Don Draper vs. Michael Scott

I'm thinking about loneliness (of men/of me) lately.

In the past {ref: reading book on Magellan} men often had no one to keep counsel with. Often they had not even friends to trust. Wives were not "friends and partners" in way they are (supposed to be) today. Great things were accomplished in this loneliness.

Why do I think it should be otherwise?
How lonely was my father?
How lonely are all men?

I'm also thinking about MAD MEN, Don Draper. He's as alone as you can be. His wife is not even a confidante ("why did you let that salesman into MY house?"). He has no friends at work. Probably the closest to a "friend" is his boss Coop who is, well, his boss. Then there are his "lady friends" -- the beatnik -- who he has to share with other men who despise him and the Jewish heiress/businesslady -- who could be his equal but is clearly unenthusiastic about him being married and a goy. If he wasn't so handsome he wouldn't be anywhere near her bed.

What do men get from comraderie? I suspect this is a hidden truth. That "jobs" (I'm thinking blue collar at the moment, construction crews) offer a feeling, however antagonistic in demeanor, of belonging that is somehow unavailable other places. Offices, like in Mad Men, are now too "equal opportunity" for anything like the (mean old) boys' clubs to exist. Men have to be on the look-out, more like Michael Scott (in The Office) who is constantly blundering from one foot-in-the-mouth position to another, unable to navigate what is required of a sensitive office man -- homage to the true mission (capitalism/money) while not offending women, racial minorities, and gays. He's clearly not up to the task and we laugh at him for it. Don Draper on the other hand, lives in the Old World before the rules all changed. His kind is slated for extinction -- the "man's man" --except possibly in the military and even there now he has to deal with women, sexual harrassment, etc.

So, how does the loneliness of Draper compare with the loneliness of Scott? Draper is driven. He wants what he wants as the saying goes. He wants money and power and prestige and any woman he wants. Scott-ostensibly wants the same things -- success, promotion--but he wants love, a partner to share his life with, comraderie and friendship in the office, the love and friendship of his colleagues. In a sense, Scott's needs are impossible to fill, the net he casts is too wide. We see the impossibility of it and we laugh, embarrassed for him. Perhaps he lacks something -- tack, intelligence-- we suspect this, but more likely the reason it's funny is that he is us, the Everyman, who can't get what he wants. Ever.
Draper is almost scary in his drive. We know the shows creators "dislike" the culture they are presenting. This is clear when the entire office is cheering for Nixon over Kennedy. "We" (wink-wink) the audience know that Kennedy (hatless, handsome, young, maverick) won that battle. We (wink-wink) know that the kind of capitalism and manipulation that characterizes Sterling Cooper Advertising is not only a dinosaur, but somehow despicable, heartless, deserving it's extinction.

Still, from our "Michael Scott" offices we (like the Pete Campbell character -- boyish forever) watch Draper's every move. How does he get the women? How does he succeed in business without being a kiss-ass pansy (like Pete, like Scott, like us)?

Why Politics Doesn't Make Sense (to monkeys)

More and more frequently my "answer" to things is merely to invoke the phrase: We're monkeys. Or What do you expect from monkeys?

This answers a lot.
Why people want a strong leader at the same time they want to tear that leader down.
(See monkeys)
Why people want "fairness" over affluence. See: jealousy of others (cheating, stealing) in monkeys
is an emotion that blocks out the reasoning that we're all better off with there are rich people.
This explains socialism and communism's appeal. We are deeply concerned with fairness
much more so than comfort and wealth.
Cliques rule. Families (royal and/or your own), bonds, friends, networks, this is all monkey stuff. It rules. Efforts to contain it, however noble, are ultimately ineffective as we trust what is close, and what we know.
Where fairness and cliques conflict, usually cliques rule by subterfuge.

Panic and fear.
"Fear stimulates my creativity," says Don Draper in Mad Men. This is a monkey thing. We are actually less anxious when we are afraid. This explains why we tend to panic, why we "lean into" fear. A serious panic (war qualifies as does a community hit by disaster) focuses us, actually is less uncomfortable than worrying about what the thing is (ultimately death) that will destroy our momentary happiness.
This explains the appeal of global warming. We "want" there to be worldwide, clear, things to be afraid of. Better yet, there is something YOU CAN DO to prevent it, like buy the right lightbulb. Save the earth at Walgreens.
As a society we are uncomfortable with war. Not all societies are, but "democracies" are
in a perpetual state of not having a (strong enough, right enough) leader no matter who they are. Being perpetually divided we are not in a good position to support small wars. When attacked we are fierce. When we feel like aggressors (bullies) we're likely to be uncomfortable, looking around, who's going to gang up on us?
We profoundly confuse gender. Our rational minds tell us we are equal and "should" be the same, this makes the differences more pronounced and the rifts in society much worse and increases anxiety.
This explains why "women's rights" are not a rallying point in much of the world. Women's rights are a product of a highly organized, modern state, however theoretical they are at all levels. The "patriarch" is the close in leader our monkey bodies expect (tolerate) and are reluctant to cast aside for a "rational" claim of equality.
We are all racists (see "cliques") and modernity casts this as a sin, so we are all and forever sinning to be comfortable around that which we know and uncomfortable around that which we do not know. Again, our rational minds (think seventh grade teacher) tries to "talk us into" overriding the clique impulse but we end up in an uncomfortable zone, halfway there because there is no there to get to.
This explains Obama. (Not to say he might make a fine president. But it explains his appeal.
The discomfort of the middle ground plus the desire for a strong leader.)

Orangs

They want me
to be sad.
No, more sad,
visible sad and outraged
about the orangutans
disappearing
in the march of
heartless capitalism
And I am
sad
yes, I am
how can you not be?
these are babies
furry and strange
babies
but
babies nonetheless.

I am lost
and alone in my
objection
to living
chronically
in sorrow
anger
and hopelessness

Why not cry
for all that's been lost already?
The great mammoths,
the saber tooths.
you think I'm kidding

or callous

think what you like
I am sad in my own way

Cave Wall (facing up to it)

I'm beginning to wonder
if it's over
I mean--
the genius track
modest hopes
for modest interviews
on NPR
modest reviews
in the New York Times

I could call it a medical condition
the ADD and so forth
and/or throw in aging
and the distraction of the internet

the ideas keep coming
(a flow, a leakage
a drainage, a natural thing)
they seem rich
and helpful
perhaps
to someone

but the world moves on
when one doesn't
make one's mark
on the cave wall

Mad Men

What a strange series. It's on the one hand looking back (nostalgically? humourusly? sadly? all of the above?) on a time when "men where men and they were smokin' assholes." What do women get out of this series? Scoffing (laughing? sympathy?) for a earlier, less empowered, but clearly more sexual (?) version of who they are now? It's yes "genius" to set a drama in the age of the Man in the Grey Flannel Suit, when racism and antisemitism were accepted, when the goal
of deceiving the American public about the dangers of smoking occupies the best brains. We are soooo much smarter than them. We know smoking is horrible. We know they are assholes to treat women, black and Jews the way they do. And yet, and yet, we are like alien overlords looking in on the experiment, trying to care about their feelings and yes, being surprised that
men (and women) locked so hopelessly into a pre-progressive era (helping Nixon get elected: omigod!) have feelings we can, well not exactly relate to, but be entertained by.
So in that sense it has some similarities to The Sopranos -- I mean, we never had true sympathy for Tony and his outrageous band of thieves and we scoffed at their "Italian" chintz lifestyles, but still, they managed to pull off, what, six seasons?
Funny how we like to hate our heroes (in the fiction sense). Or we choose heroes that we comfortably feel superior to which relaxes our need to judge everything (we KNOW these folks suck) so we can kick back and in our virtual reality of TV see if the boss nails his secretary.
How shameful!

sex sex sex

there are days when i care nothing about anything but sex. sex sex sex. why do art when you can be in bed with someone, touching, being touched? is art better than this? making books for people who don't want them? Now, writing short fiction and poetry for godsakes. jesus. what's all this? why don't i just play? what if the world were ending, what would i do? sex sex sex

Terry Gross and Cormac McCarthy

To garden or not to garden
that is the question
Is it better to sit here
and pretend someone
will find me brilliant
deserving of NPR honors
with their soft,
chortling voices

Where have you been?
Terry Gross will ask
with a wink.
Hiding from us?
Yes, I will say
with a sly grin.
Gardening, I add.
Oh, you garden?
Between writing brilliant novels
which I've hidden away
with instructions to
burn immediately upon my death
And my paintings
locked away
for no one to see
And of course
the poems
verboten to human eyes.

Can I hear one?
Terry will ask
'jes 'lil 'ol moi
and the entire
smarty pants nation?

Aw shucks, OK,
I will say
she glances to the wings
of the sound stage
where Cormac McCarthy,
her next guest,
(the real one)
and why
everyone's here.

Maybe next time
she says.
Thank you so much!