Being a madman in old-time Phoenix


In my travels, in a longish life, I've known people who have seemed to be, well, a little off. The definition of sanity is of course difficult, even nowadays with modern medicine, and medical advice on the internet (which just seems to make it worse), and of course whether someone is rich or poor can be a big factor in whether they're eccentric, or just plain crazy.

Phoenix has always had an insane asylum, but today I'm thinking of a more gentile madness, similar to that of Don Quixote. It's that hazy, delusional, madness that isn't really all that dangerous, especially if someone has plenty of money and isn't out wandering around in their nightshirt.

If I time-traveled back to old-time Phoenix I would have to be very careful about what I said, for fear of being thought of as a madman. I could tell people that some day the streets would all be paved, and there would be machines traveling on those streets, going much faster than 25 miles per hour. But I don't want to be locked up!

I suppose the way that I spoke would mark me as a little bit off, a little "touched". By the way, I've always like that word for someone who seems to be out of touch with reality: touched. I've known a lot of people like that, and I fear that I'm one of them - not dangerously crazy, but just off enough that the Indians would leave me alone, and not kill me. Or maybe that's just something from the West of the Imagination, that I learned from old movies.

If I didn't want to be considered a madman, but still wanted to talk about the future, I'd get a crystal ball, and wear a big pointed hat. I'm trying to think of the things that I could tell about the future, and for some reason I feel as if I'd never be able to convince people that dog owners would walk around carrying plastic bags. Of course I'd have to explain plastic, and I really have no idea how to do that.

My image of a madman in old-time Phoenix might be someone walking down the street wearing a sandwich board that says, "The World is Coming to an End!", and shouting it. The unpaved roads would have been a little too rough to roller skate backwards on, wearing a pinwheel hat, which I've always felt is a pretty good way of demonstrating that you're a looney. Or it might be someone who says that someday people will travel on the streets of Phoenix in machines that are air conditioned. Either way, I'd imagine that someone would send for the nice men in the white suits to come and take you away.
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