During my years as an itinerant folksinger, I was careful in my choreography of where I stayed and how long for any particular location. Sometimes I was simply homeless. I spent a particularly nasty week in March once residing on a rooftop mattress.
Not to place too much emphasis on it, but my first actual small apartment was a true luxury despite the leaks, bugs, and occasional rodents.
The ramifications soon sunk in; I could now entertain young women in my new bachelor “pad.” Moreover, all my reading of the “Playboy Philosophy” columns would now pay off.
I had no money for decorating, so my decor choices were limited. Friends contributed redundant furniture. On Labor Day weekend, while students moved and threw out half of their possessions, I picked up an entire small stereo set, a neat kaleidoscope, a phonograph, and a collection of jazz albums. I could put Mingus on the phono and be hip. I stocked the bookshelf with student discards of the works of Sartre, Camus, and Plato.
This phase of my existence lasted all six months that I had the apartment. It was long enough to discover that most of the young women I admired laughed at the Playboy Philosophy, preferred my music on guitar to Mingus, and had an aversion to leaks, bugs, and rodents the landlord refused to take care of. Plato, Sartre, and Camus are still somewhere in my library.
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Women. Whaddaya gonna do?
This is awesome. I remember the olden olden days, when a sturdy cardboard box overturned was good enough for a coffee table for a year or so. I could cover it with a piece of fabric. I wasn’t picky back then. Getting the place to myself was the most important part, and I could spruce it up with some clever posters taped to the walls.
I raised my eyes about the Playboy Philosophy as a source of wisdom, and I’m glad to hear that it was as I suspected. The real wisdom is always in lived life.
Around here, we have what is called Alston Christmas on Labor Day. It’s when all the students move in or out. The streets around cities like Alston are filled with discarded furniture and possessions. Some of the stuff is trash, but some is good stuff. People often picked among the discards for their own apartments.
As for Playboy? It was a lot of pretense and idiocy.