You Fit Right In

I wake up at 4:00 in the morning.

You know what the fuck I do. I make cereal, turn on my baby and sit down to blog until I get tired. Once done eating, and yawning, I crawl back into bed and go to sleep. Later, I wake at 8:20AM. Pretty fucking late to make it into work on time at 9:00, but that's alright. Today is rent day and I have a check to give to my landlord. I take a long, hot shower, change my gear into retreads again, and head for the elevator. Upon getting in I am greeted by a woman with three large black, swollen garbage bags around her filled with clothes. Laundry? Moving?

Two floors down on the elevator another woman gets in, working her way in with us and the garbage bags. The two Shelts know each other, and they begin to converse in their hammered out English. That's how I describe 'ghettospeak', a mish mashing of the language, 'hammering it out' so to speak. The drawl of the seriously uneducated. "Hey, wha's up?" The first woman says to the other. "Wassup?" The first woman: "How u likin' it here?" Second woman: "Nicer den where we waz befo'." First woman: "Yeah, quiet'er den dat place." They both chuckle to each other. They must have had good times together in the little Fallujah that they came from.

I can't wait for the elevator to let us out. I'm about ready to scream. It's like I'm trapped between two brain sucking vampires. I head to the cafeteria and grab a bag lunch and then go to the office, finding the sweet as sugar administrator standing inside, filing something in to a cabinet. Sugar Plum comes up to me, how can I help you, Hobobob?" I am impressed, she remembered my name. I need to know how to pay my rent. She proceeds to tell me, but I'll have to wait for 9:30AM. I nod, I'll have to be long gone by then, but I'll come back tomorrow when I have more time. She says that's fine.

I swear, you can get tooth decay standing around her, she is so sweet.

I grab my gear and blast off, hitting the Way and burning a line straight to the office. I'm late, I know, but who really cares? The day goes pretty fast. I am out and down the street, heading for Madison Starbucks. I read my book about addiction and recovery and it had an interesting passage...

"Not exactly. In the last month of 1988, and for the first five months of 1989, this was my place, and these were my people. And while it is one thing to find ourself in a place full of lunatics, crackheads, and career losers, it is quite another to notice that you fit right in."

Sounds like me backwards and forwards there. My road to recovery, my final trek to redemption. I sit back in my seat and really enjoy my book. The writer has been down the same road as I in the Box. Now that I'm out, sprung like a jailbird, nothing will take me back. Nothing. I'm amazed as to how clean and sober I am. Now if I can just stop my addiction to sugar and eating.

I head in, going to Duane Reade first to pick up some detergent and bleach for tomorrow. Yes, that 's right, this morning, when I went for my bag lunch, one of the Loits introduces himself to me...let's call him Fletcher. Fletch for short. Fletch stands taller than me, but his neck must have had a problem, because he held his head low, as if he was constantly walking beneath a low ceiling. I quickly found Fletch to be a well spring of information. My first question that I ask him is did he know where the nearest laudromat is. Yep, he did. Up the block and around the corner. That is the most sweetest sound that I ever heard. The most saddest sound that I ever heard is that detergent and bleach cost me $30.00. Shit! That's a Big Assed Chunk out of my pocket full of cash.

But it had to be done. Tomorrow was going to be the beginning of the end of my retreads, my going commando, my bare feet in my sneakers. Tomorrow was going to be a great day, because it would be a symbol of my finally moving into my apartment.

There was a knock on the door. I turn from my meat burritos in the microwave, and Vitamin Water on the counter and peep through the peephole, taking my MP3 player's headsets out of my ear. Paula was on the other side of the door. I open it and she puts a foot inside. At first I thought it was to keep me from closing my door on her, but I quickly realized that it was to keep her standing. She wobbled on two legs, as if on the floor of a moving A Train. Her eyes were half closed, her speech a drawl. "Do you have a cellphone?" She doesn't even address me, doesn't say hello. No, I don't. "I have a friend next door and he's complaining of chest pains." She points behind her, with a thumb over her shoulder. I hear you, but I don't have a cell phone for you. "Oh, yeah..." She still struggles to remain standing. "...Igor has been looking for you. He says come up to his room." Yeah, right.

Not that I felt like being cordial to someone that is using again. But I dismissed her. Yeah, I'm sorry, I don't have a cell phone. She takes an unsteady step back to avoid a fall, and I closed the door on her. Igor wants to get in touch with me. I guess he feels that we're going to be little play pals now that I'm here in The Spot. I'm sorry, but not that I'm antisocial, I'm not. I just have too much to do for new friends who aren't aligned with my goals. I don't have time to play or socialize with just anybody. I need to keep focused, keep my contacts to the bare minimum. I have enough friends. I don't need those in recovery also. Although Igor was never a user of any substance.

But I'm too into my own shit right now to mix it with hay.

In fact, hay sounds good. I'm going to hit it now.

Hobobob