Party

There is a party raging out in the yard behind my house. There is a small bonfire, and I thought there might have even been a band...but I think it is just the radio. Looks fun. Reminds me a little of some of the gutterpunk parties I have attended, with the bonfire...

I think back to so many parties, outside with a fire. Man, those kids I used to hang out with really could drink. Really can drink, so many of them still drink like that today. Swilling cheap tequila right out of the bottle. The clear shit. The real nasty five dollar fifth. I swear that shit will make your life shorter. Keg stands by thirty year old guys who stink and haven't showered in days. Food grilling up, adding to the sweet smell of the bayou. The smell of the fire, and the food, and the liquor. Sitting out back, on an upturned bucket, or sometimes chillin right there on the ground. I see the faces of my friends around the fire through squinted alcohol eyes, swirling in smoke from cheap swag weed. Looking up, the light of the flames licks the faces of Maya, Shannon, Wick, Paul, Jordon, Kelly, Bald Paul, Mikey, KC, Angele, Kayne, Aimee, Matt....so many others...

Interruption of thought, slamming right into my thoughts...something that sounded like a pop. Being from New Orleans, my thought first goes to gunshot. Then, cheering. I hear it again. My son's room is in the back. I just have to check. The mother in me takes over and goes to investigate the sound.

It is a hell of a party. I am still not sure what the pop sound was, but I am sure it is harmless. This is a nice neighborhood. I watched out the window for a while. It is loud...and there is a fucking band there! Pretty cool. Except that Lucien is sleeping in the room closest to all the ruckus. It looks fun, but I just really wish they were partying somewhere else.

I understand. It is Halloween weekend. This used to be a weekend that I partied all weekend. Halloween has always been one of my favorite holidays. I loved dressing up in a costume, and it was always a great excuse to party. Halloween is a big deal in New Orleans...and one of the best times of the year. I fucking love Halloween.

But, things are different for me now. I wish the party behind my quiet little piece of heaven was somewhere else. I am excited about Lucien's batman costume, but I am not even sure if I will dress up. I will not be going out to all the bars, and I will not be doing a lot of shots and lines. I will be trick or treating. And I will be in very early. I probably will not eat much candy, and I have to get some sleep because Mondays are always busy. Things have really changed for me...

And I am happy. I do not want to leave the house tomorrow to do a bunch of running around. I want to spend the whole day with my son...going to the park, taking a walk, cooking, and talking in three syllable sentences. I have an easy dinner planned, and I am looking forward to a peaceful day with my baby. I cannot wait.

My how things have changed. I never thought I would see the day that the party is just too loud. I never thought I would see the day when I chose to just stay in. Solitude. Sanity. Soul. Complete.

Update, and a bit about Perry

Just a little update because I have been SUPER busy!!! I am working with the new media at my college, which involves the online paper and radio station. I start my own radio show in the morning. It is 9am, and I am not sure how many listeners will be out there listening to college radio this early...but I will have been up for hours! My show is about music. I am researching many of the unknown college bands that we play, and talking about them while playing their music. I am pretty excited. Tomorrow I talk about Thievery Corporation, whom I already know and love. They feature Perry Ferrell on one of their tracks, and I have to say I have made respect for anyone who works with Perry Ferrell...

SPEAKING OF PERRY FERRELL...
I fucking love this man. And I think he is really fucking sexy. Back in the early days of Jane's Addiction, I loved them. Most of my friends swooned over Dave Navarro, but I always got weak at the knees with the sight of Perry Ferrell. I mean, just watch the man, with his energy and his oddities. And his voice...sexy as shit. He is weird, and I fucking love it. Not to mention, the whole kissing other men on stage is a turn on to me. I just watch perry Ferrell and get excited. I saw him last summer, and he is sexier than ever, by the way. His hair is shorter and more brown than it used to be, and he is in better shape. I always loved his stick thin figure, but recently he had some muscles (lean muscles of a former skinny man...) and I loved the muscles too. He is just fucking sexy. (I also think Billy Corgan is one of the sexiest men out there...)

Poem...

Trepidation
Fear
Conditioned to mistrust
I want to believe...
I want to trust,
But past progresses
To future,
And I am too burned.
Thoughts
Swirling
Like one two three
I know how it is
To be all alone
I know how it is
To have it all
Heavy
On your shoulders
I know how it is
To be stuck...
And we single mothers
Have to stick together.

Rant at Baby Daddy

Are you serious that this mother fucker is such a cheap bastard? What the hell was I thinking when I had a kid with this mother fucker? I do not even have an excuse, I was not high at the time. I had been clean for a while...

Just bad mother fucking judgement...AGAIN.

He does not even buy diapers. He does not help out with childcare. Or clothing. And he cannot be trusted to watch my baby for more than a few hours, for fear he will get too frustrated...

And then he has the fucking balls to ask me to bring my 3G modem over for the afternoon!!! Are you fucking serious? I pay for that Internet, and you cannot even buy a mother fucking diaper...and you want to use my Internet connection? Fuck you, you fucking fuck. Get a mother fucking life. Buy your own shit. Pay for some stuff with your son. And pay me some child support, and don't forget about the mother fucking 700 bucks you owe me. And no, mother fucker, you cannot use anything else I fucking pay for, until you pony up some cash, you asshole!

Sweat

I read an article about methadone, and when it discussed some of the side effects of the drug, I was reminded...

When I was on methadone I sweat profusely. Granted, I lived in Savannah, Georgia at the time, and in the summer it is really hot there. But, it did not matter to my body...I constantly sweat.

Waiting tables in an air conditioned restaurant, and the sweat was pouring down my face. It would just drip and drip and drip. A constant stream of sweat, drip, drip, dripping. I thought it was really bizarre. I had always been cold natured, but on methadone all I did was sweat. I would be bundled up in a jacket, slightly shivering, yet sweating a little. In the summer, it was unreal.

I never remember being like that on dope, and I most certainly was never like that before. Among all the other detrimental side effects from methadone, I think the sweating was the most obvious. And the most annoying.

Rambling On...

Thinking about disclosure at work...

I dare someone to judge me for my past, without looking at the person I am today...which happens to be the only person my coworkers have ever met. I dare someone to look at the time clock, and see who is never late. I dare someone to challenge my work ethic and knowledge of food. I dare someone to pass a judgement on me because I was once addicted to heroin, I guarantee that today I do a better job than they do. And I am more reliable. I have been clean a long time, and I don't even drink.

I work in the restaurant industry, where a lot of people drink and go out. And I am pretty sure that I am more clean and sober than the majority of the people I work with. I bet almost every one of them has been so wasted in the last year that they did something they regret at least once. I have not done that in almost five years. I am not late for work, and I work really hard. I go to school, and I write every day...and I am a good mom...I dare someone to judge me.

Go ahead, take a good look at my life. If you are not willing to give me a chance, then you are not worth my wasted breath. My life is pretty good. I have a lot of positive things happening to me, and if you cannot see through that veil of the past...then I don't give a fuck about you.

I feel pretty damn good about myself. I feel pretty damn good about every single thing in my life. And I got nothing to hide. But, that doesn't mean I have to flaunt it either. Sometimes it is best just to keep your mouth shut, act like you don't know anything. But, I never lie.

If someone asks me directly about it, I always tell the truth. There is no point in lying about it. I have nothing to hide. I am not ashamed of anything. There are some things I may not be proud of, but I have nothing to lie about at this point in my life. Lying about my past, makes me look guilty. I am no longer guilty. For the first time in my life, I got nothing to hide.

And I volunteer the information to some. I talk about my addiction a lot in school because I write about it so much. Sometimes, when we are doing a peer edit and I first tell the other student about my memoir about my addiction and experience with the Hurricane, I see a look of partial shock on their face, like they don't really know how to react to me when I say, " I used to be a junky, and here is my story about it..."

I will say, I am glad I did not defend myself to the coworker, and I don't think I could have done that anyway. I really do not like anyone who makes prejudice statements such as this. I think it is moronic to stereotype people. But, I do not want to waste my fight and fire on a losing battle. Sometimes, no matter what you say or do, that mind set will not change. And those are the kind of motherfuckers I cannot tolerate, and I don't even want to waste my time. I would rather waste my time with the type of person who can learn something from my experiences, even if they only learn that not ALL ex junkies are not such and such...

I do wish there was as much respect for recovery as there is stigma for heroin addiction. It seems very unbalanced to me. It takes a lot of really tough work to make it in recovery. It takes a lot of soul searching, which is something most people avoid. If you do not know your demons, well, you most certainly cannot attempt to overtake them. It is a major accomplishment to stay clean and to become something in your life. It is a serious accomplishment to change your life around, and fucking do something with it. I wish more people could see how hard a road recovery really is, but then the only way more people could see this is if they had some personal experience with it because that is the only way you can know...and I do not wish more people had experience with addiction. Instead, I wish less people had this experience.

It is what it is...and its one of the things I cannot change...

Conversation with a Coworker

Talking with a coworker this morning, and the subject drifted to concerts coming to the area. Apparently, MC Hammer and Vanilla Ice are starting a tour together. My coworker wants to see this show, and then he mentions, with a tone of disapproval that Vanilla Ice has his own home improvement show. I point out that while Vanilla Ice may be a musical laughing stock, he was smart with his real estate investments and has made more money flipping houses than he was able to save from his short rap career. My coworker shruggs his shoulders and replies, "Yeah, but he is a recovering heroin addict." I am left speechless. Then, all the questions start spinning for me. Do I defend recovering addicts, and hence defend myself? Or would that merely open the door for problems at my job? I never lie about my past, but I do chose to omit those details in some settings. There is such a stigma with heroin addiction, and the stigma with recovery is never enough to overcome those labels. I feel sure that a recovered addict has put more effort into his recovery than most people put into anything they do. There is nothing I can do about the stigma and attitude surrounding addiction, even the recovery from addiction...but it still leaves me speechless and frustrated to hear these sentiments.

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