Well, a promise is a promise, and I suppose that being clean and reforming myself includes doing my best to keep them, and thus—the timeline.
Day Two- I mentioned in my last transmission about the drug not working any more and that was true, but immediately following that my mind and body reset itself, effectively rolling me back to a condition of Day One usage. This phenomenon is not unknown to me and has heretofore been a signal to open the floodgates and bask in unfettered tweakeristic abandon, but I chose, oddly, to interpret it as a gift and a blessing in the form of a possible amelioration of withdrawal symptoms should I instead go forward with my plan to curtail the madness. I was correct, I think, in that I don't feel quite so disgusting as a barrel of toxic sludge from a rustbelt manufactory circa 1955, nor quite so worthless as a business concern associated in the slightest with the name Trump about two years from now, but that could've been for any number of reasons. Fairies, benevolent gremlins, who knows? I’m not a— what’s the guy who wants a reason for things?—a, a, dammit, a causality whore, for fuck’s sake. I’m just trying to get through this week.
Day the third: I hope I didn’t give the impression that this is shaping up to be a cakewalk in the park with duck soup for lunch and beer and skittles to follow (Beer and skittles: an obsolete reference to a life of ease and leisure, not an answer to the question: what does a teenage alcoholic have for lunch?), because I assuredly am not in the anywhere near pink. I’d say I’m in the about middling portion of the beige spectrum. I’m eating well, if by well you mean a lot, which is to say that anything within a certain size range goes into my mouth (insert dick joke here) NOW and gets classified as food/not food LATER. I don’t have time to figure that shit out, I don’t want to get up and turn on the lights, and my body is smart enough to expel anything toxic or undigestible.
El Dia del Cuarto: ¡ai caramba! Why is it getting worse? I don’t remember the inane apothegm being “time heals all wounds except self-inflicted tweakier complaints,” it was “time heals ALL wounds.” Fuck this noise, I’m going to go score a bag. No I’m not. But it would feel so good. But I don’t want to go back to prison or the earth from whence I came. But-but-but, repeat ad nauseam and then eat until I pass out. Morning will bring:
Day Five: is that the figurative sun I see peeking around the edge of that metaphorical thunderhead like a tweaker at the drapes, or is it just another emblematic bomb coursing through the allegorical atmosphere on a Potter Valley vector? Too soon to tell, but this is not my first bingo night and it’s right around this time that the what I like to call “false dawn” phenomenon turns up, where you get about two hours of feeling pretty much fine on waking and then back to the torture/torment. Never let it be said that I ever did anything to a horse’s mouth besides shove a carrot in, though, so I’m going to enjoy it while it lasts. Having an interesting thought (first one in a blue moon): Trump, no dummy he (he’s THE dummy), in his pardon of that disgraced SEAL who was rightfully stripped of his benefits and insignia and his continual and ongoing blowjob of all things military, is paving the way for an eventual coup. Believe it, campers. If you consider that an absurd proposition, I ask that you consider two things: the endlessly mounting cascade of absurdity that characterizes his administration and the historical precedent of every military-backed coup ever, in which the heads of state did exactly the sort of sycophantic pandering at which our dickweed-in-chief so excels. I would never promote or encourage assassination of anyone, Mr. Government Spy, but that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t get a tattoo of the person’s name who finally shut that disgusting mouth up for good, right next to MOM and BUCKY FULLER.
Day Six: It’s not a train loaded with earth-moving equipment bearing down on me and no place to run! It is that storied light as the tunnel finally manifests its non-infinite nature. God bless time, sleep, and solid food in its manifold diversity. I do believe I shall live, and in living thrive, and in thriving not act as if I didn’t give two hoots about the carcass I’m lugging around. It’s not like I haven’t said this or something like it pretty much every week for the past 40 years but eventually it’ll be true, is my thinking. This doesn’t mean that things are back to normal, though. Next stop on this infernal voyage is a period of emotional instability that would make a teenage girl with weight issues on her period look like the Dalai Lama getting a massage. The very best thing I can do for myself for the next two weeks is to keep all sensory input within an extremely narrow range of the banal and mundane, because anything even remotely positive or negative is going to make me cry. Now, even on my sanest days my feels are layered pretty thinly, epidermically speaking, and I’m not shy about sharing my extremes of temperament with the world at large. I’m no stoic, is what I’m saying, but this is ridiculous.
Here is but a small sampling of the things that have induced tears today: 1. Coffee commercial jingle. 2. Picture of a bear. 3. A hole in my sock. 4. Passing thought about Gwen Stefani. 5. The river rushing by. 6, and I’m not kidding, considering the phenomenon of crying. This is what I’m up against and it may give you some insight about why I choose to apply the numbing balm of intoxicants so liberally. I’m not unique in being the sort of person who frets and fusses and worries and wails (internally) about every little thing nor in empathically absorbing whatever artful emotional trigger emplaced in whatever thing I’m likely to see or hear, and I’m sure not the first to take the easy way out in dealing with it, but in fairness to me and all the other supersensitives, it’s a load.
Day 7: I seem to remember something about someone resting on this day. Seems like a good idea.
Addendum in re my above observation about Trump’s probable plan to maintain residence at 1600 Penn in perpetuity: I have not served in uniform nor taken up arms to kill my foes, but I do know a little something about being a warrior, of sorts, and one concept I think all true warriors — those of courage and character — hold inviolable is respect for one’s enemy. You respect his sacrifice and ideals, however contrary they may be to your own, and honor his defeat as well as your own victory. You do not piss on him, you do not fashion jewelry from his parts, and you do not dishonor yourcause by dishonor of his. Period. Fuck that dude.
Actually, you know nothing about “being a warrior,” a concocted new age expression at best. However, if you could only wake up to yourself, you would clearly see that you know a great deal about arrogance, self pleasuring and delusion. Once upon a time, admitted fool that I am, I sent money on your behalf. Currently, I’m more than willing to buy you a bag of crank. Veteran
Flynn, we’ve been reading your hyper-literate ramblings since the early incarcerated, letter-to-the-editor days and have developed a real appreciation for your submissions. Whether you’ve crafted articulate insights on existential topics, shared humorous reflections or ‘fessed up to despicable deeds, your offerings always provide us with new vocabulary words, a deep gratitude that my life is only distantly affected by addiction and a comforting sense that bibliophiles and word nerds are everywhere. Keep fighting and writing.
Mr. Koepf-
I certainly did not mean my “warrior” comment to have even a whiff of new-age about it, nor would I ever knowingly employ any similarly tinged verbiage to express myself. I find the concept to be ridiculoso in toto and would invite the new age community and their obfuscatory babble to really do the planet a favor and shut the hell up. I meant it literally, but in the sense of being a person who, in the service of duty, loyalty, and ethical responsibility, puts themselves in harm’s way as a weapon for their cause. I never donned a uniform save the Scout olive green (not for lack of trying- first denied on medical grounds and later on legal), but one of the most significant watershed moments of my life was when I stopped cowering in the face of aggression and began standing up for myself and others. I was part of a “gang” when that meant not shooting unarmed, unsuspecting people from safe cover but squaring off with your boys in the street and working out your differences with your fists and feet. I have never let a friend fight alone unless he wanted it that way nor let fear of physical harm deter me from intervening when honorable obligation demanded it. I was stabbed and very nearly killed in defense of a woman in distress and stood between a loaded gun and an intended victim, ready to take the bullet for him. I probably wouldn’t have done that last one without the snootful of vodka urging on my recklessness, but the point is that I have operated within a code rooted in the knowledge that any negative consequence of doing the right thing is preferable to the shame of turning your back. If you thought I was referring to something like that “way of the peaceful warrior” bullshit or to my battle with addiction, you don’t get me at all. In fact, and I say this without anger or bravado, if you think you are pissed enough off at me to think I deserve an ass-whipping, I’d be happy to let you try. I’d rather you had a clearer view of my motives and intent though, as I have always had respect for what I know of you from your comments to the paper.
Please take the money earmarked for that bag of crank and send it to MCAVHN, 148 Clara St., Ukiah, to be used in the service of harm reduction. I am now employed by that fine organization of selfless and dedicated people as a member of their outreach team and running the needle exchange program. Part of the solution instead of the problem.
Good luck, kid. Your verbiage is long, somewhat confused, and certainly threatening, but I come from people who toil on the sea. One chance is all you get; pull your wait or get off the boat. You may think you talk and write like a man, so I sincerely trust that the time has finally come when you can prove it to yourself and yourself alone. Pal, these liberals that you’ve conned, really don’t care. They use your plight to shine virtue upon themselves. Happy New Year, kid. I hope you make it, but you have reached the age of sink or swim. The sea is deep and oblivion awaits. The offer remains: straighten out or I’ll buy that bag.
I only know what I read but I saw this article in the Atlantic recently
The Irrationality of Alcoholics Anonymous.
The point being there is an almost d-I-y treatment option available. Also see a documentary called
One Little Pill. Good luck. Lord knows you are overdue for some