy your new raft by floating
along and looking at what the River of Life is pushing past you, all the sights
and sounds, and people, and their rafts…
Your Fellow
Travelers
Somebody
once said that life is an affair of people, but there is plenty out there
wherever you look, alone or together.
Most people tend to have two main interests on their journey, the
non-people things and the people things.
Some old head doctor named Freud, who lived back when horses drove at
night, said something about life’s bottom line – “to work and to love.” In any case, this introduction to the Owner’s
Manual will simply highlight some of these people things.
You
are the navigator, and it certainly seems best to steer within a certain
distance of your fellow travelers – friends on rafts headed in the same general
direction, and not part of a raft-chain, are probably the most that the River
of Life has to offer to the common human traveler. It seems too, that through our fellow
travelers, our own journey becomes meaningful; many choose to put those
non-people things above the people things, and it’s certainly an open debate
for some. You are steering your own raft
wherever you want, but along the way you usually will find it clarifies things
to clear close to others.
“We
get by with a little help from our friends.”
“And
in the end, the love you take is equal to the love
You
give.”
-The
Beatles
It
also seems appropriate now to point out that whatever direction you choose, the
real enjoyment is to be had along the way, not later on at the end of the
journey. Many people mix this up and
simply paddle like fiends in a hurry to get somewhere. They don’t see the difference between heading
in a general direction and taking a plane trip to Hawaii. It’s not always clear, but usually these
people find,
“When
you get there, there isn’t any there there.”
-G.
Stein
Many
people will steer close to your raft, and you will steer close to their
rafts. It is fun and relaxing to talk of
our journeys, to create adventures in the River Life, to live and share each
rafts potential, to be. Indeed, we all
know to some degree the real joy to be found when two rafts steer very close
together and journey together.
Unfortunately, there are many mysteries that exist when rafts get very close, especially back in the old days when trucks used to drive at night.
Unfortunately, there are many mysteries that exist when rafts get very close, especially back in the old days when trucks used to drive at night.
Some
rafts try to sink anchors into other rafts, to pull them along their way, sort
of a mini-raft-chain. Other rafts are
really floating aimlessly down the River of Life, with really unconscious
navigators. These people sometimes bring
their rafts very close to find their general direction, or they may seek to
ride along in the wake of some hero’s raft.
It can all get very complex.
Others
seem to bounce from raft to raft, playing pin-ball with their fellow travelers. Sometimes these people substitute a lot of
bouncing for their general direction.
Again, it’s all very complex.
Others want to steer very close, but are afraid to dent their rafts, if
a collision occurs, and this is certainly not an ungrounded fear.
In
any case, this is only an introduction, and future chapters of the Duro-Raft
Manual will attempt to go into more detail on some of these complex
issues. For now, enjoy your Duro-Raft,
navigate bravely in your general direction, draw close to others, and let
others draw close to you, even very close.
You only go down the River of Life once.
Be careful. Strive to be happy. Before the deluge.
“Never
forget, rarely forgive.”
-Ed
Koch, major of New York, on survival.
-For Ben and Elise, I love you all the bunches in the
world.
