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A Meth Expierence: Dancing With The Dirty White GirlJan 21 '03 (Updated Jan 23 '03) Write an essay on this topic.The Bottom Line Built for speed? The blue sky had begun to twist itself into vibrant hues of orange and pink on my way home that first day. The steering wheel felt perfect in my hands, the need to accelerate urging me to go faster. Almost everything in my twisted life was for once, okay. If it wasn't okay, I knew it would be. I was level headed, the glass was half full for the moment. The love and appreciation for life itself was so strong that it was almost overwhelmed me. My mind worked quickly, intelligently, if you will, and I specifically remember the sunset and the way that it never moved as I sped forward. I also remember associating it with a specific lyric to Third Eye Blind's Semi Charmed Life. "The sky was gold, it was rose, I was taking sips of it though my nose." That was the day I enlightened myself to a new drug. I had done crank. Crank is a form of methamphetamine. Call it what you will; crank, speed, crank dope, dirty, the sh*t...I had finally tried it. I don't use the word finally like I had been longing to use it, you see, some addict friends of mine had been pushing it on me for over a year. Addict isn't a word to be used lightly, either. These people were daily users, staying up on close to two week binges at a time. Crank is extremely popular around my small town, and almost everyone I know has at least tried it. I had never been a fan of what I knew as speed, which didn't go much farther than caffeine and ephedrine pills. I have always preferred pot and shrooms above all. Why did I give in? It's simple. A nasty split up with the husband was on the mend, and he had confessed to me that he had done crank twice in the few months we were apart. My pride could not stand to allow him an experience of his own, one that I knew nothing of, and I longed to become as "knowledgeable" as him. I had ventured over to their house that fateful day, a small, white vinyl sided older home, on the corner of a street in town, infamously known as a "crank hole". There were actually two major dealers on that street, one of which I had visited before...the smell of a mix of cat p*ss and chemicals, and the slew of crunk zombies that met me at the door will never be erased from my mind. Skeletons with tightly strung skin around them, looking into the distance, claiming they'd been up for thirteen days. One young man, trying desperately to hold his cigarette in a shaky hand, asked me if I wanted a bump, to which I politely refused. A friend and I were there to buy meth for someone else. Little did I know, that within months, I would be doing the same thing that these poor souls had done to disgust me. Sitting on the white and blue shabby couch, looking around at the windows covered in plywood, as not to let the daylight in, which I now understand to be a trademark in identifying a crank house, looking at the baby sh*t green shag carpet, picking out the places the ravels started, nervously looking and looking and looking as she prepared my first boat. [For those of you who don't know, a boat is a three inch wide by six inch long piece of aluminum foil rectangle, folded in half lengthwise. A small amount of meth is placed at one end of the boat, lit with a lighter, and the smoke is inhaled through a tutor, which could be a straw cut in half or the plastic body of an ink pen.] I glanced at the box of Reynold's Wrap, remembering the jokes a former friend of mine that was on crank was always making...that he was going to name his child Burt Reynolds. I never had really gotten the joke until that moment. They had told me what to expect. Rapid heartbeat. An overall good feeling. You won't want to sleep, you won't want to eat. Don't hold the smoke in like you do pot. Etc, etc, etc. I didn't listen, but I heard, as I blankly stared at the five inch wide hole he punched in the dingy yellowish wall, probably from anger when he couldn't get crank. Truth be known, I was horrified, but the reassurance that they had been up on the same sh*t for days, it surely wouldn't kill me this one time. She did the firing for me, as I inhaled the clear smoke. It wasn't painful, I couldn't feel it in my lungs. It tasted somewhat of burning plastic, an almost pleasant flavor. She informed that I was getting some protein...the specific crank that they had was dubbed peanut butter, for it's brownish and creamy quality. I waited. Nothing. I hit it again. I waited. Nothing. I couldn't understand. No buzz. She explained that I wasn't going to feel "intoxicated", not like when you get high on marijuana. I began to feel a sort of excitement building inside of me, not knowing if it were just placebo effect or if it were the real thing. The more I smoked, the faster my brain worked. I felt good. Not really high, just good. Comfortably aware of everything. Happy. The more I smoked, the more normal I felt. I had tried crank, and I liked it. I even snorted a line, a big difference from the prescription pills I had insufflated in the past. This sh*t burned, but all the while, it felt good too. But, it's always good, in the beginning anyway. "And then I bumped up. I took the hit I was given, Then I bumped again, And then I bumped again." After the drive home that day, I talked to my mom, openly, for quite a long time, which was not normal. I even ate and took a nap, almost to disassociate myself with the myths of the drug, as I am always trying to do. That night, however, I would have never thought that my husband would have greeted me at 11:00 p.m. after work with, "Hey, wanna do some crank together?" Of course, I obliged. Inevitably that night, we did the meth with each other, boat after boat, line after line. I was the talkative one, the one who wouldn't shut up on the sh*t. We did it with the couple, fifty dollars worth. I was learning how to craft boats, how to smoke correctly, the basics of being a crankpot. I joked with her, calling her the "Martha Stewart of the crack house." I was beginning to recognize what the "up" felt like, when to slow down, and when I needed more. We were all extremely up, and we discussed the feeling we shared for hours on end. For me, the effects were more mentally felt, as where some feel it more physically. Some people wanted to clean their house, or just do anything to remain busy, I, on the other hand, just wanted to sit and talk. I wanted to talk about my feelings. I wanted love, peace, and logical explanations for everything in the world. The late night rides were the parts that I loved the most, driving in circles until the sun came up, talking out our problems and pain. A screwed up form of therapy, if you will. The windows were down, the cool autumn air gave the nostalgic sense of sneaking out -- just like in high school. "And I wish I could get back there, Some place back there, Smiling in the pictures you would take, Doing crystal myth, Will lift you up until you break, It won't stop, I won't come down, I keep stock..." I also found out that weekend, going into my third night without sleep, just what the shadow hallucinations were. After the body passes the regular fatigue limit, your mind starts to play tricks on you. Meth doesn't make you see shadow people, the lack of sleep does. I saw a shadow lizard, little Amish children hiding in the shadows, shadows that looked like smoke, people walking around the house that weren't there. I wasn't tripping. I knew they weren't there, but I could see them until I made my eyes focus. This is common in meth abusers, the handfuls of people that I've known that have "stayed up" for a few days also saw them. For about six weeks straight, we did crank, only on the weekends. A Friday night would begin out journey, usually ending in the wee hours of Sunday night. I never actually felt myself getting addicted, it grew to be a feeling the didn't feel quite as good as it did in the beginning. At least a hundred dollars a weekend, not counting the freebies given by the dealer to "get you hooked". Even though my husband and I were able to control our usage, the couple, especially him, could not. I watched them develop a deeper and deeper addiction. At over a year into his habit, I watched him steal from friends, and eventually, he began to steal from us. He would do anything for crank. Hurt anyone. There were no boundaries, as long as he fed his addiction. It hadn't come on all of a sudden, by being a newfound "speed buddy", we were let into the secret hell he'd been living in. Over the weeks as the curtain slowly parted, we watched his demons slowly emerge. We had known in the past that he was strung out pretty bad, but never, in a million years, would I have imagined to what degree. We had known that they fought, but had never known the severity nor the root of their troubles. I came to see that when she took hold the the reality, she would tell him she wanted to quit. Her struggle was commonly ripped down by the lies about the money and where it went, the little balls of aluminum foil found hidden in the crevices of what was left of the funiture. It would all snowball to a fight so intense that he would resort to physical violence, then lightheartedly joke a few hours later over a boat that he had "busted her lip". He had become a peddler of the worse sorts, not only was he selling his own possessions, what few there were, but also anything else he could get his hands on. Trips to their home were like walking into a flea market. Many items, without actual verbal confirmation, were labeled as stolen. Never thinking he would turn on us, I blindly watched as our things began to come up missing. Not only had his addiction begun to cause him to thieve, lie and cheat, but he was dying. We were watching him die. Over the past year, we had watched him shed 50 pounds from his already slender frame. He shook uncontrollably, all the time, rather up or down. His heart never slowed down. His body never had a rest. I remember specifically the moment of realization of what danger he was in. I remember specifically telling him that if crank would make me turn out anything like him, that I didn't want anymore. We told him that we quit, and wanted him to quit also. She could quit, he couldn't. He wouldn't. "One, Now you hold me, And we're broken. Still it's all that I want to do. Feel myself with a head made of the ground, I'm scared but I'm not coming down. And I won't run for my life, She's got her jaws just locked now in smile but nothing is all right, All right, I want something else, To get me through this, Semi-charmed kind of life, I want something else..." We brought him to tears that night, being hypocrites ourselves, just coming off of a two day binge. We did know better, and we tried to teach him. He slowed down, for a month or so...but he's back on it hard now. The song fades in my mind as I can do nothing but watch a friend die, both physically and mentally... "I'm not listening when you say, good-bye." The Complete Lyrics; Third Eye Blind, Semi-Charmed Life I'm packed and I'm holding, I'm smiling, she's living, she's golden and she lives for me, She says she lives for me, Ovation, She's got her own motivation, she comes round and she goes down on me, And I make her smile, It's like a drug for you, Do ever what you want to do, Coming over you, Keep on smiling, what we go through. One stop to the rhythm that divides you, And I speak to you like the chorus to the verse, Chop another line like a coda with a curse, And I come on like a freak show takes the stage. We give them the games we play, she said, I want something else, to get me through this, Semi-charmed kind of life, I want something else, I'm not listening when you say, Good-bye. The sky it was gold, it was rose, I was taking sips of it through my nose, And I wish I could get back there, Some place back there, Smiling in the pictures you would take, Doing crystal myth, Will lift you up until you break, It won't stop, I won't come down, I keep stock, With a tick tock rhythm and a bump for the drop, And then I bumped up. I took the hit I was given, Then I bumped again, And then I bumped again. How do I get back there to, The place where I fell asleep inside you? How do I get myself back to, The place where you said, I want something else to get me through this, semi-charmed kind of life, I want something else, I'm not listening when you say, good-bye, I believe in the sand beneath my toes, The beach gives a feeling, An earthy feeling, I believe in the faith that grows, And the four right chords can make me cry, When I'm with you I feel like I could die. And that would be all right, All right, When the plane came in, She said she was crashing, The velvet it rips, In the city we tripped, On the urge to feel alive, But now I'm struggling to survive, The days you were wearing, That velvet dress, You're the priestess, must confess, Those little red panties, They pass the test, Slide up around the belly, Face down on the mattress, One, Now you hold me, And we're broken. Still it's all that I want to do. Feel myself with a head made of the ground, I'm scared but I'm not coming down. And I won't run for my life, She's got her jaws just locked now in smile but nothing is all right, All right, I want something else, To get me through this, Semi-charmed kind of life, I want something else, I'm not listening when you say, good-bye.  |
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