You know when everything's going all right and you think you are a little invincible and you sort of just go "Aww fuck it" and you risk all your hard work and everything for a little high?
Yeah, well, as we all know with the chilling clarity of sobriety, there is no 'win situation' from pushing our luck - or even tempting fate, or riding the plateau, or (and I don't even know what this means) chasing the dragon.
What happens is before you even have time to absorb the insidious mind cram of the high, you are transported instantly back to that time you were strung out - crawling around the house on a weekday looking for butt ends or a skerrick of a joint. Even just a bit of a butt, or the teensiest scrap of smokeable grit you could transform into a high and the escape from the doldrums of sobering up.
Sure, the headache of the hangover can be sweetened by lying back and just well lying there, but nothing beats a hangover like doing it again before the hangover has time to fully deaden into what you think is the grim tooth-grind of reality.
Yeah, since this blog is my church, and I certainly can't say my body had been my temple lately (unless you count the offerings of chocolate and ice cream and other assorted sweet crap) - I have a confession to make and it is embarrassing and frankly fucking ridiculous.
For the past eight days I have been smoking this synthetic weed that I honestly can't tell you what it is made of - someone likened it to flyspray on paper - and I have just stopped yesterday. Today is my second day without it. Fucking crazy - but I was virtually (really? virtually - like as in Tron?) no, was basically hooked on this shit and my world was caving in again.
*
Mmmm. It's a fucking joke that I am so reckless and foolhardy acting as though I can walk into an impossibly high threshold addiction situation and just flirt on the edges without being sucked into the volcano.
So, yeah, I had a joint of it. And I just squatted there, looking at my tree ferns, and I smoked a cigarette (yeah, they appeared just a few weeks ago too) and my mind skipped away into that deep stoned trance where the garden and the plants are almost more than three dimensional and somehow the garden design and layout becomes a whole body experience.
When I am stoned I work hard. I planted dozens of native grasses and re-built all the compost around the existing ferns and palms. I dug drainage trenches and made space for a sandstone bench. I re-potted all the pot plants in the courtyard with fresh compost, and trickled fertilizer onto all of my tress and plants too. All this over the last seven or eight days.
Waking up, getting dressed, going to buy more plant shit, and then curling a joint and smoking it whilst I garden with the headphones on playing classical music. Me, lost in concentration moving plants and thinking, acting out the best sites for them to grow. I moved my tahitian lime tree from the pot it was in since 1999, and planted it in the ground, and then went and bought two more so I would have a little orchard.
Everything was so twee and nice and stoned and calm out there by myself, doing the gardening thing.
But I don't live in a vacuum, and sure enough, it all came to a shuddering halt. I was basically addicted again.
Yeah, well, as we all know with the chilling clarity of sobriety, there is no 'win situation' from pushing our luck - or even tempting fate, or riding the plateau, or (and I don't even know what this means) chasing the dragon.
What happens is before you even have time to absorb the insidious mind cram of the high, you are transported instantly back to that time you were strung out - crawling around the house on a weekday looking for butt ends or a skerrick of a joint. Even just a bit of a butt, or the teensiest scrap of smokeable grit you could transform into a high and the escape from the doldrums of sobering up.
Sure, the headache of the hangover can be sweetened by lying back and just well lying there, but nothing beats a hangover like doing it again before the hangover has time to fully deaden into what you think is the grim tooth-grind of reality.
Yeah, since this blog is my church, and I certainly can't say my body had been my temple lately (unless you count the offerings of chocolate and ice cream and other assorted sweet crap) - I have a confession to make and it is embarrassing and frankly fucking ridiculous.
For the past eight days I have been smoking this synthetic weed that I honestly can't tell you what it is made of - someone likened it to flyspray on paper - and I have just stopped yesterday. Today is my second day without it. Fucking crazy - but I was virtually (really? virtually - like as in Tron?) no, was basically hooked on this shit and my world was caving in again.
*
Mmmm. It's a fucking joke that I am so reckless and foolhardy acting as though I can walk into an impossibly high threshold addiction situation and just flirt on the edges without being sucked into the volcano.
So, yeah, I had a joint of it. And I just squatted there, looking at my tree ferns, and I smoked a cigarette (yeah, they appeared just a few weeks ago too) and my mind skipped away into that deep stoned trance where the garden and the plants are almost more than three dimensional and somehow the garden design and layout becomes a whole body experience.
When I am stoned I work hard. I planted dozens of native grasses and re-built all the compost around the existing ferns and palms. I dug drainage trenches and made space for a sandstone bench. I re-potted all the pot plants in the courtyard with fresh compost, and trickled fertilizer onto all of my tress and plants too. All this over the last seven or eight days.
Waking up, getting dressed, going to buy more plant shit, and then curling a joint and smoking it whilst I garden with the headphones on playing classical music. Me, lost in concentration moving plants and thinking, acting out the best sites for them to grow. I moved my tahitian lime tree from the pot it was in since 1999, and planted it in the ground, and then went and bought two more so I would have a little orchard.
Everything was so twee and nice and stoned and calm out there by myself, doing the gardening thing.
But I don't live in a vacuum, and sure enough, it all came to a shuddering halt. I was basically addicted again.
Addiction is addiction is addiction, isn't it? I've thought of taking up pot again after 20+ years, I'm sure it's nothing like the dirt weed I smoked back in the 80's but....I think we're meant to walk around on this earth as "us", aren't we? Some people can mildly accentuate their personalities, get mellow, get happy, momentarily without stringing out, but we can't, can we?
ReplyDeleteBroken arm. Can't type. But I will second what Kary May said. We can't go there.
ReplyDeleteThose people at loans for bad credit say the nicest things, don't they? lol
ReplyDeleteI remember in one of your blogs you spoke of the momentum of updating your blog as being the fuel to feed the momentum of your sobriety...or something like that. So look to your keyboard and us once again.
ReplyDelete(Oh, and Kary May, I think I love you.)
Q
Get in line! LOL!!!
DeleteI hope you take this the right way but I've read your entire blog and have been watching for updates for the past few months and frankly I'm sick of your merry go round. I found this blog when I was desperate and drunk, you honestly- no bullshit here- honestly this blog helped me find AA and go for actual treatment of my addictions. It really pains me to see you going around and around like this I can feel your uneasiness through your writing (one of the hazards of you being a good writer that you are). Seriously though stop with the bull and find some help for this disease- there is no reason any of us have to go through this alone and I really REALLY don't want to see the blog where you go "oh damn I drank again and launch into that whole deal".
ReplyDeleteWe all started with one day. Some of us a few day ones. Good for coming clean. We have the opportunity to live in this world unaltered, if we choose. Good luck with your recovery.
ReplyDeleteStill a follower, still pulling for you. Hope you make it. Your kids deserve their dad.
Oh. Oh, dear. That's a slippery slope. I am very happy that you realised this was no damn good.
ReplyDeleteI hope that you write again soon about where you are now. I sense that your blog is a great place for you to take stock and be accountable. I'll be checking in.... and I am also pulling for you.
Michelle
I leave you with an Ani diFranco lyric:
ReplyDelete"What kind of paradise am I looking for? I've got everything I want and I still want
more."
Well. That's disappointing isn't it? Now we pick ourselves up, brush ourselves off, and have another go at it. It's worth it. But you already know that. Though only 18 weeks sober I've discovered there is a tremendous amount of clarity and freedom in sobriety I simply will not trade for anything that might drag me back into that dark corner of fear and frustration. Well done on the gardening.
ReplyDeleteHey matey how you going? xxxx
ReplyDeleteHey dude,
ReplyDeleteWhere are you? The pay day loans and bucket trucks are overtaking your site, time to come clean house and let the rest of us know how you're doing. BTW the bucket truck people say you overlap and they tell me I can't friggin' speal.
Hey folks,
ReplyDeleteRelapse is a bitch! I'm going on three years alcohol/drug free and life is GOOD! I started when I was 12 and quit when I was 49, lost my marriage, respect of my kids, jobs, the whole nine! Along the way I tried the AA cult, rehabs, etc.. It all felt wrong (especially AA! urgh). I'm not powerless and I refuse to turn my will & life over to anyone or anything. Sorry but it's a fact...Addiction is a choice. Grow, evolve, learn, use YOUR right and responsibilty to make GOOD choices. I figured out how to do it and maybe I can help a few souls along the way. Check out my website (and book) at thefreedomtorecover.com
I just typed you a whole book and Wordpres ate it. I'm going to check out your site as we are like minded. I recently got into it with some AA fanatics about my blog and how I'm ruining their traditions. I have a post about it coming out soon. I'd love for you to guest post some time. Check me out at www.soberandskinny.com
DeleteHey, just checking in. How are you doing? You wanna talk?
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