LUXURY PROBLEMS

Hi, and thanks for passing through.  As you may know, the first 22 posts of this blog are the text of my much-acclaimed ebook, 'How To Become A Crack Addict' (Jan to April 2013).  You can read it here, or buy it on amazon, if your morals allow it.  If you do, please leave a review, as all feedback is appreciated.  As for now, this blog is the sporadic ejaculations of yours truly, Benjamin of Turnham Green.  And here is today's emission...

LUXURY PROBLEM

One day, I was in a Narcotics Anonymous meeting, feeling disconsolate, dishevelled, and deeply angry at those who'd found a way of life that didn't involve constant scoring, spottiness, and empty cupboards.  But one guy really got my goat.  He was going on about how he couldn't decide whether to sell his Mercedes or not, and was genuinely talking like we should give a damn.  He went on for about ten minutes, making out how humble he felt these days, how he was now there for his family (the unfortunate wretches), and had accessed the magic of a god of his own choosing.  I can't remember if he used the phrase 'luxury problem' - he probably didn't have the grace or intellect, but he was keen to make it clear he wasn't living in a skip anymore, gnawing on chicken bones.

I, too, have some luxury problems nowadays.  In fact, some of the problems I have now I would have called solutions a year or two back.  Now, for example, I try to keep my bank-account in credit, and slightly resent the £6 charge if I go over.  Up until a year ago, my overdraft was constantly hovering around the £2,000 mark, and thoughts of being in credit seemed distant, difficult to achieve, and potentially dangerous, because it wasn't so long ago that I couldn't hold on to £100, let alone £1,000, without squandering it in one or two sittings.  I have a nice little phone now, nothing flashy, but I can take photos and videos with it, and see it better than my old one, and it hasn't fallen into the clutches of a stranger at dawn, never to be seen again.  I've been doing a bit of stand-up most weeks lately, and even though I didn't get through to the final of this competition recently (due to scoring anomalies), a year ago I wouldn't even have turned up for the gig, that's even if I'd organised it in the first place.  I have a rug on the floor, a spotlight, a lovely peace lily, and a big blue wine glass, the image of which is thrown onto the wall by the spotlight, making for quite a nice feature, even if I say so myself.  I find the spotlight's beam a bit narrow, but not so long ago there was no blue wine glass, no spotlight, no rug, and no peace lily adorning that corner of my cabin, which was, as it goes, just dry thin grey carpet and a CD rack.  Yes, and even though I can't see to drive, I can't wait to purchase my first Mercedes, and go ram it down the throat of a captive audience in a local twelve-step fellowship.

And that is all I have to say today, bitter but grateful.  But just in case you want to hear a song by me, here is one for you to click on...The World Is Full Of Whores

Maybe tomorrow?

MONSTER IN THE VORTEX

Hi, and thanks for dropping by.  As you may know, the first 22 posts of this blog are the text of my ebook, 'How To Become A Crack Addict' (Jan to April 2013).  Since then, it's become the rambling thoughts of yours truly, Benjamin of Turnham Green.  So let's go for today's ramble...

 

MONSTER IN THE VORTEX

The rumour-mill of White City is back in business, grinding down dirt to make more dirt, filthy accusations, gossip, lies and envy - and they say we have no manufacturing base anymore.

It's always nice when you hear a name you haven't thought about for a while.  There I was, languishing at the bus-stop, on my way to a comedy spot (five minutes in a pub cellar that smelled of the adjacent gents'), when up pops husky Nelly with a gravelly salutation.  'Ben,' says she, 'you alright?'  I was on the cusp of terror at my forthcoming stand-up, and fury that my life had come to this, doing five minute spots in smelly cellars, when things could've been so very, very different, etc, etc.  But comedy aside, I said a cautious hello, recalling our last meeting, Boxing Day 2013, when Nelly wandered off with my portable telly in the middle of the night.  We'd been using, run dry, and began looking around for things that someone in the minicab office might buy.  The telly was cubic, and quite heavy, being an old-style cathode ray one, and I don't know how she jammed it into my holdall, let alone lumbered down the road with it over her shoulder.

Of course, she said she'd be back in forty minutes or so (you know it's a lie when such a specific length of time is given), and besides, it wouldn't have raised more than a fiver even if she had found a buyer.  Obviously, I didn't see her again...until her greeting woke me from introspection at said bus-stop.  'Have you heard Jacob's back?' she asked.  Her question at least made a change from the usual 'what are you up to?' (translated: do you want to use), or 'you alright though?' (translated: do you want to use), or 'you don't have a cigarette, do you?' (translated: do you have a cigarette, and do you want to use).  Jacob, I thought.  Oh dear, back in White City?  That really wasn't good news.

My last memory of Jacob was hearing the toilet flush as he punished an inexperienced working-girl for not obliging his peccadillo for an amorous liaison in the bathroom - her head was down the toilet at the time, which he proudly disclosed on emerging from that darkened and grimy mezzanine, soon followed by a bedraggled girl with wet'n'lank brown hair, and a face that looked too young to be in such a predicament, although I can't imagine there's actually an ideal age for that sort of thing.

Months later, I heard he'd been accused of, or maybe even charged with, sexual assault.  This didn't surprise me, because I'd once been in the kitchen of a flat he'd appropriated when he was torturing his girlfriend in the bathroom.  That time, he'd emerged with a softly spoken speech regarding his girlfriend's lack of respect, and a complaint that her moans might have been heard by the family below.  It's amazing how inconsiderate torture-victims can be.

There are numerous vignettes I could convey to you regarding the borderline escapades of Jacob.  But now, according to the gospel of Nelly, he was back.  He'd been spotted outside Cash Converters, looking shifty in a too-tight shirt.  Nelly went on to say that Hamish was looking for him, because Hamish was the boyfriend of the girl he's assaulted before his disappearance.  And there was speculation too about where he'd banished himself for that wilderness year...Nelly said Reading, but she'd heard someone else say Slough.  But even back in White City, his old stomping ground, Jacob was still a fugitive, weaving through the market-crowds, laying low in a basement-flat, or brutalising a vulnerable female in a tower-block toilet.  I felt a wave of antique fear swell like a foetus in my gut...would he spot me on my wanderings, accost me outside Costa, bark at me in the market, or hail me outside Halo Cabs?  If so, would I be direct enough to make him go, or would I linger, be just a bit too polite, just a tiny bit too curious and malleable?  Fear used to be a key part of my prelude to using, almost as if, once in that terrified state of paralysis, the only way to offset it, get rid of it, was to use.  Many's the time Jacob would pop up on some gloomy night when I was hanging myself out to dry in the W12 postcode, looking for someone to score through.

My bus came to convey me to my comedy-spot in the smelly pub-cellar.  'You haven't got a cigarette, have you?' asked Nelly, but I garbled a polite 'sorry, no', and hopped on.  She stayed sitting at the stop as we pulled away.  I find it's always worth practising saying 'no', just to get your mouth used to forming the word.  You never know when you might need it.

And that is all I have to say today.  However, if you would like to hear my recent song, entitled 'Windswept', just click on the title, and your ears will imminently be delighted.  It's angsty and autumnal, and I hope you like it...Windswept

Maybe tomorrow?

HOW TO SPOT A RELAPSE

Hello, and thanks for dropping by.  As you may know, the first 22 posts of this blog are the text of my ebook, 'How To Become A Crack Addict' (Jan to April 2013), which you can also buy on amazon, if you do that kind of thing.  Nowadays, the blog contains the musings and epiphanies of yours truly, Benjamin of Turnham Green.  So, here is today's inspirational speculation...

HOW TO SPOT A RELAPSE

1. The doormat can't be seen for letters.
2. The washing-up's begun to smell.
3. The game-show channel has been on all day, and the last episode of Family Fortunes seemed too familiar.
4. You're playing incessant Pac-Man online, and actually putting your name in the high-score chart.
5. You haven't seen anyone for a few days, even though you could easily have met a friend.
6. You may get up, but you don't eat until your ravenous, maybe late afternoon, probably at the fridge door.
7. You're entertaining the possibility that a bath with Radox may change your life.
8. You're eyeing up the hoover, wondering how much it might be worth.
9. You're reading the twelve-step book for the first time, in search of loopholes.
9 (a) You find many loopholes.
10. Yes, you definitely saw that episode of Family Fortunes last night, or was it this morning, maybe at dawn?
11. In a bout of virtue, you make it to the shops, but you're walking slowly and obviously, in the hopes you'll be spotted by someone you've used with, which, if it happens, won't be your fault.
11 (a) All you buy is milk, but rather than going home, you start weaving through streets to a place you're sure you once used.
12. You're dialling variations of a number that you think belongs to someone you once used with.
13. You dredge up a grudge that hasn't bothered you for weeks, and dwell on it, from the victim's perspective.
14. You study passers-by to see if they look dishevelled enough to hook up with.
15. You turn down a street you vaguely remember using on, and look for that door, it was red, number seventeen?
16. You're thinking it's as good as fate now, so you may as well just get it over with - upping your game, you go loiter around that tower-block you know is no good.
17.  And my final way to spot a relapse is if none of the above applies to you, ever.

Well there's a few thoughts on what I was like before a relapse, and it's a grim place, torn between wanting to use, but knowing it's wrong, dangerous and damaging.  Many's the hollow afternoon I'd lie there, craving a life, but too impatient to do anything about it.  If I'm honest, I knew as soon as I woke up if I was going to use, but I'd tell myself that it wasn't a forgone conclusion at all, and that a new trajectory might present itself, a life-changing tangent I could fly off on, to love, luck, a new life.  Then, a few hours later, I'd be tortured and torn again, so alone it felt like my head was full of setting clay and, by then, it was like I had to use, just to assuage the desire to use, and all the sorrow it was causing me.

It was like being in a strong current - yes, it was hard to swim against, but that didn't mean there was no point swimming.

Oh, and here is a song of mine, if you'd like a listen...  Masochists Anonymous

Anyway, I think that's all for today.  Maybe tomorrow?

THE RELAPSE

Hello, and thanks for dropping by.  As you may know, the first 22 posts of this blog are the text of my ebook, 'How To Become A Crack Addict', which you can read here or buy on amazon, if your morals allow it.  Nowadays, this blog is the fairly frequent musings of your faithful blogger, Benjamin of Turnham Green.  Today's entry is a sorry tale of relapse after a period of freedom from the maelstrom of 'active addiction', as they lovingly call it.  But don't worry, it has a happy ending.

THE RELAPSE

Well, having let my life get even more empty and directionless than usual, I found myself, or should I say lost myself, meandering along the Goldhawk Road of a Tuesday afternoon, officially pleased I was piecing my life back together, secretly seething I'd not been reimbursed for ten blighted years, or awarded a CBE for services to impatience and remorse.  A studious pupil, satchel full of lessons unlearned, I turned the corner by the cheap barber's, to find an old familiar door, in maroon gloss.

I knew I'd made a mistake as soon as I arrived, but I'd come too far, and, as the door swung open, and my pasty hostess saluted me, I stepped over the threshold in dread and desire.  She ushered me in, and after a few words of polite catchup, I once again found myself ensconced in the gnarled wicker chair I knew from the ruined years, with cat-scratches and sunken seat, breathing in the thick, greasy air, made so by years of cheap cigarettes, and assorted fumes, in a place where the only wind was breathing.

You know what a relapse is like.  There's a clue in the name.  If you want to read a gory account of one, well, there are plenty scattered through this blog if you look.  But what made this day especially galling, apart from the almost unwilling, jittery use of crack, and comforter heroin, was the sinuous presence of a mottled cat, and the scant pageant of humans that passed through in various shades of day-centre chic.

The cat, a tortoise-shell with Marlboro Lite lowlights, frequently insisted on springing onto the table, in search of a bag of fishy treats, last spotted by the ashtray.  Rizlas, lighters, and little bits of cling-film would be jostled around before a flapping hand shooed the thing away, lest it caused grievous damage to the wares - but its tail, floating like a comma, punctuated a stained afternoon.  And when other people were scuttling from office-blocks, travelling on the tube, thinking what to have for dinner, our gross reunion tapered away, my hostess mostly engaged in mock-medieval battle, and I, in wicker, dragging on flavoured bleach, with a cat's tail arcing like a slow whip before me.

A guest decked out in drop-in denims sauntered in, keen to make a significant purchase, news of which rendered me a sycophant.  Would he feel sufficiently munificent to grant me a smoke, a couple more hapless stabs at happiness before I wandered home disconsolate?  I'd been clean nearly a year at this point, and things had been so much better...generally...but the casual saboteur sensed it was time to test the rules again, check if the same laws applied...they did...they were way above my pay-grade to dissect.  What's more, our denim companion had no intention of sharing his wares, and he was off just as soon as the haggard delivery-teen placed them in his waiting mitt.

So, it was back to me and my hostess, but she was still clashing swords with hordes, and didn't really feel like talking anymore.  The feline was still skulking around, springing on and off the table in search of ancient treats, but when, maybe it was fumes, or just disillusionment, it was sick on the wicker arm of the chair, it seemed meet to make my excuses, and I ventured a goodbye.  She said how good it had been to see me, I said the same, hating what I'd done, and worrying that she and her boyfriend might think I was back on the beat, ready to be a regular fixture.  The cat followed us out, darting under a car, as I spouted assurances I wouldn't be a stranger, skipped a bin-lid with alacrity...but who's this?  Denim was dropping in again.  He'd been given the wrong amounts, and was down by twenty quid, which is a basic unit of currency in that world.  My hostess paid lip-service to his plight, but she didn't want him going back in, just to phone and hassle the guy to cough up, which he almost certainly wouldn't do.

It was over, and head down, bitter as battery-acid, I began the walk home, feeling like I'd kicked a jigsaw all over the floor, one that had taken me months to complete.  All I could hope for was to go to bed, wake up some time the next day, regroup, recommit, and kind of forgive myself - but it's hard doing any of those things when your brain feels like it's been paved over.

Like a penitent moth, I fluttered lopsidedly home, singed, ready to stick to the wall for a bit, and not get all hung up about that angelpoise down the hall.

Moth cannot live on light alone.

And that's all I have to say today, apart from here is one of my songs, which you're welcome to listen to by clicking...  Revenge Of The Sirens

See you tomorrow, perhaps.

RECOVERING RECOVERY

Hi, and thank you for passing through.  You may know, the first 22 posts of this blog are the text of my ebook, 'How To Become A Crack Addict', which you can read here, or purchase on amazon, if your morals allow that kind of multinational collusion.  So anyway, here is today's little entry for you.  It's a few ponderings about recovering a lost recovery.

RECOVERING RECOVERY

Firstly, I don't much like the language of addiction and recovery, including the words 'addiction' and 'recovery'.  They seem to smother, in the former, a set of choices we come to regret, and come to call addiction, perhaps as a disclaimer, or a mantle we're glad enough to wear if it gives us an identity, or gets us out of trouble, or both.  In the case of the word 'recovery', what is it that's being recovered from, a disease?  Oh yeah, that disease of addiction we hear so much about, that disease of bad choice after bad choice, attempt after attempt to reach, and stay on, that plateau of whatever kind of euphoria it is you're striving for.  The disease that twelve-step groups and various support agencies call a disease because it sounds a bit medical, psychiatric, psychological, a bit of a sociological dis-ease.  You know you're on a losing wicket when you're adding a hyphen to a word to bolster your case.  But, being a whore, I use the words 'addiction' and 'recovery' because I want people to stumble on this blog, find succour and solace herein, and possibly entertainment - and, linguistic skirmishes aside, I don't want to wake up in the gutter, or worse, not wake up in the gutter.

In recent months, like a soothing priest, with illegal proclivities, someone has been skulking, cowled, in my hall, whispering stuff.  A few months ago, he quietly mentioned that I wouldn't be seeing my music partner anymore, thus freeing me from the weekly commitment of learning a new song.  She was moving on to do new things.  It's amazing what a hole in your diary can do - an empty Wednesday can have the charm of a picked boil, and the same scope for infection.

Then he congratulated me on a period of fiscal prudence.  I'd managed to save up to go away with a friend and, this achieved, I could now relax the reins a touch - even though I was still £1,500 overdrawn.  He commended me for having applied to work in my local Oxfam, but when they didn't get back to me for a few weeks, he suggested they might not want me.  My days and weeks got emptier and emptier, until old feelings of failure and stasis began weighing me down.  One friend moved to Cornwall, another just got bored of me - then, after days of toying with the thought of using, and how it might 'be ok this time', I found myself on the road to relapse.

I was scared as I meandered down the road to an old familiar house, containing two old familiars, but even when I rang the bell, a part of me hoped there'd be no answer, and I could wander home and make good of the day, or at least save it from disaster.  But, bell pressed, I heard movement within, the front door opened, and there, welcoming me, was the ashen-faced ghoul I'd come to call a friend.

Invited in, and a few nice words exchanged, I soon asked if we could 'get something', and she knew I didn't mean a takeaway.  Still apprehensive, my innards felt like an abandoned hearth, and I thought I might die if I had crack again...maybe my body and brain couldn't take anymore...perhaps the long gap since the last time would mean my tolerance was low.  Rationalising our qualms away, she rang a local vendor, who, as chance would have it, was only based a few doors away, and it wasn't long before a preteen with a mouthful of cling-film was tapping on the window, and our brains were a storm of anticipation and denial.  In he shuffled, politely spat the tiny, glistening packages into his hand, and my hostess placed them on the ash-clad coffee-table.

I'll fill you in on the relapse, and its consequences, in tomorrow's entry, because I'm a little tired right now.  But please be assured, things didn't pan out too great.  And here, if you're not already in a coma, is a song I wrote, which I would be chuffed if you'd like to hear...  My song, 'The World Is Full Of Whores'

Hope to see you again, maybe tomorrow?

BRIEF ENCOUNTER

Hello, thank you for dropping by.  As you might know, the first 22 posts of this blog (Jan to April 2013) are the text of my ebook, 'How To Become A Crack Addict', which you can read here or buy on amazon, if you do that kind of thing.  Nowadays, this blog is the fairly frequent musings of me, Benjamin of Turnham Green, along with some of my artwork and music.  So, here is today's musing...

BRIEF ENCOUNTER

I met myself on the 94 bus.  I got on at the usual stop, on my way to the coffee-shop I frequent.  Two stops along the way, I got on again, but I didn't look so great, bit shabby and stooped, pasty-looking I'd say.  I sat down in front of myself, not having noticed myself in the seat behind.  And I couldn't help wondering what would happen if I introduced myself to myself, which I then dared to do.  'Hello,' I said, 'it's Ben, isn't it?'  He turned politely, I'm relieved to say, but there was a steeliness in his eyes, like the shutters that come down when the chemist's shut.  His cheeks were  mottled, there was a spot by his mouth, and a slight flakiness to the tip of his nose.  'Been out and about?'

I knew I was teasing him a touch, but he graced me with a reply all the same.  'I haven't had a particularly good time of it lately,' he murmured discreetly, and I knew the tone, I felt it, as if my own throat was still moulded to recite the phrase without resistance.  'Have you been using?' I enquired.  I knew I'd hate this question because, when I've been using, I hate being asked if I've been using.  'What do you think?' he snarled, and even I was surprised at the acidity in his tone.  'Well, I'm guessing you have been,' I surmised, trying to self-counsel, 'but don't despair, because I haven't used for some months now, somehow, and I can only guess that if I can do that, you can too.'

'Yes, I guess so,' he agreed, trying to give off an air of one who's listening, and may even have just had a small epiphany.  We fell quiet for a second or two, and he pressed the bell for the next stop, one before the coffee-shop, where I was to alight.  I was tempted to get off too, but, apart from the fact it would have looked a bit strange to onlookers, I knew that I would be tempted to go where he was going, and where he was going, I knew, might kill him, and therefore me.

And I didn't want a suicide and a murder on my conscience.

And that is all I have to say today, apart from here is my most recent song, which you may or may not enjoy...  The World Is Full Of Whores

Thanks for dropping by.

ANOTHER DAY DOWN THE SEWER

Hello, and thank you for popping by.  You may know, the first 22 posts of this blog (Jan to April 2013), are the text of my ebook, 'How To Become A Crack Addict', which, even if I say so myself, is a riveting read.  It's also available on amazon as an ebook, for a mere three quid or so, and you can buy it there too if you like.  If you do, I would love a review, because there are only three, so far, all good, but I'd like more.  So thanks.

Here is a song I wrote.  It would be great if you'd take a listen.  It's quite good...  The World Is Full Of Whores

ANOTHER DAY DOWN THE SEWER

I was just watching Channel 4 News, about Romanian sewer-kids, that's to say Romanian children who'd taken haven in their local sewer network.  Quite how you go about this, I'm not sure, but it seems to begin by being in an orphanage, probably getting abused, and then wandering the streets until you fall in with likeminded lost souls, get addicted to something, and then, when you're properly initiated, opens up before you a manhole cover, leading you down, down into your new life.

It looked quite cosy down there, although lacking in most of the facilities we tend to take for granted.  About ten kids were clustered in a tunnel, seemingly not knee-high in sewage, presumably because there are tunnels down there used as access points for those whose task it is to keep the shit flowing properly under Bucharest streets.  There they were, blotchy and deeply bewildered, hangin' out in the underworld, with occasional visits from some guy, their dealer and apparent chief, who dished out the wares, so long as the relevant notes were placed in his waiting palm.  He had the look and air of a disaffected Billy Idol fan, black leather waistcoat, chains'n'such, and hair made silver by some aerosol he was also selling as a stimulant.

I can only imagine the bonding and sense of collective bondage these forlorn high-schoolers must have known, too young to truly hate each other, too young to have lost all hope, even though no hope had ever really been offered them, too young even to think 'this is no good, it's time for a change...'  No, it was a kind of waiting-room, coming-and-going-room down there in the service-duct of your Bucharest sewer, and if you were lucky enough to have a few minutes high, it didn't matter where you were, what your T-cell count was, who came to you in dreams, a near-silhouette in a care-home dormitory, reassuring, rationalising.  When you're high, however low the starting point, the aim is just to feel ok...not indulgence, or luxury, or sensual overload...no, just ok will do.  Wouldn't you go down a manhole cover if you thought that's where your friends were, your future was, a passing peace of mind might be?

They only really came overground for funerals.

And that is all I have to say today.