It's been almost 17 years since I've done drugs. I did 'em all, sold a lot of 'em too. I used to have a real serious fondness for smoking crystal meth. Crack, powder cocaine, heroin, pills, I could take 'em or leave 'em. Smoking crystal, though......it made me feel like superman for about 4 hours, then I was left feeling empty headed and spaced out, unable to do anything but smoke more crystal. It's a waking nightmare. Like doing push-ups in your sleep.
I've done enough LSD that it's a miracle I can still tie my shoes or look anybody in the eye. But, human beings are resilient, and able to adapt, overcome.
For me, the choice to stop doing drugs was simply one of economics. There was no way I'd ever find my way out of the kind of grinding poverty I was in, if I kept on doing drugs. I spent close to eight years being pretty much homeless.
You know what the blues is? The blues is being on a greyhound bus in the middle of Missouri at three in the morning, Lightnin' Hopkins on your headphones, not a penny in your pocket, not knowing where you're going, not having a home anywhere, trying not to think too hard about that .22 you got in your backpack. That was my introduction to the blues. That's poverty. It ain't for me.
Any kind of decent blue collar job requires a pre-employment and then usually random drug screens. So, one day, I just stopped. It was extremely easy, I wasn't really hooked on anything. I'm very lucky that I never got into heroin. It just didn't do much for me. (I recently read that in England they did a long term study that showed the degree to which a person enjoys heroin is relative to the degree of schizophrenia they suffer from. The more schizophrenic they are, the more they love heroin.)
I've always believed it's not the drugs, but the people who do the drugs. Some stoners are lazy bums who live in mom's basement, while I've also personally known people who smoke bales of the stuff and are highly motivated and driven business owners. Some guys will smoke a joint and watch Sesame Street, while others will smoke a blunt and then go shoot somebody.
I've known junkies who never stole a dime in their lives, and other people who robbed their own grandparents for beer money.
Drugs won't magically turn someone into a piece of shit. That piece of shit was already a liar and a thief, he's just not as good at it now that he's strung out.
I really can't understand people who do drugs past their 20's. It's been so long since I've done drugs, I can't imagine ever doing them again or why I ever did them in the first place. I drink probably 4 times a month.
My sons are 7 and 8, and have never seen me drunk. To me, the lowest of the low are those who choose to do drugs after becoming parents. Having never met my father, I have a serious chip on my shoulder when it comes to fathers who choose not to be fathers. But I never blame the drugs. I blame the people who do the drugs.
link › jameslafond.blogspot.com
Masculine Axis: A Meditation on Manhood and Heroism
In the preface to the Little Golden Guide to Hallucinogenic Plants (remember that children's series....I have a copy of this one) it states that mankind's fascination with and use of substances is nearly as old as man itself. Personally, I think we've all used things because of good marketing. I also think that the biggest provider of illicit drugs in the US is our own goobermint. Put two and two together and there you have it. I further think that our decaying infrastructure, the lack of factories/work etc. is that these guys make so much off our drug money they don't need to manufacture anything but our bliss/misery complex. And from there I roll with James' notion that druggies ARE the linchpin of our economy. Most jobs are about going after, spying on, following, arresting, prison, hospitals, nurses, doctors, rehab etc. Add to that the tendency of Americonned people to label junkies as worse than "niggers". We are a fucked up stupid people. I am with Robert Anton Wilson on this one, ala his Guns and Dope political party (I registered to vote as one for two election cycles....I did get audited) which is based on Dope for those who want it, no dope for those that don't and Guns for those who want them, no guns for those who don't. Put those two numbers together you have a huge voting block.....this is obviously tongue in cheek and I think there is a place for that too. Great post. Thanks.
Thanks, Ruben.
Posting as an article.
Awesome James. Thanks. You know, I think I have a copy of the Golden Guide on a file. Should I, I'll shoot you a copy and should there be further interest I can load it on Zippyshare.
I would like to check that out.
Thanks, Ruben.
Heroin, morphine don't screw with your neurones like methyl-amphetamines; you're a lucky guy not to have suffered lasting psychiatric effects.
I don't know if it is genetic, an element of your character or some other mysterious quality, but I consider men like you, Big Ron, John Paul Barber and James to be some sorts of miracles, whether it is avoiding drugs in the first place, or dropping them all of a sudden, when so many of our generation have been utterly destroyed.