People sometimes ask me:
Was there an Ah-Hah Moment, when I knew I had to quit drugs for good?
Not really…like many of us persons who struggle with addiction, I mostly got sick and tired, of being sick and tired
Although over the course of my two decades of addiction, many little moments coalesced into the closest something to that Ah-Hah Moment
Here’s a story very close to the truth; one that begins and begins to end on a dreary and disturbing North Beach night in October 2007
I’m eleven years into my meth addiction, have taken up residence in a hotel in the theater district
Meaning, I live above a strip club, in a rent-by-the-week single room with a sink in the corner…the sink is where I wash my clothes, ash my cigarettes, and urinate
Amid the flashing neon beckoning mostly male partygoers into places with names like Big Al’s, the Roaring 20’s, and the Hungry I
And the drunken revelers’ howls
Allen Ginsberg strode these North Beach streets, and even today Jack Kerouac — his larger-than-life-size picture, anyway — stares roughly east, perhaps past the towering dagger of the Transamerica Pyramid, towards where he began his heroic journey West, in On the Road
I, deep in the throes of methamphetamine psychosis, often believed myself a hero, fighting the vast conspiracies against me
Destitute, my life’s savings gone — much of it to the strip clubs
Not showered or brushed my teeth in months
Dressed in filthy Ben Davis slacks, black baseball jacket, Converse shoes bound with duct tape…no socks or underwear, nothing like that
For years, I‘d partied at a back table in my favorite club
Flinging fives and fifties!
Buying rounds of drinks, and half-hours in the Champagne Room
With an entertainer who went by the stage name Harpy
Harpy was my girlfriend…
(Meaning, she rightfully took my money in exchange for not dispelling my various self-delusions)
She was a beautiful human being, with a kind soul, a solid heart
She drank Corona, a wedge of lime lodged in the bottle’s long glass neck
The skin of the fruit the same green as her eyes
The green in her eyes, flecked with gold
She wore a tattoo of a harpy…
A mythological half-woman, half-bird
Greek poet Hesiod writes: “…the Harpies…in the speed of their wings keep pace with the blowing winds, or birds in flight, as they soar and swoop, high aloft.”
I believed myself high aloft, gazing into Harpy’s gold-flecked eyes…
Convinced, in those hours between midnight and dawn that shimmer like a plucked guitar string, an optical illusion of substantial steel shrinking thin as its resonant sound fades
That I’d found — in my drug-addled strip club lifestyle — a pinnacle of existence, the methamphetamine dream
Yet when the gold in my wallet disappeared, so did Harpy’s green eyes…
(The rest of her, too)
I spent a disastrous summer working as floorwalker for the Larry Flynt’s Hustler Club
I’m grateful to the owners of the Hustler Club: They hired me, gave me a chance…
Yet I made them pay for it
Stole money, showed up high for work, carried a bottle of Jack Daniels in my tuxedo jacket pocket
The Club (rightfully) fired me…
Which brings us to one dreary and disturbing Friday night in October 2007
In my flophouse hotel, I “clean” my tuxedo…
(The tux, left over from my Larry Flynt’s floorwalker days, is the only clothing I own other than the Ben Davis slacks and baseball jacket)
To clean the tux, I’ve invented a trick whereby I pop open a can of shoe polish, stolen from the supermarket
Light it afire with my meth torch, hold the smoking sludge up to the tux
Turning my suit a nice, deep, black
Looking real sharp! Or so I believe: Sharp, for a few minutes, anyway…
Until, maybe from the wax in the polish, the tux starts to turn yellow
I look as if a swarm of bumblebees mistook me for a flower and tried to pollinate me
As if it isn’t bad enough…
The one shirt I own looks like a light-blue pajama top
I slouch downtown, work my way to the Hyatt hotel
Where in the lobby, a massive statue, globe-like, towers within the pyramiding terraces outside the guest rooms…
It must be the most fantastic temporary home ever built!
I slouch to the bar, and lurk about
(A bee-pollen pajama-top James Bond, blending in)
A patron leaves behind a half-finished drink, I slosh it down
Feeling Eyeballs upon me
In a banquet room, a wedding reception is taking place, I stand on the fringes
The loneliness and despair like that towering globe upon my shoulders, hating the world for the mistakes it let me make
In the past four years, five couples had married, ten of my closest friends…one couple asked me to serve as best man
Can you guess how many of those weddings I attended?
Zero
I return to my North Beach hotel room, pee in the sink, smoke the stub of a joint and the residue left in my meth pipe
The following morning: Dawn, and drugs all gone…
I borrow a broom from the parking lot attendant across the street
Start sweeping the sidewalks outside my flophouse hotel
Cigarette butts and cracked plastic cups
Hoping to be rewarded with a free cup of coffee by the owner of the cafe down the street
(It had happened once, but never again)
I pause my broom, send my gaze down
Back in those days, the strip clubs used to print advertising flyers with pictures of their entertainers
On the sidewalk below, what do you think I see?
Two green eyes staring back up at me
Some part of me that needs to confess, admits…
All along: It had been a lie
The life I’d led was a delusion
To my left, the gaping maw of the Broadway Tunnel
Like the mouth of the glass meth pipe from which I’d smoked my life away
Cars zipping and zooming into the tunnel’s blackness, like what I’d lost to my pipe
My home, career, relationships…even my dog
(To name just a few)
To my right, the glittering waters of the San Francisco Bay
The storied West Coast to which I’d escaped, two decades before, seeking promise and opportunity
The sunlight sparkled off the water, like diamonds in the waves
Those diamonds were brighter than the gold in Harpy’s eyes
My choice that October morning was clear…
I haven’t used meth since, and don’t plan to
In the twelve years I’ve been clean, society has allowed me to contribute
Amazing people inspired me to pursue a spiritual path of self-improvement and being of service
I’ve been allowed to contribute to organizations that assist formerly incarcerated people find jobs and start businesses
My family has taken me back in
Life is a series of wonderful opportunities to be grateful
Thanks to a practice of meditation, spirituality, and lot of hard work
And even more help…
Today, each day presents its own Ah-Hah Moments, in which to give thanks for all that’s been given me
Get your free copy of my PDF: “Ten Helpful Questions to Ask if Someone You Love is Recovering from Addiction” at www.edkressy.com
Contact me at ed.kressy@icloud.com
