Pubdate: Mon, 09 Aug 2004
Source: Daily Times, The (TN)
Copyright: 2004 Horvitz Newspapers
Contact:  http://www.thedailytimes.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1455
Author: Steve Wildsmith

RECOVERY MAKES BLUE SKIES MORE ENJOYABLE

Just For Today

It's fascinating to me how certain things -- a sight, a sound, a smell -- 
can trigger a landslide of memories long forgotten.

I had one of those episodes Friday morning, when I awoke to dawn spreading 
into clear skies, the grass wet and heavy from Thursday's rain. I sat 
outside, on our deck, and smoked a cigarette. The air was cool, delicious 
against my skin. And it took me back.

As a general rule, addicts lead pretty sorry, pathetic lives. When drugs 
dictate everything you do -- when you eat, when you sleep, how much money 
you're going to spend, what you're going to do to get that money or that 
dope -- nothing else really matters.

You wake up craving and dope-sick, most mornings, seized the instant your 
eyes open by the overwhelming, screaming, gnawing hunger in your brain. You 
go wherever that hunger drives you -- usually to a lot of unsafe 
neighborhoods, where you interact with a lot of shady characters. You drive 
if you've got a car, catch a ride if someone else has one, or walk if 
that's the only option.

It doesn't matter how much pain you're in, how sick you feel; it doesn't 
matter if it's high noon in late July and the asphalt seems to bubble in 
the heat or if there's a severe thunderstorm warning and sheets of rain are 
coming at you sideways -- you go where you need to go to get what you need 
to get.

Addiction is a lot of waiting -- watching the second-hand on the clock tick 
slowly toward the time when your dealer turns his pager on, or you know for 
sure he'll be at his usual spot. Sometimes you wait on the job, pretending 
to be busy, screaming on the inside because it feels like your guts are 
going to crawl up your throat. Sometimes, it's waiting in a hot car, 
sweltering in the summer sun, staking out the parking lot or apartment 
where your connection lives because you don't want to miss him leaving or 
arriving.

Sometimes, though, you have one of those days where things aren't 
rock-bottom horrible. They're not good, granted, but you don't pass out at 
night praying to die in your sleep. And because any minor improvement to 
your miserable life is better than its overall steady decline, it actually 
seems like an OK day.

The weather in Friday morning reminded me of one of those days. It was a 
day where I woke up feeling tired and queasy, but the withdrawal wasn't 
excruciating. Most of the time, withdrawing from opiates made me feel like 
I came in third in a hatchet fight, so on the days when you'd wake up 
feeling not-so-bad, it was a pleasant surprise.

Friday's weather was the kind we prayed for in active addiction. It made 
walking five miles or more to the 'hood feel like a stroll, and waiting on 
the corner, while boring, not pleasant. Perhaps it's because the skies seem 
so crystal-clear after weeks of muggy haze, but it was the kind of weather 
that made me, as an addict, feel like maybe . just maybe ... I wasn't doomed.

That somewhere out there, some hope might be coming my way.

It took a while, but I have that hope today. It's a gift given through 
recovery, the hope of never waking up dope-sick again, never having to 
waste hours and days and weeks and months hunting a poison to inject into 
my arm. It's the hope of feeling human after years of feeling less-than, 
and the hope that, whatever the beautiful day brings, I don't have to get 
high to cope.

In my active addiction, those OK days were a rarity. Today, every day is an 
OK day; most are downright awesome days. Because my worst day clean is 
better than my best day getting high -- and for that, I'm grateful.
- ---
MAP posted-by: Terry Liittschwager