SLPAD - 126 “Low-Lands” - 37

[Michael Bailey]

It’s not like Nerissa is a solitary phenomenon, easily fobbed off as a
delirium tremens consequence of Dennis’s prodigious wine-bibbing.

- I remember picking up a hitchhiker with an amazing array of facial and
head hair back in the ‘70s who told me some interesting stuff about Sri
Aurobindo and The Mother, his life as an itinerant, and how he dealt with
coke freaks (basically by not internalizing their speeded-up mindset) - one
of the things he said was, “Every time there’s a significant change in my
life, it’s preceded by a bump on the head.” (Or was it, “Every time I get a
bump on the head, there’s a significant change in my life”?)

I’ve never heard either version of this theory anywhere else, but it seems
semi-valid, or at least worthy of consideration.

Dennis receives such a thump from a stack of snow tires which falls on him
whilst he’s trying to follow Nerissa thru the dump. Knocks him out.

He awakens to her ‘cool fingers on his forehead and a coaxing voice: “Wake
up, Anglo. Open your eyes. You’re all right.” He opened his eyes and saw
her, the girl, her face, floating wide-eyed and anxious over him, and the
stars caught in her hair.’

So presumably it’s not the wine - or, not only the wine -

And she’s got a legitimate place in a community, she’s known, tolerated,
most likely also protected, cherished, and loved - they’re already being
watched (but not interfered with)

“On top of the pinnacle of bank run stood a human figure, watching them.
Other shapes hovered and flitted in the darkness; from somewhere came the
sound of guitar music, and singing, and a fight in progress.”

Not only that, Gypsy Nerissa has a gypsy woman of her own who told her
fortune:

“The old woman with the eye patch who is called Violetta read my fortune
many years ago,” Nerissa said. “She told me a tall Anglo would be my
husband and he would have bright hair and strong arms and—”


On the way to her place - reached via a tunnel commencing with a backless
GE refrigerator thru which Flange overcomes his dubiety to fit his
portliness - she explains some of the social facts of the dump.

The gypsies had found tunnels ready-made by a would-be terrorist group in
the 1930s called the Sons of the Red Apocalypse. Fortunately for all
concerned, even - maybe especially - the SotRA members themselves, “the
feds” had “rounded them all up”
leaving their infrastructure for the gypsies to adapt for their own needs
and purposes.


- this all speaks to 3 recurring Pynchon themes:

The Preterite and their place in the world

The contrast between revolutionary violence and the efforts of people to
live their lives

And (this shows up in BE, and CoL49 the most) the idea of Waste and trash
heaps


Nerissa is cognizant of the history and the current workings of her
community, in which she has secured, one might say, an enviable place:

“They reached a dead end finally, with a small door set in the gravelly
soil. She opened it and they entered. She lit candles, whose flames
revealed a room hung with arrases and paintings, an immense double bed with
silk sheets, an armoire, a table, a refrigerator. Flange had all kinds of
questions. She told him about the air supply, and the drainage and the
plumbing and the power line that had been run in without Long Island
Lighting’s ever suspecting; about the truck which Bolingbroke used in the
daytime and which they drove out at night to steal food and supplies; about
Bolingbroke’s half-superstitious fear of them and his reluctance to inform
anyone in authority about all this lest he be accused of alcoholism or
worse and lose his job.”