My Nightmare

I was sitting in the darkened house, shades drawn, not a hint of light anywhere (even though it was the middle of the day) wondering if the nightmare I lived everyday would ever end.  I sat there and I looked at what was around me.  People who were lifeless, uncaring, speechless, gaunt, out of touch with reality.  People that seemed to be unable to care for themselves.  Here was a room so smoke filled one could hardly see the face next to them.  It was so quiet.  Only a few moans, some humming and the flick of the lighters was all I heard.  The smell was of old, dirty clothes and musty, wet furniture that had been sitting for way too long.  The smell there was of death.  Some of them couldn’t even make it to the bathroom.  They’re sitting on urine soaked floors, couches, chairs and sometimes even themselves.  The smell of chemicals was all around.  It was almost like there was no air there.  As I sat there and looked around I asked myself in a brief moment of lucidity (and there weren’t many of those), “How did I get to be like these people?”

I seem to recall life not being so hard at one time.  I remember hiding behind the trees, counting to ten, running to base, and yelling “Tag, you’re it!”  I remember wearing the orange flag and running up and down the street with all the boys in the neighborhood.  I recall the smell of freshly cut grass.  The smell of baby back ribs and steak that had marinated all day cooking on the grill outside the garage.  The house that my grandparents lived in was magnificent.  It had plush, brown, wall to wall carpet.  The den where the big screen T.V. was, was huge.  We would watch the horse races on that T.V.  The formal living room (no children were allowed in that room), where the baby grand piano was, was all white.  Most of all, I remember the family being together every weekend, on Christmas, at Easter, laughing, drinking, and telling stories of the previous weeks.  Those were times of innocence.

For many years after, fifteen to be exact, I lived in a world much different than the world of my grandparents.  The nightmare began early for me.  I was curious about some of the evils of the world, drinking and drugs to be specific.

I began following the crowd.  I started hanging out and wearing black as everyone else I new did.  I didn’t like it, but what did I know?  I was going to be like everyone else.  I started listening to heavy metal music.  I remember hearing it pound in my head as my friends played it louder and louder, so loud that you could hear it down the block.  The ringing in my ears seemed to go on forever when the music was finally turned off.

“Come on, try it!”  Those were the first words I remember to begin my journey through hell.  The couch we were sitting on seemed to be dingy merely from all the cigarette smoke.  The faces of my friends seemed to be clueless.  They were glassy eyed, almost like they were in a daze.  Others laughed uncontrollably at nothing.  So, after fighting the feeling, and remembering what my parents had taught me, I picked up the funny looking cigarette and took a puff.  The rush of smoke to my head almost sent me to the floor.  I was sitting there, room spinning, not knowing whether to laugh or cry.  After my eyes straightened up, I told myself that it wasn’t so bad.  I soon discovered that the more I smoked, the sillier (and hungrier) I got.  That was it.  No big deal.

“Come on, try it!”  As I was sitting on the same dingy couch, this time glassy eyed and laughing, the cloudy mirror came my way.  There on the mirror sat a perfect line made of white powder.  The straw and the razor blade sat next to it.  I seemed to have lost my buzz all of a sudden as they sat this in front of me.  I played it over and over in my mind what my teachers had taught me.  The pot wasn’t so bad though.  Maybe this won’t be so bad either.  I looked at the faces around me again.  People that looked to be in such deep thought, like they were trying to solve the problems of the world.  They couldn’t find the right thing to quench their thirsts.  Noses were running and people were sniffling.  No one could sit still for very long.  So I tried it.  The problem was, I like it, this feeling of raw energy, and the feeling of never needing to sleep again.  It seemed like you could run for days and never tire.  Now this was totally cool (and I looked cool in front of my friends, too).  This feeling of pure energy became an everyday thing for over fifteen years.

“Come on, try it!”  By this time I was experienced.  Marijuana, cocaine, acid and pills were on my list of choice drugs.  If you could name it, I had done it.  I still looked as everyone else did.  I looked as if I were trying to solve the problems of the world.  My hands shook.  I could never quite get still enough or comfortable enough.  I would grow tired after days of not sleeping.  When I finally would have the urge to sleep, my stomach would ache.  The drugs seemed to replace the blood running through my veins.  If I ran out of drugs, my body felt as if it were going to shut down.  So when the pipe came my way, I held it as though I were a pro.  The surge of energy was tremendous.  You feel it spread through your body like air that you breathe, and then nothing.  You know nothing, you feel nothing, you see nothing and you hear nothing.  You are in complete darkness.  You’re in a room with other people just like you, yet you are totally alone.  It was a force that took over my whole body.  My body was already weak and tired which made me helpless to fight this.  I had gotten myself into a world where there seemed to be no escaping from.  I lived in this hell that only I knew about.  My gaunt, almost skeleton like body could take no more.

I was locked in a room, only my best friend and I.  I hadn’t eaten in weeks.  I hadn’t slept in days.  I looked like I was wearing the clothes of someone who weighed 400 pounds, only they were my clothes.  My body looked like that of a 10 year old child.  My hair had thinned out like baby’s hair.  My fingernails were transparent and thin like a sheet of paper.  My body was a pale yellow color.  I stumbled as if I were just learning to walk.  I had to do this.  I wanted no more experiences.  I just didn’t realize that this experience was to be the worst yet.  I was locked in this room for what seemed like an eternity (it was actually only 72 hours).  This room held me like a prison holds a prisoner.  I felt more alone then, than I ever felt being high.  This room seemed to close in on me and the more it closed in on me, the more air it seemed to suck out of the room.  It was like being tied in a plastic bag and not being able to get out.  I was in pure agony.  My body was shaking like a leaf shakes on a tree during a rainstorm.  My hands were trembling.  My stomach ached.  I was sweating like I had just run a 20 mile marathon in 110 degree weather.  I couldn’t sit still.  I was going crazy in my mind.  Colors were flashing in my head.  Different pictures flashed across my face like someone was switching the channels on T.V.  I paced the floor, screaming obscenities at the person whom I had asked to help me.  She was, in my mind, the enemy.  The one keeping me from feeling better.  The one, who in reality, was keeping me from killing myself, only I couldn’t get past the pain long enough to realize this.  I would swing at her, trying to get myself out of that prison I was in.  One minute I would be out of control like a raging bull, while the next minute I would be curled up in the fetal position crying like a baby, a baby who was defenseless, helpless, and starved.  I would throw up every few minutes although there hadn’t been any food in my stomach for weeks.  Now I was truly in hell.

As I lay on the floor in her bedroom exhausted, I remembered the smells, the darkness, the people who I thought were my friends, and realized that I didn’t want to go back there.  I was so exhausted, so weak, so hungry and for the first time in years, so in my right mind, I cried.  And I cried for what seemed like hours.  She sat next to me, the person who saved my life (and I know that now) and held me while I cried.  I don’t know if they were tears of joy, relief, sadness, or pain.  I just know that for the first time in a very long time I felt real emotion, and I prayed to God (as I did for those 72 hours) that if he would get me through this, I would never hit another pipe again.  And I never did.