Whitney Houston: 1963-2012

I saw the 'breaking news' about Whitney Houston's death on the News page at WNYC.org, my local NPR station.  I felt--well; I felt many emotions.  But the immediate sensation, other than terrible sadness, was a powerful sense of deja vu--December 26, 2004.  I was home alone, and I logged on to the NYT early in the morning to the breaking news that a Tsunami had hit SE Asia.  As the minutes and hours passed, my knowledge of the magnitude of the event grew--really, the best analogy for the ever-growing amount of images and information might be "like a Tsunami"--but I always remember that brief period when all I knew was the essential fact of the event, and I had a little time to think about what it meant using only my own images, my own vocabulary. And so it was yesterday.  Just the headline off the AP news feed: "Whitney Houston, deat at 48." I was alone in my apartment.  A quick trip to my go-to news sources added nothing to the stark headline.  I knew what was coming--the headlines, the appreciations, the laments, the links to You-Tube videos, the whole 24-hour news cycle treatment.  I was so grateful, I guess is the word, for the chance to reflect in peace and send a message of thanks and farewell to her spirit.  The urge to make assumptions about the cause and circumstances of her death is so powerful.  I have been--I AM--a drug addict.  Believe me--there is nothing that you can say to an addict that they haven't said to themselves--on some level self-destruction may be the goal, but it is rarely the target we are aiming for.  We are chasing peace.  Quiet. Pleasure. Escape. We know that self-destruction is part of the price we pay, and we think...what?  I don't know what anyone else thinks, I only know what I thought.  That I was different.  That I would stop in time.  That I could manage it.  It looks, for now, like I was right.  But I might easily have been wrong.  I survived.  Whitney Houston didn't.  But please--show her the respect she deserves:  keep your judgments to yourself.  Yes--she seemed to have almost every gift imaginable. Why would she throw it all away?  Because she had to.  Because she had a hole in her heart that her talent, her wealth, her fame couldn't fill.  I spend a lot of time with people of enormous privilege.  For a long time, I saw their problems as "trivial".  But we can't judge.  Each of us experiences our life through our own eyes, and each of suffers our own trials and burdens.  I've lost the thread here, but it makes me so angry to read the hundreds of people who are compelled to criticize Whitney or her family & friends rather than simply mourn the tragedy of her death.  She shared the glorious, incredible gift of her voice with the world.  We should be grateful.  And we should mourn her death.  And that's all we have the right to do.  To judge in ignorance is disrespectful and unkind--at any time.  To do so in the aftermath of her death is pointless and cruel.

Rest in Peace, Whitney.

Crystal/Clear

After years of use--including many years of daily use--I've rid myself of the Dirty White Bitch.  (You know who She is...  Check the title of the blog...)  I quit in June of this past year.  Cold Turkey.  If you haven't experienced it yourself, trust me when I tell you that there is no "tapering off" with this one.  I had a friend back then--a very bright guy, with a PhD and everything--who had a perfectly rational and well-reasoned theory about quitting "in stages".  "After all," he used to say "I didn't start out smoking an 8-ball a day.  My use ramped up over time.  And it's unrealistic to think that I can give it up all at once.  I have to  'ramp down'."  Except, of course, that you can never 'ramp down'.  I will leave the chemistry and physiology explanations to others:  suffice it to say that your brain will not let you taper off.  As long as you're using Crystal, you are--slowly or quickly--increasing your use.  Your brain demands it.

So--I quit.

And now I'm a former addict.  A former addict with an attitude problem.  I don't like 12-step programs.  A lot.  I've always not liked 12-step programs, in theory.  When I became a candidate for participation, I began to not like them in practice.  When you are mired in your addiction, however, disliking 12-step programs has a whiff of self-delusional rationalization to it.  Air your grievances, say, about the relentlessly judgemental nature of the whole enterprise, carp about how insanely counterproductive you feel it is that participants can 'forfeit' days, weeks or years of sobriety if they take a mis-step, and you open yourself to the smug, knowing smile, the smug shake of the head--"Well--you're a drug addict.  Of course you find fault with the faultless, life-saving wonders of the glorious 12-step system."

But I'm not here to condemn CMA (Crystal Meth Anonymous) or 12-step programs in general.  I mean, I DO condemn them for certain things, which I expect I will focus on in future posts.  At the same time, however, I recognize certain constituent components of the 12-step system that I think are commendable.  In fact, it is the 12-step notion of "sharing"--periodically telling one's story and un-burdening oneself of one's doubts, fears, thoughts, etc.--that led me to sit down and blog.  As a devout and regular non-attendee of CMA meetings, I have no regular opportunity to "share".   There are a (very) few acquaintances from my Crystal Days (kudos to me for not ever referring to them as my "Crystal Daze") with whom I still speak, and there are an even smaller number of friends who were waiting for me when I left my Crystal Days behind me.   I can only share so much with any of them, but I can share it all with the blogosphere.

My Name is Nate.  And I'm a Crystal Meth Addict.  ("Hi Nate!!!")