heatherbeck
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Dingbats (Nincompoops?)
🕑 Added 2023-03-11 08:59:02 +0000 UTCThere was a word that was tactlessly omitted the other day, when I was formulating my Grand Return post. (For future readers, it was posted on Instagram, in March of 2023, and featured an image of yours truly in the green... top? The one with the cleavage. That one.)
In short, I spoke of the waywards. But, I neglected to mention one particular type of nincompoop I find myself particularly drawn toward. A person I can really only refer to as...
The 'Dingbat.'
There are a couple of meanings, I guess. On one hand, it is a playfully derogatory term for a person who is eccentric, foolish, or silly. Maybe a little naïve. Clueless? Lacking in intelligence? Nah... not so much. But those are charms the dingbat tends to indulge in. Certainly in their most-cherished hours.
In the daytime? They're indiscernible. Couldn't tell them apart. But in the reverie? You'll find them. If you know where to look.
I was a magazine gal, back in the day. One of those folks with real, actual bylines in magazines you might have actually heard of! (I used a nom de plume, so no use in Google-ing. Plus, it was all rubbish, the majority of what I wrote -- this is all far more interesting.)
In some magazines, there's a little symbol they use to denote the end of an article:
"No need to skip ahead; this is the end of the story." This mark would vary from periodical to periodical, but assume it's a type-sized square, a star, a dot, a capped letter, or that douchey little top-hat wearing guy from The New Yorker. About 1 pica tall, and just a little bit of silly. Frivolity, at the tail end (at least for now) of carefully collected wit, observation, and hard work. The dingbat.
I think that term applies to people of a certain sensibility, and most certainly in the modern age. Take... Walter and Chad, for instance. The two gents in the back of this image who are casting their own particular versions of concerted curiosity. At first glance, it might seem as if they were looking at *me* with lascivious eyes! But, no. Don't believe everything you see. They're actually a wonderful pair of chaps.
A call from the other side of the room was more like it. More, like a pre-coordinated smash of vidrio, and attention was drawn, and a flashbulb. I'm not unaccustomed to having a camera in my face; in this case, it was a friend who was just taking a pic, and this the the moment the shutter went off.
Walter, on the left, was a metal man. Still is. Easygoing guy who had spent the majority of his life cobbling together the ingredients necessary to make his shop work. An anvil here, a hammer there, and finally, a coal forge.
Chad (everybody calls him Literal Chad) worked in finance. Still doesn't. One of those fellows who takes money, turns it into more money, and for himself, makes money in doing so. He hates money, and knows that it's just a thing we invented, and he seems authentic about that, so I give him some credit. In the way that only someone who knows how to create it can possibly hate it: it's easy/hard, "Face/Off" to produce; God forbid that you spend your life in the pursuit of it. He's benefitted, from this, for sure... But. Not an enemy. If there is a cross to get off of because we need the wood, he'll eagerly trade it for one that's made of something more decorative, stronger, and fuerte.
Whatever the case, their story is not my own. But, it was a fun, drunken talk. These men-of-a-certain-age, they got out. Moved to Mexico, as the old meme said we should all do. It's nice down here, in the free-flowing air. I can't blame them for the decision; it's mine, too. I'm only 39. The last year, where 'only' feels like its last huzzah. There's nothing that makes you feel younger than to have a pair of 50-somethings say, "Shit, wish I would have been doing what you're doing when I was your age."
"Nice Work," or some variation thereof.
Makes you feel that your boat is going the right direction.
They're right. Here, the rent is fair, the food is tasty, the people are nice. It's safe. Life, here, isn't as destructible as it's so-goddamm-frequently made out to be. This'll be an essay for later, maybe, but in short... the air fills your lungs different, down in these-here parts. It just does.
The glass broke on the other side of the room, again, intentionally. Someone had an announcement that didn't make a whole lot of sense (not because of the linguistic barrier, but when you're lulled by the muse? There it goes again.) His quadrant of the room, excited about something, feigned amusement, but it's all cool. I mean, shit. Who are any of us to take away from someone's moment of joy? Not these days, shit-knows.
Walter, and Chad. Great couple. They have a pair of mutts, a fine house not too far away, enough food in the fridge, a place to chill out back, and no shortage of fine, fine, fine Iron Filigree. I fear I shall be a dog sitter again, soon. (One of them might be reading this right now... and if you are, you guys know that A.) We Talked About This; and B.)I can 96% guarantee that your dogs aren't gonna die.
They're scamps. That's another word. Schmucks? Literal Chad would agree. Balderdasherous miscreants? For sure. When the wind blows, and when the full moon is up in the sky. Cretins. Nincompoops.
Dingbats.
May the same be said of all of us. They got out, intentionally. I got out, by accident.
That's all I can instill into the rutillation, for now. I'm just still wrapping my head around the idea of just hanging out, and if I'm lucky, making soup.
Better to do so with the dumb, the brilliant, and (always concomitantly) the dingbats.
Comments
Annibale
Heather? U disappear. Can i add some news on Patreon?
Adam Funk
Certainly not the crux of the essay, but are you even allowed a nome de plume if you don’t use a real quill? I’m taking the phrase back. No feather, no deal. 😤
