21

“21”

I let a 21 year old guest have an overnight pass Monday night.  He didn't return in the morning.

Or answer my texts.  Or my phone calls.  Or when I messaged him on facebook.

He wasn't at either hospital.  Or the jail.

I waited up till 11 pm yesterday, and had messaged him that he needed to be back by that curfew time.

I went over to the main sober living home at 10:55 pm.

He wasn't there, but another guest told me that he'd heard from him and he wasn't coming back. And he didn't want his stuff.

Which means he's off partying so hard that he doesn't care, and figures he can "crash" wherever he's partying.

And high, changes of clothes are no real concern.

21.

I suppose I could be angry at him not bothering to have called me.  Or that he ripped his mom off for $50, she having been the one who paid his program fee.

But no, I'm not in the least angry.  Which kind of surprises me, but I'm older, I've learned to accept more, and this is not exactly the first time something like this has happened.

I'm sad. Hence me writing at five till one in the morning.

21.

All the potential in the world, but he'll spend easily the next 10 years, and maybe even 20, before he's "sick and tired of being sick and tired".  Because with the energy of youth, he's not even feeling the "sick and tired" yet. He'll have no good life now. That's not for him.

Not for him meeting a nice girl and settling down.  Nice girls don't settle down with active addicts/alcoholics.

Not for him the job that will turn into a career that will give him the capital and credit to acquire all that makes life easier.  Careers aren't for those who miss three days out of five and are useless for the two days they show up late to.

Not for him the nice house that can be turned into a home with the love of a good woman and the laughter of well cared for children.  Houses are for those with good jobs and long term vision, not those who's furthest planning into the future is for "where's the next hit, rock, shot coming from".

No, for the active addict/alcoholic, it's a life of idiotic drama that gets such importance ascribed to it, but is truly as Ecclesiastes described, "vanity" or "meaningless".

"Jimmy done jacked me over that rock I spotted him last week, he best be comin' up with that 20 spot or Imma gonna mess 'em up.  That was one fat rock too, you know I ain't all cheap ass."

Or

"She best be know'n who're man is, I hearin' this crazy sh*t 'bout her'n Ronnie an she goan wish she'd shagged her sorry ass back to her momma's stead of commin' round spectin' me to support her ho'n self."

Or

"My dad be all trippin' 'bout what he think I need doin' wit my life and ahm all lahk, what'd you workin' your ass off fo dah man evah do fo you, dint stop mom leavin' your ass when you got laid off now did it?  But he all like still not lettin' me crash out or spottin' me a bit to tide me over so I'm all like screw this and you too!"

Or

"You know I'm all good for it man, when any ever say I not be keepin' my word, words my bond man, any one tell you that, what you think I'd rip you off, sheet, I done know I aint that stupid, and you know that to, I know you do, just hook me up man, little sumpin' sumpin', just a bump to get me on through man, we cool?"*

Repeat.

And repeat.

And repeat again.

Year after year.  Twenties.  Thirties.  Sometimes, heaven help them, forties and fifties.

Sometimes it ends in the twenties, not for recovering but for dying some senseless death.  Overdose.  DUI.  Fight.  Sometimes it ends in the twenties or thirties with prison.

If it does not, it may end in recovery in middle age.

It rarely ends in death in the sixties - but only because that usually happened earlier, like they're Medieval peasants who can only expect - barely - to see fifty, and that's if they're lucky.

And those that do recover?

Oft times, by the time they're in their forties, too late for the wife and kids in the traditional sense. Too late for the thirty year mortgage.  And no real career for them, though there are still a wonderful variety of opportunities in the Food Services trades.

And besides that, they'll have less of old age than others, they need not fear reaching 80, and even 70 is sometimes a stretch.

Me?

Ahh, I was blessed to not go "active" till my thirties, and had but a few hard core years before grabbing hold of myself just before the forties struck.  I'm speaking of the majority, who sadly start in their teen years - poor or no upbringing.

Who had not my education.  Or my years of practice at living a real life as an adult.  Or my - and this surprised me - apparently above average ability to monomaniacally focus on one single goal and make it work in spite of everything.

I have come to the sad conclusion that for many who recover, there will be no house for them, as they weren't up for having a house even had they never had drugs or alcohol.  Recovery can put you back, and even make you a smidge better in some ways, but it's not going to add an education or IQ points or whatever it is that lets some make it and others just subsist.

Yet.

Yet.

I've never yet seen anyone who's life would not be better for getting clean and sober no matter how old they are when they stop.

I've never yet seen anyone who can't get a bit more financial comfort and security in their life just for getting clean and sober.  Even at fifty, even at sixty.

So don't get me wrong, it's worth fighting for everyone of all ages to clean up and dry out.  For their physical safety, their financial well being, their emotional recovery...and not the least, their spiritual salvation.

But did I mention he was 21?

Yeah, 21.  He started young.  Not even a "bad upbringing".  But whatever genetically based physiological flaws lead some into this more readily than others, whatever sociological and emotional and spiritual factors lead some into more than others, he obviously has thos.

And is not ready to change.

Now, there is no rule that says that he can't get sick and tired at 30, or 25, or even next year at 22. But I don't see that often.  If by "don't see that often" I mean "don't see that ever".

I see some in their twenties and thirties who go to rehab or come here.  But I never have seen it "stick" yet.  Usually they must be in their forties or fifties.  Late thirties seem as early as I've witnessed, though I'm sure some do it younger that I've just never come across.

But I've seen enough to know that such must at least be a bit rarer. Or maybe some how shake it off with the vitality of youth before it gets too bad.

Hopefully he'll be one of the rare ones that just shakes it off one day, like it was nothing, and then go and celebrate his 23rd birthday and do all the great things with his life that he could. But I'm thinking that doesn't happen very often.

I fear that instead he'll just party and lurch and move about, a friend's house here, a drug house there, a couch to crash on over there, this and that and this city and that and all that dumb drama I mentioned, random girls, some scattered children here and there, many jobs that last just the day or four needed for the bosses to realize their mistake, or even a month or so before another relapse because they "can handle it now".

And then he'll be 41, and at my door, or the door of someone else like me.  And then he'll be ready.

And?

Well, it will still be worth it.  But what a wonderful 20 years he'll have missed for the "pleasure" of drugs that by then won't have gave any semblance of pleasure for 19 of the 20 years.  Drugs and drink that will only be done routinely, automatically, joylessly.

He'll have made nothing of himself in the years that a man has to make something of himself and unless he's different like some few of us, he'll have to strive mightily just to get and keep the low level job, the small apartment and the very old car. He'll not only be recovering from addiction, but recovering from a life of drama, and most even who can kick the drugs, cannot kick the Jerry Springer-style drama.

They'll still be dealing with baby mama drama, various kids, past fines and fees, past misdemeanors, even past felonies, prison scarrings of body and soul, all the wreckage of two decades of demented debaucheries.

If only one had a way of getting a 21 year old to listen! It's like watching a guy amble towards the edge of the Grand Canyon, you yelling, "Stop! Stop! The edge is coming! You'll die! Please, please stop!!" While they amble on, looking back only briefly and contemptuously, giving you the finger and ambling onward.

21.

*the dialect wrote out in the drama section is common to all ethnic groups.  I have noted that it's not an "ethnic" thing, but a "poor", "ignorant" and "active addict" thing.  "Street", for want of a better term, where the street has every color, race, creed, sex and such you can think of, all wallowing in idiocy and addiction and proud of it. For instance, no one speaks more "street" than some idiot suburban boy who's never done a day of time, but acts like he just got out of Marion.