Ricky wInd-down
Ricky's leaving tomorrow afternoon. It's been a fine visit. You may have seen a post I made a few hours before he showed up on Friday, detailing some concerns I had; several hours after meeting him at South Station he was acting so wonderfully together that I regretted the post, and eventually went back and privated it.
He did say a handful of politically poor things to me, but at the same time he mixed happily with every manner of humanity that the Greater Boston Area had to offer him. I think his notion of "Arabs" (as he calls them) is something like many Americans' notions of "Communists" a half century ago; not so much a type of person as a sort of invisible, monstrous infection which could be inside anyone, and you can't know one until the moment he's blowing himself up at you. So while he is quite terrified of the "Arabs" in his mind, this seems to have zero effect on how he acts towards or around anyone, regardless of appearance. My fears were groundless.
Some of my misgivings also because when he was at his worst, circa 1990, he was so racist that he was like a grotesque parody of a racist. He shocked my parents, who are racists of the more casual stripe that peoples' parents tend to be. He even made my dad's obligatory racist friend kind of uncomfortable, when he got going with his talk. I can't pinpoint when he gave all that up, but golly gee you would never imagine he was ever like that, to see him today.
More later; all is well, sleep time now.
He did say a handful of politically poor things to me, but at the same time he mixed happily with every manner of humanity that the Greater Boston Area had to offer him. I think his notion of "Arabs" (as he calls them) is something like many Americans' notions of "Communists" a half century ago; not so much a type of person as a sort of invisible, monstrous infection which could be inside anyone, and you can't know one until the moment he's blowing himself up at you. So while he is quite terrified of the "Arabs" in his mind, this seems to have zero effect on how he acts towards or around anyone, regardless of appearance. My fears were groundless.
Some of my misgivings also because when he was at his worst, circa 1990, he was so racist that he was like a grotesque parody of a racist. He shocked my parents, who are racists of the more casual stripe that peoples' parents tend to be. He even made my dad's obligatory racist friend kind of uncomfortable, when he got going with his talk. I can't pinpoint when he gave all that up, but golly gee you would never imagine he was ever like that, to see him today.
More later; all is well, sleep time now.