The Fall of Innocence: A Month of Memories

Autumn has always been a very special time for me. I remember London in October the city full of burnt wood and magic, the cold creeping in off pink skies and warm evening traffic crawling slowly into nowhere. There is something so sedated and calming at this time, and with each intake of burnt air a memory drifts into my head. As a young boy I remember walks along the mansions near the river. It would be the time just as the light fell, as the parks and public spaces were chained and locked and mellow winds chased the scents of the freshly dead summer around the city. Overhead the last flocks of migrating birds would twist and dive by and the final distant calls of nature would sound out and then fade with no reply. So many such evenings I wandered mesmerised down shadowy west London avenues staring in amazement at the illuminated stained glass doors, the cosy hallways and the family get togethers in the living room. I would watch young girls play piano, or peer through huge open plan rooms as families sat and ate supper in the distance. I loved those little walks, the tranquility as the light gave way, as the street lamps rescued the city from darkness and as life and nature and all things living and dying settled down for the night. For a few brief moments I felt as though I was a part of it all, that I was watching a lost film roll of my own family life and it was with a longing sadness that I dragged myself slowly home, my young footsteps echoing a loneliness that only I could understand.

Later on in autumn, as the evenings darkened ever earlier and the cool winds cut chill and whistled through stairwells and lift shafts, I remember being sent on errands to the Fish & Chip shop. In fear of strange shadows and pursuing footsteps I would run back home, holding the bag of hot food against my stomach to keep me warm. But in our house fish & chip supper was not a weekly treat where the days food budget was abandoned in favour of succulent golden battered cod, spiced Jamaican patties, pickled eggs and chips soaked in onion vinegar. They were sad events, suppers which signified that my stepfather was absent and my mother, due to the intake of several litres of cheap vodka, was incapable of cooking. Often my mother would use my short absence as an opportunity to gather up all the tranquilizers and sharp knives in the house. I would return to find her sitting on the side of her bed with a sagged and evil clown face and either spitting mouthfuls of pink and green capsules or running a sharp potato knife menacingly up and down her wrist. More often than not the fish would end up splattered against the wall and the chips tramped into the carpet or vomited up into the toilet. On very special nights I’d be hit in the head with the hot bag and then sent off to call for an ambulance on another false suicide attempt. In the early hours of the morning my stepfather would return twelve pints of beer heavier and finding the house empty he’d stagger back out knocking up the neighbours until he found the one who had taken us in and saved us from police cells, or worse, social service units. I’d hear his deep dangerous voice asking of details and then he’d lead us home, a small rabble of sleepy heads, blankets and teddy bears. But that’s not a autumn memory, not really... that’s just a memory, a timeless reminiscence of days long gone.

Autumn is also the build up to winter, to crystal brittle skies and a silver sun whose distance fails to penetrate the cold. It’s a mid-time, a halfway house between two extremes, a time of beauty and romance and reflection. So I reflect, I send myself to sleep with past images and stories. As the leaves start to bruise and prepare to fall, as goalposts replace cricket boundaries, so once again I get lost in memory and return to lands that no longer exist. This post was brought out by the season, it is born from changing times and lost and forgotten loves. On the winds of this new autumn under fading October light I deliver another piece of myself.... The first 31 predominant memories of my life.

I do not remember being born, not many of us do. But I do remember being fed. That is my 1^st memory, being held to my mothers breast as she lay on a blanketed bed cradling me. My 2^nd memory is of being scolded for knocking over a glass full of Martini... my mother pushing me off my tricycle and onto the floor as she sponged up the wet. My 3rd is the year 1980... I had returned home after my first day at school with that nugget of knowledge: “It’s 1980... Mum, the year is 1980!” My 4^th memory is watching my father open up his veins with a small meat cleaver after a violent argument with my mother. I watched from behind a long pleated skirt as my stepfather fought and wrestled him out the house. My 5^th is a camel ride in London Zoo...red top, Wellington boots and beige Rupert the Bear trousers. My 6^th recollection is my mothers scream... an unbearable sound that pierced my life and brought me fully into existence. My 7^th is learning that my father had been murdered, dismembered and flushed down a toilet. My 8^th is finding my mother choking to death on the froth of an overdose... pills and broken glass littering her room. My 9^th memory is of the hospital ward where she laid for a week, bruised, unconscious and full of tubes. My 10^th memory is taking a beating from my stepfather and then having my head shaved. My 11^th is a dark room, nighttime radio, the glurping of neat alcohol being poured from bottle to glass, burning cigarettes, LED’s and tears. I remember the touch of pubic hair as my mother rubbed herself against my little legs. My 12^th is realising that my brother and sister had rejected and distanced themselves from me after it was properly understood that I shared a different father. My 13^th memory is my mother turning up drunk on my birthday and smashing all my new toys. My 14^th is falling off my bike and losing consciousness. I remember pulling a wheelie, a pair of spinning handlebars, approaching concrete ground and then nothing. I came around grazed and bloodied on a public bench with a pair of watery grey eyes peering into mine. “You ‘ad a bit ov a fall young man... you’re Ok though?” My 15^th memory is the Black House*. My 16^th is my mother spraying perfume in my stepfathers eyes and then his hands tattooed with ‘Love’ & ‘hate’ smashing into her jaw. My 17^th is breaking my collarbone and laying in unbearable pain for 3 days before being taken to hospital. My 18^th memory is being hit by the sperm of one of my mothers lovers. My 19th feeling the force of adult fists and kicks. My 20^th is my stepfather doing the ironing in a dress. My 21^st recollection is being arrested and detained in Hammersmith police station after throwing a grapefruit through Mr Brownhead's window. My 22^rd & 23^rd are of my mothers repeated suicide attempts. My 24^th is being summoned to my mothers room and her declaring that she was dying of cancer. My 25^th memory is being hit in the side of the head by a large bunch of keys. My 26^th is fleeing the family home with my mother brother & sister. A secret car ride across London in hiding from my stepfather. My 27^th is the window ledge of Hobbs Hotel in Victoria, my paralytic mother swaying on it 70ft from the ground. My 28^th is Christmas 1988, my mothers lesbian lover trying to strangle my sister to death. My 29^th is White City Estate, no furniture, gas or electricity. It was cigarettes, stolen cars and my mothers final yet unsuccessful attempt at suicide. My 30^th memory is throwing a world globe out off the geography room window and being permanently excluded from school. My 31^st memory is starting off on my first days building work at the age of 15. I realised on that day, as i returned home absolutely exhausted after 8 hours of soul destroying work, that I was no longer a child... that the burst balloon sponge cake party was over. I also realised that hell was not an obligatory place of stay, that I was not there on her Majesty’s service. There were roads which led to hell and if I was ever to return there again it would at least be in consequence of my own footsteps. In a sense that sums it up, from the fall of my innocence rose my independence, a passionate and dangerous independence that flirts with hell without quite descending into it. But maybe that’s not really a choice... maybe I am just a blessed and lucky sod, who knows?

Anyway, that’s my month of memories... as many reminiscences of my dead youth as there are days in October. But contrary to what it may appear, I have never thought of my young years as a broken or traumatic time. Far from it, my overriding recollections of those years are the memories that do not exist but those which littered and filled in the gaps. The childhood I remember was one of joy and escape... of exhilarating bike rides, hard schoolyard walls and dusty football marathons. I recall late evenings, staying out playing as one by one the other children were called home and finally I was left kicking my ball down dark streets alone. So, in tune with the new season, that is how I see my youth, it was a bruised but not a battered time... it was an autumn not a winter. And as the new season imposes itself proper and mornings and afternoons sweep cold, my eyes can only blink heavy through golden tones and I can only ride high as once again the scent of burnt wood wafts through another European city. In a way the combined beauty of 33 autumns is the answer to my unknown equation, the present can never be more wonderful or less hellish than it is right now, because after everything, and before anything else, this is all that there ever really is.

Take care Readers and thanks for sitting out the drought...

My Thoughts and Wishes as Always and Ever, Shane.x

*Read relevant blog entry

Something Special for the Undeserving

Dear All,
Please excuse the disgraceful lack of posts here at the moment but The Hounds have once again been unleashed from Hell and they run wild through my life. If there's not a motorway pile-up there's a plane crash and Lyon is strewn with debris at this moment. I will try, try, try to have a post ready for the next day or so, but please bare with me if nothing comes. I've given my heart and soul and tears and fears to the writings in this blog and the followers here know me better than any friend turned foe I have. So, I ask you to excuse me, but I do not apologise because I also need time for living and when life runs her course I can only follow like the rest.

I am well, I am happy and I am straight (almost) most of the time. Thanks for still bothering to visit and in the very near future there will be something very special just for the undeserving.

Hope you're all well and my thanks as ever for your continued support and comments.

PS: Special thanks to Cathy who I've sometimes neglected in my replies. It's not you, I was just very very short of time and internet access. So here's a special THANKS and it's a big one and it's a true one.

All My Very Best, Shane. x

Poems Between Posts - Quiet

Quiet

So this is what happened when you lived
You got drunk on much darkness, and black was a gift
Shot out your lights, then you started to drift

So this is what happened when you died
You came from a hangover, the puffed eyes of life
It took all your contrasts like a thief in the night

So this is what happened when you were dead
All the shadows were turning dry in your bed
Evaporated the radiance that you never had

So this is what happens when you'll rise from hell
The truth is that there is nothing to tell.

Poem written by The Most Happy
Ainsi sera, groigne qui groigne

* * * *

Dear Readers, this poem is an original work by The Most Happy who has kindly agreed to allow me to publish it between my own posts. As I have fallen in love with such rhyme and words I have asked The Most Happy to become a permanant fixture on my blog. She has agreed and will write all future Poem Between Post entries. I hope you enjoy as much as I do, and a new Memoires of a Heroinhead post will be along very shortly.

All My Love, Wishes & Thoughts, Shane. x

The Consequence of Living

God, we were cruel kids. But battered and beaten at such a young age in life, what else could we have been? What chance did we ever really have? When life tramps and kicks wearing 21up Steel toe-capped DM boots, what else can one do but kick back? What other option is left? And so we kicked back, but not at an invisible life that we as yet had no concept of, no, our return blows were directed against people, objects and possessions. We kicked and smashed and bottled our way through tender years, and in our wake we spilt blood, teeth and glass. More than just delinquency, vandalism and violence, this post is about friendship and escape. It is about what happens when young kids are united through abuse and face that world together. In a way it is about hope, in another about hopelessness. It is as much about death as it is of life. For as we live so we die, and in those days we died so much. This post is dedicated to the lost and the broken... this one is for Simon & Shelley... As always, this one is for You.

* * * *

Simon & Shelley Maudlier were my best friends. It had been that way ever since I punched Darren Marsh in the throat for going “Urrrgghhh” when the Mayor kissed Shelley after she handed him a bouquet of flowers in front of full school assembly. In what should have been her proudest moment she stood there crying as the school jeered her presence... laughed as the Mayor kissed a greasy-haired girl who smelled of stale urine and burnt wood. As Shelley was led of the stage in tears, a pair of oversized brown corduroy trousers sat down beside me and a grubby nail bitten and scabby hand was placed upon my kneecap. That was Simon and it was the beginning of the first friendship of my life.

Like me, Simon & Shelley were the produce of alcoholic and drug addicted parents. For the first 6 years of their lives they had travelled Britain and Ireland going from flop house to flop house, from one social service unit to the next. Every time they were on the verge of being taken by the authorities the family would flee, until finally settling down in London. It seemed that from the womb all they knew were vile beatings, social services, alcohol and abuse. At least I had had half an hour of innocence... at least I had 30 minutes to prepare before being hit by life. But not for them, they were born straight into the shit... it was all they knew and it had only ever gotten worse.

At the age of eight they were forced by a drunken carer to have sex with each other. This practice had continued over and beyond that, and for the years I knew them they engaged in sexual activity together. It was in their bedroom one day whilst we were playing that they confided in me what they done together through the days and nights. I remember Simon touching Shelley and then Shelley kissing him almost as a token of acceptance for what he had done. They fell back on the bed laughing, both looking at me with dark brown eyes. They showed this to me... they were proud of it. Not of the sex, but of the adult behaviours they were mirroring. At the time I laughed along with them... I saw nothing wrong with it. It was almost the same as badly smoking a cigarette or knocking back a teacup full of vodka... it was that kind of naughtiness and nothing else. Now it’s a memory which I can’t ever forget, and it’s sad, because they showed me this and then Simon retook up his space invaders game which hung around his filthy neck and Shelley returned to playing imaginary families with her collection of cheap naked dolls which she had pulled from dustbins. And that image of us on the bed, of the broken innocence that it relates, forever reminds me that this is a cruel and unrelenting world, and that our place within it is a hazardous one. But at the time, it meant nothing... oh, we knew what sex was - the physics at least- we had seen it all our lives, but we didn’t understand the intimacy or the morals... we had no oversight. All we knew is that adults and animals done this and there seemed no laws concerning where or with whom. It was a reflection of innocence, that is all... but innocence cannot always be understood or accepted and the events of those years would be a 10 year timebomb that would explode between brother and sister and blow them both off the edge of the world.

After Simon & Shelly's confession and me realising that what was going on in their house was the backside of my own mirror, we became inseparable. Our days and evenings were spent together toughening ourselves up, bonding and preparing our offensive. Our first decision was to join a boxing club. We were weak targets for the bullies and older children, and in order to walk the streets and parks untroubled we needed to learn how to throw decent right hooks. So one Wednesday we joined Chelsea Boys Boxing Club and on Thursday we knocked each others teeth out. The three of us taking it in turns to square up to one another and direct our anger and pain towards a physical body. But we never hurt each other, we toughened each other up, and as we lay in the park, on the grassy hill with black eyes and busted noses we joked and laughed as love and friendship throbbed and stung upon our young bodies. We felt tough not just against the other children, but against the adults... the adults that had heaped abuse upon us ever since we were born. We were fighting a force much more twisted and perverse than our immediate peers, we were fighting our homes and our histories... we were fighting ourselves.

Not many people realise just how violent Britain is... it’s a cruel, cruel place, especially for a kid in toeless shoes. There is no sympathy and little escape. If you can’t impress with a pair of £150 trainers and a half decent phone, then you’d better be able to impress with something else... and that ‘something else’ is normally violence. Violence became an everyday fixture for a while. Almost every evening we’d return home with some cut or another. Shelley as well.... she kicked and punched and bit just as hard as any boy, and we licked our wounds and celebrated our victories together.

Our friendship was an honest and equal one... it wasn’t based on toys or videos or clothes. It was based on understanding and comfort. Apart from that we didn’t have much else to trade... We had nothing alone and even less together. Between us we had half a parent, two pairs of trousers and a dress. My shoes were football boots with the studs removed, Simon’s were leather strapped sandals and Shelley went barefooted - soaking up all the piss, shit ad spunk that South West London had to offer. On and off we would spend almost five years in each others company, five years of escaping the hell that we were born into. But in escaping one hell we contributed to another, with our six fists and our scarred and beaten bodies we used violence and delinquency as a means of escape... as a means to unprise life which had taken lockjaw around our necks. But in escaping this life we already started replicating it... stealing cigarettes and beer and vodka and imitating the actions of our elders. In a certain way we escaped our lives by joining it... we became a part of the hurt and the world that had made us. Instead of fleeing it we copied it, but in our replica world we were the kings of the castle.... we were the abusers and not the abused. We became the enemy.

In the following year we took the beatings but fought back. We’d raise with bloody lips and swollen cheekbones and we’d rally for more. We built up a reputation of recklessness, and if we couldn’t win with our fists, well... there were always cricket bats! There were kids stronger who hit hard, but our recklessness scared them. When someone screams “Fucking stay down!” it means they’re scared, it means they know eventually it will be them running... And we never stayed down. We had mouths and angers that couldn’t be shut. Eventually we instilled fear and terror into those we saw as potential threats... those other cruel kids with other problems who were also looking for escape. If we were not strong we would be it... we would be the punching bags, the buffer that soaked up our peers domestic problems. We would have become the escape route not only of our parents and their problems but also of the other kids... and that would have been one hell too many. We were on the offensive from a very young age... the bottles and bricks that made up our homes now became objects to throw at the world. And my god, did we throw them.

We threw them at bus stops, at policemen, at ambulances. We chucked bricks on the motorway and through car windows. We vandalised vending machines, ticket machines and shop shutters. We set fire to post boxes, telephone booths and elevators. We pulled up parks and gardens and demolished garden gnomes. We roamed the streets inciting violence and bloodying the noses of anyone who so much as looked at us. We robbed the more fortunate kids and destroyed the toys of the rich. we done it all. Then we went to bed, woke up and done it all again. We didn’t care for nothing or no-one, not the living, not the dying not the dead. Everyone and everything was fair game, and that is how we escaped our lives... that’s the exit we took. We were cruel kids preparing to die.

Our lives meandered on like this for the best part of two years and then one morning on going to see Simon & Shelley I received news that they had been carted off by the authorities and placed in a foster home. “My kids... they’ve taken ma fucking kiz!!!” Bridgette slurred before throwing herself around me and breathing a mouthful of vomit and whisky fumes into my face. And that was it, they were gone taken away by unknown and distant forces... the kind most children are only ever threatened with. I strolled back home alone and waited for news. I asked at school, I asked my mother and I asked Simon's mother, but no one seemed to know anything. Yes, they would be coming back, but when, well that was anyone’s guess. 3 months later they were back, and the first thing we done was scheme escape plans in the event it ever happened again. Well it did happen again, they disappeared once again later that same year. Simon remembered our plan and within the week a letter was delivered to my house carrying their new address. I was 10 at that time and with my brother we boarded a train to the address just outside London and together we skipped the wall and made the journey back to London. We stayed missing for two days, passing the time at a friends house in Shepherds Bush. On the third day we were apprehended by the police on Uxbridge Road and were all taken into custody at Hammersmith Police Station. My brother and I had been reported missing by my stepfather and Simon and Shelley by their foster parents. I wasn't beaten much by my stepfather as a child, but arriving home that day I took ten years in one sitting. I was so bruised they did not send me to school for over a week. I’ve only ever curled my body up to kicks once in my life, and that was it. But of course, in my family that was an expression of love... it was because he loved me that my stepfather kicked my ribs in.

In the following year Simon and Shelley returned, disappeared and returned again. They didn’t seem to mind too much as away from home they enjoyed proper meals, proper baths and proper clothes. We still remained friends but the separations took their toll and as I left lower school and approached my teenage years we slowly drifted apart and spent less and less time in each others company. The final break was when my own family split up and we left west London and was put in hiding from the hands of my stepfather. Fulham was out of bounds and we were reallocated to the other side of London. Contact with Simon or Shelley was impossible and it would be more than twelve years before I saw either of them again.

In that time we had all changed considerably. Our young accepting minds had started examining things, processing all those behaviours we saw, heard and done. Youthful innocence developed into an illness that plagued and ate away at us. We were all sick, suffering from memories and actions that had been forced upon us. With the end of youth and the coming of our real sexual awakenings we realised we had been corrupted... that certain fantasies and shames had been branded into our minds forever. We each tried to eject these... to vomit up our pasts... to reject history, but vomit leaves a very specific taste in the mouth and is a memory all of its own.

So it was, that the events that formed us also repulsed us, and when one cannot reconcile one's history with ones present then the only option left is to split... and that is what we done. But not just friendship and kinship, we split internally, we divided as people as adults. Shelley became a young prostitute, Simon found his way in and out of psychiatric hospitals, and I ended up trailing them same old streets searching crack and smack and dreaming of the Black House. In the end our youthful hooliganism and cruelty had served for nothing, .. it was just a natural reaction to a life that was putting the boot in. All it done was deflect the blow... absorb the shock of the impact and delay the consequences for a later day.

More than anything else that is what this blog is about. It’s not about heroin or addiction or murder or abuse, it’s about consequence. But not always consequence of a good or bad decision, more the consequences of independent and external forces which we have no control over. It’s about history and the equation of all our yesterdays... it’s about who we are at this exact point in time. It’s about the consequence of living.

* * * * *

In 2002 at the age of 27 Simon Maudlier finally found his peace. It seems he died as a result of huge amounts of alcohol on top of prescribed medication. He was buried in a communal grave in Fulham without ceremony. As far as I know Shelley is still alive and as late as 2006 was still working the streets of West and Central London. Neither of them, nor myself have any children, and that is probably the greatest gift we can offer this world.


As always, I wish You all well and thank you for reading and making it all worthwhile. My next post will concentrate on my feelings towards Dennis Nilsen, his continued imprisonment and my thoughts concerning his controversial and as yet unpublished autobiography “History of a Drowning Boy”. Until then, take care & take heart, Shane. x

Stable Habits & Sexless Sheets

If death would float me into your arms
I’d jump from a building
From the 91st floor
Just to be certain
Just to be sure

A fictitious poem to a fictitious lover

* * * * *

Sometimes I wish I didn’t love, I didn’t feel and I didn’t hurt.. sometimes I wish I didn’t live in such extremes, enjoying freezing winters just to take pleasure from hurrying into the warmth. That is what I do, I hang around in the cold and then seek refuge in a warm room, shuddering with pleasure as the first waves of heat hit me. Sometimes I wish my muscles didn’t contract and that my heart would stop beating excessive amounts of blood around my body. Sometimes I wish I lived in a securely mortgaged house and drove a Grey Ford Fiesta. Sometimes I wish I had a dog and two dustbins. Sometimes I wish my name was Chris.

Chris is 47 years old. Of those 47 years he has been married for 29. He has never strayed, nor cheated nor done an around turn and followed the echoes of a strangers high-heeled shoes. He neither loves nor hates, cries or laughs, lives or dies. He is in the middle of all that, living a life of unbroken and regular habit. But not dangerous habits... not habits that gamble with the fate of ones day, no... safe habits... routines. Practices that secure the fate of one’s day. In a life of mystery and surprise, of low blows and axe chops, Chris wanders through oblivious to all and everyday brings the same, and the same comes everyday.

At 6.30am one can find Chris walking his dog around the block and down the old brewery alley. On his way back home he will pass the the newsagents and pick up the paper. Dog lead hung on the coat stand he’ll sit down to an already made up and perfumed wife. He will slurp his way through two cups of tea, butter some toast and smoke a cigarette. At 7.am he rolls up his newspaper and puts it in his back pocket. He winks goodbye to the wife, kisses the dog and leaves for work.. For 8 hours everyday Chris unloads lorries and then makes sure people like me don’t steal the stock.He has done this since leaving school at 17. His evenings are homecooked meals, quick stop family visits and cable TV. At 10.30 he badly dries the dishes that his wife has washed and together they climb the wooden hills to Bedfordshire. Chris removes his shirt and slips out of his trousers and into the bed before anyone has time to even see his kneecaps. He turns his head so as his wife can change in peace. 30 years of marriage divides the kingsize bed in two. The sheets are clean and freshly pressed and never smell of sex. At 11 o’clock they turn back to back, each pointing in the direction of their half of the room. They sleep without dreaming, although the wife occasionally dreams she is living a nightmare. At 5.45am, the alarm rings and it all starts again.

For a while I was one of the many co-conspirators in Chris’s life. I became a little part of his routine, another little event that added to the surety of his day. There I’d be, every morning outside Allied Carpets, waiting to be collected and driven in to work. There he’d come, pulling into the bus lane whilst simultaneously stretching across the passenger seat and pushing open the door. Car still in a slow roll, I’d hop in and he’d accelerate away as the door swung shut. “Time?” He’d ask nodding towards the cheap unstealable radio “7.23,” I’d say “You’re bang on time.” And he was bang on time... always. In two years of early morning meets not once did that clock read any other minute past seven. I came to thinking that he must arrive early, park up down a side road and pull out at the exact minute. Sadly, I am probably wrong about that. He probably is the only man in the world who can manoeuvre through London’s traffic to the exact second. In fact, I do not doubt it. But if it was easy for Chris to pull up at the exact second I was the polar opposite of that. I’m not sure if he ever realised the hell I had to assault through to get there.. to be standing there calmly in a freshly pressed shirt. Whilst his life was a monotonous journey through tried and tested avenues mine was a life of mayhem and last minute fixes... always chasing that which had already left. If Chris knew what would happen next, I was still in shock at what had happened before... and it was with a certain envy that I strapped myself in and looked across at Chris in his one and only state of being: not quite happy, but almost.

Chris became a fascination to me. I would feel good just to be in his company... just to have his calmness rub off on me and know that besides this man the perverse was not going to happen. Life did not bluster unannounced into this man’s life... it gave him a smooth flat stoneless ride. I would catch myself observing him, admiring all his little mannerisms and laughing along as he whispered a clean obscene joke into the ear of the young female receptionist. I’d watch him preparing his sandwiches, devouring them in delightful measured mouthfuls, then wiping and patting his lips free from any sauce or grease. I observed as he took a million tiny pleasures from a world I had no excitement for and didn’t really want to be a part of. He even seemed to enjoy paying his taxes... filling out the forms and posting them off to the Revenue. Chris had found his slot in life. And no matter how awful his routines seem, or what a waste I knew it was to live like that, I could not help envying him... At one time, I could not help myself from desperately wishing for what he had.

Sometimes I would sit in the car beside him on the drive home and stare at him as he damned without swearing, as he looked up and around at the new buildings that were being put up. He’d be tapping away to some old rock beat or another, nothing intense, bland love songs of coming home. Once we had a little bump in the car and he seemed to take a sick pleasure in reckoning up the insurance costs. There he was, counting out on thick fingers garage repairs and labour costs. Nodding away knowingly at just how costly a little bump could be. When his mum died, he cried for a lunch break in his car and that was it... That was the nearest he ever got to tragedy. He returned after an hour his same old consistent self, just one parent less. He celebrated her but never grieved. One night I met him and his wife for drinks. He wore a denim jacket and a thick shapeless bright pink top. I think it was the first time he had been out since the early 80’s and that was his old pulling shirt.They both left after one drink as the dog needed it’s nighttime walk and the bins needed emptying. I was completely shitfaced and had only been there for an hour. They had to drive me to my door and walk me up the garden path. But they enjoyed that... it was a little story for hem, just as it is for me.

Once I asked Chris if he loved his wife. His reply talked of the kids, the mortgage and the joint possessions. “But do you love her Chris?” I repeated “Do you love her?”

“Well,” he replied “we’re thinking of starting up a little market stall on Saturdays so as we can spend a little more time together... there’s not many couples who after twenty odd years want to spend MORE time together. That said, we could also do with the extra cash as the roof needs fixing and we had the plumber in last week.”

“Yeah, that sounds like love.” I said, thinking of sex in parks, golden showers and planes out the country. And he winked at me as if he held all the secrets to the world.

One evening whilst stuck in traffic I told Chris of my heroin addiction. He sat there staring ahead in silence, a thinking middle finger drumming out a rhythm on the side of the steering wheel. I waited in gritted discomfort as my words hung thick with the smoke in the car, but nothing came – not a squeak, not a sidewards glance, nothing... Chris just inched forward in the traffic and never mentioned it at all . It was like telling someone you love them and not getting so much as a blink of acknowledgement back in return. Seven eigth’s of my existence was left two feet back in London’s rush hour traffic... under the wheels of a vibrating diesel powered double-decker bus.

And what else should I have expected? What other response could I have possibly received from a man welded so securely into a life of routine? He could hardly have pulled over and took me off for an unplanned talk and drink... Oh no, the wind from the wings of that little butterfly would have had far too many repercussions in his own life to be a possibility. No, Chris done exactly as I would have expected of him: he saved my revelation for the dinner table... a five minute conversation with the missus spat out through mouthfuls of chewed up sausage, cabbage and potato’s.

The remainder of the ride to my drop off point was a sombre one. I sat there with my head turned staring dismally out as West London passed by the smeared and rain speckled window. I had given up hope of receiving any kind of response from Chris and it was with relief that he finally swung in and slowed to a stop at my bus stop. As I clambered from the car that evening, Chris leaned across , and with his chin almost on the passenger seat and peering up at me under the door, he said: “Hey Shane, why don’t you come over to ours for dinner one evening? My wife knocks up a great steak and chips.” And with that comment, and the way in which it was delivered, London collapsed... it was the saddest thing I had ever heard, from anybody’s lips. That Chris imagined that the answers to the unanswerable could come through a hearty home cooked meal, carving up cheap meat whilst laughing away to evening sitcoms was sad. It was sad because I wished it were true... it was sad because I wished I had that to go home to. I gave Chris a light smile and a pair of tragic eyes “That’d be nice,” I said quietly “I’d like that.”

In a way I was touched that someone, anyone could think so simply about life and her problems. That someone was so stable and so secure that they imagined a good family dinner could heal all woes. And I desired that... I envied that in him. That stability, the knowing... the surety. He knew when he arrived home his wife would be there. OK, there was no passion but there was a bizarre kind of historic love and dependence. I would settle for that... I wanted that. In this mans head there were no dreams... no wants or desires. “I wish I was like that.” I’d think. He enjoyed simple things, things that I cannot even understand. Walking the dog at nine o’clock in the evening... greeting a neighbour or two and swapping the days gossip. I dream of that, of that kind of a life.Everything in Chris was stable and secure and I wanted it, and I envied him for that. But at the same time I knew it was not for me... it was not possible. One cannot learn to be like Chris... that kind of regimented and ordered life cannot come through discipline. One has to be born like that... or as good as. I was not... I was born dodging cricket bats and bouncing to the blows of life... all i’ve ever known is extremes. To live without question and to enjoy all the little hardships of life, one must be a very certain person. Of course, I would never want to be that... my head tells me that. But somewhere in me, somewhere buried below all the fancy thoughts, I do want it... to be less complex, to be just an average Joe.

Wouldn’t it be heaven to be guided and led by social norms, to have one’s ethics and morals laid out already dressed on the plate? To know what is right and what is wrong... what is clean and what is dirty? Wouldn’t it be good to have a built in sensor that stopped you going too far in either direction, that stopped you from falling madly in love or making suicide pacts? Wouldn’t it be fantastic to feel the cold and the warmth for what they are and not for what you will escape. To watch film for entertainment and not in search of yourself. Wouldn’t it be good to put your money in a fruit machine, not for the gamble but because that’s what you do.And whether you win or lose, well, so what! Nothing is going to change. Wouldn’t it be good to never be tempted, to be imprisoned by invisible and weightless chains... wouldn’t that be heaven? At one time in my life I wanted all of this... I needed it, and I went to bed dreaming of it. But even having that behaviour, that desire for something else told me I could never have it. No, my envy of Chris and his position was just a healthy response to my own life which had spiralled out of control and had left me on the edge trying to claw my way back in. And it helped... it helped because looking at all these things and thinking them over I decided that no, I do not want to be Chris... and I would not choose to be him even if I had the choice. I would much rather be me... I would much rather have obsessions and violently passionate relationships than calm waters and sexless sheet. I would much rather be able to write this than read it and not understand it. But for a while... Oh, for a while, I wanted nothing more than to just be someone else. Someone stable.

My relationship with Chris, like so many others, petered out and died. Rides home in his car became tense affairs after I had revealed myself. I’d unburdened my condition upon him and now I didn’t hold back. I sat in the passenger seat with my head almost slumped in my lap... coming to every now and again to see how much further we had crept through the traffic. As we arrived at my drop off point Chris would now lean over me, open the door and bundle me out into the street. I would scramble to my feet and before having the chance to turn around he would be gone. He stopped acting like a father towards me, probably realising and thanking his lucky stars that no son of his was anything like me. He stopped sharing his sandwiches with me in the canteen and would look grumpy as I came from the toilet with my bag and rubbing my arm. Eventually he stopped giving me a lift home, petrified that I had drugs in my bag and that my passenger seat antic would bring the police to us. I didn’t mind... he wasn’t a friend, just someone I once aspired to be... just someone I needed to see and be with for a short time in my life.

It’s now nearly ten years that I haven’t had word from Chris, but whenever things aren’t going great in my life or whenever I am riding high, I still think of him. I think of his life of routine and his measured, calculated way of doing everything. I wonder can anyone really be like that? Is anyone really able to be that stable and satisfied with their lot? Is the leaking roof really an enjoyable cost? Then I start to wonder what goes on behind closed doors... what happens when the family has left and the light goes out in the bedroom. Is it all as cosy and as clean cut as he’d have me believe? Does he really never dream? Is it only the occasional nightmare his wife has, or are they recurring and omnipresent? Does his sexless frustration never turn into something a little more sinister?I don’t know... that’s just me thinking and maybe more a reflection of me than of him. But then I remember something... a snippet of a conversation we once had. We were discussing films and Chris told me that his favourite film was A ClockWork Orange and his favourite scene was the gang rape one... and for some reason those words hang heavy in my ears and disturbs me. Butit’snot the fantasy that disturbs me, it’sthe repression of the fantasy, the denial of it... and when i think of that my envy turns to fear. Fear of what such a person is capable of. Far from being attracted to or in awe of such a person, the Chris’s of this world scare me... They scare me more than my shadow scares myself.


Take care Readers... and keep the fires burning, Shane. x

Six Feet Over

Dear All,
A huge thanks to all of you who sent me mails this past week enquiring after my wellbeing and asking if everything is OK. Well, things are better than just OK... I'm still six feet over and the life has never seemed so wonderful and full of hope. Rather than revisiting memoirs from my past, I have been living what will certainly become a memoir of the future. My absence in this time is a positive thing... a cause for celebrtion but not concern.

Anyway, my mysteries must remain that for now... some moths I must keep to myself. Thanks for bearing with me in this time and keep peeled as a new post will appear here within the next few hours.

Until then, my hopes, thoughts and wishes to you All, Shane. x

* * * *

PS: If you can read Portugese or don't mind reading through a translate tool, please go check out Vanessa Zombie's new blog: http://acismadacisma.blogspot.com/
She's been reading and commenting here since day one and deserves this little payback.

A Death in the Afternoon

Somewhere lost in the autumn of 2002 the 4th dead body of my life hammered upon and then fell through my door. Once again, death in all it’s shameless and humiliating glory was laying on the floor by my feet... this time floating hideous fumes into my face.

* * * *

James Tullock was a retired London Underground worker. He had emigrated to Britain from St.Lucia in the 1960’s and had killed himself repairing signal boxes in carbonated tunnels for a petty pension and a free buspass. He wore undersized suits and Trilby hats and cooked fish every Friday. He moved in below us 2 months after the body of the previous tenant had been stretchered out after succumbing to a toiletbowl heart attack whilst trying to rid his bowels of constipated constipation. No-one mourned that passing, we were just relieved that the BNP* posters that littered the downstairs window would finally be removed and that we could sleep without the worry of bricks or petrol bombs being thrown or put through our door. The arrival of Mr Tullock was a very welcome relief, but his stay didn’t last too long. It was barely two years before he too would be carried away, and not in too dissimilar circumstances as that of the last.

It all unfolded one early afternoon on my first day off on a week break from work. I cannot remember the exact month or date, but I know it was in the autumn, maybe early October or November of 2002. I know it was between 12 and 1pm as the children from the nearby school were screaming and hurling to whistles and play. It was one of those low sedated afternoons when sound and smells merge into a sweet tranquility and eyelids drift heavy on lazy days. I was sitting in the living room, needle in mouth and feeling for veins... my mother was bent double on the edge of her bed - daytime TV invading her brain. At first I heard a door, and then a bang and then the commotion of voices. I pulled back the yellowed net curtains and watched as a delivery van moved off down the street.I took it they had just dropped something off for Mr Tullock and had banged the wall whilst manoeuvering it into his flat. I left the curtain slide back across the window and returned to my business in hand. But once again I heard it, only this time it was a scuffling and rapping on the wall.

“Mum... did you hear the noises? I think someone’s in the hallway.”

My mum wandered half dazed from the bedroom and peered down the stairs at the little square of glass that topped the door. “Nah, there’s no-one there, Shane... You can see a shadow if anyone’s in the hallway.” But then it happened again, and this time we both heard it. We looked at each other worriedly but before we had time to speak a heavy rap ran down the door.

“Fuck, it’s the police that is...” my mother whispered “That sounds right like the fucking police!” My needles and heroin were laying on the table and foil and pipes were in the bedroom. For one horrible moment I thought she was right. I had visions of chucking the lot... the gear at least, but then reality hit.

“It can’t be the police... no, it can’t be. What reason would they have to be here? Who would be calling the police to us?” And then the door knocked again, only this time lighter and with a chesty groan. That was it, someing was not right, I was opening the door.

I tried to unlock the door but it wouldn’t release. Something was jamming the deadbolt in the catch... I could barely even turn the knob to release it. When I finally succeeded the door burst open.. Mr Tullock falling in on his side and flapping about like a fish on the floor. His eyes were bulged and going northeast and west and he lay there like that flapping and heaving and looking terrified. I tried to speak to him, but from his mouth the most horrendous smell was being released... it was as if a bag of crabs had been left to rot in his stomach. It was a nauseating smell, and one that was almost unbearable... it was the smell of his death.

My mother came hurtling down the stairs, “JAMES... can you hear me? CAN YOU HEAR ME?” And he seemed to, there was something in his eyes that still moved to attention... that still recognized human voice and his own need for help. And then the smell hit my mother, and she gagged and holding her mouth run back up stairs.

It’s strange that in a panic nobody knows what to do... we run from place to place not even sure if we should phone an ambulance or comfort the dead. I had to shout instructions up at my mother, step by step, guiding her to the phone and explaining what to say. At least twice she returned to the top of the stairs with some irrelevant question or concern.... looking down in the hope that Mr Tullock had made a miraculous tap-dancing recovery. Finally she did call the emergency services, and while she did I comforted James, touching his head and holding his hand. He had stopped flapping and seemed to be calmed by my words and presence, but his eyes were still all askew and all of hells rottenness still poured out from his mouth. I listened to my mothers hysterical voice on the phone... her tears that somehow didn’t seem genuine, and at the same time I felt James relax and calm further, his eyes now settled on me.

“MUM... I think he’s going!” I yelled out “He’s stopped moving... tell the emergency services he’s not breathing... he’s unconscious!” I heard my mother repeat what I had said and then hang up. She came back to the stairs and looked down. “Mum, take over here for a while... just hold his hand, I’ve got to clear the table” . Actually, the table wasn’t my concern, I needed some time... the eye’s of James and the smells had hit me hard, and I needed to be free of my mothers eyes to release my emotions. Since being 8 years old and begging her not to leave home, I’ve never allowed my mother the privilege of seeing me cry. In many ways I’d feel a pathetic weakness weeping in front of her... or maybe more than that I am petrified that she may try to comfort me. Maybe I am scared she may throw caring arms around me, for in an instance like that I would be completely and utterly lost.

My mother held the fort and I rushed upstairs and sitting in the living room I cried. I tried not to, I tried to keep my tears behind my lids, but they just came... like spasms of orgasm there was no holding back, no plugging the dam, and in silent streams my emotions ran their course.

That I even cried surprised me... I was not extremely close to Mr Tullock and only really saw him on the weekends. The closest we came to friendship was him giving me bottles of West Indian muscle rub after seeing me hobbling off to work in the mornings, sore and swollen from missed injections. Apart from that I had nothing much to do with him. I think the tears were because of death... because of the closeness of it and my inability to help a man with eyes shock wide with terror. I imagined all the things his paralysed mouth wanted to say, all the fears that rushed through his short-circuiting brain... I remembered his light grip on my hand and his crusty lips as they breathed out vile and rancid body fluids. And then I remembered his legs and his undressed lower... it was the first time I realised he was laying there half naked, and that brought tears again. The terror that someone must be in to flee their house in that state must be horrendous... to stagger naked and gasping out into public, well... what else but death could chase a man that far... especially a man who cooked fish every Friday?

I never went back downstairs, instead I tidied away the needles and cleared the room of any paraphernalia. About 10 minutes after our call an ambulance and three paramedics arrived. My mother left the scene and came running up with eyes full of water... but not tears, they were burning from the stench that James had released her way and which were now a drifting presence throughout the flat. After about 15 minutes a paramedic joined us and said that James was dead and that it appeared as if he had suffered an enormous stroke. He said that even if they had been able to resuscitate him he would surely have been brain dead and was probably that even by the time he fell through the door. He asked for the name and address of any of Mr Tullock's relatives and we gave him that of his sister. James was taken away, and once again I was left stunned and sitting in shocked silence at a world that only half an hour ago had wafted by like a hypnotic scent. I watched as the ambulance pulled off and then reached in the draw for my needle and the fix that I hadn’t earlier had the time to take. My mother returned from the bedroom with a square of aluminium foil and a tube in her mouth, and as I calmed myself with a prick and and a push, so she did the same with a crackle and a suck.... both of us escaping the sights and scents that this day had brought.

As happened after the passing of Ewan, death doesn’t hold us reflective for long, and there is always one junkie who is distanced enough and cold enough to profit from tragedy. When Geoff, my stepfather, returned home and was told the news, he suggested that we use the spare keys James had given to my mother and search his flat for prescription drugs and money. yes, unbelievably Geoff wanted to rob him!!! Of course, we never done that but it was close. All it would have taken, from either my mother or I, would have been a slight nod or a moments hesitation and Mr Tullocks door would have been opened and the possessions of a dead man ransacked and stolen. Rather, in light of our shock, Geoff pretended it was a joke and talked endlessly throughout the evening of how he wouldn’t do something like that but that he knew many a scoundrel that would. Two days later he was kicking himself, because it was revealed that under James mattress £12,000 had been found along with another £5,000 hidden in a shoebox in the loft . I later overheard a furious Geoff say to my mum: “We could’ve fucking had that!! It shuld’ve been ours!” And he’s right we could have had it, we could have robbed the dead... who would have ever known? And then this question came to me and it is one which I am embarrassed to answer here: “If I had have been aware about the money, would I have opened the door, sneaked in with Geoff and took it? And the answer is yes... yes I probably would have.

Take care readers & keep hope, Shane. x

*BNP: British Nationalist Party.. a political party (lol) on the extreme right.

A Family Affair

Two months before my 17th birthday my stepfather was released from prison and moved into the family home alongside my mother, brother and I. Along with an electric safety razor, his prison shoes and tattoo's, he brought with him a backpack full of opiates. Geoffrey Smith would be my 1st drug dealer, my second stepfather and the stepping stone that took me from recreational drugs to hardcore opiates. 7 years later, with the exception of my brother, the household will have descended into full-scale heroin and crack addiction... my mother, stepfather and I rolling about sick on the floor, lying cheating and stealing from each other. It would end with Geoff having both his legs amputated, my mother booking herself into rehab, and me fleeing London with 500ml of methadone, a bloodstained shirt and a french lover. This post details the bizarre descent of my family into drug addiction, how we managed through that and the past and present consequences of those years.

* * * *

In 1983, the year of my fathers murder, Geoff Smith held a barful of people hostage with a sawn-off shotgun after he discovered his wife was having an affair with the proprietors 18 year old son. After a 5 hours siege and coming down from a tab of LSD, Geoff exchanged four shots with the police and then surrendered himself and his freedom to the British Penal System. He was arrested and sentenced to 15 years in Wakefield High Security Prison. Of the 15 years he served 9, during which time he met my mother and married her inside. At the end of his jail term, released 6 years early on account of good behaviour, he boarded a train to London. As he had kept his release date a secret no-one knew he was on his way. One dull Friday afternoon I answered the door to a small, squat, grey haired man with pin prick pupils and an Adidas sports holdall. He shook my hand, introduced himself as my new stepfather and said he had come to stay. In disbelief I called my mum and watched in absolute amazement as she jumped into his arms and then dragged him off into the bedroom. It would be 12 years before he left.

The first thing I noticed about Geoff was that he slept a lot. During the first month I only saw him on a handful of occasions. Rather, he and my mother spent their days and nights couped up in their bedroom with a small television set... my mother occasionally staggering down the hallway and into the kitchen to knock up a peanut butter sandwich. I reasoned that Geoff's heavy and long sleeping was a prison habit he had yet to shake off, and to a certain extent I was correct. It was a prison habit alright... a prison drug habit. He had entered the system a drinker and dope smoker and had left an opiate addict, crushing down and snorting up tiny white pills boxed under the name of Temgesi... a strong painkiller doled out to the terminally ill. Geoff bought them by the box load from a friends mother who was dying of liver cancer. The active drug in Temegesic is buprenorphine, the same drug that Subutex, the heroin substitute, is comprised of. But at this time Subutex did not exist, buprenorphine was not yet being used as a heroin substitute.

From the moment I discovered what these little pills were I was intent on trying them. This wasn't the first time I had thought about opiates, I had had them on my mind a long time before Geoff rolled onto the scene... I had been half-heartedly trying to acquire heroin since I was 15, but didn’t know where or how to get it. It was not long before I approached Geoff and asked him for a couple of his Temgesic's. In order to befriend me he slipped me a few outside of my mums knowledge and warned me to not take more than one at a time.... and that’s what I did, and then I floated off to heaven. Within a month I was crushing down and snorting up the pills almost daily... using the same tube as my mother.

This went on for about a year, then our immunity increased and we were on 3 or 4 pills a time... from here on we had problems. Temgesic were very hard to get... They were almost impossible to buy on the street. When our supply was finished we put our lives on hold until the end of the month, until the next repeat prescription was ready. We would live in stretches of two weeks... and when the drugs were gone we’d all sit in miserable silence, staring at a blank TV that anyone was too bored to get up and turn on. Sometimes we’d buy a few grams of amphetamine and try to pass the time that way, but as the come down hit us we yearned for opiates more than ever. I learnt very quickly that you either use opiates all the time or not at all.... there is no comfortable middle ground.

This behaviour with buprenorphine continued for a little more than three years, until the day we received news that the mother of Geoff's friend had succumbed to the cancer that had gradually been monopolising her - our supply was cut dead (though not quite immediately). We convinced Geoff’s friend not to declare the death of his mother to her doctor and collect a final prescription. He done this and we payed him triple the price as agreed, but that was really the finish of it. With our last two weeks worth of Temgesic we schemed and planned our future supply. I convinced/paid my supervisor at work to go to a private doctor for a slipped disc he had suffered. I told him to say the hospital had once given them to him and they were the only things that eased the pain. Geoff’s method was a little more radical. He had a friend hit him in the chest with a huge mallet. Due to the blow he sustained three broken ribs and managed to convince his doctor to prescribe him Temgesic for that. Between the two of us we managed. We didn’t have as much as we needed, though at least we had some. But doctors are very wary about prescribing such strong opiates, especially for back and rib pain, and within two years both had lost their scripts and we were left in the lurch again. It was at this time that I started scouring the streets for Temgesic... approaching homeless people, new-age travellers, and alcoholics. But all avenues were fruitless, until I met Gerald, a new work colleague and someone who showed an active interest in hard drugs.

Gerald was the first person outside my household to even know what these drugs were. He told me he knew of someone that could reconnect the supply line. I met Gerald one evening after work and we travelled to a ground floor flat on The West Ken Estate. Of course, it turned into a Witch hunt, no-one showing up and no pills to be had. That’s when Gerald played his true hand and suggested that I buy heroin instead. “It’s exactly the same.. only stronger.” he said. “I can get that for you right now.” Without even having to think I gave Gerald the money and watched as he disappeared down an alley with a small hooded black boy. He returned a few minutes later, spat 3 small bags into his hand, wiped them clean and handed them to me. I gave one back to him and we parted.

I arrived home excited and proud. I felt like the breadwinner returning with the weeks pay... the food that would end everyone’s godless hunger and revitalize them back into the world of the living. I rolled the two bags on the table in the same way one throws gambling dice: “It’s heroin...” I said “A bag each.” Geoff was very happy, but my mother looked nervously at the bags. She didn’t say anything, but I could read her thoughts. She had lived with a junkie, my father, and she had never joined him in addiction, now, some 10 years later and at the age of 48 she was confronted with her son giving her heroin... heroin she knew she would take. And she did take it... we all did, and Gerald was right, it was exactly the same as buprenorphine only much stronger and much more readily available. After that first bag of heroin I knew I was/would become an addict. The fact is , I was a heroin addict long before I had ever even touched it. As for my mother and stepfather, well they enjoyed it just as much... and soon we were all regularly scoring and spending the evenings together.

Heroin addiction is not like it is portrayed in film or book. One does not take it once and turn into a hopeless and desperate addict. Addiction is a slow process and progresses from gradual to constant use. It always takes a few months and in our case it took almost a whole year before we even became aware that addiction was looming. What started out as a weekend thing soon covered Friday and Monday. Wednesdays also crept in to the mix and before long we were using every evening. The start of the evening became earlier and earlier, until finally we were using on waking... the real sign of proper physical and psychological addiction. It is no coincidence that on entering treatment centres one of the first questions is : “Do you use on waking? How long have you been using on waking?”

The progression from Temgesic to heroin happened over many years, during which time many things changed. I had grown up and left the family home, and Geoff and my mother had given up the flat on White City Estate and moved to a small maisonette in Shepherds Bush. As I was spending most my time there, scoring or using, I decided it would be cheaper and easier if I gave up my apartment and move back in with my mother. We were all using daily by this time and when funds allowed crack also. But the exertions and the expense of drug life was fast catching up on us, and in a bid to keep ahead of the game Geoff and I were constantly borrowing or advancing money . We were living on our next months pay rather than our last. It was a precarious game and one that would soon fail us. We were building pyramids of cards in the wind... We were heading for disaster.

Our first bout of junk sickness did arrive... just as we knew it would. I was out of cash and my friend who would lend me money was not in London that weekend. Geoff had been refused cash at work and instead had been given a cheque... he had a long 4 day wait for it to clear. During the first morning we all sat together in the living room twiddling our thumbs and asking the other: “You’re sure you’ve got nothing? Not even £5???” We emptied out our bags and pockets again and searched under the sofa and down the sides of the cushions... but we were all out, there was not a penny in the house.. It was the first time in our addiction that we had awoken with not even the heroin to give us a morning boot. We were not ill, but we were psychologically uncomfortable. By evening we were all on our backs, snivelling and retching and sweating. Our yawns were so wide and so deep that we almost dislocated our jaws trying to get them out... and when we opened our scrunched up eyes, burning hot tears would stream down our faces. By nighttime body smells and fluids filled the room.... we were so sick we barely had the strength or inclination to go to the toilet. It pained to move and it pained even more to keep still. Buckets of vomit sat unemptied in the room and crusty mucus clung to the blankets and pillows. The muscles in our bodies had had enough... they rejected the brains signals to move, and would spasm now and again completely of their own accord. We each lay in our own little hell groaning and crying and cursing a world that could not float £10 through the window... Not EVEN £10 measly pound. We were in one of the main financial cities of the world, in our street alone there was ten’s of millions of pounds worth of property and possessions, yet if you need money right HERE right NOW you cannot get it... what the fuck is that!?

After 48hrs, real debilitating junk illness had arrived. We were sick through to the marrow of our bones, bed ridden with all poisons of the world breaking out through the pores in our skin. And there is no respite or escape. Sleep is impossible when you are ill – you must suffer hell with wide open eyes. We lay there like this for three long and miserable days, the clock ticking by in hour length seconds. We groaned and swore at invisible pains, cursing the day we were born and the world we born into. We damned the rich and the fortunate and we bellyached about not having a pittance between us. We cursed Geoff's employer and bemoaned the banking system that makes one wait four days for a cheque to either clear or bounce. We cursed almost everything, but we never cursed heroin... we just prayed for that. Each of us sending out silent messages to a God that none of us believed in.

After three days I made an emergency call to my absent friend. She must have heard my discomfort for although she had just drove back to London that morning she said she’d cross the city and bring me some money. I told my mum and Geoff and we sat waiting the three hours for her to arrive. She did arrive, on time as ever, and there ended our first bout of family junk illness.

We lived together like this for the first year of addiction, during which time we sold anything and everything we had. My guitars and music equipment. The video... the DVD player. My brothers fishing rods, golf clubs and stereo. My mother decided that her little collection of jewellery was worthless and so one afternoon we sorted through it and took it along to the pawn shop. Her and Geoff adding their wedding rings to the kitty. We flogged the two antique lamps I had stolen from work and finally we sold the television. We ended up spending our evenings consuming heroin and crack and staring at the square dust patch on the wall where the TV used to be. To raise more money Geoff & I started doing private building work on the weekends... me knocking up cement and him constructing walls that we could crouch behind and smoke crack. Once an elderly client caught us on the pipe and asked what we were doing. We said it was a special substance that is blown into the wall and which hardens the cement quicker. At the end of the day we were paid and told not to ever come back.

But these times, by no means wonderful, did have their worth. Through the joint use of heroin and addiction I bonded with my mother. We had the same concerns and the same priorities and when we got high we spent the time talking and going over the past. She started taking some care of me, scoring for me and making sure I had heroin to get to work. In the daytime she’d pick me up clean needles and return my used ones. She done all she could to keep my injecting clean and free from disease. For my part I helped keep her in dope... leaving her money for a rock of choice each day. As we fell into sickness together love would be shown by the other managing to raise some money and then sharing their heroin with the other. I have memories of hanging around street corners, both of us scanning the street for a sight of our dealer.... rushing home with a pocketful of heroin and crack and smoking or shooting away our illness. Ok, it’s not the usual thing that brings a mother and son close together but it worked for us. Through the ordeal of heroin addiction we managed to understand the others suffering. Her past problems and behaviour suddenly made sense, and in that moment I forgave her all.

The first year and a half was rough trek, but then the good times came. I had been provoking trouble at work due to the conditions and the treatment of some of my colleagues. One Thursday morning I was called into the directors office, fired and handed a cheque written out to the tune of £10,000 on the agreement I took no action. I accepted the offer it in a flash. Two weeks later I landed a top job managing an accountancy company and for the moment our financial worries were over. But as one problem goes, so another fills it’s place, and with my recent payout and my newly acquired directors wage I started scoring crack every evening. And not just for me... for my mother and Geoff too. Soon the household waited desperately for my return from work... knowing that I would arrive with my hands full of crack and smack. It was the crack addiction that finally blew the biscuits out the tin.

Crack is a much more desperate addiction than heroin.... it’s effects don’t last as long and the come down leaves the user wired and willing to do the most daring things to raise money for the next rock. Because I was buying the crack and all were reliant upon my return from work, there was a certain amount of animosity which began to develop towards me. It wasn’t long before money disappeared from my wallet or rocks of crack and heroin started going AWOL. Geoff would go out to score and return with nothing saying he had been robbed or lost the money. Then the bedroom door would close and from inside I’d hear the unmistakable blabbering of crackheads.During the evening the door would open and smoke would pour out like opening a freezer on a hot day. “Oh, it’s just the cigarettes.” Geoff would say “They’ve changed the gauge of the papers!” I didn't care, I was in the living room piping by myself... it was the theft and lies that annoyed me. I suppose they just wanted some power and control over their own addiction... I understand that. It’s very difficult holding a habit and relying on someone else to fund it. My mother was in the middle, and like any half-decent junkie used her position to best advantage. She wandered between living room and bedroom, taking the benefits of both. When Geoff thought she was coming in to collect my dirty plates and cups, she was actually sneaking crack outside of his knowledge... collecting it in rolled up tissue and smoking it on her own later or when we were at work. All these lies and sneaking made for an angry and explosive house. It was not long before Geoff smashed an ashtray into my head and I knocked out two of his teeth with my elbow. We never recovered from that fight or from me pitifully flicking him rocks of crack on my return home.from work.

During the next two years crack and heroin took all our money. I was still living within my means, but Geoff had borrowed, stole and sold all he could to fund his addiction. His latest idea to raise funds was taking on private and undeclared building work... work he neither had the qualifications nor the tools required in order to carry it out. What he did have was an almighty drug problem that pushed him to insane lengths to get money. 50Ft up, fixing the tiles of someones roof for £100, he slipped and slid. He held onto the guttering for as long as he could and then strength robbed him of his grip. He let go and dropped feet first to the ground, breaking both ankles and shattering both shin bones. He was in hospital for 5 months and two weeks after his release he was hit by an infection and both feet bloated up and turned brown. This infection would eventually rob him off his legs and leave him wheelchair bound with a crackpipe hidden under the blanket that covered the stumps of his legs.

With Geoff out of action and all the fuss and expense of hospital visits, my mother decided it was time to quit drugs. She applied for a detox programme, and after waiting 4 weeks she started out on a Methadone Maintenance program. Since that day she has never taken heroin again... though her crack problem still lingers on. After giving up smack she still continued to allow me to live and use in the house, and she still continued to score for me in the daytime whilst I worked. In turn, I continued to keep her supplied her with a healthy amount of crack each evening.

Two months after the amputation of his legs Geoff returned to the house, but in his absence things had changed and so had he. With no legs he used my mum as a servant and shouted orders for crack cocaine at me from the bedroom... threatening to chuck me out the house and phone the police if I didn’t comply. Finally we all had had enough, Geoff too. My mother was in no position to look after a disabled and demanding crackhead, and after months of incessant arguing Geoff left. I carried him downstairs and wheeled him to the Social Security offices. I rolled him to the reception desk and left, putting two rocks of heroin and £100 in his top pocket With no handshake and no goodbye I was gone... though in truth I was expecting to see him later and hear some half-arsed story as to why he was back. But the strange thing is, I, nor my mother have ever seen him again... he disappeared without word or trace or legs. Maybe he was more fed up with drugs than I realised... maybe sitting at the reception, at yet another person’s mercy, he had looked down at himself, at the place where his legs used to be and realised that this was not a good place to be at his or any age in life. Maybe he regretted ever coming into contact with my mother or me. Maybe he chucked the heroin away and used the money to help get himself back on an even keel. On the other hand, and more probable, maybe he fiddled as much money as he could from the social services, wheeled himself back d own the Uxbridge Road and spent it all on crack and smack. If I had to hazard a guess I’d say he done just that.

I continued living with my mother, working, scoring and smoking white together. But I was becoming bored of that life and the crack was beginning to affect me badly. I was turning into work dishevelled without having slept and with a bag full of needles and heroin. I would spend the first hour with my office door closed whilst I searched in desperation for a vein. One employee found a needle in my office and another popped his head over the toilet cubicle one morning and saw me digging for veins and with needles scattered over the floor and a crackpîpe sitting on the cistern. He tried to blackmail me and then left in a rage after his complaint was received as lies and nonsense by my directors... No-one else believed him either. Though I never considered quitting heroin, I was constantly cursing and promising to stop smoking crack. I started going out in the evenings or staying late at work so as not to be around dealers. My mum would score my heroin and her crack in the daytime and by the time I arrived home all that would be left were my bags of brown and my clucking mother. It was in this period that I met a french girl, fell desperately in love and began a romance that would finish with me getting onto a MMT program and then exiting London for Lyon and a heroin addiction on alien soil.

On informing my mother of my plans to leave she had mixed feelings. She was happy for me but her mind showed off other fears. What would she do without me? Who would fund her crack addiction? I felt terrible for this... I felt guilty. I had kept her in crack for the past three years and now I was leaving her with nothing. But my life had taken an unexpected turn, and it was a turn that I had to take. It was a fresh break, away from London and away from crack and heroin. But more than that I had fallen in love.... there was someone other than myself to think of, and I couldn’t keep my partner living in the hell she had experienced in London. The decision had to be a selfish one... I had to leave London and those left behind would have to fends for themselves. If my mother would be without crack, well so would I... we’d have to live that together.

My mother was strangely quiet in the week leading up to my departure. We sneaked crack in the house past my girlfriend, and we took turns occupying her whilst the other hit the pipe. The quiet was only broken by half arguments... my mother throwing bitter and sarcastic comments towards me, yet not having the stomach to finish them. Well she did finally get it out.... on the morning of my departure she could hold her anger nor hurt in any longer. She broke down and started crying and asked what would happen to her? To me? What started off as quite healthy despair and fears ended in her accusing me of abandoning her to the dogs... of getting her hopelessly hooked on crack cocaine and then deserting her. She was also jealous that I had found and chosen another women to spend my life with over her. It all came out and as I descended the stairs with my suitcase of clothes ready to join my girlfriend in the waiting taxi, my mother came running down the stairs crying and threw a bag full of my old needles at me:

“They’re yours!!! Fucking take them to France.... don’t leave your shit here for me to tidy up!!!”

The needles hit me in the side of the head and scattered everywhere.... over 300 of them. Two lodged in the side of my neck.and dangled there until I pulled them out and threw them on the floor. Silent with anger I turned around and climbed in the taxi.

“Stanstead Airport, is it?” asked the driver.

“That’s it, mate.... Stanstead. Get me out of this fucking shit hole!” And with that he moved out and slowly pulled away. And as the blood rolled down my neck and soaked through the breast and collar of my shirt I turned my head and peered out the back window. There was my mother, on her knees in the street, sobbing hysterically amongst a pile of old needles as she gathered them together and put them back into the bag. She never looked up, never looked back, and I didn’t expect her to either. In a lifetime of alcohol, violence, sexual and physical abuse, she had never given me so much as a sorry or a pair of regretful eyes. And as the taxi moved and my mother became smaller, I once again surrendered, “I Love You, MUM!” I shouted “I LOVE YOU!” And as the last word slipped out my mouth and the first tears slipped out my eyes so my mother slipped into the distance... Smaller, smaller, and smaller until finally she was gone.


Thanks for sticking with me everyone... my very Best Wishes to All, Shane. x

The Junky Underground*

Visit & join The Junky Underground.... a haven for the broken hearted and the nearly departed. It's a place free from fascist administrators or idiotic site moderators taking pleasure in suppressing IP addresses or denouncing you to the CIA. On The Junky underground you are free to write, chat and upload photo's or video's of whatever you'd like... free speech reigns supreme. And what's more, you DON'T even have to be a junky to join... membership is open to ALL! Hopefully, we'll see you there!

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http://thejunkyunderground.ning.com/

A un~social network for the socially undesirable...we know who we are.

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* The Junky Underground was created and set up by Melody Lee: http://melodyleeisdamned.blogspot.com/

Between Two Hells & Myself

“I only come alive in moments of extreme joy, tragedy or illness. When the heroin is here, I am not, and when it is gone I wake up in pain.... all the intrusion of existence shining in my eyes and blasting through my ear drums. Sometimes I wonder, “Do I even exist at all?”

Heroinhead to his fictitious drug counsellor

* * * * *

It is 4.21am. Outside it is black... the new day has no dawn just yet. I sit on the edge of my bed smoking. On the table there are spoons, needles and lemon juice... but there is no heroin – it’s all gone. My phone is on silent and I am up to 85 missed calls and 27 text messages. My Inbox stands at 117 unread mails. On the floor there are endless wrappers from chocolate bars and cans of soft drinks. A pizza crust smiles at me. I can barely walk... my feet and legs are swollen due to all the injections of the past five days. Scars and bruises trail from my groin down to my ankle and the room smells like stale sex and overflowing ashtrays. I think about doing my filters once again... boiling up the cotton balls I draw my heroin through and straining them through a 5ml syringe. But I don’t do that, it would be the third time and would only result in a pale yellow water. Instead, I unscrew the caps from 3 bottles of 40ml methadone and down the lot. Within an hour the effect will kick in... just in time for the early birds and the sun. I know I will not do much... just nurse my wounds, curse my throat and stomach and groan about how awful I feel. I think about watching a film but the DVD player seems so far way and so low down. Anyhow, in such times nothing can occupy me better than sleep... and sleep will come, I know that. But she will come with heavy smells, age old fears and hyper-realistic nightmares... tormenting me into wishing I was awake. I will be paralysed between two hells and myself, sweating out a weeks worth of junk in Kafka's castle. This is me, Shane X, 12,291 days into my death, waiting for the sun...

Take care Readers & best wishes to All, Shane. x

A full post will follow shortly...

An Introduction to the Black House

At eleven years into my death I was introduced to a house that was to have a huge impact upon me. At its simplest it was a flophouse, drinking den and shooting gallery... a palace of filth, vice, and poverty. At it's most complex it was a small multicultural ecosystem, a detached group thriving on the waste of modern life. It was a resthome for the broken hearted and the nearly departed, where the used, bruised and abused found themselves... It was the direction of the undirected. It was in this place that I would see and experience an underbelly of society that would inspire me forever....where I would meet characters that would almost fictionalize my life. It was a place of dark walls, dark tales and fishhead soup... of death and disease. But for me, it was a place of hope in the midst of all hopelessness... it was the Black House.

The Black House was not actually a house at all but a flat. It was the 3rd floor home of my best friend and his sister, their alcoholic mother & step-father. It was through them that I first entered the Black House, but through my own mother that I got in on the guest list. In the three and a half years that I passed in this place I never saw it in the light. The electricity and gas had long been disconnected, and carboard boxes and blankets covered the windows. The only light came from the fire place which burned constantly and which was used not only for heat, but also for cooking. This fire was not fuelled by coal or tinderwood, but by newspaper, clothes and broken furniture. The smoke and ash which poured off the flames rained constantly down and settled and covered the entire apartment in a thick layer of fine black soot. It was due to this that the house acquired its name... although at the time it wasn't known as the Black House... It was only later, in my writings that it would be thought of as that.

The Black House had a peculiar smell. It was a mix between burnt wood, stale feet, piss, fish, garlic powder and alcohol. Cans of beer sat open like aromatherapy canisters. It was in that atmosphere and amongst those smells that I saw my first dead body, that I witnessed acts of barbarous violence and that I would once again see, for the first time since my fathers death, someone injecting themselves with drugs. It was in the Black House that I first came into proper contact and fell in love with London's West Indian and African communities. It was there that I first tried trotter stew and jerk chicken, and it was in that house that the one-armed Quashie revealed a saucepan of swimming fishheads and assorted eyes and then slid a bowl of it my way. Me sipping nauseously at it's contents whilst the apartment flopped about in drunken laughter.

At first the house was a very scary and disturbing place for me. It was the first time I had come across such characters and people with such a wide variety of deformities and problems. A typical gathering would resemble something like this: In the single bed would lay Bridgette, as thin as death and with skin as pale and as white as dead plucked chicken. The only time she showed any colour was after having taking a beating, and she would then sit there in all the colours of autumn, her puffy, swollen face gulping down cans of extra strength beer to ease the pain. Besides her sat Lloyd a tall thin muscular Jamaican.... His face scarred and marked in fantastic ways. On the sofa wedged between two men would be Vangine. She was a small fat West Indian woman who had the habit of laughing her boobs out off her top... them flopping around to the rhythm of her joy. To her left was Konki, a Ghanaian who believed he was the son of Margaret Thatcher, and to her right was Tootsie, a deformed white boy with a bent spine and a glass eye. Rodney and Andy (twin brothers) would be on the floor, cooking up or nodding out, and Quashie would be in a wooden chair next to the fire, stirring and adding things to the pot. They were all here. The one-armed, the one-legged, the one-eyed and the toothless. With all the missing parts one could have made another person. It was a unique household which bordered somewhere between the bizarre and the frightening. But as with everything, if we are exposed to it enough it becomes the norm, and soon one would see past the deformities and the problems to the people underneath.

What I came to enjoy most about the house was the atmospheres, it became an escape for me, a mix between TV, theatre and cinema. Through the night as the silence crept in and the city slept, we'd sit hypnotised listening to the crackle of the fire, the cracking open of beer cans and hushed West Indian tales. Giant shadows would loom and retreat on the walls as the room settled to listen to Lloyd and Wardog's reminiscences. There were stories of home cooked food, young love, childhood beatings and exotic fruits and juices. I would sit mesmerised as the strange stories unfolded, riding on Lloyd's rhythmic words and deep dangerous voice. It was poetry... and it was poetry I have not and will never forget. My two favourite authors of all time have never written a book nor word between them.... and their works probably exist only in me. When my time comes, three artists will leave this world.

But the Black House was not just this, oh no. As with anywhere where drink and drugs are taken in large quantities, this place balanced on a knifes edge, and a room of laughter was never far from sparking over into one of anger and physical violence. As I mentioned, it was also a place of death and disease, and during my time there I witnessed two deaths and heard of another.

The first death was a natural one and was the first dead body I ever saw. His name was Murdoch but he was known throughout the house as The Doc. He was an old dreadlocked Jamaican who lived illegally in the roof of the building. A ladder led up there from the Black House and The Doc had made his home there many years ago. Each day a different woman would go up and collect this old mans beer order and also give another favour which he paid for. My mother was often this person. Up until the time when The Doc retreated from the roof to die I had only seen him once, and that is a bizarre story in itself and one that will be saved for another time.

The Doc had a cancer but refused to take treatment for it or go to hospital. Instead he suffered alone and in silence and only when the pain and discomfort became unbearable did he come down. He retired to the corner armchair in the living room and in the following week he rotted away in front of us, the cancer eating through his body. We all ignored the smell, the acidic digestion of his internal organs, until one morning he was dead. I remember the paramedics scooping him up and removing his thin body from the flat. The chair that had supported his discomfort had decomposed with him.... just a soggy burning melange of all the poison and waste that The Doc had expulsed. In many ways it was the start of the end of the house. The police made a routine call due to the death and after that Law & Order and Social Services became frequent visitors to the house... it became corrupted. The other two deaths were Bridgette (my best friends mum), and Rodney (one of the junkie twins). But those tales will also have to be for another time... maybe even for another blog.

To bring this post to an end I need to explain what I meant in the first paragraph when I stated that The Black House was a place of "hope in the midst of all hoplessness" because you may be thinking that it sounds more like a "hell in the midst of all hellishness". Well, I understand this sentiment and it probably was, but for me, coming from the home and past I did, it was a relief... a bizarre kind of therapy. For the first time in my life I came into contact with other kids of alcoholic and drug addicted parents. We became brothers in arms and took comfort from each others broken and twisted homes. Just knowing we were not living this alone was an enormous relief... seeing someone go through the same (maybe worse) was comforting. That may seem quite selfish, but it's how it worked and how we got through it

For me personally, it was the first time I had even had a friend.... in any context Because of my family and our home I was constantly on the defensive, making up tales of the number of TV's and videos we had... lying about having a washing machine and discussing the birthday and Christmas presents that I never received. "No, my mother had the flu!" I'd insist when my school mates would say they had seen her fall over in the street or pee herself in the supermarket .My young life and home was a closely guarded secret, and the best way to guard that secret was by having no friends, no-one to play with and no-one to invite home. So the Black House, with all it's problems and it's diseases offered me a home, a place and a group that I felt comfortable within.

Another positive of the Black House was that I met adults with the same problems as my mother, but who treated me so kindly and who explained things from a perspective I was blind to. I still find it fascinating how my friends parents, who treated their own children so appallingly, could have been so kind and loving towards me. And my mother was no different. She bought the other children presents and sweets and took them to the park and swimming pool. She protected them from the violence of their own families whilst showering the same abuse and worse upon me. It's strange how much someones behaviour can change when the burden and bitterness of responsibility is released from them. These were kids that had no past significations, that she didn't have to feed, clothe, justify her behaviour to or tuck into bed. They were not clinging to her leg screaming for her not to drink anymore... they didn't care. They were just enjoying the escape from their own terrible lives... a few moments of ceasefire in a childhood of bullets.

And I think this is why I can enjoy the company and friendship of other addicts and junkies, because we have all been there . We understand without questions why the other will remove his trousers and poke around for an hour to find a vein in the leg. We understand the scars and the bruises on each others bodies and from where all the tracks lead.They lead to the same place, off the fingers and back to the Black House. But where they lead to is another question, and it's one that I just cannot answer.


My Thoughts & Wishes to You All, Shane.

X

Heroin Hiccups #1: Fires & Explosions

The heroin life can often be a rollercoaster ride. When it is hard it is hell, though when it is easy, it’s very VERY easy. But in between the highs and the lows there are the ‘loop the loops’... the often comic and shambolic mishaps and adventures that arrive with the junkie life. In a series of broken posts titled Heroin Hiccups I will detail the bizarre events that have littered my own addiction. They range from the near tragic to the unbelievable and from runs of bad luck to acts of breath-taking stupidity. Along with one far from fatal overdose, two apartment fires, and an elderly neighbour falling through my door dead, I’ve also had a deer escape from me in central London, a 3am police visit whilst outside trying to recapture my fly away Cockatoos, & an emergency visit to the vets after my dog swallowed a 16th of an ounce of heroin. I’ve had junkies try to sell me everything from monkey meat to kingsize duvets and have witnessed one exploding kitchen. If one puts that little lot together, stirs with close scrapes and seasons with shotgun wielding crackheads, then you’ve got yourself a wonderful book. But this is not a book, it’s a blog post and so for now we will concentrate on the sparks... the fires and explosions.

I suppose setting one’s bed alight must be a very common Heroin Hiccup. Because of the drugs sedative qualities addicts are forever dropping lit cigarettes onto the floor, the sofa, the bed, and themselves. The large burn holes in a junkies clothes are often the sign of a nighttime panic to put oneself out. Along with the obvious scars from shooting, the addict is often littered with neck and chest burns and blisters... another little clue for an eagle eyed observer.

My first bedtime fire was a very mild affair. A dropped cigarette, a light sheet and a fan on low power... Just the right mix of ingredients to further heat up an already warm summer night - me awoken from slumber by my cover burning my back. A well directed cup of cold tea later and it was all over... not much smoke and save having to reverse the mattress and buy a new sheet, an undamaged bed. My next fire however would be a completely different affair.

In very similar circumstances, but this time in France, I awoke to flames and pluming black smoke. My first thought was that I had died and had been sentenced, but unfortunately it was not so... just another dropped cigarette, from another junkie onto another bed on another night. This time, however, it wasn’t so minor... it was way past the stage where a cold cup of Tetleys could get me out of jail free. And as the fumes, smoke and particles found their way up my nose and down my throat it suddenly hit me: I NEED WATER!!! I leapt out off bed, but due to smoke and fume inhalation whilst sleeping I found I was completely dizzyheaded and unstable. In my comical fumble to pull on my trousers I ended up doing the potato sack dance before falling and bashing my head on the dresser and ripping open my leg... but my mind was so intent on getting the fire out that in the moment I felt neither. I scrambled to my feet and staggered to the bathroom. On returning with a mop bucket full of water the disaster had escalated and now the entire bed was burning and smoking intensely... so much so that I had to retreat. I searched frantically for my painting mask, but running consistently with the mess that I am, it was nowhere to been found. My last memory was taking it off, chucking it over my shoulder and muttering “Fucking thing!” With time at a minimum and no mask in sight, I wrapped a cravat around my mouth and nose, retook my red bucket and for the second time that morning I went firefighting.

Of course, one bucket of water was useless... I chucked it on and with barely a sizzle the fire blazed on. If anything, the breeze made whilst chucking the water seemed to have worsened it. I started to panic... I grabbed anything at hand: saucepans, bowls, buckets and started filling them simultaneously. In the meantime I ripped the end of the shower unit and stretching it as far as it would go, I turned the water up full hilt and stood shooting water into the bedroom. After a few minutes of this and so many buckets and pans of water later the flames had beat a retreat, though the bed was still smouldering and smoke was pouring furiously from the mattress. As I could no longer breathe in any room of the apartment I rushed around opening all the windows.

As the bed was still smouldering furiously I continued with my water operation. Just as I was heading back to the bedroom with my latest bucket of water, the door rang. It was my upstairs neighbour who having seen and smelt the smoke had come down to see what was happening. I told her that all was fine and under control, but the popping of the mattress as it once again burst into flames and the thick black smog that bellowed from the bedroom sent her into complete hysteria. “You need the Fire Brigade!” She screamed.. “...the whole building will go up!”

“No, no.. it’s all under control... it’s all in hand. It just looks much worse than it is, that’s all.”

“But the smoke!?! Look, look... it’s too much... it’s TOO much!”

“No... That’s a good sign... It’s the flames you’ve got to worry about...” I wanted to add that when you see the smoke through the flames it’s serious, but when you see the flames through the smoke it’s under control... But I never got the chance. She was gone, hurrying back upstairs. I slammed the door and dashed back to the bedroom, throwing another couple of buckets of water across the re-ignited bed.

I heard the sirens from a distance.... I was hung out the kitchen window sucking fiercely on a cigarette. “Fuck! She’s only gone and called the Fire Brigade!” It was a fuck situation as my kitchen table was littered with needles, small aluminium cups and filters... my gear was poured out on a tea saucer and sitting innocently in the kitchen cupboard. I made a frantic rush to clear the paraphernalia away, sweeping all into a large grey bin bag and chucking alongside the other rubbish that was waiting for disposal. As the sirens came to a stop I went and looked out the living room window to see what was taking place outside. Down below, were two fire trucks and behind them on the opposing side of the street had gathered a small crowd. They were gawping up and pointing and counting windows and shaking their heads... I’m sure it came as no surprise to themthat it was my heroinhead that finally emerged from the smoke filled apartment window on the 3rd floor, smiling and with a cigarette dangling from the corner of my mouth. I gave them a little wave, smile and shrug and then held the cigarette up and gave it a little shake as if to say: “I’m Innocent... it was this little fella’s fault.” As I looked down, my upstairs neighbour emerged from the building holding a sack of belongings and followed by her two children and dog. As they were leaving the firemen were rushing in. I made my way to open the apartment door, but not before seeing an ambulance roll onto the scene... “Shit... that means the police will also be on their way!”

I opened my door and stepped calmly outside. “It’s fine, it’s fine. Just.....” They didn’t listen nor let me finish. Pushed me aside and barged in like some specially trained crack team... small fire extinguishers in hand. I chased in behind them. In the bedroom there was still masses of smoke but no smouldering or flames... that didn’t stop them though. They proceeded to systematically soak the ENTIRE room: my clothes, shoes, walls and ceiling... Only satisfied when water was dripping from the lightbulb. As I turned around in disgust and annoyance, my mouthful of classic British obscenities bounced off the chest of the first of two policemen. I just pushed past ignoring their, “Monsieur... Monsieur!” and went and sat in the living.

Anyway, to cut a long story short, I was questioned by the police and fire brigade (a neighbour and friend helped as at that time my french was very poor). Once they were satisfied that the fire was out and that it had been an accident they left me to the clean up, but not before giving me a lecture about the perils of smoking in bed and flogging me a smoke alarm!. My neighbour asked if I needed help and breaking the habit of a lifetime I conceded and said “Yes, I do... BIG TIME. I explained that my wife would be home at 6.00pm and that I needed to clean the bedroom and buy a new mattress and shower unit before she returned. My idea was to cover up everything and not breathe a word. OK, the bedroom would be dripping wet, but I’d explain that away by saying I had awoken with the cleaning bug and so scrubbed the floor, walls and ceiling... No problem, she’d swallow that. The reason for the cover up was one of self-pride.... She’d always said that one day I would do this, and I hate proving people right.... especially her!

After a 20 minute bathroom break and just as I was pulling on my jeans, I heard the key turn in the door... that dreaded sound that arrives when in someway you are shitting on your own doorstep. With that key turn the gates of hell swept open and she was there... I’d been rumbled, caught with my trousers down (again!). It transpired that the Property agency had phoned her enquiring about details of the fire and wanting to arrange an immediate visit to survey the damage. I could only pull a ridiculous grin, and then grimace and then get angry. I think I shouted something about it being her fault “for buying cheap sheets!”... Yes, I blamed it on her. But she was having none of it... instead she just calmly poked her head around the bedroom door and then went and sat down at the kitchen table and cried. And then I felt bad... and then I asked my neighbour to leave.

The outcome of it all was, we were given a 3 months notice of eviction, lost our first month deposit and in addition had to pay €1000 in damages and repair costs. I never bothered to contest this, even though it was only an estimate. I paid and we made arrangements to leave. It had been an expensive cigarette and a very narrow escape. I did make some half-hearted apologies to my wife and promised to quit smoking in bed... but she knows me too well and just nodded and scoffed. We didn’t wait the three months, we searched another apartment immediately and within the month we had moved out and into our new and current apartment.

But as with all Heroinhead's, mishap is never far away and it wasn’t long before an exploding oven blew my poor wife halfway across the kitchen and straight into a bed in Accident & Emergency. Once again she was to blame... it was her fault that I had cut the gas at the mains before killing the flames! The result was that when she went to cook supper later that evening, she was using the hob blissfully unaware that the oven was leaking into the open at gas mark 8. After 20 minutes the gas had filled the oven and had began escaping up the back of the cooker. Just as she was adjusting the pan on the hob the inevitable happened...

Whilst nodding in the living room I was brought around by an almighty bang from the kitchen. I leapt into action only to find my wife staggering dazed and drunkenly down the hallway... the oven door was strewn across the kitchen floor along with a medium sized saucepan and half a packet of bow shaped pasta (not quite al dente.) When she had come down from the shock she explained what had happened. She rolled up her trousers and said that when the oven door was blown from it’s hinges it had smashed into her leg... though she was adamant that all was fine. As the hours passed her leg reddened and started swelling and burning intensely. Finally, at gone midnight, and in quite a bit of pain, we left for the hospital. It turned out that her kneecap was severely bruised and that the heat had hit her with such force that it had penetrated the skin and had burnt the muscle and flesh underneath. She was put through to the Special Burns Unit where they creamed and wrapped her and kept her in for monitoring. I stayed overnight to keep her company.

As we went over what had happened, our first thoughts were that the cooker was at fault... that it was old and had sprung a leak. It was only during he 150th re-analysis of the evenings events, when she asked: “But when you finished cooking earlier tonight did you turn the gas off by the mains without cutting the oven?” that it all finally clicked and we realised conclusively that she was at fault again:

“But you’ve got to check these things!” I screamed... “YOU KNOW WHAT I’M LIKE!” And not for the first time, she gave a forlorn look down towards the ground, and with eyes as cold and as sterile as the stainless steel hospital units she muttered, “That’s just the problem.”


This post is dedicated to Kat Skratch... A loyal and dedicated member of the Shredded Heart Club. x

http://katesparrow.blogspot.com/

Take care readers & if you can only be one thing... be careful!

My very Best Wishes, Shane. x

Mythical Darts & Broken Hearts

In 1999 I fell in love, married and died for the first time. The girl was Buket, the marriage lasted three days and my death 3 years. After all the events in my life it was finally an arrow from a familiar bow that got me... left me strung out on the edge of nowhere staring over bridges into dark waters and looking for heavy stones that would permanently weigh my body down. London transformed from a place of beauty into a prison of smells, scents and memories. It was the only time I’ve ever felt abandoned to the wolves, the only time my flesh was up for grabs... I was so alone I was nowhere, so suicidal I was already dead. This post is of love, obsession, loss and hopelessness. This post is straight from the belly of The Black House.

I first met Buket in a dark bar on the Fulham Palace Road. I was returning from the funeral of my Grandad and had dashed in to escape the torrential rains and the devils lightening that crackled overhead as South London turned pewter and erupted into storm. She had sought me out in the darkest, loneliest corner of the bar and had awoken me with a light shake and two large brown eyes.

"Have you smoked too much?” she asked in foreign English. I smiled, shook my head and tapped my nose. “No, something else.” I said. I fell back to sleep, but when I woke again she had pulled a chair up to the table and was sitting there smoking and waiting. She told me she was from Istanbul and was working in London as an au pair. We remained there like that until last orders, our chairs inching closer together until our knees were touching . We swapped cigarettes in order to touch each others hands and I lent across the table and whispered things to her just to feel her dark hair on my face. Sometimes I would start sinking into sleep and when I'd awaken I’d catch her looking at me. I done the same... stealing hidden glances when she wasn’t looking... blinking her beauty into my head... a beauty that was so immense it made me sad.

By the time we left the bar the storm had calmed. We stood outside waiting for some advance from the other... the silence of the ‘what now?’ Finally I asked her where she lived and she explained it was on a street at the back of Putney Heath. The Heath is a large expanse of wasteland, parkland & open space. It was there that in the late 80’s a series of brutal rapes had occurred. I told Buket this and then I offered to walk her home.

As I accompanied Buket over Putney Bridge the lashing winds and rains whipped up again. I pulled her in close, removed my jacket and chucked it over our heads. We hurried along like this, past the swirling river and off into the mist. When we finally arrived at the house where she was staying we stood once again in awkward silence. I tried to move but couldn’t... for some reason I didn’t want to leave. Beneath the wet and the cold there was a warmth... a warmth that neither of us wanted to detach ourselves from. It wasn’t touch or contact, it was something so much more... an excitement that glowed within us like lava from the core of all existence. I eventually moved off into the rain, but a few metres down the road I turned around and shouted “Would you like to walk a little more?” And without a word she gave her answer and came running.

We finally came to a stop at the bottom of a long shadowy tree lined avenue... an open paint flecked bench offered us rest but not shelter. We sat there, huddled tightly together... cheek to cheek as the rain plummeted and fell like dead birds around us. There was no kissing, no fondling, no words... just two strangers with the same eyes, the same hopes and the same loneliness staring out into a raging storm. And as the trees swayed and bent, and the rains and the gales lashed cars and buildings, we peered out from under my jacket and watched the beauty as nature battered the world and the city... taking revenge on all the cruelties that had been inflicted upon us. This was the beginning of the end of all our past tragedies, the start of the healing process, the beginning of stark truth. But as we know, despair and suffering are never more than a shadows length behind in this life, and as this night beckoned the end of many hurts and traumas so it welcomed the beginning of a new disease... a disease so deadly that it takes more lives per year than any other... on the wings of the storm we fell in love.

After that night we swapped numbers and waited in desperation for our phones to ring. We met up and I took Buket on tours of London.... clubs, pubs & parks. Being from the Bosphorus she adored the sea, but as there is no sea in London we gave our hearts to the river. I introduced her to parks and secret gardens, and by late summer she had fallen in love with London's public spaces... she had swapped blue for green. For me London had also transformed... from a place of shadows and mirth into cherry blossom and floral scents. Parks and gardens came alive, and the brown sludge of the river suddenly flowed clear and led to unknown and fantastic places.

Buket moved in with me, sharing the house in Fulham with my friend and I. Bed covers were changed, the thick blankets I used as permanent curtains were removed from the windows, and the floor was no longer allowed to be used as an ashtray. It was fresh clothes and a shower once a day... proper dinners and sanitary living. But it felt good and it felt right and as the spring crept off the back of winter, the layers of dirt were slowly washed away.

But it was a rocky romance. It was so intense and desperate that a wrong word from either lip would send the other reeling into fathoms of insecurity and jealousy. And as the intensity grew and suicide pacts beckoned, I realised that this was not a healthy love... it was a draining, exhausting black love... an obsession that had only one logical conclusion: death. I watched each day as this love warped into something new, something bent and twisted... as eyes released tears of history and orgasms become desperate cries of help. We couldn’t get close enough to one other... we wanted to become one, but we were separated by our pasts and an eternity of wants and needs. And it was this that ate away at us like cancer.

During the courtship my drug use was open and honest (well almost). Because though Buket was aware that I was crushing up Subutex and snorting them every few hours, she was unaware that I was in the backroom piping heroin and crack.... meeting dealers in restaurant toilets and that the man who she thought was my manager at work was in fact a drug dealer. Of course, she had promised me that my drug use was my business and that she would not be like the others and ask me to quit, but barely a month into the relationship she blew up and demanded that I stop and abandon myself wholey to her. Unfortunately I was incapable of this... love was one thing, safety was another, and this wasn’t a safe love; it was a dangerous messy affair and one in which I needed drugs to get through the exhausting emotions of each day. Still, I had no choice but to go along with her wishes and feign desire to get clean. We came to the arrangement that she would hold my supply of subutex and anytime I needed or felt like it I would phone her and she’d meet me with 5 little white pills. Gradually it descend to 4, 3, 2,1 until the time I would no longer need them.

I phoned Buket almost daily after this... she became my dealer, doctor & drug counsellor. Sadly by the time I arrived to meet her my mind was intent on getting opiates into my blood, and with barely a kiss or a “hello” I’d snatch the subutex from her, rush into the nearest bar or McDonald's toilet and crush them down and suck them up. I’d then slide down the wall in relief, waiting the 15mins it took for them to get into my system and attack my brain. I would then return zombie eyed and full of shame, apologizing for my weakness and pledging undying love. But she understood I was there for the drugs and not for her, and it was just another of a million problems that plagued us.

Another problem was her mental illness. She had a split personality and this had been accentuated after the trauma of being repeatedly raped by her schizophrenic younger brother just before coming to London. Actually this was the real reason she was even here, her father banished her from Istanbul & the family house on account of her outrageous tales of incest. Through every pore in our skins seeped darkness... black tales and black experiences. Our nights became a time of stories and dark reminiscences... our wide eyes glowering to candle light as we took it in turn to relate our histories of horror. We told our tales and then lost ourselves in music and love. But now in our glances there was a sadness and a fear... an understanding that we were probably the worst possible thing we could offer each other. Summer was coming to an end, and although love still existed enemy forces were encroaching slowly from all sides.

Buket had planned her return to Istanbul for mid November and we both lived in dread of this date. We made hurried plans so as not to separate... not then.. not forever. Our talks and discussions brought this game plan: We would marry in London, she would head off to Istanbul two days later and I would join her in December for the wedding reception which would be held there. But this trip was not just for the reception, I wouldn’t be coming back... we were setting up life in Turkey, an apartment overlooking the Bosphorus Straits.

We married in November, her in a black wedding dress and me in my funeral suit... the same one I had been wearing when we first met. It was a bizarre affair. I was working on that day and in a large van at lunch time all the firm travelled down to the wedding.... colleagues in work overalls and with black hands celebrating and throwing confetti as we left the registry office. Neither of us believed in marriage, we went through with it because her family were muslim and it was the only way we could openly share the same bed together.

As we sat for drinks in the bar afterwards, just Buket, my family and I, I looked across the table at her beauty. We had married for very specific reasons, but in that moment, in that millisecond of happiness before our hells would collide, I was proud. I was proud of her, of me of my wife, and I think she was too.... for a smiles length of time she was proud to have the name Levene. Though an hour later she would be in fits of fury as I returned from the toilets with a single streak of crusty white powder running from my nose and then nodded into the wedding meal. And as she pointed to my nose, letting me know the streak of residue hadn’t passed unnoticed, I knew.... I knew that in two days I would take her to the airport and would never see her again. There would be no reception... no Bosphorus dreams.. only heartache, divorce, pills, heroin and crack.

*************

The Taxi pulled up at 4pm and I bundled Bukets suitcase into the boot and slipped in the back beside her, my breath awash with the nutty scent of piped heroin.We had arranged for the taxi to exit London by a very specific route, a mini tour of the streets, avenues and bars that had fuelled these past months. It was a blustery English day and the autumn light was already fading. We looked out the window together and watched as London rolled away into history and memory... as the motorway took us out of the reverie and on the 45miniutes journey to Gatwick Airport.

I was calm.... we was quiet... this was it. I walked Buket to the departure gate, and we stood outside holding one another. “We’re never going to see each other again, are we?” I said.... holding back tears that could not be held back.. “This is the end isn’t it?” She kissed my nose and wiped my eyes... and then she broke down herself and started making desperate promises and gestures of love. Her eyes wide and speaking a hundred thoughts at once. We held each other on last time and I sucked in an audible lungful of air and courage. Trailing fingers broke free and without looking back I headed off, my tears falling freely as I made my way back home. Patting my pocket to make sure the two little bags of heroin were still there.

We kept in contact over the next month... daily phone calls and desperate pleas for the time to quicken up it’s pace. The reception was planned and booked and I had bought my plane tickets and that of my mothers and sisters for the event. But then one dull afternoon, an event happened that would almost kill me and push me fully into the arms of heroin and crack. A conversation so bizarre that I still don’t understand it now. But in that conversation my wife would slip into psychosis, threaten to have me killed and we would never speak nor see each other again.

I received the call at work, it was Buket and she was desperate... crying and swearing undying love: “I need you... can you come earlier... you need to be here now!”“I can’t just leave like that” I said. “Anyway, I’ll be there in 14 days.. it’s not so long.”And then she changed.... for the third time in our relationship her psychosis appeared and in a click of the fingers she was a different person... someone evil, uncaring and spiteful. “14 days!!! You think that’s not long.... how can you be so fucking cold! I need you and you speak with tiredness... yeah, yeah, yeah! Are you that bored by me???”"I’m just a little tired...”“Tired!!! how can you be tired... we only speak once a day... how can that tire you!” And then the phone went dead and so did I... because I knew from experience that when she became like this she was inaccessible... she was no longer there.

That evening I tried to phone, but got no response. I was in complete panic and began phoning her friends and family. Finally I got through to her family home and it turned out she was there but refused to speak to me. Her father however had this to say:

“The marriage is over. My daughter says it was a mistake and she no longer wants to see or hear from you again... EVER! Please send her clothes and belongings over and do not call back!”

Well I did call back... many times but Buket wouldn’t speak with me, and as the realisation dawned that our beauty was dead, I sunk into a depression and a hurt that gave a self-destructive edge to my recklessness. London and her memories began taunting me and I started to die... and then I broke down and cried. This life was not for me.... all the hurt and the pain and the tragedy and the upset and abuse and...and... and... it could keep it... I’d had enough! But life doesn’t care for such despair and 2 weeks later she delivered my friends dead body to my feet, and for a while I gave up... but you already know that story. It took me a whole year to get over the break-up, and three years of heroin abuse to ease the pain. Since that bizarre phone call with Buket I have never seen, spoke nor heard from her again. We’ve never divorced and I never sent her clothes back. I hold no ill will towards her, and have no desire to see her again... it’s something that is done and dusted. Instead I think and I laugh.... I laugh about my 3 day marriage and I laugh at just how very human it is. All the things that have passed my way, and finally it was the old dart of love that got me... brought me to my knees screaming for mercy. And I’m proud of that.... I’m proud because I can love and I can hurt. I am proud that after everything I am not numb, disconnected and unfeeling. I am proud because I have a heart... an open heart and a heart that can be broken.

Take care All...

Shane. x

Rubber Duck - A Poem between Posts

Rubber Duck

When I get lonely
I rub my rubber duck
I fart he rides the bubbles
As they break around the tub
I pick him up and kiss him
I smother him with love
He sometimes stinks but never sinks
My enduring rubber duck

.

Main post to follow shortly... Best Wishes, Shane. x

A Mother's Love

Like all babies I was born innocent and cloaked in parental scent. 8 years later I would lose that innocence, yet once again be covered in my mothers perfume... but this time it would have an entirely different signification. This is not a tale of love, rebirth or re-bonding... it is a story of sexual abuse.

* ~ * ~ * ~ *

In the weeks, months and years following the murder of my father my life became forever tainted. My mother, lost and unable to cope, became a chronic alcoholic, knocking back in excess of 2 bottles of vodka a day. With alcohol her attentions turned to razor blades, bottles of tranquilizers, sex with strangers and me. As I was the only child to her murdered lover I became her last hope... the last physical connection to a man she had desperately loved. ‘Shane’ became a slurred and deformed sound from an alcoholics mouth.... an expletive to scream... a forewarning of the perverse. Due to my mothers alcohlism I saw, felt and smelt things no child ever should. My brother and sister also experienced this, but there was something else that I experienced... something that they were and are completely oblivious to.

After the murder my mther could no longer bare sleeping alone, so due to this and because of her frequent and long disappearances, when she was home us children took it in terms to sleep with her. I always tried to avoid this, I had a strange sense of something very wrong there, but I was the one that she always wanted.... it was always my turn. This brought a lot of resentment from my brother and sister. That I was my mothers favourite when we were all so desperate for her love was something they couldn’t understand nor forgive me for, and it was the start of a jealousy that was to separate us for ever. Little did they know the horrors that I would experience in those nights... alone with a bed-ridden and suicidal alcoholic.

My mothers room was a dark place. The light was always off and just the little green LED from the stereo shone out in the dark.The badly tuned frequencies and ghostly voices of late night radio crackled in the air... old love songs, filtered through broken speakers, took us into a world of sadness and decay... my mother sobbing away as she sat on the edge of the bed completely naked, filling glass upon glass with vodka. Sometimes she’d fall on the floor, splayed and helpless, and I’d have to try with all my strength to lift her back into bed.

In the dark I would lay there, feigning sleep and listening for the heavy breathing of my mum. I was constantly waiting for the chance to slip the room, to rejoin my brother and sister, but in those times, no matter how much she drank, she never seemed to sleep. She would just sit there crying, the clink of glass on glass and the glurping of neat alcohol lolling from the bottle. Finally when she had punished herself enough, she’d roll into bed, her tears spilt down my neck and back... her 40% alcohol proof kisses slobbered over my face. Naked she would curl up tight against me, rubbing and gyrating in a way I didn’t understand. Moaning and groaning against Rupert The Bear pyjamas... my hand placed where it should never have been. It was only looking back that I understood what this was. But there’s no shame to be had here... I was an innocent party, a seven year old boy as cold as stone.

During the following years my mothers naked presence and sexual acts in front of me became constant... I can barely recall her with her clothes on. It seemed she had a desperate need to rediscover a touch that no longer existed.... to find a love that couldn’t be found. She took male and female lovers.... Old and young, fat and thin, black and white. They were all sleazy characters and all with problems. Either alcoholics, junkies or convicts. I watched them all... flabby naked bodies and exposed sex. Socks used as tissues, sinks used as toilets, a constant release of hideous adult smells. I was dragged from house to house, from bed to bed, from sofa to sofa. During these encounters I either curled myself up at the bottom of the bed, or was relegated to the floor with my blanket. There I would lay, my ears blocked and without moving, just trying to close out the animal sounds from around me. If here was a TV I would try and become lost within it, but mostly there was no TV... nothing. Just smoke stained walls, soiled sheets and smeared glasses. There was never any love... not between anyone. Until I was 22 I never knew what love was and I had never had the word directed at me.

Along with shades of sexual abuse came unmistakable blows of physical abuse. My mother caught between life, death, sex and vodka, would beckon me and reject me. I was all that was left from a disrupted past, but also the unwanted clinger on off a present in which she wanted to be free of responsibility. She would drag me around ,but would then see me as a burden.... the reason why she couldn’t abandon herself completely to a world of numbness and vice. With this resentment came hatred, and acts of physical violence towards me.

In front of lovers she would call me, and when I arrived she would punch me in the face with all her might. We would all roll around laughing.. me feigning pleasure in showing how tough I was.This was one of her party tricks, and one that was repeated over and over again. Along with the right hooks there were darts stuck in me, pans of boiling water chucked in my direction and thin stiletto heels to the head. I would be thrown downstairs, hung out the window, kicked in the ribs and gripped up and slapped by angry male lovers. One kicked me so hard in the back that I lost breath for over a minute and almost swallowed my tongue. It was in such situations that 350 of the 400 blows would arrive.

Not only was there sex and two forms of maltreatmnt, but also drug and alcohol abuse. I remember needles and pills, bottles and cans. I remember blackened burnt spoons and tin foil. I remember tourniquets and cheap roses, slurred words of passion towards dulled emotions. Whenever I could I would steal and drink my mothers Smirnoff, and so there began not only repetition of what was around me, but also the use of substance to escape. But my young drinking was not successful and it soon brought more trouble to the house. At nine, drunk on vodka, I fell through the window of a neighbours house and landed 10ft below with shards of glass stuck in my hand and wrist. I was taken to the hospital, and when they realised I was drunk and had no-one to contact or collect me, the social services were introduced to our family.

This life continued up until the age of 11. At this point, due to violence between my stepfather and my mother, our family split in two, and we left west London to begin what was advertised as “a new life”. My mother had promised to stop drinking and under the surveillance of the Social Services she was put in sole trust of my brother, sister and I. She stayed off the juice long enough to have us settled for rehousing and for the heat to die down from the social worker. But as with all forced abstentions from addiction, there was soon a relapse and it all started again.

Firstly in the hotel, and then in the new flat, strange men and women would be calling around for sex and drinking sessions. I was no longer in the room with it... I had learnt to disobey, that a paralytic drunk was no match for a quick, sprightly eleven year old boy. These were good times for me... times of pure escape. I had no-one to answer to or look after me and so I walked the streets until the early hours with young friends. We’d climb walls, break into disused buildings, go camping and travel London. We all shared broken and perverted homes, and we all took comfort in the late nights together. Sitting out in warm summer evenings, London calm and silent, we’d stare up into mauve skies and blow smoke rings towards the stars. We’d dream of football matches and cup finals... we’d talk of success and fame. And when we had that fame the clothes we’d buy, and the cars we’d drive. And when we’d finish, we’d examine each others toeless shoes and share the last of the cigarettes. Just wonderful, wonderful memories... full of magic and play.

My mothers cheap and loose behaviour continued into my mid-teens. She was often to be found naked and legless, offering up sex to all and sunder including my friends. Desperate friends fucked her, intelligent friends refused her, and stupid ones fell in love with her. I was in the room opposite and heard it all... all 5 seconds of it. Young boys, with young guns and fresh bullets don’t last very long. There was disappointment, anticlimax and shame everywhere. If it was hard for me to look these people in the eye ever again, it was just as difficult for them. But as with everything, we learn to disassociate and to distance ourselves from the things that hurt us. And that’s what I done... I disconnected and ignored it, and my good friends ignored it with me. With guitars, music and poetry, we drowned out the grown-up sounds and covered up the noise of the headboard banging the wall.

Apart from a handful of friends I have never talked about this with anyone. Certainly not my mother, brother or sister. Though I once asked my brother if any sexual abuse or touching happened to him during those years and his response was so shocked it could only have been the truth. How those years affected my adult life I cannot really say. It happened during a period when I was completely sexless, completely oblivious to the different kind of touches that exist. For many years I did suffer with a feeling of responsibility for what had happened. Looking back I reasoned that I could have left the bed, I could have moved myself along or made some excuse to escape. But at the time that wasn’t an option... I didn’t even know that what was happening was anything other than a drunken woman acting out more incomprehensible behaviours. To me it felt the same as the slobbered kisses... a ridiculous act of drunken affection.

No, there was no escape... there never really is. And there still isn’t, because when darkness falls and the city sleeps and the radio crackles through the night, I sometimes return, and in those moments I am repulsed and I am sickened by the female touch. And so I shake myself free from my lovers arms, and on the very edge of the bed I turn my back and curl up tight. And if I am lucky it is 3am, and if I am silent I will pass unseen, and if the world is playing by the rules this night, the light will be back soon.

My Fondest Wishes to All,

Shane. x

A Post from a Ghost - Guest Spot.

18 years ago, just before opiates made an entry into my life, I was living on the White City Estate in West london with my mother, my brother and my dog. Whilst there, I only ever made one real friend... that was Andrew Frankham. Unfortunately that friendship ended at the end of a lump of wood, a dog chain and a skateboard. Andy breaking my finger and me breaking his colarbone and his heart. In the past weeks we have been back in touch and have once again become good friends. Here is Andy's version of me, 15 years old and just starting down the long road of drugs and danger. I hope you all enjoy...

A Reflection of Me

Shane and I go back a long time, twenty years in fact. That we managed to find each other on the anniversary of our first encounter is no coincidence. I’ve never believed in such things; there is a reason behind everything, whether we’re able to comprehend said reason is another thing. When he asked me to do a guest spot on his blog and tell his loyal followers a little something of the kid I knew back at the arse end of the ‘80s I at first felt quite honoured, but then reality set in and I realised I hadn’t really thought much about those days in nigh on ten years. The only things I had distinct memory of were the events that led to the parting of the ways for Shane and I; it’s curious how easily we are able to recall the bad times. So I took it as a challenge to myself; for just over a year we had some good times, and got to know each other pretty damn well. Indeed, we became best mates; therefore the good memories had to be juggling around in my mind somewhere. And just like all my worthwhile writing projects, this meant a little research.

I left White City in 1991. It’s always struck me as odd that a concrete jungle with roads named after Commonwealth countries, and houses named in honour of participants of the Commonwealth Games, should be called something with such obvious racist undertones. An historical irony, perhaps? Even more ironic considering the confluence of culture that pervades every aspect of that housing estate. But this is not about the place, so much as how it pertains to the relationship between Shane and I. For some inexplicable reason I’ve never been able to decipher, since 1991 I would return to White City in my dreams. No matter where I was living at the time, no matter what friends I had about me, White City would always resurface in that darkest of subconscious arenas.

In this dream I’d be doing my thing with my friends, usually the most mundane stuff, and we’d start off in whatever given place I was living at the time. Then, as if stepping out of the back of the wardrobe, we’d be in White City. And it always seemed the most natural thing; after all the dreamscape of the unconscious mind rarely entertains the notion of logic, and so having my current friends in the place of my teen years made perfect sense. But I never ended up in just any part of White City, always I’d step into the forecourt of Wolfe House, the red brick block of flats in the shape of a capital L, signalling the truth of that place. The home of Lost Souls. Within seconds I’d be jumping up to the fourth floor, like Superman taking a single leap, and coming to rest outside a door in the corner of that L. I never lived in this flat, that much I knew, yet I would enter as casually as if it were my own home. The interior always seemed dark, shadows dancing around. I’d never think to look around the flat, after all there was a familiarity about it that I’d find comforting, and so I’d walk up the hallway, passing both the kitchen and the living room, until I came to this one white door. Knocking never seemed necessary, and so I’d walk into the room beyond. Empty but for the sparse furniture and posters on the magnolia walls; one poster in particular stuck out, a group of men in tight jeans and t-shirts, with the words Skid Row printed jaggedly above. From there the dream would segue into a new place, and I’d be back with my current group of friends.

An odd dream, one full of meaning but little understanding. For the longest time it made no sense to me; why would I keep returning to this place? Recently, though, some clarity has come my way. When talking to Shane on the phone the other day, going through remembrances some two decades old, he reminded me that his flat was number 40, and in a flash I saw that corner flat of my dream. For the best part of eighteen years my dreamscape would take me to the place Shane lived with his mother, brother and dog. A place where, for the best part of year, I could most often be found. It seems that even though Shane and I had parted company in a terrible way, a part of me kept returning. I had not let go of the friendship we once shared.

I forget exactly how we met, but I do remember that I first met his mother. I was living at my sister’s at the time, on the second floor of Wolfe House, and she had struck up a friendship with Lesley, Shane’s mother. Tracey tells me that she met Lesley through Gary, my sister’s then fella, who provided Lesley with ‘draw’ (cannabis). As I was living at my sister’s I’d often see Lesley popping in for a coffee and a chat, or as the old cliché goes, to borrow some milk or sugar, and just as often Tracey would pop up to the fourth floor to return the favour. I seem to recall that my first encounter with Shane was brief; his mother was having coffee at my sister’s and Shane popped in for some reason or other. Memory’s a funny thing, and two decades is an awfully long time. My fist impression was of this quiet kid, a little younger than me (exactly three years to the day, as it turned out), who had a certain sparkle in his eye. It’s what I would now call a cheeky glint; the kind of look you see in the eyes of those for whom mischief is never far away. And me being me, I was attracted to that straight away. Looking back the source of the attraction is abundantly clear; it was recognition of a familiar. We soon got to talking, little more than small talk at first, something which both Shane and I suck at, as I popped up for coffee with my sister. In those first few days Shane was something of a mystery to me; this wraith that would appear from his bedroom, say a few words, ask his mother for something, and then would disappear back into his room. I think it was me who made first contact proper, sticking my head into his room and striking up a conversation. I’m not sure if I’m remembering that, or if it’s merely something I’ve since convinced myself happened as it is the kind of thing I’m prone to do.

Nevertheless a friendship was quickly struck, and it came to pass that Shane and I were more often together than not. It was a pretty standard friendship really, one full of hours talking about random things; music, books, and all kinds of arty stuff. Even back then we were both creative types. Every night we’d be out in Greyhound Park, the overgrown former grounds of the infamous White City Stadium, once renowned for dog racing before it was torn down in the early ‘80s and the ground bought by the BBC, walking his dog. Even now I can see Shane clearly walking beside me, while his dog ran around. Back then Shane was prone to talk quietly while we walked, head lowered, shoulders hunched, thin and tall, dressed in dark clothes. With hindsight and some understanding of body language, it’s obvious now that the signals he was giving off were clearly a clue as to what was going on within. This was a teenager living mostly in his own private world of pain, and as much as I got to know Shane, there was always more to know. But there was so much that he would not let me in on. He often alluded to something nasty in his past, but would clam up whenever I asked him what. Still, those brief moments of potential darkness never harmed our friendship. And yet, for reasons now clear to me, our friendship was a doomed one.

Shane was a volatile young man, always on the verge of courting danger, and this side of him often caused me concern. But again it was something I understood, for I had my own issues going on and there was a heart born of rage bubbling within. That we were kindred spirits was beyond doubt, but he was heading down a path I could not walk, at least not then. We were ultimately too alike; both intelligent, with enquiring minds, prone to mood swings, and bouts of depression. The main difference between Shane and I, though, was his willingness to dance on the side of darkness, a place I couldn’t allow myself to go. I had my family about me, disjointed as they were, and they continued to anchor me. Shane and his family, however, were living in a world of hurt that my teenage mind couldn’t begin to comprehend. As the months past by and 1990 came about, the feeling in the Levene household began to turn grim. They had two lodgers living there; people whom Shane was spending more and more time with. Perhaps it was because they were new and thus more interesting than I, whom he already knew? Here were two adults, two men, doing the kind of things Shane was used to seeing around him; drinking, smoking dope and generally being loud and obnoxious. They probably thought it was funny; Shane certainly seemed to. Drugs became a regular fixture; to my mind it was usually only light drugs, but I suspect it might have been more. I was wonderfully naive about these things back then! I was spending less time there, the welcoming atmosphere diminishing with every visit. To this day I am convinced it wasn’t a malicious act designed to oust me from Shane’s world, rather a moment of life where a single path was meant to split in two.

Shane’s mother was drinking more and it was becoming nigh on impossible to talk to her with any expectations of common sense; and with her drinking came a more maudlin woman talking about random things from her past. In truth I thought she mostly making it up; the brain addled by the excess of alcohol or dope. As for Shane? Well, I saw him around, but we didn’t spend any time alone any more. I do vividly recall one night where we went out to walk the dog and we had this almighty row about something trivial, Shane refusing to talk about what was troubling him, issuing forth sarcastic comment after sarcastic comment. I was left with a sinking feeling in my heart. The loss of a kindred spirit is a harsh reality, and it cuts to the core. I spent most of that night awake, probably crying.

Over the following few months I became the object of much verbal bashing from Shane, almost always when he was with his neighbour whom I suspected was doping up with Shane on a regular basis. It began to wear me down, even though I still held some hope that Shane and I would be able to rekindle the friendship that had been torn away from me. I still popped up to see his mother from time to time, most often when Shane was not about, always sounding her out to see if reconciliation was around the corner. But nada. I had the misfortune of being there on occasion when Shane did come home, and received the darkest and dirtiest looks, usually accompanied by some slur. It was a hard time, seeing this person whom I once considered a friend now treating me like some intruder in his world. The old sparkle in his eyes had started to dim, and now an evil glare seemed to be cast my way.

It all ended one evening in Greyhound Park. Others had got involved in the growing animosity between us. And so egged on, the rage was beginning to burn. Finally we decided, mutually or not I forget, to have it out once and for all. In mind I still see this moment clearly, although I suspect time has altered my perception slightly and built it into something a lot more dramatic than it actually was. But the moment replays like this:
Shane one side of the park, me on the other. Shane’s crowd of onlookers is notably larger than mine. Shane begins shouting obscenities at me, and I think ‘fuck this’, yet at the same time wondering how we had come to this. I know for sure that I do not want to do this. Then I notice Shane has the dog chain in his hand, and so I rip a wooden slat from a rather feeble fence. We literally run at each other, like two wild animals. None of this sizing each other up, provoking the other into making the first move. As I near him I throw the wood away; still I do not want this. But I am on some inexplicable course than I cannot pull away from. We clash, and I rip the dog chain from his hand (possibly the reason for his broken finger), and we lay into each other. There is none of those fancy moves you see on TV, just two teenagers scrapping, tumbling around on the floor while others jeer us on. At some point Shane is on his feet, and someone hands him a skateboard, which comes crashing down on my collar bone.
After this I remember very little of the fight, I still can’t even remember how it ended. But end it did and for the next week I was walking around thinking that my shoulder was only bruised. At that point I’m not actually aware that a skateboard had been used, I only discovered this later. I saw Shane around still, but I refused to be cowed, although I noted his hand has been bandaged and I felt a guilty glow of satisfaction. But it was a temporary thing cause I knew that whatever we had was gone.

I left White City in 1991, and that was the last time I saw Shane on a regular basis. By this point he was a stranger, his hair long, looking more drawn than I ever saw him before. It weighed heavy on my heart that I no longer knew him, that we’d pass in the street with barely a nod of acknowledgement. When coming home I’d usually walk behind Wolfe House, cutting across the grass and past the rear of No. 1, but Shane often hung around there as he was friends with those who lived at No. 1, and so it became a habit to go the long way home, just to avoid any further hostility and emotional hurt.

For eighteen years I was left with a lack of understanding as to just what had gone wrong. But recently we have got back in touch, and in some ways it’s like we never parted company. But what is most amazing of all is that in the intervening years we have been on very similar emotional journeys, even living through closely linked events, like the deaths of loved ones (a step-brother and a friend in my case), and we’ve found ourselves to truly be the kindred spirits we sensed in each other twenty years ago. Only now more so. And we’re still as arty as we ever were, Shane with his paintings and fiction, and me with my own fiction.

I look back, and now having some context on the events going on in his life at the time, I understand what happened between Shane and me. We saw too much of ourselves in the other and neither of us were at the place we needed to be to accept those similarities, to rejoice in and embrace them. Shane had decided he had to be a certain kind of man for his mother, and so did what he had to do to become that person. He isolated himself from the friend who really cared, turning instead to easier more spendthrift friendships, with people who could offer him exactly what he needed at that point in his life, and so continued down his own path, the one that would lead to the point he is at today. And so that path we were once on, the one that had split so abruptly back in 1990, has finally merged once again. And now, finally, there is true understanding.

As a postscript, let me add that since Shane and I have found each other again, my dream world has not once returned to White City and Shane’s old home. Curious, isn’t it?

Methadone Maintenance & Continental Socks.

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During my ten years of heroin addiction I have been in rehab just once. That was for a very specific reason and was not my choice. It lasted 5 months. This post details my reasons for entering rehab along with my experiences and observations of it. I do not go into the failings of that system, as it is outside the scope of this post.

I will start by saying: I don’t believe in rehabilitation... not for me anyway. To go for that means you think that you have something to be rehabilitated from, and I don’t feel I have. There is nothing wrong with me...I am dependent on a drug, that’s all. Rehabilitation suggests something so much more... that beyond heroin the person is the problem, that the person needs rehabilitating. But from what? From life?

My reasons for even considering rehab came about because of my wife. We’d been living together in London for a few months and each month had became more miserable and more depressing than the last (especially for her). What she thought she could handle, she quickly realised she couldn’t and that what may have seemed romantic on paper was not so when it was the crux of a daily existence.

By the end of October (I think she waited until after my birthday) she said she was leaving... returning to France. She asked if I was following, but I could only shake my head and look down. As our relationship crumbled all I could do was stare despondently at her red, flat soled shoes and continental socks. We parted on the corner of the street... me heading off to work and her heading to the airport. She was crying, but I was dry... of tears, apologies or goodbyes. Poetry would have been useless... it was that which had brought her here. And so she left.

After a month apart I realised that unless I done something the relationship was doomed and I didn’t want that. The last year (including the fights) had been the happiest of my life. In absence of any other acceptable solution I agreed to enter a rehabilitation clinic (though not to stop using) and promised that once I had been stabilised on methadone that I’d transfer my script to a hospital in Lyon and then we’d leave together. Whether transferring a script to France was even possible I had no idea, although I told her I’d looked into it and that it wasn't a problem. The reality of what I discovered was it was extremely difficult transferring a script from one London borough to another, let alone abroad. Still, I had to tell her something... and as I had nothing to tell her, I lied. On the back of that lie, and actual proof that I had really booked myself onto a maintenance program, she returned.

It was during the middle of December 2003 that I experienced my first taste of white-walled, fruit-filled and sickly Drug Substitution units. After passing my 2 months on a waiting list I was finally there, feigning junk illness so as I could get as much methadone as possible. It was 8.30am, and I was surrounded by snivelling, groaning, moaning junkies... sick to the bones and begging for their dose. From the start I had problems.

After waiting 30 minutes in the dying room I was called by a doctor. I followed him into his little surgery and was joined by my drug counsellor (my key worker). I tried pretending illness as best I could, but it’s a difficult thing to do, especially around those who know it so well.
“When was the last time you used Mr. Levene?”
“Last night... just before going to bed.” I admitted.... omitting to mention the injection I had taken just before leaving
“You’ve not gone the 24hrs? You are not withdrawing?” The doctor enquired.
I explained that I was withdrawing, but that I wasn’t sick and couldn’t understand why I had to show up ill.... did I have to earn my treatment?
“No, but you’ve got to show you want it... that you’re serious on quitting”
“ Well, I’m here...I’ve money in my pocket and I’m here, how more serious can I be?”
The doctor scribbled something on a notepad and gave it to my counsellor. “We’ll give you 10mls... if you want more, you’ll have to come here withdrawing.”
“10ml! That won’t do anything. I need at least 90ml!.. 10ml!!!”
“Mr. Levene, 40ml is enough to bring about fatal overdose... whilst using on top we cannot give you anymore. Tomorrow morning we’ll review your situation further. Good morning.”
“Good morning?? It will be... I’ve gotta go and score now!”
With that I left the doctor, swallowed down the measly 10ml I’d been prescribed and then caught the bus to Shepherds Bush where I scored before heading in to work.

This pattern continued for nearly two weeks. Each day the doctor telling me the same and upping my dose another 5 or 10 ml. By the end of the 14 days I was on 110ml a day, which was enough to stop me from becoming ill if I had no gear.

After being stabilised I still had to travel to the treatment centre each day, see the doctor, have my urine tested and then drink my little cup of juice in front of the nurse. It was a one system suits all... yet from what I could see it was a one system fails all. On account of my job, I asked for special permission to have a weeks script at a time... I explained that I could no longer justify to my directors why I had need of an hour and a half absence each morning (and for the foreseeable future too), but it was refused. It wasn’t until I forged a letter on company headed paper, threatening myself with disciplinary action, that I was finally given a weeks script. Thank God for common sense!

To cut the story short, I was at CAPS, the treatment centre in West London for 3 months before being in a position to transfer my script to France. During those three months my heroin intake remained the same as it had ever been. This disappointed my wife a little, as regardless of my lack of resolve to quit, I’m sure she secretly hoped that I would... or that I’d at least slow down a little. Instead the truth was this: when she left England I was a crack and heroin addict, and when she returned I was a crack, heroin and methadone addict... things hadn’t gotten better, they’d become worse. Anyway, soon she’d have her wish... soon she would experience a life free of any illegal drugs.

Surprisingly the transfer of my prescription to France couldn’t have been more simple. Two faxes and a note from my key worker and it was complete. So at the very beginning of March 2004, my wife and I left London to start a new life in Lyon... a life where heroin was no longer a barrier down the middle of the bed.

For me France would be the unknown.... not just in terms of the language or people, but as an adult living a drug free life. I knew that once I left England that heroin & crack were off the agenda... not possible, at least for the time being. My only heroin contact in France was Alexandre, my wife’s brother, but unfortunately he was serving 3 years for heroin trafficking charges in the local St. Paul Prison. So France was the real beginning of a heroin free life... my first in almost 5 years.

The methadone clinics in France are pretty much the same as in the UK. Early morning visits, drinking your juice in front of an observer... weekly urine test... psychiatrist reports and meetings. The main difference between France and England is the punishment on giving dirty urine's. In England you are punished severely for this, whilst in France they use the information more for monitoring your progress and the success of the treatments. In France all addicts have their own script, in England all addicts are thrown off their scripts. The ideal position to be in, and which I’m in now, is to give enough clean urine's to build up a little bit of trust. Once this has happened you can ask to be transferred to a GP (who rarely if ever takes urine tests).

In France I stayed clean for almost 5 months... just enough time to speak a little, and get some money in my pocket. Those 5 months were not miserable or unhappy I got down and got on with life. I used them to concentrate on my painting and writing and other creative outlets that I had neglected in my drug addiction. That little break really served its purpose as I reviewed the past 5 years and made certain promises to myself. My writing or thinking or painting heroin free was no different... it was no better or no worse. Heroin doesn’t affect one in that way.

My gradual descent back into addiction upset my wife, but she always knew I’d bring heroin back to our bed. Like everyone else I suppose she just hoped. At least here she had some control and a hand in my addiction. She knew the dealers and how much I was buying... if my usage was constant or increasing. The paranoia of London was not here and it was a huge release for us. Also, I had given up my addiction to crack cocaine so she was thankful for that She was also thankful that I was painting and at last doing something creative, though she was always urging me to write... well, maybe now’s the time to do that. In fact, I think it is.

I’ve explained a little of the program and my experience of it and now I will go through the problems of treatment.

1) Methadone or Subutex is NOT heroin. It stops the physical withdrawal but gives the addict nothing else. Unless the addict is also taken away from heroin these substitutions cannot work. 50 or so years of treatment have proved this.

2) The punishment of the addict and the subtle ways he is made to earn his treatment or to deserve it.

3) The strict discipline for dirty urine's. The clinic is fond of reassuring you that a slip up is nothing serious, that heroin is a long term addiction. Yet if you are caught using, or you stupidly admit to it, you have your methadone dose cut down and if use is continued will be thrown off the program.

5) 95% of addicts enter rehab because of financial problems. They’ve hit bottom and can no longer sustain a habit. They are there not because they want to give up junk, but because they can’t afford it.

6) The early morning meetings and all the hidden agenda’s that are attached to drug treatment. Instead of attacking the main problem they sneakily serve to discipline and train the addict.

Of the 52 addicts that I met during treatment in England only one managed to kick first time. Of the rest 46 admitted to being there because of financial reasons. Most were still using heroin at any opportunity.

I don’t offer up any solutions here for drug substitution treatments, I’m not informed enough to do that. But I do know that neither methadone nor subutex works. What is needed is Heroin maintenance programs. These do exist, but are extremely controversial (especially when state funded) and one has to be almost dying (if not dead) to get on one of these programs. The controversy (outside of giving addicts free heroin) is that they do not encourage the addict to stop... that they encourage prolonged drug use. They do, but they stop all the crime, dirt and destroyed lives that come with illicit addiction. And what will be surprising is just how quickly a completely stabilized addict will feel completely stupid using just to feel normal. Once the highs and lows are removed from heroin addiction, the addict is as good as permanently straight... there is very little difference. And if one is straight using, one may as well be straight and not using... I myself sometimes feel this... but then there is a drought.


Take care readers... was it really 7 days??? (No, it was 8! ;))

Help, I Think I'm a Hypochondriac

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Apart from being born dying, my first experience of terminal illness came when I was 5. I lay on the sofa, bandy legged and nauseous after a school medical, feeling for whatt had been described as “an irregular heartbeat”. I heard that expression over and over again, and with each repetition the face of the school nurse became more drained and more concerned. Soon, in my young head, she had straightened up after listening to my chest, absolutely speechless and horrified. My future was so terrible, I was so damned, that it was unutterable. It must have been, as she sent me packing with a smile and without a word to anyone. I was only five, yet already I was preparing for the hospice... I was dying.

As neither of my parents were informed of my condition, I battled it alone, understanding what I could from my step-fathers thick volumes of medical encyclopedias. I never did leave those books with an exact diagnosis, but I did leave them with enough medical knowledge and facts about disease to fuel a 30 year long panic attack... and that’s exactly what I’ve had. I can barely remember a time when I was not bound to my bed by straps of irrational fears... imaginary pains shooting up my arms. And it really was that... I didn’t just imagine the symptoms, I felt them.

In the years following that first taste of phobia, I went down with the lot... every fatal disease imaginable. I had tuberculosis, yellow fever and jaundice. I succumbed to the plague, legionnaires, polio and parrots disease. With the winter came bird flu, pneumonia, bronchitis and meningitis. And survival done nothing to brighten my days, all it meant was I was alive to catch rabies, scabies and lockjaw through tetanus. At 10 I made the self diagnosis of HIV, and in the same year came down with diabetes and gangrene. When my brother whacked me in the head with a pair of swinging binoculars I collapsed with brain hemorrhaging. Three stitches later and a short taxi ride home I learnt it was more probably a slow build up of fluid in the skull cavity and that my death would be postponed until at least Friday. When my math’s teacher talked of cubic feet or square foot I looked down worryingly. And as for cancer... well. I’ve had tumours and growths of all sizes on every part of my body. I’ve had cancer of the lung, liver and stomach... I’ve even had cervical cancer and I don’t have any cervix. And that’s not all... oh no, because to top it all off, I worried endlessly that I was a hypochondriac. I certainly had all the symptoms.

But though I can laugh about this, there is a serious side, as it was due to these irrational fears that I first sought an escape from the world... that I first sought an immediate emergency exit. It wasn’t drugs at that young age but rather TV and books. In order to free my mind off a skipping heartbeat and shortness of breath, I’d curl up with a pillow and blanket close to the TV and watch fantasy films and cartoons. I’d become so enwrapped in them that I was lost to the world, lost to disease and lost to death. And it’s here that it is interesting... that it has a relevant place on this blog. Because there began a history of escapism... an early clue as to how I would handle future torment. From that very tender age I was already self-diagnosing and (in a way) self medicating... it was just a small hint of things to come.

As to how I first acquired this fear of disease is not clear, but there are two things from my early years that I can link this behaviour to:

1) my drunken mother feigning terminal illness for attention
2) my step-fathers tales of death, decay and our days out together - spent exploring he local cemetery.

This first point I’ve touched on in a previous post, so will not revisit here, though the second I will expand upon a little.

My stepfather was a bizarre man obsessed by the paranormal, magic and the afterlife. He would often predict the death of family members and explain in minute details all the macabre and grisly details. He would make pendulums and dowse the city maps for gold or lost money... he believed in fate, luck and chance. It will come as no surprise to hear that he was a compulsive gambler. Anyway, along with stories of gruesome deaths, ghosts and rotting bodies, he would take me for dark days out around the local cemetery. There, he’d clear the top stones off old tombs, and holding my little legs would allow me to lean far in... staring down into the blackness. Before a young boy should even know what death is I was looking at it. But death isn’t attractive or clever to a small boy... it’s frightening and scary, and I think my fear of disease (mortality) has more to do with these days passed with my stepfather than with my mothers declarations of having a terminal cancer.

I don’t know for sure, but whatever brought this into my life it exists and continues to this day. What is more bizarre and probably what many of you are wondering is: How can a person suffering with hypochondria become an injecting heroin addict? How can one with an irrational fear of disease take daily injections of street drugs from unsterilized equipment... leaving himself wide open to two of the worst diseases we know of? Well, I cannot answer that, and I do not understand it myself. All I can say is that it’s another one of the many contradictions that hold me together. It's all a balancing act...a calculation. If the the gain from the exit seems worth the loss of the entry, I do it. Actually, we all do that... it's called living.

Still, In relation to heroin and the needle, my hypochondria has served me well. My fears and paranoia of disease have ruled out any sharing of equipment or group use. In my ten years of heroin addiction only a handful of people have ever witnessed me inject... Of those, 3 were addicts. For me, even injecting in the same room is too close for comfort... it's asking for trouble. Instead, I score, sneak off alone and put up with the suspicions and accusations of being the police... the rat amongst the pack. And maybe I am a rat, but you'd better get used to it, because after surviving 35+ fatal illnesses I've got the feeling I'm going to be around for quite some time to come.


Wishing everyone the best of health, Shane.

Apologies Between Posts...

Hiya everyone,

There will be a new post here in the next couple of hours... if you really can't wait, you can go across to my other blog (Memoirs from The Black House) and read some thinly disguised fiction, or search this blog for a Hidden Post... the choice is yours.

http://memoirsfromtheblackhouse.blogspot.com/


Best Wishes, S.

Tragedy Comes On A Calm Wind

Maybe she was a junkie...she had junkie eyes. But that was probably due to the morphine they gave her (they did give her morphine – I saw them). Maybe she was twenty... maybe younger, who can tell? All I know is she was there, impossibly wedged in, looking at me like a lost and depressed lover from under that No.7 bus. At times I thought I saw her move, but I wasn’t sure... it was hard to see through the crowd, and beyond it, the police and the firemen. All I could be sure of was she was unfairly pinned to the tarmac by 7 tonnes of steel, metal and plastic.

Our bus was just to the side, the large windows like a cinema screen. The road leading out of the bus station had been blocked off. We stayed there a good hour watching in shocked horror as the fire brigade tried to free her. What one would imagine to be a delicate operation was carried out with lumps of timber, a heavy duty jack, an industrial grinder and a pair of large metal cutters... it was an excruciatingly slow process. That wasn’t anyones fault or bad practice... it was the only way. Her leg was broken and mangled in the bus’s undercarriage, her arm bent in the way as when children twist a Barbie doll’s arm 180 degrees. How she ended that far under what should have been a slow moving bus is impossible to fathom... when one looks there is barely enough space for a new born child to pass through unscathed.

Many people left our bus... Some to walk home, others just to get a better and closer look. I understand this. I understand trying to understand death... up close and impersonal. What I don’t understand is life, and within it the people who remained seated, cursing the poor girl for getting smashed during the rush hour. Once again the crudeness of a world ruled by money and time was here, unashamedly still pushing on... still screaming for life to move ever faster. It was this crudeness that was my reason for alighting and joining the crowds around the police cordon. At least there I was amongst the caring.

Balancing on the tips of my toes I strained to get a proper glimpse. This was not because I have a morbid obsession with death, I don’t. I have seen too much death to be obsessed by it. Rather, I had a base instinct to know if this girl was dead or alive... If I had stumbled through yet another obscene tragedy. That which I had earlier took for her talking was in fact the firefighters talking to her.. either soothing a terribly injured girl or trying to wake the dead. It wasn’t clear, but there seemed to be movement. I mentioned this to the shocked man besides me: “I think she’s moving?” I said/asked, hoping to get a reassuring nod. But all I got was a hand sliding from over the mouth to the eyes and a cried and desperate “OH NO... oh no..” I followed his line of vision and watched as a white van rolled into the scene. On the side was written: ‘Reanimation unit’. That “Oh no” was now an unbearable sound... especially from a man’s mouth. It was full of all the grief of the terrible and the unwanted... it was an instinctive groan.

‘Reanimation’, what a horrible word. The ‘reanimation’ of the dead... the 'reanimation' of a life. It probably doesn’t have that significance in french, but into english it is an awful name and an even worse presence. A paramedic appeared from each door of the White van and each went to the back. Two returned with a stretcher, one with the oxygen and the other with the defibrillator. They stood waiting in the wings, ready to earn their bread... ready to break the chestbone... Ready to pass an arrow of electricity through the heart.

The young girls body was finally unhinged from the wreckage, rolled over onto the back and carried clear of the raised and broken bus. The leg was already protected, encased in a moulded strapped boot, the arm held down against the the body. The reanimation team approached, had a look and then backed away... they were of no use here. The young girl was lifted and placed on the red-blanketed stretcher of the ambulance and covered, but not completely. She was alive, though in a very poor state. There was still no movement, just the firemen* who raised the stretcher and placed it in the back of the ambulance. It moved off first, without sirens and in no particular haste.. The ‘Reanimation unit’ was close behind followed by a police car. Soon all three were out of sight.

With the undetermined close of the spectacle, the crowd of onlookers dispersed and the exit from the station was cleared. I got back on my bus and sat back down in the same seat. Looking out upon the site of the accident it was hard to believe what had just taken place. Now there was nothing... no blood, no ambulance, no equipment, just two policemen and a parked up and out of service bus. No clue at all of that which had just passed. And that’s it... that’s how this life moves on. Things come and things go, some things are born and other things die. Some live a healthy life and others take the freeway. It doesn’t matter, because death is often indiscriminate and always unfair. I sat and thought about this as our bus pulled away, following the route of the ambulance for a while before turning off. I should be dead, I thought, or at least seriously ill... instead I am watching others fall victim to what is all too frequently a cruel and callous life.

The bus made its way along the route. Some people got on and others got off. Gradually sounds returned as we that had witnessed the accident became the minority. The early evening opened up ahead of us, the sky darkened a couple of tones and the smells off the city and of home became stronger. Life was back, noisy and oblivious to all. Suffering and pain do not exist here and if they do we usually do something about it... all of us. The next time we will be silent again, it will be too late...way too late. But such warnings are useless and futile... they are a waste of time. How can one ever prepare for the unprepareable? We can’t. And tragedy is unprepareable, she gives no warning. The birds don’t scatter from the trees and the dogs don’t cower or take cover. No, when tragedy arrives she blows in on a calm and silent wind, and it’s very similar to the one that is blowing right now.

Take care Readers... and mind your step. All My best, Shane.

*In france if you dial for an ambulance you get the fire brigade... they carry out a dual role. The back of a french fire truck is better equipped medically than a British ambulance.

As forthe girl, I don't know what finally became of her. I've searched the internet and the local papers, but found nothing. I take it she lived, as a death involving public transport almost always makes the news. Fingers crossed.

Death Isnt Always Fatal

Hiya everyone. My internet connection is down at the moment so I'll use this opportunity to direct you across to a few friends... they make up the tag-team.

http://sarcastbastard.blogspot.com/

http://checkingforelves.blogspot.com/

http://myblogfatalflaw.blogspot.com/

and for anyone who wants something in Portugese:
http://bzombieantidote.blogspot.com/

I should be back online within the next couple of days... Internet death isn't mormally fatal. I hope everyone's fine, I'm on good form... Best Wishes, Shane.

Just Another Day at the Office.

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Today I awoke to a glorious sky. It was 6am, the sun was halfway up and the feint hum of traffic was a constant below. I opened the apartment window and the delights of the city wafted in on a breeze. All the flowers from all the gardens from all of Lyon had released their scents.The café on the corner opened it’s shutters and set out its chairs for another day of business. I was up for business myself.

For the last four days I’ve been solely on methadone... not out of choice, but because this city is dry. 4 days is the longest I have been without dope in three and a half years. I don’t feel bad for that... I just feel bad for the wait. It’s been 4 days of piss-stained stairwells, broken promises, unanswered phones and last trains home. Where I come from this doesn’t happen. Where I come from heroin is a 24/7 shop with no shutters. In London, if you’ve got the money and you want to kill yourself, you can. There’s little wait and there’s rarely disappointment. I would hate to be suicidal anywhere else.

Anyhow, I was up with the sun this morning as I was on a promised promise... “Get your arse to Croix Rousse for 10am sharp... it’s sure, sure SURE!!” Normally when I receive a message like this it is genuine... it means the dealer has the gear in his pocket. I hoped so, because not only had I no gear, but due to this little drought I had almost drunk up my entire supply of methadone. Apart from the dose I swallowed early yesterday evening, I had just one left and after that.... well, I didn’t even want to think of it. So my meeting today was more important than usual... It was to score methadone and heroin, to buy my well-being.

I arrived at Croix Rouse just before ten and made the short walk to a pre-arranged spot. On arriving I was horrified... there must have been 15 or 20 junkies circling or lurking around the block of flats where the meet was... half of them dope sick. This is a residential area... people live here with their children and they quickly notice a strange group of sniffling, filthy and poorly dressed adults hanging around. What’s worse is, as no-one is sure from where the dealer will appear, we are all constantly up and down, searching in every direction imaginable for a sight of him. Whilst tyring to act inconspicuous we do ourselves no favours. The only direction we don’t look is up... God has yet to drop a bag out the sky. I distanced myself from this bunch and went and sat alone at a nearby bus stop.

At 10.30 I received a text. “I’m there... I’m there.. 10 minutes...” At 11.00 I was still waiting... at 11.15 the same. Finally, at 11.20 there was some movement. I watched as one be one the circling junkies slid out from nowhere and filed slowly into the flats. Someone must have gotten the call... our man must be here. I crossed over and went in with the rabble, past the elevator and through the door to the fire escape. Imagine the scene: 20 junkies sitting hushed in a stairwell, the dark only lit up by burning cigarettes and the screens of our cell phones. Suddenly my own screen lit up: ‘30 secs’. I let everyone know and we got our money ready. After 8 minutes and 3 unanswered calls the bottom door opened, the light flicked on and someone came running up the stairs. We all stood up ready... but it wasn’t him! Rather, it was a motorcycle courier using the backstairs instead of the lift. He slipped through us suspiciously. “That’s police!" I said to one of the junkies... "That was the police!” He just shook his head... “Calm down... it’s just a courier. We’ll be gone soon!” Well, courier or not I was not comfortable with this... it was just too hot. And not even for us... we were clean... it was the dealer who arranged this that would have all the problems...it’s he who would be in possession of the gear.

I tried to phone the dealer twice more and then I made my decision to up and leave. One other addict decided to part with me. On the way back down the stairs I mentioned Methadone. By pure chance this guy had two bottles of 100ml in his pocket. I bought them both. We left the darkened stairwell and headed out. Just as we were leaving someone was coming in... he stopped us. “What are you doing here?” I didn’t answer. The addict alongside me said something about waiting for a friend. “Who? What floor?” From that question and the way my entrance from the building had been blocked I knew this was more than just a nosey neighbour. “Do you know who I am?” the man asked raising his head slightly “I am the police” he finished, now poking at his chest and grinning. With that he had his ID produced and then strapped an orange police band across his left bicep. Four others entered in behind him and rushed into the stairwell.

We were led outside where there were two more policemen... standing either side of our dealer! I could only imagine they had caught him in full possession... his sullen face and drooped head told me that. Out in the forecourt we were soon joined by the rest of the rotten bunch and just as 15 minutes ago junkies had slid from nowhere out the shadows, now the police done the same. There was soon at least one policier to each addict. We were made to strip down to the waist and remove our hats, shoes and socks. Whilst doing this another police man walked the sorry line of jaundiced, hollow cheeked, scarred and bruised junkies and left with a handful of ragged ID cards and passports. We were told to empty our pockets and lay the contents on the little wall where we were standing. It was here that I remembered I had just bought 2 bottles of methadone. Fuck! I seriously considered just ripping them open and swallowing the contents. I was going to be arrested (it’s a class A drug) so I might as well make sure I’m not ill as well. But I didn’t do that... instead I took them from my trousers and laid them on the wall... the wall that had just turned into a chemists top-shelf! Along it now was a booty of drug paraphernalia and every possible prescribeable drug . There were bottles and strips of pills, amps of morphine, packets and boxes of syringes. There were tourniquets, blackened spoons, pen-knives and razor blades. In fact, there was everything EXCEPT heroin.

After a moment a policier confronted me. “Where did you get this from?” he demanded holding up the two little bottles of methadone
“It’s mine... I get it on prescription.” I replied.
“Where’s your prescription? Can I see it?”
“I don’t have it on me.”
“You do know that this is a class A stupifiant without a prescription, don’t you?”
I nodded, “Yes, excuse me.”
“Who is your doctor?” he asked. I gave my GP’s name, address and number. The policeman went away.

We were all properly searched and then ordered to get dressed. On being questioned everyone said they were “waiting for a friend” though no-one could remember this friends name, address or telephone number. When they asked me I told them what they already knew: I was here to score heroin. They asked me off whom and I said I only know him as ‘D’ (this wasn’t true).“Is that “D”” a policeman asked pointing at the dealer. “No... that’s not him.” I replied. I can only imagine that my broken french and little bit of honesty had helped me, because after a moment of conferring I was suddenly hit in the stomach by my passport, handed back my two bottles of methadone and told to “Fuck off!” I left at a quick trot with about ten others. Our dealer was kept behind.

We were all in shock... me especially. How I left & with the methadone was unbelievable. The other addicts all agreed I had been extremely fortunate. We walked on quickly... we just wanted to get away from this place. 5 mins down the road my phone rings: “It’s me... I’m ready!” Well, we couldn’t believe it... only minutes ago 'D' was being held by police and now he was ready to serve us!? We were sure it was a police set-up to catch us in possession. Even thinking this, not one of us backed out of the deal... we all still took our chances. We met 'D' five minutes from the same block of flats we had just been searched in and we all left untroubled with our orders. As we made our way back down to the Metro the other half of the rag-tag junkie army were making their way up, joking and laughing about the police. We let them know that ‘D’ was waiting and everything seemed in order. By now we were laughing and joking too.

And it is a joke... because 20 police men had been surveying us. They had watched us circle about for nearly 2 hours and had probably listened to our phone calls. They knew who our dealer was and had followed him. If they would have waited five minutes longer they would have got us all on possession charges & the dealer on trafficking... bang to rights. Instead they busted us with nothing to bust... and how they never caught the dealer in possession remains a mystery! So it’s a joke... it’s a waste of junkie time, a waste of police time and a waste of god knows how much public money. What the neighbours must have thought as they saw us refill our pockets and bags with drugs and needles and then be set free I cannot even imagine. I wonder if they saw it as effective community policing or not?

And so it was, I arrived home a little before 1pm, though a little later than planned. I was still half expecting the police to jump out and nab me as I exited the metro... but no, their brains couldn’t follow a smacked-up drug dealer through a block of flats, so there’s no way they’d be able to organise an arrest through the maze of the underground system. Instead, I was once again left to my own devices... to enjoy the tranquillity of the afternoon. I did what I had to do and I laid down on the sofa. I closed my eyes and opened my ears to the noises of the day. I listened to distant sounds and voices... to the chipping away and shouts of workmen. I listened to the afternoon screams of school children and to the echoes of high heeled shoes . I let this day wash over me as I sunk in & out of a self-induced sleep. Today I had been lucky - it had been a close one, but I had made it home with my gear, my methadone and free of any drug convictions. This means I can still get a US visa... that I can continue to dream New York dreams. It means that I can still make good on certain promises.... that I can still one day visit my homie sKILLz and kiss the Brooklyn Dogs.

Best wishes everyone & stay safe, Shane.

2000 Years (part 2)

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My last post ended as it had started: me laying in my childhood bed, distraught and grieving, trying desperately to escape the cheering jibes of a world in celebration . I probably wouldn’t have celebrated anyway, I’ve always hated New Year time... it makes me think of death and dying. There is only one day each year which is more depressing, and that is my birthday. But Millennium night, even by my standards, was an exceptional one. There has never been a time when I felt so fundamentally at odds with this world . I’ve never felt a part of it – not really... but on millennium eve I was out on a broken and withered limb.

I have already detailed one of the two events that lent itself to this night (my friends death) – the second was the realisation that I was a heroin addict. Not a user... not a casual smoker... an addict. Me, Shane Levene, 25 years & dying... a heroin ADDICT. This is important, because the point one realises this, is a huge turning point.... it’s a shock. From this moment on, life will never be the same again. Heroin will no longer be take or leave, it will be life's main distraction. It will be the safety pins that holds fragile garments together. But how and when does one realise they are an addict, and how does that really change one’s life? I will try to answer those questions in this post.

I had fantasized and romanticized about heroin for many years. I had grown up subdued and itching to opiates. But in reality I had no idea what heroin addiction was, and if I had, I probably wouldn’t have wanted it. Heroin addiction is the end of heroin chic... it is where fashion and image stops. There is nothing contrived or fashioned about the addict... his hair is greasy because he doesn’t wash it. But, the character traits are easy to deal with... in many ways they’re the desired side-effects. The biggest and most unwanted aspect to heroin addiction is the physical addiction... the biological need for an alien substance. It is with junk illness that one can say they are an ADDICT, and the first taste of illness is a shock to the system.

Like most people I thought addiction was psychological... a matter of will-power. During the months leading up to 2000 addict friends would ask: “But, haven’t you got ill yet?”
“No? What d’you mean, ill?” I’d scoff. I’d also hear addicts talking of ‘being sick’ or of ‘clucking’, but for me it was an exaggeration... people unable to cope with the psychological cravings and using the excuse of a physical addiction to justify their lack of willpower. I always reasoned, “when I’ve got no money I won’t use... simple!” And it was... it was simple for months. I used what I could, when I could, and stopped when funds got low. Yes I thought of heroin... I even found myself counting down the days until payday, but I was never “ill”. No, it was all just a matter of restraint. But restraint become somewhat of a stranger to me. As my priorities and budgeting changed to take in account my heroin usage, it soon arrived that I was never without money for gear. And it continued like that up until the evening where life and fate coincided to part me forever from my best friend. It was this death that finally nudged me across the line of addiction.

The days following Ewan's death I spent in a haze... my senses so numbed that his passing seemed unreal. I swathed my wounds in bandages steeped in heroin and even as I passed his darkened room and caught the unmistakable perfume of his tragedy, I still somehow managed to trick myself into believing that the events were somehow not finalised... that there was still hope... that the result could be reversed. This postponement was due to heroin. Heroin is a drug of delay... her comfort is a waiting room for those in trauma. From the night of Ewan's death forth, I was permanently in this waiting room... postponing the moment when I would have to realize that once again life & death had blown through my house. Well what else was there? Evenings alone in that same house in Fulham, laying under jaundiced lights & cheap Christmas decorations & balloons... staring at guitars that would never be played again? No, reality would have been impossible. I was trapped in a crime scene... and not just that of Ewan, but of my entire history. Laying in those conditions, alone and in the same house where everything had happen, would have just been too much. I needed something to allow me to accept the unacceptable.

But don’t misunderstand... I wasn’t left alone or abandoned. I had friends and family who all offered to put me up, but for some reason I wouldn’t accept their hospitality. Maybe I derived a secret pleasure from remaining in that house alone... I don’t know. All I know is that I would pass the days in company and invariably head home alone in the evening. December the 31st passed like this.I spent the day with my mother and I left just before 5 pm. My intention was to draw some money, score and then go home and blank out the world.

That walk, from my mothers to the cash machine, is my first junk memory... and strangely, anytime I’m withdrawing the feelings from that walk return and play out like a repetitive tune in my head. I remember it was unusually cold, but more than cold, it was uncomfortable. I had an aching to be home, to be in the warmth.... To close the doors and succumb to the peace that heroin offered. The city, her lights and her smells all disturbed me. Yet something happened which would disturb me even more... the rejection of my bank card. My card wasn’t damaged, I had entered the correct PIN code and I had money (I’d just been paid). But these things mean nothing if the readies aren’t ready - they weren’t; I couldn’t draw. Not from this machine nor from either of the twenty five others I found on my trek home. By the time I got in, I was depressed and exhausted.... more so than I could account for. It seemed my entire evening had been ruined... that my dreams of bed and rest had been violently sabotaged. Still, itwasn’t too bad.... tomorrow morning my wages would be cleared, so I tried to forget about smack and get through the evening.

It was about three hours later that I started feeling unwell. My nose was running and I had a yawn that seemed to stretch every muscle in my body. I was restless and psychologically uncomfortable. I sat down & stood up and moved back and forth from the window. I thought of heroin and I thought of money; I stood looking out the window hoping against hope that some miracle would blow by... that someone or something would knock at my door and give me money. Of course, that didn’t happen. What did happen was my illness got progressively worse. My yawning intensified until it was an uncontrollable reflex, and my constant sneezing and snivelling exhausted me. I started getting hot flushes and my eyes were streaming boiling tears. By 9pm I was so ill and the urge for heroin so strong that I left the house and jumped the fare of a bus ride to my mum’s. At this time I didn’t know that it was heroin illness that I was experiencing. I knew I craved heroin and that I was unwell, and something told me that heroin would help with this illness... but at that moment I just thought that I had come down with a severe cold.

By 9.30 I was at my mums. I was agitated and every cell in my body was sick. My mother saw immediately that I was not well... I used this to get her sympathy, to procure money... “Mum, I’m feeling awful... I think I’m dying and I’m not joking! My wages didn’t go through... can you lend me...”
“What, £20 for a bag!” she interrupted. I didn’t have the strength to deny or confirm this... I just wanted money and as quick as possible. “It’s just for tonight... I’ll return it first thing” I said. My mother made a fuss and I overheard her moaning to her partner “I knew it would come to this... I fucking knew it!”
“If you’ve got £40 it would help even more!” I shouted... and I wasn’t being funny. She cursed me and then returned with the money... mum had come good. I left that house with barely a thank you... I had a one track mind. SCORE... SCORE... SCORE!

The walk back to the bus stop seemed like a marathon. My legs walked but never seemed to get me anywhere. Time had slowed to hour long seconds yet my metabolism had speed up ten-fold. I was a body of sweat and mucus... every pore seemed to be releasing fluid... poison was squeezing itself out through my skin. Needless to say the bus that arrived was the slowest bus in the world, and the driver the stupidest. He obeyed every traffic regulation (known and unknown) and even stopped at red lights. Had he seen my distress? Was he taking a perverse pleasure in making it worse... in torturing me? Was he pissed because he was working new years eve? And Jesus, where the hell did all these bus stops come from!

I did finally get home... no quicker or slower than usual. I scored quickly and rushed home. I burst open a bag and squeezed out the heroin onto a rectangle of foil. I made a little tube and I smoked. Those first few lungfuls of heroin stopped everything... they took me from hell to paradise. I felt my nose stop running and my eyes stop burning. My yawning and tiredness melted away and my muscles relaxed and felt light and springy. By the time my pupils had shrunk I was perfectly well... hungry and warm. I not only didn’t feel unwell, I felt great... better even. It was here, at this point, that I realised that what I had been experiencing was junk illness. It was very mild junk withdrawal, but even that little taster was agony. With full blown junk withdrawal one is bedridden... down with the vilest flu of the season. Worse, you are dying. It is from this illness that junkies run scared.... it is because of this, and the manner in which it renders one helpless, that being an addict is a complete re-evaluation of one’s daily life. All that becomes important is to be well... to be able to function.

After the relief of those first lungfuls of heroin, reality and the house and Ewan's death and Millennium night all returned. It was to make for a deadly cocktail. This would be the only night ever in my life that I would seriously entertain thoughts of suicide... where death held more attraction than life. Heroin subdued those thoughts.. it helped. This is why, after everything, I keep a certain fondness for this drug. I do not love it... but I do not hate it. As I’ve said before, it’s helped me as it has killed me... I accept that trade.

Ewan's death, though a tough blow, had nothing to do with my heroin use or addiction. As is stated, I was using long before he died, and had he not died, I would have surely found some other tragedy to piggyback me across the kine of addiction... there’s no question there. More than likely, if he hadn’t have died he would have followed me... who knows?

And so that was the first time I realised what heroin addiction was and what physical illness entailed. From the morning of 1st January 2000 I had a new priority in my life. I stopped playing music... I stopped reading & writing. I worked just for the money... and lived just for the dope. I wasn’t myself during these times... I was living off instinct. It took a while, but things did get better and my smile and laugh did return. I’ve learnt in life that nothing is forever... not pain not happiness... not friends or family. Tragedy comes and tragedy goes... it’s all a cycle, a part of this wonderful life.

Take care readers & BW, Shane.

PS: Since Millennium night I have purchased over 12,000 bags of heroin and have spent £120,000+ on the drug. I have gone through 25 rolls of aluminium tin foil, and have taken in excess of 25,000 injections.

Death of a HealthShop Girl - Poem between Posts

Death of a Healthshop Girl

She sells minerals and vitamins
And Homeopathic heroin
Herbal Weed and Jasmin Tea's
And great big bags of Cabbage Leaves

And it seems to me
That all disease
Is remedied
With Pumpkin Seeds

So I decide to kill that Girl
Gonna push her from the top of the Health Shop Shelves.

-------------------------------------------------------

Excuse the delay in posts recently, but I've been very busy with a set of paintings for a friends theatre piece. Tomorrow there will be the second-half of the Millennium post, & from then on we'll be back to 2-3 posts per week.

As always, thanks for reading and waiting and reading and waiting... your eyes bring out the best in me.

Best Wishes to All, Shane.

2000 years of Tragic Skies

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Millennium night 2000 was the worst night of my life... In many ways it was the start of it all. In the pitch dark, in my old family home, I lay on my bed like a disease... shaking and bleeding tears to exploding fireworks. The worlds celebrations and whoops of delight contradicted my entire existence. I was in pain and I was alone... I wanted to shoot the crowds.

4 days previously I had found my best friend curled up and dead in our shared apartment, and just earlier this evening I had discovered I was a heroin addict. On this historic night, darkness and despair hung in the cloisters, lit up by Chinese Rockets, Roman Candles and a flickering lighter. My friends vomit and blood stains were still on the floor... his room still the wreck that the paramedics and police had left it in. The perfume of death was still thick in the air.

It was in this house, 17 years ago that I had watched my father disappear... had found my mother 3/4’s dead... and had lost the best days of my youth. In many ways I had travelled a perverse circle and had once again traipsed tragedy up a familiar flight of stairs.

I first met Ewan in 1995 whilst we were both working nights in a Soho Rock Club. We shared a love of music, hairspray, eyeliner and opiates. Ewan had a huge complex because he had a large chin, but I told him it gave him character and he looked like a pirate. “If you dangle a cigarette from the corner of your mouth & get a parrot... everything will be just fine.” That was my advice to him. Well, he never purchased a parrot but he did smoke his cigarettes with style. I think he even ended up liking his chin.

It was in the spring of 1999 that we decided to rent a place together. As my step-father was in the process of exchanging properties, we were able to rent my childhood house in Fulham. It was in disrepair and the council surveyor had classified it as a “death-trap” but it was going at next to nothing... which was exactly the price we could afford. On moving in, both of us held steady jobs and neither of us were addicts... though we were both using Subutex and occasionally heroin & crack.

The eight or so months leading up to December were passed working and spending our evenings mucking around with our guitars or talking nonsense. We would spend our weekends watching new bands play at the Kings Head Pub on the Fulham Palace Road. There was not one evening we did not spend together... not one, except the night of his death. There are three things that haunt me from that night... this is the first.

The night of Ewan's death (Monday 27th December 1999) was like any other. I returned home at 6.00pm and went straight up into his room. He was on his bed with a cigarette and his guitar... his scuffed boots kicked across the floor. His greeting was always a ridiculous heavy metal guitar riff... him laughing as I sat down to a Judas Priest classic. For the past month I had been doing heroin every evening... I asked Ewan if he had anything. He shook his head and nodded to the bedside table. On it there was a little wrap of heroin but inside was only dust... not enough to kill a fly. Still, he said I could have that if I wanted. I refused and said I was going to score. I asked if he wanted anything... he said to pick him up a bag. He gave me his bank card and I shot off. I scored quickly and headed home. It was on this journey back that a callous and familiar world put in its latest appearance.

As I was turning onto my street I was met by someone running across the road, all twitches and snivels. It was Gerald, an old work colleague. But Gerald wasn’t just any ex-colleague, he was the boy that had put me on to my first heroin dealer. With barely a “hello” he asked if I had anything... he said he was ill. I told him if he had another number I would treat him. Within 20 minutes we had withdrawn more money & scored again... not just heroin, but 2 rocks of crack as well. Gerald talked me into going back to his flat. I can’t explain why I took up his offer, but I did, and we spent the evening smoking and talking about work. Apparently he had been dismissed for stealing an expensive Persian rug. He went on to sell it for all of £30!!! By the time I left it was gone midnight. I rushed off home to give Ewan his gear and return his bank card.

On entering the house Ewan's bedroom light was still on. I flew the stairs and into his room. Ewan was laying on the floor curled up asleep next to the fire. The crack pipe, which he used to smoke heroin on, was besides him. I stepped over him quietly... placed his bank card on top of his television & then retired to my own room. I sat down on my bed flushed and distressed. “No... there’s something not right here.” I thought. “There’s something very badly wrong.”
I didn’t know what it was, but that image of him on the floor wasn’t correct... there was something disturbing about it. He was slightly out of posture... as if his joints were bent in the wrong direction. The position he was in just wasn’t natural, or possible. I rushed back into the room. This time I saw that his back was tight against the fire. One can’t lay against the metal frame of a fully powered electric fire like that... you would burn. I looked at his posture again and noticed that his head wasn’t resting against the bed, it was supported by it. It’s mathematical place was on the floor... a neck can’t comfortably support that kind of presure. It was here that I realised tragedy had arrived with this night. She had snuck in the back and she was wearing ruthless boots.

I called and shouted at Ewan, nudging and trying to rouse him. I didn’t want to touch him, it felt perverse, uncleanly. Something told me I was touching the dead, handling that which shouldn’t be handled. I finally kicked him... quite hard. His head just sunk down further. I bent down and saw that from his mouth and trailing to the floor was a thick dark red liquid. At this point I caught hold of his long hair and pulled his head around. Again, I didn’t want to, I suppose because I knew what I would find... & it was that, exactly that: a puffy drained face and two badly directed eyes - almost cataract in their appearance. There are three things that haunt me from that night... this is the second.

I let go of Ewan's head and let it slump back down. It was panic stations. In and out of the room... up and down the stairs. I sat down... stood up... back in the room. I stopped... started. I thought... I didn’t think. Help... I need help!.. an ambulance... I need an ambulance... Fuck!... HE needs an ambulance! Fuck..fuck.. fuck...I need a phone... I don’t have a phone... the neighbour has a phone. No... Ewan has a phone. FUCK! Back in the room... search... adapter.. no phone... fuck... crack pipe.. Fuck... body... FUCK... Can’t find it. There it is.. no its not.. TV remote... . Fuck, fuck FUCK!!!

I eventually found his phone, he was holding it. When I finally managed to prise it from his grip the first two digits of 999 had already been dialled. There are three things that haunt me from that night... this is the third.

Once I had calmed down a moment I phoned the emergency services. I just wanted an ambulance and they just wanted to ask me a series of bizarre questions, all the while telling me to calm down. Finally they asked:“Is he breathing?”
“No” I said “I think he’s dead.” With this they said an ambulance was on its way!

I didn't wait for that ambulance,l I fled the house. I was scared and I needed company. I ran back to Gerald's and hammered down his door. He opened stripped for bed. “Gerald... I got home and found Ewan dead!”
“What he’s overdosed... he’s unconscious””
“No.. he’s DEAD!”

Gerald chucked on some clothes and we sprinted back. If things weren't bad enough I had Gerald shouting in my ear: "You've gotta get rid of the body... lay it outside. You'll go to prison for this - manslaughter... you gave him the gear!" I had no intention of following Gerald's advice... if I was arrested and charged then so be it. My best friend had just lost his life, I couldn't think past that. Anyhow, even if I had have listened to Gerald it would have been too late, for when we got back the police and paramedics were on the scene and had entered the empty house. Outside, the neighbours had revealed themselves and were crowded in the street... that same group of faces that had watched from behind twitching curtains as my family disintegrated. 17 years had only served to bring them more wrinkles and bigger ears and noses.

I explained to a police woman on the doorstep who I was and she let me in. I tried to go upstairs to Ewan's room but they wouldn’t let me. The paramedics were trying to resuscitate him. I knew that was no good but I still kept hope. I wished beyond wish... & even as the paramedics took his body downstairs, completely covered, I asked “is he alive?” Of course the answer was in the negative. Two disgusting things then happened. 1) A policeman dragged me over to the ambulance where Ewan’s body was put... he forced me to look at the stretcher “That will be YOU next! Keep fucking around with that shit!” 2) Gerald's suggestion that we steal Ewan’s bank card and empty his account... Of course I never done that.

After a moment the paramedics left and the neighbours returned to their beds. The police questioned me for a moment but didn’t arrest me nor take me into custody. Ewan had died with a crack pipe in one hand and a mobile phone in the other... a modern inner-city death. The post-mortem returned a verdict of death by heroin overdose. I successfully contested this and an independent post-mortem put the cause of death down to a burst stomach ulcer. My heroin use spiralled.... It was no longer an evening thing. From this point on it was H for breakfast, lunch and supper. I drowned out Ewan's death in a heroin haze... all the time alone in that same house in Fulham. But I was soon to have another shock... my monthly exertions had taken their toll and on Millennium Eve I was hit with a sickness, a flu that I had never felt the likes of before... For the first time I became dope sick.

And so those are the events that brought me full circle... back to my childhood bed, in my childhood room in my childhood home. Laying in the dark and shaking to the tune of the Millennium night celebrations. To my left was my mothers old room... to my right was Ewan's. Down was the wall my father had skipped, and up was the sky... the year 2000, exploding in colours across another tragic London sky.

Take care guys, S.

Ewan S was 28 and was buried just after the New year in his home town of Rotherham. I was warned not to attend the funeral for my own safety. I didn't.

PS: Next post will deal with the part of this night where I realised I was an addict... I didn’t want to mix the two events as they demanded their own posts.

Heroin Addicts Vs Junkies - A request.

Yes I do requests... hows a Heroinhead to survive if he doesn’t turn a few tricks now and again! This one’s for Lou over at http://brokenheartedmom.blogspot.com/ . She paid in comments.


The Heroin Addict Vs The Junkie*

Within heroin culture and society there are a myriad of different people one will encounter, and as with many other parts of society these groups tend to stick together. There are smokers, snorters and shooters. Snowballers, drinkers, Valium, Prozac and Amitryptiline-heads. There are the depressed, the oppressed and the repressed... the mentally ill and the mentally sane. There are the young the old the dead and the dying. We are all in one house and we are all Heroinheads. We all crave the same drug and we all double up in illness when it comes a knockin... but some of us accept that illness before others... some of us do not break certain rules. We are all dope fiends but we are not all junkies. In this post I will try to explain the difference.

I will start by saying that I am a heroin addict.... I am not a junkie and have never been. I have crossed that road & I’ve assisted in it, but I have never taken it... there are some things I am not willing to do. On the other hand, my father was, and many of my friends are junkies... out and out. When you’re in their company you’d do well to glue your shoes to your feet and padlock your trouser closed, because if there’s anything that can be stolen... it will be.

A junkie is noticeable... he/she is the visible side of heroin addiction. The junkies habit is out of control and has led to a certain lifestyle. This lifestyle is of cheating, lying and stealing to get his dope money. A junkie scores on a day to day basis and from waking up doesn't know where that days drug money is coming from. He is open to most ideas.... starting small and getting progressively more desperate as the day wears on. The point when he retires and accepts withdrawal is when he is sick... until that point almost anything goes. The junkie is the scruffy, unkempt jack-the-lad that will wish you well as you leave on a shopping trip and then scramble up your drainpipe and in your window as soon as you turn the street. He will ask for your money and if you refuse he will steal it. If you do lend to him you can be sure you’ll not see it again. If you do it will be a symbolic gesture: “I have your money... but can I borrow it again until next Tuesday?” Next Tuesday?? Well.... you know what they say about tomorrow.

But junkies are not bad people... they are the creation of an addiction that has wound out of control. Being a junkie is an economic problem... it is not a fashion statement. Not one junkie I know enjoys thieving... and all have a conscience. If they could fund their addictions without resorting to theft of underhand activities they would... no-one enjoys that kind of pressure and. and the last thing a heroin addict needs is an arrest, or the police knocking at their door. When people talk of losing a loved one to heroin they are in fact referring to the junkie lifestyle.

In contrast to the junkie is his sibling the 'stable heroin addict'. Stable heroin addicts are almost undetectable.... even if you live with one. As long as they have their drugs they will perform and remain a valuable asset to society. They will work and pay taxes, do their shopping and pay their rent. They will hold intelligent conversation and will give you their undivided attention. The heroin addicts priority is in planning their addiction... in making sure they have their dope well in advance and not scored on a day to day basis. They are able to buy bulk and ration properly.... if funds are tight they will adapt their usage to that. Your Director, bank-manager or author of your favourite blog may be a stable heroin addict... you just wouldn’t know.

I am sometimes guilty of joking around this subject, but there is a real serious side to this distinction. Because junkies have a hard time with their habits they will usually be using other opiates or downers... occasionally some will drink. Downers and anti-depressants on top of heroin are lethal... you may as well be dealing with an alcoholic. 90-95% of overdoses are due to a concoction of drugs. The junkie runs a much higher risk of heroin death than the stable addict. Junkies also run a higher risk of contracting HIV and/or hepatitis. They are often in the position where they have to share... not so much needles, but equipment and water. The reason why they share and not divide the gear is because the former is an exact division (sucked up in milligrams) and the latter a division by eye. Each party always thinks they’ve had the bad deal. No, its all into the spoon and then everyone draws... that’s how it works. But in that draw, all it takes is one infected needle, one microscopic bacteria... and everyone is playing Russian Roulette. The junkie walks a fine line every day... and it is one that I couldn’t keep my balance on.

As this post was from a request by Lou, it is only fair the last paragraph is about her.

Lou has a junkie son, he is called Andrew and he walks the line everyday. Unfortunately Andrew is ‘out of bounds’ at the moment. Lou has experienced the lot... the lies, the scams, the stolen money & missing jewellery. She’s had her car stolen... her bedroom ransacked and probably her video recorder pinched. She’s had the early morning police calls and the bail charges. Her son Andrew made a road trip of US prisons & then went back for more. He has been in & out of rehab and jail for a long time. Lou loves Andrew... but Lou thinks she has lost her son. She has, but not forever. I tell Lou this whenever I can. I have to... because if Andrew is lost then so am I.
Keep heart Lou... you’re one in a million. X

Shane.

http://brokenheartedmom.blogspot.com/

Ps: Andrew's release date is in 239 days 1 hour and 10 minutes... if that doesn't seem long try being him.. if it still doesn't seem long... try being Lou.

*The word 'junky' was coined at the beginning of the 20th century and used to describe New York addicts who scoured the rubbish dumps and vacant lots looking for scrap metal they could sell in order to get the money for their next shot.

A Drunken Man's Praise of Sobriety - W. B Yeats

.
Come swish around, my pretty punk,
And keep me dancing still
That I may stay a sober man
Although I drink my fill.
Sobriety is a jewel
That I do much adore;
And therefore keep me dancing
Though drunkards lie and snore.
O mind your feet, O mind your feet,
keep dancing like a wave,
And under every dancer
A dead man in his grave.
No ups and downs, my pretty,
A mermaid, not a punk;
A drunkard is a dead man,
And all dead men are drunk.


My favourite poem of Yeats was pinned to my bedpost from the age of 18 - 22. .. I think it served me well.

Thanks for all your comments & "Hello and Welcome!!" to all the new followers. Due to the activity in the comments section, 'Memoires of a HH' is no longer only my blog... It has become much more than that - It's a joint venture. I have realised that there are many more wonderful people in this world than I ever imagined. If the blog has become successful it is because of your input and not mine. That's not a statement of negative worthlessness... it's just my way of saying "thanks".

There will be a proper Heroinhead post for you all tomorrow... excuse the delay, but its been a hectic week.

I hope you're all well & I send you all my very best wishes.

Shane. x

Once Upon A Time I Was A Juvenile Delinquent

As far as I have memory in my head I have always been a juvenile delinquent. My school years, from 5 – 13, were a history of vandalism, busted noses, twisted arms and broken windows. I spent my days smart-arsing teachers and my nights prising off car badges and defacing bus-stops... I was a tearaway. Still, despite these things I was top boy in class and advanced into the above year. At the age of twelve I won the London Schools Poetry competition*, and less than a year later I was expelled from school and banished for good from the British educational system.

My final day in school was as memorable for my smartness as it was for the bunch of keys that hit me in the temple, knocked me unconscious and split my brow open. Looking back I still think I was unfairly dismissed. You decide.

It was one of those hot, dusty afternoons where the tarmac burns through the shoes. A bedraggled bunch returned from a lunchtime of football, hopscotch and cigarettes. Our chewed and eaten ties were in our back pockets and our shirts clung miserably to our bodies. All pupils, boys and girls, were three buttons open from the collar. It was in these conditions that our eccentric music teacher Mr Ward Jones, decided to test his theory: xylophones are indestructible. To prove this he sat a xylophone in the middle of the music room and challenged each student to break it. “Kick it... punch it... clatter it” he said... “it cannot be broken”. He was trying to be clever... there was a two-fold lesson being taught here.

Pupils were called out one at a time and each scruffy body offered up an attempt to break the unbreakable. Kids kicked and tumbled the xylophone... clattered and struck the metal keys together. They rolled it, bounced it and jumped on it, and each time Mr Ward Jones would smugly and coolly replace the keys and return to his seat. I watched this procession, and I couldn’t help thinking this was somehow designed with me in mind... it was a lesson for all, directed at one. Finally Mr Jones summoned me to the job in hand. I knew what I was going to do... I had it all sussed. I walked confidently up to the xylophone and lifted it up off the floor, high over my head. I turned and faced Mr Jones... his subtle nod said: “do your worst”’. With this I brought the xylophone crashing down... straight into the piano. For the second time in my life I was surrounded by carnage... this time playing out to a discordant tune. Yes, the xylophone survived, but the piano wouldn’t be playing Beethoven’s ‘Sonata in C minor’ again. Before the dust from the sackcloth had settled Ward Jones had me. His violence was so thick and so fast, that to this day, it still seems he scooped me up and climbed the four stories of stairs to the headmasters office in one stride. He had the devil in him.

The quiet of the 4th floor was eerie as only empty school corridors can be. The headmasters office was closed and locked. Ward Jones crashed me down onto a table, holding me by the shoulders. He stared directly at me and through me. What I saw in that look, in those eyes cannot be described. They were the eyes of a man that was no longer there... his body was acting independently of a brain. I was scared... I was a tough boy, but that isolation with this man scared me. I somehow knew the perverse was once again at my door. Mr Jones began: “You little...” I gave a smirk, not a smart one, I just didn’t know what else to do. Well that smirk was the second from last thing I remembered. The next was seeing Mr Ward Jones unclip the huge bunch of keys from his trousers and hurl them. When I came around the keys were laying on the floor next to me... I could sense a half closed damaged eye and I caught the sour taste of blood as it curled into the corner of my mouth. Jones then had me by the arm and was dragging me off, back down the stairs, me scrambling to find my feet. How I shook off his grip I am not sure, but on hitting the heat outside I was free, running across the concrete school yard and out the gate. My stepfather, an ex-borstal boxing champ, wouldn’t stand for this... Ward Jones was in for trouble.

My stepfather must have seen me coming, for before I had time to open the door I caught his thump in the side of my head. That was for bloodying my new cheesecloth school shirt... combined with fighting and disturbing his afternoon peace. And with that punch, with that reaction, he lost a part of me forever... I also realised he wasn’t as hard hitting as he liked to make out. For the piano incident I was suspended from school, and 28 days later the Board of Governors convened and permanently excluded me. Mr Ward Jones denied everything and got off Scot free (though later he would be fired for making indecent remarks to a 13 year old girl). And that was it... apart from 2 months of 'one on one' tutoring, that was the end of my education. I had been abandoned to the wolves.

What’s strange is that the moment I was expelled I immediately acquired an unquenchable thirst for knowledge. I passed the next 5 years in public libraries and university canteens. This wasn’t a conscious effort to do something about my situation – I wasn’t that smart, it was just a natural thing. Libraries were full of books & I enjoyed reading. After reading I wanted to discuss and I found I could do that in university canteens. I don’t have a complex about my lack of education, in fact I’m proud of what I’ve managed to learn and study of my own back. Nevertheless, there are still many things I missed out on. The biggest was the lack of second hand information coming my way. When you’re within an educational system you don’t only learn what goes in your head, but also what goes in your fellow students heads and what comes out their mouths. Second and third-hand knowledge is coming at you from all sides.... I didn’t have this. For me it was a chore... one book seemed to lead to a thousand others. And so that’s what I done... I followed an endless trail of words... blinking each sentence into my memory. I read some books so quickly I missed them!

The second, and more serious consequence of my expulsion, was I had too much freedom. Freedom, youth and the White City Estate are a bad mix... it can only lead to mischief. It soon happened that if I wasn’t in a library I was in the back of a police car. Nothing serious... a multitude of petty crimes. The most ridiculous of which was throwing a Grapefruit through a neighbours window.

But this post isn’t about my schoolday antics, it is more about who I was before heroin... and the direction I was already going. It’s about the wildness, the dingo that has always been in me. I am a very shy, introverted person, but I have a need to impress. Because of the shyness I never took the eyes with a loud mouth, I took the eyes with my actions... I distinguished myself with danger. I was always the one to push on... to take one step further than anyone else. And this behaviour has a huge rapport with my drug use, because the feeling I got from doing heroin was the same feeling I got from destroying pianos. It was the same feeling I felt from having the neighbours watch me being led away in handcuffs... it was for the eyes, always for the eyes. But where delinquency gets teenage eyes, heroin gets adult ones... (actually it doesn’t, but I only learnt that later).

What I have just said there may not seem like much, but it is a huge thing for me to admit. It is one of those silent truths that you always keep to yourself... that you hide from psychiatrists. It’s like knowing the reason for your sexual deviance and shouting it out for all and sunder to hear. It’s hard and It’s embarrassing. But I made up my mind when I started this blog to give everything & I will remain truthful to that. The blog means nothing if I’m holding back on myself. You’re not walking down the street naked if you keep your pants on.

Over the years my youthful problems and needs have all mellowed. I’m not so timid anymore, yet I prefer to avoid strange crowds. My need to take the attention has tamed, but there is and will always be a streak of that in me. I no longer think heroin impresses... I’ve had too many people disown me to believe that. My last fight was at the age of 18, and I no longer vandalize bus-stops or destroy pianos. I do however still throw the occasional Grapefruit, but that’s not too bad.... I’m getting better every day. Yesterday I was bad, today I am good... and tomorrow I may very well be You.

Take care people... keep well & keep heart, Shane.

PS: Here’s my winning poem.

Midnight Revenge

As I walked into the yard
A mummy was a nasty guard
Watching every step I took
Then a spectre popped up to look
Running, running I was scared
“Boo!” a ghost jumped up and blared
And this is what I found
Skeletons were in the ground
Worms and maggots in their hair
Even they started to stare
They jumped on me and took my soul
Threw me in a fresh dug hole
So this is what I done you see
I haunted them instead of me.

The Weld Why'd Webb - it's a whole new vocabulary.

.
Today, a little later than early afternoon, I shut my computer down, lit a cigarette and sat looking out my window at a day of bleak despair. After 33 years of dying I had finally had enough... I couldn’t take no more. I called my mum, gave her my love and asked her to kiss the cats goodbye. I then closed the phone, removed the battery and wrote a post-it note of regrets. I changed into my Sunday best, dragged myself into the kitchen and closed the door. I gave an underarm salute out the window to life and then pulled the shutters down on a world that had mocked me once too often. I turned the stove on, dropped to the floor and put my head in the oven. I think I was on my 5th lungful of gas when reason put in a belated appearance: “Fuck you HTML!” I screamed... “You’re not getting the better of ME!”

Yep, you’ve guessed it... I’ve done what no Heroinhead should ever do, I’ve been meddling with my Blogger template. What seemed a simple, straight-forward task, turned into a waking nightmare. I don’t have many regrets in this life, but taking on HTML at 8am this morning is one of them.

It all started innocently enough – downloading a new template and then tiling an image in the background. Easy... until you realise the template is riddled with errors and that it isn’t compatible with half the blogger functions. Between trying to decipher miles of retarded template jargon, I was smashing my head into the keyboard and leaving frantic messages in technical forums: “Help, or I will be the latest online suicide!”. Well, my pleas were not ignored... though they might just as well have been. I have never known so many experts, have so few solutions, in so many words... these guys get paid for answering question that were never asked. And as for ‘The Blog Doctor’... well, lets hope he never turns up if you’re in need of CPR! Barring a half an hour suicide break, I was mixing it up with codes and downloads in excess of 16 hours. At one point I thought I saw my blogs soul rise from the top of the monitor, and waver off towards the great Blogspot in the sky. I really thought it’s days were numbered. It just goes to show what a little perseverance can achieve.

Anyway, the by and by of it all is I have revamped my blog... given her a complete make-over. Yes, there are a couple of glitches, a few ladders in her stockings, but she’s up and running... back on the game and turning tricks again! (If your viewing this in a ‘reader’ or mail... go cross and have a look. Not bad for an amateur, hey?)

Also, in addition to my new found knowledge of HTML, I’ve left the day with a small notepad of vocabulary. Whilst going through all the forums, help desks and chat rooms I started noting down all the new words, phrases and terms that have come about due to the Internet. I’ve put a few of these together in the following:

The Weld Why’d Webb – it's a whole new vocabulary

So, what better way to end this post than with a few words on Cyberspace... this virtual realm which is the portal into our times and the 21st century. Not only has this sprawling mass of technological tentacles wormed its way into every aspect of our lives, but it has also had a profound affect on our language. What with Spiders and Crawlers... Gigabyte, Megabyte, RAM & Bitmap... Emoticons, Assicons, Autobots and Bit-buckets... dictionary compilers must be having a field time. One can go Phishing, Lurking, Page-jacking or Trolling. One can download, upload, preload, streamload or shoot ones load, and it can all be detailed on ones Blog, Vlog, Plog or Wiki. With the advent of Myspace, Facebook, Twitter and Friends connect, social networking has never had it so good. So why not Boot-up, Log-on, Sign-in and Google it, and you too could soon be registering for Proxy surfing Wankware. There can be no doubt about it... The Weld Why’d Webb it's a whole new vocabulary.

Crack Cocaine - A Life on the Rocks

This is my first post on my addiction to crack cocaine. In contrast to my heroin addiction, crack was a habit I never enjoyed and didn’t want. It never made me feel good, only anxious and uncomfortable. Nevertheless, it was dragging on my heels for almost 3 years and I only shook it off on my arrival in France.

I came into contact with crack cocaine during my teen years growing up on the White City Estate in West London. First as an observer, then as a casual user and finally as an addict. I was 17 the first time I ashed a Coca-Cola can and sucked in the sickly fumes of this expensive rock.... 8 years later I would be a hardcore Crackhead, scouring the floor for crumbs of rock I knew I never dropped.

******************************************************

White City Estate is a huge housing complex tucked in the pants of Shepherds Bush – it is notorious for housing problem families. It is where the worst of the worst are banished.... full of drug addicts, travellers and thieves. In White city the telephone boxes are burnt out, the lifts are public toilets and rats and roaches scurry around huge metal dustbins. It is a place from which everyone dreams of escape, but escape is rare... for in White City, the cars have no wheels.

It is there, in that pre-war maze of red brick low rise flats, that one will come across walking shrapnel... people indelibly wounded by domestic atrocities. Imagine stepping on a landmine, having a limb blown off and your head opened up... and then staggering around concussed in the aftermath of the blast... this is what exists in White city.

Paul X was one of these walking wounded... he was also a crackhead. He spent his days crouched near the lift shaft, smoking coke crystals and hiding from police that weren’t there. He was paranoid and dangerous. It was with Paul X that I first licked the rock.

My first encounter with this type was not a pleasant experience. He had taken me at knifepoint and forced me to burgle houses to fund his addiction. My way out of this was a stroke of youthful genius: on gaining entry to a chosen property, I phoned the police on myself. I was arrested and I informed on him. I spent the next 8 months in hiding, petrified of retribution. By the time we saw one another again, Paul X was in no state to be settling old scores... he was on the verge of tears, begging me to lend him 50p so as he could page his dealer. It was in exchange for this that I was given my first hit of crack.

From the age of 17 – 23 I only smoked crack on about 10 separate occasions... it was a drug that didn’t seem to affect me. I was more into buprenorphine (a heroin substitute) which I bought from a friend whose mother was dying from cancer. By the time I started smoking crack professionally, Paul X was dead, White City had been renovated into one of Londons more respectable housing estates and I was taking 5 injections of heroin per day. And I wasn’t the only victim... I wasn’t alone scouring the floor for crumbs. No, my mother and her partner had also fallen prey to this vicious drug. Mum was no longer using acetone to remove cheap nail varnish... now she used it for washing out her and her lovers crack pipes. The 3 of us, wired at 2am in the morning, burning then scraping recycle of enamel tiles. This is where crack eventually leads... well, here and prostitution.

Crack cocaine is very different to heroin. It has a different history and a different image. If heroin is thought of as an artists or musicians drug, crack is a street drug. Although it is cocaine, it has nothing to do with rich Hollywood types, fashion or high living... Crack is from the ghetto and the crackhead is a species apart.

As I mentioned earlier, I never enjoyed my crack habit. I carried on smoking it daily for 3 years due to addiction – nothing else. I just couldn’t stop. I tried... I would make it to the evening and then at the very last moment, just before the dealers turned their phones off, I succombed... I made the call. I think that my battle with white is the reason why I can always understand the heroin addict who wants to quit but can’t. In that way it served me well.

You may be thinking that it is a huge thing to be addicted to both crack and heroin, but it is more common than you’d imagine. 7 out of 10 heroin addicts I know also have a crack habit. In fact, it is often crack that leads to heroin. The crack user is left saucer-eyed and anxous after use, and often takes a little heroin to come down, or to get rid of 'the jitters' (as we say in the trade). Because crack is more expensive and doesn’t last long, the crack addict normally ends up using heroin whilst funds are low... and before they know it they have a double whammy... a twofold addiction. This wasn’t the case for me, but I’m sure there will be some readers that will identify with this.

So, how and why did my crack habit stop? And why am I not buying 'white' in France?

My crack habit stopped the day I moved to Lyon. It wasn’t difficult as I had no choice and crack, unlike heroin, is not a physical addiction. Also, and certainly the deciding factor, crack does not exist in France... you cannot get it! One can free-base coke but one cannot score crack. Still, it took me almost a full year to get over the cravings of the psychological addiction. There were times in that first year when all I wanted was to return to London. Not for a break, not to be back home, not even to see my family... no, my sole reason for wanting to return was to score some crack... to construct a little plastic pipe and to smoke myself into a fidgety paranoia.

Today as I write this, I have not touched a rock in nearly four years. I never will again either... my head is over that. When I think of crack I feel nauseous... just the thought of its sweet, sickly perfume turns my stomach. Maybe one day heroin will also turn my stomach... maybe one day I'll be writing about my third year clean of that - who knows? Like everyones, my future is undetermined... what the the wild dogs will bring to my door, I just don't know.

Take care Readers & Keep Well...

S

English Blogs, Punk Rock Frogs & Smoking Dogs

During the past couple of weeks my blog has been given over to past details. In many ways it was hard not to interrupt that, as some interesting things were happening in the present. One of those was a meeting I had with a young man from Lyon who contacted me through my email.
This is part of the message I received:

“I'd really like to meet you (as you guessed I live in Lyon), it's
becoming rare in Lyon to find people who aren't narrow-minded and
over-prejudiced .I've got a sad history too, and I felt very concerned about your memoires on your blog.Well, I won't be there this week-end but maybe next other week ends we could catch up.
Here's my phone number ...”

He also left me his Myspace page.

If I receive a message like that I cannot and do not ignore it. I immediately visited the link he had given me. If I felt uncomfortable before, after my head was in my hands... I was in deep thought. Staring back at me from Ian’s Myspace page was Johnny Thunders, Dee Dee Ramone, Sid Vicious, Jerry Nolan, Lou Reed, Velvet Underground, The Dead boys, etc. An anthology of punk and more... from what I saw, it was ‘heroin culture’... this wasn’t just about music. I don’t think there was a rock star still living on his page. If I had a Myspace page in my teens or early twenties, this is what it would have been.

I think you can see my fears here.... a young kid, with an interest in heroin, probably already having a mental romance with it, contacts me and wants to meet . ME, that is openly admitting to being an addict, that can score in his own city, NOW. The mention of a ‘sad history’ was another arrow towards his intent.

Still, I replied to his mail and said I would like to meet him and to contact me when he was free. I sent that email & then crossed my fingers that he’d back out and never contact me again.
I heard nothing for over a week... no mail, no phone call, no blog comment, nothing. Then last saturday during the early afternoon I received an unknown call to my mobile. I thought of Ian immediately, and checked the number to that which he had sent me. It was him. I redialled and we spoke. He said he was travelling into Lyon to meet friends and would call me when he was free.

I put the phone down on this conversation and thought ‘what the f*ck do I do?’. You may wonder why my dilemma was so great? It’s quite simple: “meet him, and if he asks for heroin refuse and warn him of this life. Send him on his way!” Well, I knew I wouldn’t be doing that... that’s not the answer when someone asks you to score. That is the answer of someone who doesn’t want a conscience, the guilt of being the rabbit into this world. But I don’t have a conscience like that... I have a realistic conscience. If someone seeks me out or approaches me asking me to score, they are already in this world... some other rabbit has led them here. And I tell you this, they will get their heroin... because there eyes and brain will be open for that... they will find (sooner rather than later) the final door into the closet of smack. I would prefer to be that door than leaving it to most other addicts I know. The wrong meeting, with the wrong junkie is FATAL. They will take your money and give you a disease in the bargain. My idea was this: meet Ian, if heroin comes up explain a little about that way of life. Score for him. Show him the safest way to use. My only real advice would have been... “up your nose and not in the vein.” Many may not be able to agree with that... I understand.

When one is around heroin it is very common for another addict to ask for your help in scoring... it’s unusual to be in the position I was in: a person wanting to try heroin and asking you to score their first bag. I’ve never been in that position before and never considered what I would do. To score for an existing addict is nothing, this was a whole different dilemma.

I met Ian in the late afternoon in a bar in the ‘old city’ of Lyon. It’s a small road, cobbled and full of musicians and incense, dogs and robbers. Despite it’s appearance there is no heroin in the old city.... it’s not a place where one can score. ‘Heroin chic’ fills the bars and coffee shops... but there’s not a needle in sight - the rents are too high for that. Fashion prevails.

Ian was New York ‘79 with a modern hair style. He was small and friendly. I was a striped shirt , plain jumper and a badge. Taller and more reserved. We embraced, crushed our cigarettes and ordered Guinness. I can’t remember our first words... I think we were both a little nervous. Huge things had brought us together and now only a small space separated us. It was down to the nitty-gritty – the here and the now. Why are two strangers drinking Guinness together in The Smoking Dog, why???

Heroin was soon mentioned... that wasn’t a surprise as the blog which initiated our encounter concerned that. We talked a little of my history and a little of his. We joked and talked music... we sussed each other out, probably both looking for the psychopath in the other. There were no psychopaths here (just the bar tender who seemed angry when I ordered a drink and disturbed him from the rugby!).

After a moment Ian said, “You know, heroin is one drug I’ve never considered. My mother died from a heroin OD.” I felt guilty for this. I felt guilty that I was representing heroin... that I had said od’s were a myth... that he had read this. I don’t retract anything, but in that small moment I felt guilty in the eyes of a young boy that had lost his mother to junk. In fact, he had found her dead.

It’s in these times I am thankful I never promote or sing the cause of heroin. I know many addicts who do... at all costs they will say heron is good (not just for them... for the entire planet). I don’t think this... it has helped me as it has killed me. I accept that trade is all I say.

Ian explained more of his mothers death. I understood he wasn’t here for retribution. I also remembered in that time that maybe heroin was not what he saw in me... maybe he saw a person who also grew up around the syringe. A person who had also lost a parent. Not everything has to be about smack. We didn’t dwell on tragedy, we understood we had both been there, been back and were now living our lives from those experiences. I think we both took heart that the other was doing well... was getting on and above all was enjoying ‘being’. Our pasts had been different, though they crossed at many intersections. Our ears and eyes had taken the same sounds and the same images, in many ways for the same reasons. But our outcome, and our outlooks were different. We were the same Guinness in different glasses.

We spent a couple of hours together and then we parted. I accompanied Ian out into the cold evening, back into town. We walked and talked some more and then we crossed the first of two rivers that run through Lyon. He made me listen to some african rhythms and chants on his MP3. We hurried along like this, sharing one headset and a love of music. After a moment we stopped. We embraced and we shook hands. The first was a continental ‘goodbye’ the second an English one. We smiled, winked and then he took one way and I took the other. Two people lost between two rivers... yeah, that’s what we are.

Once again thanks for reading & I hope you enjoyed,

Shane.

Your Reward - Infamous Killer Sauce

As promised here’s your reward for sticking with me - my infamous Roasted red-Pepper & Killer Tomato Sauce – (& you all thought it was a joke, oh no...) You won’t get better anywhere (not even in Naples!)

What You Need:

1 Red Pepper (sliced into 8ths)
1 Tin chopped tomatoes (or Passatta)
Salt
Pepper
Sugar

What To Do:

Put a frying pan on a high heat (without oil). Place the red-pepper skin side down in the pan. Leave for ten minutes untilthe skin is completely black. Remove pepper and with a knife scrape off the burnt skin. Turn heat down to medium & add 2 tbsp of olive oil (vegetable oil will do). Place skinned peppers back in pan and cook for another 3 minutes. Add salt & pepper & a pinch of sugar. Put into a container and add half the tin of tomotaos. Blend down to a textured sauce (you don’t want soup!). Pour back into pan and let excess water from tomatoes reduce. Voilà, Roasted Red Pepper sauce.

Serving Suggestions

Pour over pasta or Tortellini of choice. If (like me) you’re the kind of person who matches your handbag with your shoes, you’ll want to garnish with a couple of basil leaves before serving... If you really want to murder it you can sprinkle over some cheese. (ReRe, http://www.re-ramblings.com/ I hope you enjoy!)


If the sauce ends up looking like this:


Well, you've f*cked up! Throw away and start again.... this time SOBER!!!

Dennis Nilsen Killed My Father - Final Part, ME.

In my previous posts I’ve detailed the murder of my father and the effect that had on my childhood and upon my mother. But what has all that to do with ‘Memoires* of a Heroinhead’? What has that got to do with ME & my continued addiction to heroin?

The actual murder has little direct association with it, but the physical death plays a big role. And more than the death, the effect it had upon my mother, and the effect her own behaviours and attitude had upon me. I am the by-product of murder, but not the product. Some of the problems I have are the waste fluid from that event.

In many ways I have (unintentionally) given my mother back what she lost. I have recognised her needs and fulfilled them... I have become a cleaner, non-violent version of my father. I am him without his faults... well almost, because lets not forget I am a Heroinhead. Though in my mothers eyes, being a Heroinhead is a good fault... it’s part of the reckless, wild side of boys which she has always admired. She has never praised me for taking heroin – well not directly anyway, but in her reactions to heroin and to the footsteps that led me there, I sensed an admiration.

My naughty acts have always gained my mothers attention and though she would scold my actions, there was always a twinkle in her eye and a pat on the head as well. The way she would report the incidents to her friends told me she had secretly enjoyed them. She enjoyed my first cigarette, my first joint and my first whiskey. She enjoyed my first arrest and then watching me winking at the judge and quoting Oscar Wilde in the Juvenile Criminal Court. She enjoyed my first trip, and my first line of speed.... she enjoyed the fights, the late nights and the love bites. Me, returning home with some woman's passion tattooed on my neck – it impressed her. She was watching the return of my father.

Of course, I am not my father... there are huge differences between us. From what I know he didn’t read, didn’t write, didn’t paint. He had no artistic or intellectual hobbies. He wasn’t into literature, philosophy, sociology, politics... nothing, just junk. All that really connects us is heroin... and this is what my mother sees. She is blind to what separates us. Still, in part I agree, I have given her back what she had been robbed of.. I often think if I didn’t she would have been dead many years ago.

But drug addiction, as with any behaviour, doesn’t stem from one event. I cannot tell you all the parts of this, but I can tell you it would have probably gone that way anyhow. The truth is, the idea of using drugs first came about as a way to overcome shyness, the continued usage and the progression to heroin probably comes from a desire to impress my mother and my peers, but drug use and drug addiction are two separate issues. I found that heroin gave ME something, not my mother, not my father, not my peers or my image, but ME... it gave an inch to an unbalanced leg.

This is why I don’t hold any ill will towards Nilsen. Maybe this is also why I hold no ill will towards my mother (my brother and sister certainly do). Because after everything, I took my decisions as an intelligent adult... I got on the bus myself. Also, I am happy within my body... and every bruise, and every scar and every smile and every suicide rescue has contributed to that. I am my own history, so how can I despise or be bitter about that? How can I regret the past without regretting myself? In life I have the ability to accept a car crash... a motorway pile up. What other choice is there? Who are we to blame... ‘black ice’?

With a different life I would surely not have meddled with heroin.... but I didn’t have a different life, and I believe in winning with the cards you are dealt with. For me, if you crawl from a car wreckage... you are fortunate. If you survive the Texas Chainsaw Massacre... you’re plain lucky. I survived the TCM albeit with an addiction.... but I’m a player, and I’ll accept a Jack of Spades for an Ace of Hearts any day.

Thanks for sticking with me readers... it’s been very touching that anyone even cares. Shane. x

* to all those who mailed me pointing out that I have misspelled ‘memoirs’... think again. I live in France and wanted to reflect that in my blogs title, so I used the french spelling ‘memoires’. At least I think that’s the french spelling... I never actually checked!. Uh oh, Google here I come...

Dennis Nilsen Killed My Father - Part 3

"... If the omelette killed him I don’t know, but anyway in going forward I intended to kill him. An omelette doesn’t leave red marks on a neck. I suppose it must have been me.”

Dennis Nilsen - on killing my father.

*

======================================================

*

Ok, lets get down to gory details. On the night of my fathers death there were only two witnesses – one is dead and the other doesn’t recall much. But it runs something like this:

My father skips the wall and heads into the centre of town. He scores his heroin around Piccadilly, has a few drinks and heads home. As he wanders down Shaftsbury Avenue he is accosted by a certain Mr Nilsen. Nilsen, seeing my fathers drowsy state decides to try his luck. He offers him a bed and something to eat. My father, with sinister intentions of his own, accepts. They arrived at Nilsen's north London flat at around one o’clock... Here’s what Nilsen describes as taking place:

“the thing he wanted more than anything was something to eat. I had very little supply in but I had a whole tray of eggs. So I whipped up a large omelette and cooked it in a large frying pan, put it on a plate and gave it to him. He started to eat the omelette. He must have eaten three-quarters of the omelette. I noticed he was sitting there and suddenly he appeared to be asleep or unconscious with a large piece of omelette hanging out of his mouth. I thought he must have been choking on it but i didn’t hear him choking – he was indeed deeply unconscious. I sat down & had a drink. I approached him, I can’t remember what I had in my hands now – I don’t remember whether he was breathing or not but the omelette was still protruding from his mouth. The plate was still on his lap – I removed that. I bent forward and I think I strangled him. I can’t remember at this moment what I used... I remember going forward and I remember he was dead.... If the omelette killed him I don’t know, but anyway in going forward I intended to kill him. An omelette doesn’t leave red marks on a neck. I suppose it must have been me.”

Nilsen then undressed my father, masturbated over him (he denies having sex with the body) and then moved him to the washroom where he laid him in the bath. He left him there for three days. During this time Nilsen would continue to wash , brush his teeth and do his toilet in the presence of the body.

On the fourth day, Nilsen removed my fathers body from the bath. He laid a plastic sheet on the floor, put my father on it, and systematically dismembered the body. First he cut the head off, then the hands and the feet. He then opened up the torso and removed the internal organs. After he severed the body at the waist and removed the arms. He then disconnected the legs from below the knee. During the following days he gradually diced the flesh and flushed it down the toilet. To get rid of my fathers head, he boiled it for hours in a large pot on the stove.
In many books they will explain that the remains blocking the drain was that of his last victim Steven Sinclair, but I don’t agree. Most of Sinclair’s body was discovered in bags still in Nilsen's apartment, so I think the body parts found down the drain belonged to my father. I cannot prove that though – and it really doesn’t matter.

I have explained the death in detail, not for shock value or to be crude, but to give you the details which were forced upon my mother... To let you understand the force of the gale which blew through her life. I know the relationship between her and my father was violent and unhealthy, but she was obsessively in love with him, and as we know, love is not a logical emotion.

With the death of my father I was all that was left of him... to my mother, I was him. As a result my mothers attentions turned mostly towards me.This made my brother & sister jealous and our relationship deteriorated from that point. Little did they know, they were very lucky - my life was about to become horrendous. My mother would keep me besides her at all times. I would watch her drink her death, break down, attempt suicide and make love with a myriad of different men. She would also call me to her, and in tears claim she had been to the doctors and was suffering from terminal cancer.There were at least 10 suicide attempts, 2 very serious. It was all unwanted attention... I didn't want to be my mothers favourite. Still, I was a boy and I loved my mother and I would defend her to death - she was untouchable.

The months immediately after the death are a little vague... in fact, I hardly recall anything. My next memories of the event come during the trial. The case was all over the papers again and there were journalists coming daily to our house. It was at this time that we really discovered the facts, and that was the catalyst which pushed my mother into the abyss. She tells me stories of the trial, but when I do my own research not everything rings true – I think she is confused from that time, but you can’t blame her. After the trial I remember my mother drinking a lot, crying even more, and sitting on the floor with the stereo listening to old love songs. This behaviour spiralled until she could take no more and decided that the blackout was for her.

************************************************************************

It was one afternoon, during the summer of 1985, that I saved my mothers life. This will always be my outstanding achievement. I’ve still much more dying left to do, but I will never give the world a better performance than I did that day. I was only young and I was only coming home for lunch & I was only just in time. But I done well, for a young lad, I done well.

I entered the house and it was dark. There was no smell of food and I had that feeling you get when the doors are shut. I looked in the kitchen and then called out. There was no reply. I dropped my bag and started to make a sandwich – peanut butter – then I heard a noise. It came from upstairs and sounded like someone was dreaming deeply. I put the bread down and climbed the steps. My mothers bedroom door was closed, but from inside I heard the same murmuring noise again. I opened the door and my little heart skipped into triple time. There were tablets everywhere, a broken glass on the floor, and laying on the bed was my mother. Her eyes were half open, and bright white foam was frothing out her mouth. - she wasn’t conscious. I didn’t touch her, I didn’t want to... in a way it disgusted me, but I knew I had to get help. Once again it was to the neighbour.

My neighbour run into my house and quickly returned. She phoned for an ambulance. After what seemed an eternity the ambulance arrived. The paramedics pumped my mothers stomach on the spot, and then stretchered her unconscious body down the stairs and off to hospital. She passed 3 days in intensive care, and was in hospital for 2 weeks.

The same evening as the OD the hospital phoned and told us she was still extremely poorly, but had regained consciousness and would be fine, though it had been very close. My neighbour explained this in terms I could understand: “If you had of arrived an episode of He-Man later, your mother would have died.” He-man lasted about 15 minutes... it was that close. For my young efforts I was rewarded with a BIG bag of Pick N’ Mix. As always, I shared them with my brother and sister.

That episode highlights the knock on effects of Nilsens crimes... it shows the secondary victims. It also shows you what became of my childhood, and just how far the murder had affected my mother. Again, I do not hold any ill will towards Mr Nilsen for this, we cannot spend our time pondering the butterfly effect of our actions. I am sure that the butterfly effect of my own life hurts many people. And that’s not my reflections as an adult, I have never felt ill will towards Nilsen, and I’ve never blamed him as the cause of my mothers alcoholism. After everything, we still determine our own actions... my mother choose the bottle, it didn’t come to her. It’s the same with me... I choose the needle.

My mothers suicide attempt very nearly led to me, my brother & sister being taken away into council care. If it wasn’t for the stability that my stepfather offered, we would have surely been carted off by the authorities and separated. From this point on my mother would never again be a permanent fixture in our lives. She would drift from bottle to bottle... from lover to lover, searching for someone that no longer existed.

My mothers behaviour followed me all the way through my young and teenage years. As I grew older I learnt how to cope with her better. I will not go through the list of her crimes now, but they will surely work there way into the blog as it progresses. Also, to give that side of her history in one lump, cut and edited wouldn’t do her justice. Between the bad there was also some good times and some good memories. In the midst of all the perversity there were still moments of love and joy.

In my next post I will relate the murder of my father and my mothers feelings towards him to my heroin addiction. I think that will be the last post on this matter for a while, and then I’ll give you something a little more light-hearted to look forward to. I’ve got a great recipe for a ‘roasted red pepper & tomato’ sauce... if you’re lucky I’ll share that with you. (Ok, it won’t generate as many comments, but hey... it’s a killer of a sauce.) ;)

Until next time, take care & take heart, Shane.

Dennis Nilsen Killed My Father - Part 2

My father was born on the 31st October 1954 in Motherwell, Scotland, a small industrial steel town glued to the arse of Glasgow. It is 150 miles from Fraserburgh, the home town of Dennis Nilsen. Little did anyone know, that 28 years later, fate would entwine these two Scotsmen together. Their fateful meeting would go down in British crime & folklore history - one as victim, the other for carrying out a string of macabre murders .

My father grew up in a stable family, and from what I know, had no significant traumas in his life. Still, by the age of 15 he had discovered Glasgow and cheap prescription drugs. By 17 he was thrown from his home and he made his way down south to London.

In London he quickly fell for the allure of the bright lights and the Soho sex shops and was sucked into the sleazier side of city life. He was soon an injecting and habitual heroin user and a registered drug addict. He funded his habit by stealing and robbing tourists around Londons west end. One of his regular haunts was the Kings Head pub in Leicester square. It was there where he met Lesley Mead (my mother) who was employed there as a barmaid. It was not long before she fell for his charms and within weeks of meeting they had fallen in love and were living together. In early 1975 she fell pregnant and 9 months later I was born.

Before we go any further, and for those of you that are wondering about my name, I need to explain the family situation. I have neither my mothers name, nor my fathers. My surname is Levene, which is that of my brother and sisters blood father, my stepfather and the man that raised me. I have known from birth that he was not my real father, but had hoped for many years that it was not true. One of the hardest things for me at the time of the murder was the separation I felt from my brother and sister... I wanted to be fully a part of them, not just half. I think we all hoped that my mother was lying... that we all came from the same place – we found out later this was not the case. But this is not for now... my messed up blood-line is for another day and is another story.

My mother and fathers relationship was very stormy, very violent, very unhealthy and very unfaithful. There were problems on both sides that led to frequent fights and separations. For this reason my mother staggered in and out of my early years. She would turn up drunk,with a cheap toy on my birhday and then disappear for another 6 months. My memories of my father are even more fleeting. I have two memories of him: 1) unconscious and being taken away by paramedics 2) playing football with him in the street - using dustbins for goalposts. This is a fond memory. I cry as I write this line & I don’t know why???

My father was in and out of prison, in and out of rehab and in and out of life. This behaviour carried on until his death. His life was hard and his addiction was harder – it was completely out of control. He really was a junkie... not just a heroin addict, a junkie – and there’s a BIG difference.

The 80’s brought more hardship to my father . He was in prison again on charges of possession and was kicked off his drug program. To ensure he had a heroin substitute he took up the hobby of robbing chemists. The relationship with my mother become more violent and on two occasions she ended up in hospital. The second time this happened was on Christmas day of 1981, when during Xmas dinner, my father leaned across to kiss her and bit half her nose off... charming, hey! But that act summed up their relationship... it was an intense melange of sex, violence and impulsive acts.

The night of my fathers disappearance in 1982 brought more of the same. I remember him arguing with my mother and demanding money from her for heroin. She had locked him out of the house, so all his protests took place standing on the window ledge and shouting through the glass. We often regret his noise didn’t bring the police. The last sight either my mother or I saw of him, was him jumping down from the window ledge and then skipping casually over the low garden wall and disappearing into the night.Of course, he could have gone through the gate, but he was a lad, and skipping the wall was more impressive. This image haunts my mother, along with her last words: “fuck off... and don’t come back!” He didn’t.

During the year of his disappearance, my mother always believed he was dead. As I mentioned, they had frequent separations but they were always back in touch days or weeks later. Even if he disappeared from London – as he did from time to time, he would always write. This time he never did. My mother just hoped that he had quietly overdosed somewhere and had succumbed to a peaceful, painless death.

During 1983 news started breaking of a “House of Horrors” in north London... a man had been arrested after human remains were found clogging up the sewage system outside his house. As with the entire country my mother was gripped by this story and followed in shocked interest as the gruesome tale unfolded. It turned out that between two houses in North London, over a 5 year period, 16 young men had been murdered, decapitated and disposed of. Of course, my mother never imagined for one moment that her future would be tied up in this bizarre event. The news broke, went from the front pages to the second, from the second to the third, and then faded away awaiting the big trial. It was one afternoon during this quiet period that all hell would break free in my family... the dogs would really be let loose.

*************************************************************

I heard her scream from the top of the road... it brought me home like the smell of food. For some reason I knew that was my mothers pain. It was the scream from nowhere... the scream without origin... it was the scream of unbearable suffering. And it didn’t stop. There was a police car outside my house and plain clothes detectives inside. My neighbour scooped me up and took me from this wreckage. But I wanted to see my mum. In retrospect I think my neighbour done well.

When I was old enough to be worth telling, my mother explained this day. She was cooking our dinner when there was a knock on the door. She opened it to find two plain clothes detectives, a uniformed policeman and police woman on the doorstep. They confirmed her name, and then asked if she knew an Archibald Graham Allan. At first she thought he had been found alive and was in trouble again. She led the police through into the kitchen and attended to the potatoes. It was somewhere here that they explained that a skull had been found and from the dental records it had been positively identified as that of her lover. It had been retrieved from Cranley Gardens... the “House of Horrors” in Muswell Hill. My mother says she doesn’t recall anything else after this.... impulse must have set in, so I fill her in on the rest!

I don’t remember when I finally saw my mother, or how long, or in what state she was in... maybe as a child I fell asleep.... I don’t remember. I should think that the adults took care of her. During this time there wasn’t police counselling, or any support, so my mother was told the news and then left alone. That is not only mean, it is imbecilic... my mother, with three young children, being left in that state? She could have tried suicide or anything. She did a few years later... I would find her choking on foam and vomit on her bed.

(My mother is fine now... the years have healed. Of course, the murder and Nilsens continued existence still pain her, but she can talk freely of it now... even joke around it. (That’s something, hey?)

In my next post I will touch a little more on the actual murder and go through the consequences of that event. On how the childhood of my brother, my sister and I was forever, and irretrievably corrupted. There were many follow on effects from the crime and my mothers behaviour in coping with the trauma had an even worse consequence.

As always I don’t like to end on a note of gloom... so I'll leave you with this little anecdote:

Many people ask me, “Why did your father accept Nilsens hospitality?... he had his own flat to go back to.” The answer is a simple one... my father intended to rob him. One of my fathers ways of funding his drug habit was to ‘roll’ homosexuals. ‘Rolling’ entails masquerading as a homosexual and then robbing the client during or before the act. There’s a moral to be had here.... don’t EVER try to ‘roll’ a serial killer! ;)

Take care people... & thank you for reading.

2 B cont’d....

Dennis Nilsen Killed my Father – Introduction...

One evening in late 1982, after a terrible argument with my mother, my father (Archibald Graham Allen) stormed off into the night in search of heroin... no-one ever saw him alive again. It wasn’t until nearly a year later that we discovered the truth of what had become of him. The truth was, that same evening that he left, he was picked up by a man – Dennis Andrew Nilsen – offered a bed for the night, and then poisoned, strangled & murdered. His corpse was left for three days in a bath, before finally being dismembered and flushed down the toilet – his head was boiled in a large saucepan. All that was left was his skull. This was exhibited during Nilsens trial at The Old Bailey in October 1983.

My father was the 14th victim of the infamous British serial killer Dennis Nilsen, who in total took the lives of 16 men between 1978 – 1983. Most of his victims were young homosexuals or vagrants. Of the 16 victims there are only two children, I am one of them.

During the course of my next few posts, I will detail my fathers life, his disapearance and his murder. I will explain the effect it has had, both upon my mother and upon my own life. Finally, I will examine the relationship between this event and my ongoing addiction to heroin.

I had initially intended to post this history as a single article, but it is too long and too heavy and so is best split up into a few different parts. I will post the first part in the next 2 – 3 days.

Until then Readers, take care... go steady on the tea & get the popcorn ready...

2 B cont’d...

Myth or Reality? The Truth about Heroin Addicts

This post, whilst acknowledging certain truths, puts pay to some frequent misconceptions surrounding heroin addiction. All in all, Heroinheads are quite different from their stereotyped portrayal in the media.

Enjoy....

Heroin addicts are thin with black eyes.

MYTH. It is very difficult to spot a heroin addict from sight. Other users will be able to, but these are things that the non-user will not be susceptible to. Thinness and black eyes can occur after severe and repeated bouts of withdrawal. Normally, someone who looks like this is a gothic.
Most heroin addicts are untrustworthy.

REALITY... by nature, no; by addiction, yes. The heroin addict needs money daily and as the day wears on he/she will consider more & more desperate means. Stealing from the uncautious is an easy solution. Though the addict will often ask before taking.

Heroin addiction is expensive.

MYTH. heroin addiction can be less than someone smoking 40 cigarettes a day. Many addicts have a bag a day habit (£10 - $15). The average is 3 bags a day (£25 - $40). In London I was doing eight bags a day which cost me £50. It can get expensive, but not how some claim. When you read in a paper or hear on Oprah “I had a $1000 a day smack habit.!”... it’s a lie and the person is probably not even a junkie. Crack/cocaine on the other hand can run into thousands of $$$'s a day. (This is based only on my knowledge of heroin in England, France & Italy)

The heroin addict is weak willed.

MYTH. This is probably the greatest myth of them all. Heroin addiction is not about lack of willpower or strength – it is a matter of science. If you put this drug in your system frequently enough your body needs it. The strongest willed person in the world will be an addict if he/she uses for a month without stopping.

Heroin addicts are mostly homeless.

MYTH... though many beg to get their dope money. Heroin addiction does not suit a life on the streets... you need light and some heat to find a vein. It’s also much more relaxing to be somewhere secure. Many addicts are in homeless shelters (so yes, homeless) but not without shelter.

Heroin adicts are mostly male?

REALITY. There are 3 times as many male to female users.

Heroin addicts are suicidal.

MYTH. If addicts were truly suicidal they could end it all very quickly and very easily. The addict is normally seeking some sort of attention for their pain. Addicts often suffer from some trauma – I don’t say depression.

A quick check of the arms will always give the injecting heroin addict away.

MYTH. The veins in the arms don’t last most addicts too long. If an addict ever rolls up his/her sleeves to prove abstention, ask him/her to drop their trousers. The marks on the legs will give them away.

Heroin addicts don’t wash.

Difficult one.. I will say REALITY. Heroin addcition changes one’s priorites. Washing first thing is no longer important... getting your morning fix is. Heroin addicts still wash, but maybe not as frequently as non-users.

Heroin addicts are sexy.

MYTH. Rotten teeth, dirty fingers and swollen limbs are not sexy. Someone masquerading as an addict may be perceived as sexy, but real addicts are not.

Most addicts want to quit.

REALITY: The percentage of addicts suffer terribly (many going to the grave) with their addiction. For most it is a lifelong battle to quit and stay clean. There are not many who don’t want to quit.

It is easy to overdose.

MYTH. It’s extremely difficult. There are many doctors in the drugs profession who don't believe in heroin overdose. It takes 10 times an addicts normal dosage to be anywhere near fatal. From my personal experience, I also hold to that view. Heroin deaths are normally put down to overdose but are probably due to toxic heroin or a combination of different drugs & alcohol. (Anyone who has lost someone to overdose... I’m not dismissing it. It does exist.)

Heroin addicts are violent – especially when desperate for a fix.

MYTH. Most heroin addicts are very passive and peaceful. They will more than likely run from trouble than confront it. A heroin addict in withdrawal can barely walk let alone fight. Violence does exist in heroin circles but it is around the group of users that have mental health issues – they are violent even without the drug. Not all people with mental health problems are violent.

The heroin addict belongs to a specific economic group.

MYTH. Heroin addicts come from all walks of life. Economy or education has nothing to do with it. I know doctors, lawyers, artists, writers and policemen who are addicts.

Heroin addicts will steal the eyes from their grandmothers head.

Unfortunately REALITY... though we’ll always try to replace them later.

Heroin addicts are young.

MYTH. Heroin is normally sought by adults. There are young users but the average age differs from around 24 - 31. This was the surprise when I first started using – the age of addicts. If you keep in mind heroin is a long term addiction (on average 8 - 10 years before recovery) you will understand this a little better.

Why can’t heroin addicts just say “NO!”

MYTH: They can and do. They can say “no!” a hundred thousand times... but saying “yes” once, wipes all the “no’s’” out.

Heroinheads have to retype their username and password, at least 10 times before successfully logging-in to a Web site.

REALITY. Yes... without fail. ;)


If anyone would like to suggest any other 'myths or realities', post them as comments and I'll add them to the list.

Junkies are fun to have around.

MYTH. Junkies are a pain in the ass, and if you find my eyeballs, please give them back.

Sent in by Lou : http://brokenheartedmom.blogspot.com/

Overdoses occur most frequently after a period of detox or abstention.

Reality: This is because the user underestimates just how quickly his tolerance has dropped. He uses what was his usual dose & wallop... the BIG BLACKOUT.

Suggested by Smack Happy: no blog at present

The Contradictions of this Heroin Life

“I am full of a million contradictions... I’m aware of this. I just try to gradually work my way through them. Hopefully, by the time my death arrives I will have figured out who I am. “
Heroinhead to his drug counsellor

====================================================

In the annuls of time, what difference does it make if I die at 35, 50 or 90? What does it really matter? It’s just a snap of the fingers. Contrary to popular belief I’m not dead yet, but already it seems that my personal history is being erased.... It’s as if there is a crusade to wipe me from the face of the earth. The three schools I attended no longer exist, the hospital I was born in is now a homeless shelter, the road I grew up on has been renovated beyond recognition. My father is dead, and my friends and family don’t know me. I almost don’t exist already. I will fade into a generation, an epoch, a century. I will go from modern man to prehistoric heroin and media addict. My size 10 footsteps will be swept away... my ugly mug removed from Facebook... my blogs deleted. It will be neither here nor there, if I lived a healthy clean life, or if accelerated towards an early end. No matter how one lives their life it is impossible to die healthy! Death treats low cholesterol fat free diets the same as 25 years of junk abuse... it kills you. There's no escape... there’s just postponement.

I’ve never really bought into this life. I’ve never accepted it’s ethics or its prejudices. I’ve never been part of the populace. This feeling of detachment was one of a thousand differing reasons that I first began using heroin. It was the ultimate rebellion... it was a complete rejection of society and its values. I mentioned in an earlier post that heroin is also a statement... well that is what I meant.

But rebelling with heroin brings its own set of problems & contradictions. The addict will always abandon his principles for heroin...I certainly do. Firstly, heroin renders the user passive. The addict spends so much time controlling his habit that he doesn’t have the energy for serious rebellion. If there is a choice between scoring your dope or attending some demonstration or other the dope comes first. Secondly, the heroin addict, whilst rebelling against society is a part of the worst side of capitalism... he helps to fuel the death trade. So while I reject and rebel I have also bought wholesale into the drugs market.. which makes McDonald's seem moral. I also eat Big Macs, because when you're scoring on the run... you need fast food.

It is here and nowhere else where I come unstuck with heroin. We do not part, but we argue. If I have regrets it is in the principles I have abandoned, in the causes I have let down. It is in the contradictions of this heroin life. I cannot argue these cases either, they are all true... I cannot worm my way into a good light. My saving grace is that I see no other life where the contradictions aren’t worse, or at least the same. At least with heroin these contradictions are bearable... at least they are MY contradictions.


****************************************************

It was to the doctors on friday. I never go to see my doctor because I am ill... I am not ill, though if I were, he is the last person I would go to see. No, I see my GP for methadone.. that's all. I also enjoy sitting there and acting completely blasé about death. I boast and laugh of everything one should never do in life, but which I constantly do. My doctor seems to like this in me, maybe I am his relief from the daily bodies of depression that come blustering in, squabbling on about the tiniest little thing and how the downstairs neighbour with the undeclared cats is the cause of their poor health. At Christmas, my doctor is one of the rare people I give a card to.

On this visit he shocked me by asking for a urine test. By law, he should ask for one every 3 months... this is the first time he has asked in almost three years. I told him that it will certainly be dirty. Maybe the Christmas cards paid off or maybe he is just a terrible GP, but he told me to come back on wednesday. I started to explain that it will still be dirty, but he stopped me. He just raised his hands and looked at me. I understood what this meant.... FIX IT! Well, I’m never one to turn down someone else’s kindness, so I will ask my wife for a urine test. This is a very common solution to get around this kind of test ....I’m sure most addicts, at some time or other, have begged their friends for urine! ;)

On the same note I saw on the Internet “Urine for Sale – Cheat your Drug Test”. Isn’t technology just great!

Poems between Posts: La Grippe

I've decided to add a little poetry feature to keep the blog active between posts. This one's called La Grippe (The Flu). As it refers to junk sickness I thought the french title (The Grip) was more appropriate.

Anyone who would like to add a Poem between Posts, please feel free to mail me your verse myheroinhead@gmail.com . Nothing will be rejected... expresssion doesn't have to be good to be valid.

You Can't Blame Johnny Thunders!

I knew from the age of 10 that I would be a heroin addict. I used to wander around my school, with my eyes half-closed, acting drowsy and drunk. I think that this came from a desire to impress my mother... to be like the men that attracted her. If I judge myself in terms of this, my life has been very succesful. If I judge myself from my mothers eyes... I am a star.

My mother has always seemed to be proud of my heroin addiction. She will tell people of it as other mothers will boast of their sons honours and achievements. I know that will sound incredulous and perverse to many of you, but I understand the place where she is coming from. When looking at me, she must be proxy to a bizarre mix of contradicting emotions and guilt.

With the butchering of my father, my mother lost (in the most horrific way) the only man she has ever loved. Of three children, I was the secret child of this man. To her, I was all that was left of him... a physical reminder of her lover. As my life began to mirror his... as she watched the new, like she once watched the old, find solace in the needle, she must have really seen in me the reincarnation of my father. In this light, her feelings are not perverse... they are quite natural and understandable. But for all this reflection, I still cannot give you an exact reason as to why I have embraced heroin. The above is a small part of a much larger reason. .. a reason that is so large, and so integregated in me, that I cannot even see it.

Many people search for the answers of drug addiction... they will look for some huge rupture or some awful event in the life. But for many addicts this isn’t the case... for many there’s no obvious reason why they turned to drugs... there is no one defining event. With lack of any hard evidence for a loved ones addiction, many people point fingers towards musicians, or artist drug users. They accuse them of gloryifying drug addiction and blame them for turning their fans onto drugs. But one can no more say that listening to Johnny Thunders leads to heroin addiction... than one can that reading Oscar Wilde will turn you into a homosexual. No, if one takes part in these things, it is because the seeds are already sown.

It is true, many addicts will also like the art, music, even the image of junkie artists (and Oscar Wilde does have a large gay following) but this is not because people are emulating them, it is because they can identify with their expression, their life. What people must never forget is heroin is not a fun drug... it is not used to have a good time. Heroin is a pain killer and an anti-depressant... and these are the underlying reasons behind 99% of addicts.

* * * *

There's been some good gear floating aound these past days so I bought as much as my dealer could sell me. I'm just lucky I'm in a position to do that.

The other news is that in St. Etienne 5 addicts have been rushed to hospital after collapsing. This adds to the 20 Parisien junkies who had the same problem two weeks ago. They were found unconscious in their cars, on the street or down stairwells, immediately after fixing. Officially it has not been disclosed if this is due to ultra strong gear or dirty gear. I will tell you now, it is dirty heroin. On the news it warns addicts using intravenously to be very careful!!! But what does that mean... inject just a mini dose? I'm sure we're all going to do that. ;)

I mention the above problem because St. Etienne is only 30 minutes from Lyon, so it's a little worrying. Still, I know it won't stop water from falling... it won't stop us. How can it... we take our chances each day.

Tomorrow I will meet with the director of the Theo Argence Cultural Centre to organise the dates for a forthcoming exhibition of my paintings. I think it will likely be either late May or early June. You can have a look at my paintings by going to my site: -->>

A Lifetime of Dying: http://shanelevene.hpage.com/

Mum... there's something I must tell you.

This post is really a response to an entry made by Melinda R Tyler on her Melindaville blog http://blog.melindaville.com/ detailing her first intravenous injection. This post is not designed to horrify, entice, or romanticize. It is just the truth.

It was in the year 2000 that I first decided to inject. This wasn’t really a decision... if I was to keep control of my addiction it was a necessity. It was an economic response to a drug problem that was spiralling out of control.

At the time I was working for a small antique company. I had been a smoking heroin addict for over a year and I was gradually using more and more. For the first 2 weeks of each month all was fine, but then my wages would run out, and the second half of the month would become a desperate trawl to borrow money. This worked sometimes, but all too often it did not. About every third day I was ill due to a lack of heroin and as a consequence I could not make it into work. It got to the point where my firm was issuing me warning after warning. Not just for my absences but also for my physical appearance. Heroin illness destroys you... it leaves one ravaged, taut and thin. Heroin illness is the closest someone can be to death without actually dying. Finally I was threatened with dismissal. That was a real scare, because my wage was my ticket to heroin, and heroin was my ticket to well-being.

In October of that year I had an especially bad month. The quality of gear was very poor and I was buying three times as much as usual. Two weeks into the month, not only was I out of money but I was out of people to borrow from. In desperation, I swallowed what pride I had, cooked up some old cock n’ bull story for my work and managed to acquire a loan of £150 from my employer. This had to keep me in heroin until I was paid – it was decision time. If I continued smoking heroin the loan would last about 4 days... it was not an option, though I knew that by injecting I could get by using just a quarter of what I was taking. This is because when you smoke a drug everything that goes into the air is wasted. By injecting, every last crumb of gear is utilised. Smoking heroin, though far safer, is very uneconomical. It was with this thought that I decided the needle was the short-term solution- though I promised myself, once I got paid, I would resume smoking again.

That weekend I sought out Katy, a beggar girl that occasionally scored for me. I told her that I wanted to inject heroin and wanted to know how. Katy warned me against it and refused to help.
“Kate, I’ll give you a bag?”

She looked at me... wishing I hadn’t said that. We both knew what was going to happen. It was one of those times where you know your fate, can see your destination, but can do nothing to prevent yourself from arriving there. We both saw the road and we took it together. She was in no position to turn a bag of gear down... she needed it as much as me.

After a moment Katy went into her cupboard and took out a large bag of needles. I was trembling. The words HIV... AIDS were flashing in my brain like an animated header.
“Are they clean, Kate? Are they new?” I asked. She threw me the bag. It was still sealed and the safety tops on the syringes were all in place. I opened the bag and choose a needle. Injecting isn’t like it is shown in films... one cannot just inject. It takes a little knowledge to cook heroin down from a powder into an injectable liquid, and it takes some experience to be able to hit a vein, and then know what to do. One needs to be shown these things.

Katy went through the procedure of cooking up heroin. She explained that I could dissolve heroin in citric acid, vitamin C powder, or JIF lemon juice. “Always filter!” she said “never forget the filter.”

Up until this point it had been easy going, but the tone was about to change. Katy took the needle from me and removed the top. I was gripped with such a fear... I wanted to flee the room. I felt sick and my legs had gone to jelly. The dull autumn afternoon crashed about outside.
Katy nodded, and asked me to roll my sleeve up. I did. She produced an old cravat and tied it tightly around my bicep.
“Flex your arm” she said.
After a moment she had a look and said “OK, we’ll go in here. It will be very quick and very easy as your veins are new... though it may sting a little. That’s just the Vit C.”
“Katy, there’s not too much gear in the needle is there? Maybe it’s too much for a first shot?”
She assured me it was only a small fix she had cooked me. Still, I insisted she only inject half and let it register before putting the rest in. She agreed. Katy brought the needle to my skin. The first surprise was the direction she put the needle... I had always imagined that the needle would be used pointing down towards the hand... but no, if it can be helped, you always shoot up. I watched the needle and I watched Katy. She really seemed just like a nurse. She was so careful and so gentle... later I would learn this gentleness was more a respect for heroin than it was for me.
“We’re in” she muttered. I watched Katy pull the plunger of the needle back and then warm, thick, red blood shot up into the needle. I gritted my teeth as she pressed the plunger. At halfway she looked at me; I nodded. She put the rest in and removed the needle, pressing a little swathe of tissue against the injection site. I felt nothing, no stinging, no pain. After a moment my arm and torso began itching... I had a strange taste in my mouth. I felt the heroin hit my head and I felt my pupils dilate. I sat back in the chair. It was the same effect as smoking, just it was administered all at once and in a smaller quantity. There was no pain, no blood and no mark.... in fact there was no trace at all of what had just happened. It was so quick, so easy and so clean.

At that point Katy told me: “You know, you will NEVER go back to smoking... welcome to the needle.”
“ You’re wrong” I said “it’s just for the next week and a half... just until I get paid.” She smiled and hugged me... and then she cried. I felt a warm tear drip off her nose and hit the back of my neck. I’ve always been a person people like to hug... I don't know why that is?

Katy took her own fix, I gave her the bag I had promised and we went out. That day, and that walk is etched forever into my brain. I remember it as a tranquil flush of peace, I remember the traffic and the shops and the distant screams. I remember the grey London sky and I remember me, but mostly, I remember the needle. Katy holding it up to the light, flicking out air bubbles, her eyes pinned and intent in a way I’d never seen before. That was junk... that was what a junkie was... those were junkie eyes she had. Very soon I too would acquire those same eyes.

I went home that evening and I stood staring in the mirror. I tried to detect what I had done through my eyes, my face, my skin... there must be some sign... something must give it away. I hoped it did. A thousand images of who I was came and went. I wondered what would become of me. I rubbed my face, took one last glance then went and sat down. I gathered my courage, cleared my throat and then called: “Mum, come in here please... there’s something I must tell you.”

Bad Teeth & Cleverness

The hassle of having to score in the suburbs is over. I met Sylvain this afternoon and he informed me that D was holding. That’s good news as D is only five minutes from me and he will usually come to the appartment.. Sylvain is one of these junkies that is always cursing heroin and constantly talking of rehabilitation. Apart from detox and the size of bags he has no view on anything else. He is of the type that will sit on the fence until they keel over and fall to one side or the other. They let death choose their life, whereas I let life choose my death.

I first met Sylvain nearly 3 years ago at The Hôtel Dieu – the city’s main substitution unit. He was quite handsome then, but he has changed drastically since. Now He is sallow & withdrawn. His clothes are filthy and torn and he has absesses all over his hands. His mouth looks like a clenched anus that is trying to suck all his features in. At one point during our brief conversation he tipped his head back and bellowed, displaying the rotten contents of his mouth. It reminded me of a dank, wet dungeon.... his teeth the remnants of a broken and rusted portcullis. I think I caught sight of only one whole tooth, mostly they were just black specks in lumpy puss filled gums.

Unlike me, Sylvain has no pride, neither is he out to deceive. He seems eagar to show the diseased existence of years of heroin abuse... to force all the vileness of addiction in your direction. I suppose Sylvains body is his work of art.... it’s his expression. I understand that more than I may let on.

* * *
I don’t want to fill these memoires up with all darkness, as that is not me. I am a very light-hearted fun-loving person and it is important that that shows. If not, I might as well pass my time writing pure fiction. So, on a lighter note I will tell you of a mail exchange I am currently having with a Parisien art gallery. A little over a month ago, trying to secure an exhibition, I sent details of my artwork to a handful of French galleries. One Parisien gallery replied, accusing me of plagiarism and demanding that I give up painting & destroy my entire catalogue of work. :) In this life I cannot be offended... though I can certainly offend! I replied to the mail, saying that if I wanted a criticism I would have sent my work to a critic and not a small time gallery owner. I then repaid the galleries insult, by putting a link from my web-site to theirs. What that link is, is a big turd, and when anyone clicks on it they are directed to their gallery. Well I think this is hilarious, but the gallery are demanding I remove it and are threatening to sue me. I don’t think they stand a chance, though even if they do, the link will remain. We’ve been swapping almost daily insults since.... unbeknown to them that I have secretely been putting half the artworld in hidden copy. Sometimes I am too clever for my own good... this is my second fault.

Romanticism & French Smack

The first hint of spring came today. It arrived on the breeze like a welcome kiss. Oh, its too early to celebrate the warmer seasons, I know, but this afternoon brought just the tiniest hint of romance. Some things transport me back to magical times, times that never really existed, and the changing seasons are always one of those things. I remember afew years ago, renting the upstairs flat of a Victorian maisonette in Fulham, and on warm spring or summer mornings I would flush and scrub the wooden floorboards with cold soapy water. The sun would heat the wood and the most wonderful scents would rise up. I would sit, bare-footed at my writing desk, smoking and reading... drifting in and out of fantastic and obsessive daydreams. That is what spring is to me... it’s the doorway to unrequited sensations. Spring offers it all. I think this romanticism is one of my biggest problems.

Heroin is also a romance... a distorted, depraved and narcissistic romance. Heroin has a history, an image. It has literary and artistic connotations... it is all glorious until one IS heroin, then things rapidly change. Romance turns to reality and reality is a solitary, introverted chase for the drug. Heroin is also a statement... it is a silent scream... a subliminal advertisement for help. But above all, heroin is a slow death - it is the way non-suicidal people choose to kill themselves. Heroin is how I will kill myself... I've known this for many years. I think I’ve already done it.

But for all this, I cannot come to criticise the drug. I honestly believe that if it were not for heroin I would already be dead. This is something that someone who has never had this addiction can never understand – the addicts lack of regret. I have seen junkies riddled by HIV or bloated and jaundiced by hepatitis singing the drugs praises. Their regret is not the drug, it is getting turned onto the needle. You must understand, death gets in the way of one’s habit... it is a permanent detour from the next shot... a permanent release from the pain. Death is neither welcome nor wanted. It is not suicidal depression that troubles the heroin addict... it is something else, something that I cannot yet explain.

* * * *

Today I will have to leave Lyon to score. This place is not like London with 10 or 20 dealers to each square mile. No, here you’ll be lucky if there are 10 dealers in trhe entire city.... it is very often that one cannot find anything. The only time this happened in London was during the war in Afghanistan. American troops on the border interrupted the usual drug routes and there was nothing on the streets for nearly two weeks. As you can imagine most junkies were anti-war! That drought went on in different manifestations for months – either low quality gear, or increased prices and smaller bags. In Lyon it is always like that. The other difference here is the wait. It can take up to six hours to score. In London you are doing badly if it takes 30 minutes. In France, the addict learns very quickly the importance of methodone as a backup. The rehabilitation rules are very lax here, so almost every junkie has their own script. That includes me... my problem is I need twice as much as what i'm prescribed, so I have to buy the rest on the street. Anyway, for now I have a good backup supply so the fear of junk illness is not a worry - that allows life to flow smoothly.