Max

I have been more than fortunate in my life. I am, in fact, one of the most fortunate of men on our entire planet. I am exceedingly wealthy in friends.

Which is not to say I have that many. The contrary statement could well be true. I have only a few. Yet those I have are friends exhibiting qualities by which the word itself ought to be defined. Among this small number I count Max, and his wife Maria.

This post is about Max. It has a specific purpose, intent and aim. It is, (and I am not bothered to say it) intended to prompt Max to continue writing. The aim, intent and purpose of this posting is to inspire not guilt, but inspiration. By addressing here the role Max has played in my life, I hope to prompt, persuade, prod, propel and provoke Max into writing again.

You see, Max has achieved what few others could ever lay claim to - Max has created a community, in his own name. Without intention of ever doing so, Max has brought together people on different sides of our world, by sheer interest in his words - in the words he has written.

Max writes (normally) everyday. Nonsense shit, often. Pointless but interesting shit, frequently. And not so occasionally, true gems. Things that make the whole internet sit up, stop fondling its own balls, and pay attention. Suddenly, because of something Max said, people's inboxes fill up with mail from unknown and nevertheless welcome quarters, because we are discussing something that Max said. And underlying the whole conversation, often between strangers, is the idea that "you must be a half-way decent person, if Max is your friend, (despite the fact that you sound like an idiot..)" And oddly enough, the theory seems to hold true.

Max has thus created around himself, by investing nothing more than 10 minutes a day, an online community. A group of people who, if they met each other for the first time, would know a lot about the other already, simply by virtue of having discussed the ideas that Max leaves us with. Thus, technology combined with brilliance and persistence has made, or re-made in a new form, that most basic of human necessities - a community.

I met Max my first year of college - an impressionable year by any standard. Max was an unmoving beacon of stability even then; he was a rock, upon which events and turmoil (of which there would be plenty,) smashed and spent their energies.

We spent much of the first semester of our acquaintance discussing literature, and by the end of the first month of our acquaintance, had established a deep and lasting respect for each other. One of the first things I noticed about Max was the quality of his friends. I can assume he noticed the same about me, as my friends and roommates of that period were, and are, people of the highest caliber. Max and I spent afternoons sitting in fields discussing literature, liquor and love, (to steal a phrase from him, "the quivering relations between man and woman.") Which was appropriate as Max was getting married that summer.

I came to recognise a quality of thoughtfulness, a premeditated air to all that he did. Max was no fly-by-nighter. Max spent time deciding what he wanted, where his effort would be spent, and then moved with conscious steps in that direction. His solidity of character was to serve as an anchor to my own life later.

The second year of our acquaintance, Max made his home in a truck-stop. He came to have his own table in the greasy-spoon cum-drunkard hangout which masqueraded intermittently as a business enterprise under the name Stateline Cafe. He would stay at his table, drinking coffee (50 cents, at that point, bought you all you could drink for as long as you could stay,) for 24 hours at a time. He achieved a grudging respect from the toothless waitstaff, and the hapless owner, who would even tolerate his books and such remaining on the table when he had to leave for class, from whence he would return immediately thereafter. I do not recall if Max ever received flying jelly-packets to the head, with the salutation "Hey, college-boy!" (as I did,) at 2:00 in the morning, but if he did, no doubt he handled it with dignity and aplomb.

Because that was what characterised Max. Max was steady, steadfast, sure, with temerity, poise, firmness and a presence of person that could put many global leaders to shame. If I had to, I would compare Max with Chirac. Always talking, always sincere, and always sounding suspiciously as though he knows you know he is right, if you would have just taken the time to listen earlier.

This precise quality is what has allowed Max to beget "the intangible extasy of Maxness," a concept that has yet to take the world by storm, but will probably end up becoming the intellectual forebear of a great philosophical movement someday, on par with the "Chicken soup for (insert your demographic name here)" series of books.

The intangible extasy of Maxness is less complicated than many of the worlds leading paradigm-arrangement systems. It has as its underlying belief something we can all comprehend and admit into the realm of possiblity - that inside Max there is a small man, called the Ego-man. He is probably round in shape, and broadcasts a general air of vague sketchiness about his character, the kind of fellow you wouldn't want to turn your back on, for suspicion he would be found either smearing your wife's chest with chocolate and bad intent, or cleaning the last scrap of meat off your chihuahua's bones by the time you turned back round again. (Were it not for the total absorption he showed in his current task, which precludes all else.) He is clad in nothing more than a loincloth, red body paint, and abundant chesthair. Said fellow has all the self-conciousness restraint of a mongoose in a chicken coop, and spends his whole day beating out interesting rythms on his drum.

And while he beats his drum, and admires his own chesthair clumped with paint, he dances a little dance, and chants a big chant. And he chants :
Max is Great.
Fuckin Great.
Yah, yup, yum and yahoo.
Great fuckin Max.
Max eats a cheesburger
cuz its fuckin great
Max read his book
cuz its fuckin great.
Great, great, great,
Max is great.

And then he goes on to sing the cigarette song, followed by the coffee song, the Maria song, the family song, the work song, and then he sings an antihistab song, and then he starts again, with minor variations on the theme.

And the fact is, if you sit around Max for too long, you begin to hear the song, too. And you start to sing along. But you don't realise it until he gets up to go to the loo, at which point you have that odd feeling that you are singing a song that has left the room. And then you understand.