Reaction to Bukowski

I want to dedicate this blog to Bukowski's Notes of a Dirty Old Man, but I do want to shed some insight on something else that caught my attention. Even though I read the text days ago, I still can't stop thinking about the part that said how all the employees of the one establishment all took off work on Mondays to take LSD. I can't imagine shutting down a bar/restaurant to trip on acid!! What kind of sign do you put outside on your window, 'closed due to acid testing'? I guess I didn't realize how pertinent drug use really was in the 60's!

Now to my original focus; Bukowski. Of all the reading, this one was my favorite. I didn't realize at first that the women that hung around the store were prostitutes, let alone African American prostitutes. I didn't know that prostituition was a part of the negro population in the sixties. Was this a common practice?? Were there a lot of prostitutes?? Were they all black?? If they were black and Hank was white, then why did Hank treat them so good. Obviously, there were some non-racists back then that didn't judge you by your skin color. It almost seems to me that Hank loved Elsie, and felt some sort of friendship for the other women.

Also, I found it interesting how the author portrayed the tension between the blacks and the italians, in fact so much so that the Elsie murdered him. And yet the reaction to the murder is quite calm and is delievered in a nonchalant, 'it figures', kind of fashion. I was appalled at how unreactive Hank was, it appeared that he was an empty man despite his lame tear he shed.

All in all, the piece was interesting due to its story, its lazy grammar and its choice to reverse the roles of the races. The blacks killed the Italians, the italians bossed the whites around, and the white man was submissive and fell in love with a black woman......what a strange story.