Wouldn’t It Be Nice

Sail on, sail on sailor, ’cause now is now and then was then and right now maybe I’m not feeling like your essayist-at-large, maybe I’m feeling more like a sewer rat onboard some U.S.S. Shipwrecked Daughters and brothers sailing wicked waters.

by

Art for Art's Sake

I’m Art Kumbalek and man oh manischewitz what a world, ain’a? So listen, wouldn’t it be nice if we had a president who knew his fat focking lyin’ ass from a hole in the ground?

And wouldn’t it be nice if our current U.S. Supreme Court would use the phrase “Different strokes for different folks” as some kind of precedent for their ferkakta rulings of late?

And wouldn’t it be nice to get through a 6 p.m. CST episode of “Jeopardy” without getting barraged by advertisements for over-the-counter tablets that promise us alter kakers to regain our desire and ability to hang-glide and wind surf whilst tearing through a peaceful forest landscape behind the wheel of a multi-thousand dollar RV implement of environmental destruction with an aging bride riding shotgun?

And wouldn’t it be nice if medically advanced aliens from another galaxy landed on Earth with a proven recipe to cure all kinds of cancer and President Dumbty-Trumpty was late on the trigger so’s to deport them back to Planet Zog or what-the-fock?

And wouldn’t be nice if my kitchen table was free from unopened enveloped mail notices from health insurance companies asking for this-or that?

Anyways, about this summer solstice June 20 coming up like a bad burrito, I see it as a bad news/good news deal. The bad news is that June 20 is the first, instead of the last, focking day of summer with way too many to follow, days to be chock-packed with the heat, stupidity, the racket, the bugs. Sucks. The good news is that the days become shorter as they say, which means a couple, three more spins of the moon around the Earth and fall, with its more civilized seasonal sanity, will be upon us. And it can’t come soon enough, I kid you not.

email newsletter iconStay on top of the news of the day
Subscribe to our free, daily e-newsletter to get Milwaukee's latest local news, restaurants, music, arts and entertainment and events delivered right to your inbox every weekday, plus a bonus Week in Review email on Saturdays.

SIGN UP

So yeah, like a cork on the ocean I floated (hip don’t fail me now) over to the “No Kings” confab here by the Downtown at the Cathedral Square Park, home to the Joshua Glover Wisconsin State Historical Landmark 463.

Check this out: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joshua_Glover

Heart-warming was the event. Nostalgic, reminded of my youthful days as an erstwhile student at UW-Madtown, thousands marching about the Vietnam boondoggle, but here, without the tear/pepper gas and National Guard.

And so, as my own days grow shorter by the second, perhaps it’s time to catch up:

The State of the Essay 2025 (Today, anyways)

Sail on, sail on sailor, ’cause now is now and then was then and right now maybe I’m not feeling like your essayist-at-large, maybe I’m feeling more like a sewer rat onboard some U.S.S. Shipwrecked Daughters and brothers sailing wicked waters. A rock in the landslide, the leaf on a windy day, cork on the ocean often frightened surely unenlightened, lost and goner. Empty Styrofoam cup in a California sandbox, god only knows.

Heroes and villains, that’s the beat. The first mate sang the children were raised, you know they suddenly rose like wild honey, they started so long ago and to turn healthy, wealthy and wise through restful waters and deep commotion… And I’ve been in this town so long, so long to this city that I’m fit with this stuff, to write in the rough, but you can bet your buck two-eighty that I’m all right by the heroes and villains, my life with the heroes and villains, always this valentine to the heroes and villains.

But if my beat were advice for all over the nation, maybe I’d say that maybe if we think and wish and hope and pray it might come true, maybe then there wouldn’t be a single thing we couldn’t do. Wouldn’t that be nice? You bet your sweet dupa it would.

And don’t forget that it’s always a good thing to remember all the places you’ve surfed and danced and, all the faces you’ve missed that in this late day are too outta site; and then think and wish and hope and pray that you can do it again.

And then sometimes a guy needs a break from his beat, a slight reprieve, I don’t care who you are. So, what do you say, let’s have one.

Whoever’s left in the room and somebody wants to know just where the heck everyone is, you just tell the teacher we’ve gone surfing, surfing U.S.-focking-A. ’cause I’m Art Kumbalek and I told you so.