June 18, 1982
Maybe Garrick was right about Jimmy all along.
Maybe all the parents of all the Little Falls kids were, too, when they
feared Jimmy had too much influence over their children, this charismatic
character who seemed to exude talent and attitude, and yet managed to do very
little with any of it.
These days he settles for the image of “wizard,” cultivating a mystical
lie no one really believes, least of all himself as he putters around the
gardens he plants near Ginger’s mother’s house in Towaco, mumbling spells of
his own making to get his plants to grow.
He's curated his own art show in that dark attic where nobody can see
any of the works without invitation.
And still, I sometimes see a halo around him, self-created sense of
superiority, but hardly holy.
Maybe it is me, seeing my own dreams collapse. Still, I can’t help but
feel that our dream is finally over.
Jimmy who seemed so perfect for so long comes across these days as an
aging conman and settles for much less than his best.
“Give the people what they’ll take but no more,” he mumbled once when
in a foul mood.
But brains like Jimmy’s come around rarely, shaped out of something
fundamental, by a god head for some higher purpose.
He needs to have a reason to take the next step.
Usually being a starving artist is motivation enough, part of that
universal struggle to climb out of the ghetto and lends to his art.
Jimmy has his own ways.
Perhaps the failure of Silver Duck Studios back on Pine Street in 73
and 74 has something to do with his lack of spirit.
He’s not been the same person since.
Ginger has changed, too, adopting Buddhism, which seems to have given
her direction.
For some reason, Jimmy cannot or will not follow down that path – even though
he tried briefly, and then gave up.
Since then he’s come off just a bit dishonest, doing just enough to
justify his existence as an artist, yet not quite enough to succeed.
Oh, how he envies the mystics, modeling himself after them, planting
seeds in our heads to accept him as one.
But he is like a lightning rod, live charges jumping from one part of
his brain to another, in search of something he can apply himself to.
He is so quick witted that is it easy for me to really believe he is a
magical being when my rational mind tells me he’s not.
With all his talent, he aches the way we ache for something neither he
nor we can ever be.
Most importantly, he needs for us to believe he is the real deal,
needing us to accept what he says he is, even when he clearly doesn’t quite
believe it himself.
He seems to miss the essential point; art is a process, a constant
perfecting, we polishing the same stone over and over until it become a gem.
Perhaps then, we – artists as a whole – can then claim perfection.
Jimmy has simply settled for the appearance of perfection, and this is
remarkably sad.
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