novelty and anachronism

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With time, every novelty becomes an anachronism just as, with time, every anachronism becomes a novelty.

My father once had a walk-in closet, at the rear of which was an enormous collection of neckties. Men's neckties, for those who wear them, come in a huge variety of designs and colors, but, over time, they also come in differing widths -- narrow, medium-wide, and perhaps four inches across at their widest points.

Noting the passage of time and the self-serving accolades of fashion, my father saw no reason to go out and buy new ties when, if he just waited a while, the 'old' ones he had would come back into fashion... which, of course, they did.

At the time when I noticed this, I thought the old man was 'old.' Novelty -- the bright-penny shininess of what 'everyone' thought or was doing -- was front-and-center in my mind. My life and thoughts were definitely not anachronisms ... after all, they were fresh as a McIntosh apple in my mind... up-to-date and in-the-flow... intellectual and emotional collections ... hell, there was the Vietnam war and Hula-hoops and sideburns and civil rights!

Not that I have a closet full of new and used ties today, but I am old enough now to qualify as 'old' and the wisdom of my father's approach seems to have wide-ranging applications, not least when it comes to enthusiasms or matters of disgust.

How many bright pennies of thought and attention and affection and distaste have come and gone and come again? Lots and lots and lots. It amuses me, for example, to look at things I once made or purchased in the bright-penny present that now qualify as antiques ... antiques that may yet see a bright new day.

For example, I once built a rip-off Shaker table (the top flips up and creates a chair) that, given the right salesman, might be sold as an antique ... at a premium ... a premium that would reshine an old penny. Looking back to the bright-penny present when I built it, I had constructed an old-timey piece of furniture ... a right-now anachronism.

Intellectually and emotionally, I suppose this line of thought can lead a person to a sort of glum fatalism -- or a T.S. Eliot wail when it's gussied up: "There is nothing new under the sun," so my enthusiasms (or despairs) deserve to be banked... it's all "the same shit, different day" ... "past and present are the same but different" ... blah, blah, blah. And that glum fatalism can lead to a question like, "if everything is same-ol'-same-ol' then what is not same ol'? If novelty is already an anachronism then anachronism must likewise be a novelty. Anyway, those may be the intellectual and emotional antics.

I don't suppose anyone is likely to set aside the shiny penny of novelty in an instant ... it really is too much fun, too delightful, too scrumptious... too ... me. The alternative may seem to depressing.

But it may be worth considering as things pass from new to old and back again: What is this exercise and is it worth the effort when you think that that same effort might produce a perfectly good apple pie ... a brand new one.
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