Scrambled-Eggs (Smothered and Covered) and an Addiction to Coca-Cola

I was planning on making one really huge post, but it was in the middle of lunch and the hunger-bug bit me so I clipped, posted it, and went and got something to eat.

So. . . if you want to read about Canal Street, it's down below this mess, but be warned - it's the same crap that I posted on the Orchard. So, if you read it there you probably don't need to read it here.

anyhooo. . . . .

Saturday I woke up expecting to do pretty much nothing all day long. GMoney and I hung around the house, watched the Buckeyes kick ass, and drank some wine. Around seven we decided to call up Kevin, this kid we've been hanging out with lately and Chica's upstairs neighbor. Kevin answers his phone and he and GMoney talk for a minute, but then the conversation just ends -- pretty abrupt. "Eh," says I, "what's Kevin up to?"

To which GMoney calmly replies, "Well, he broke his back in three places, put a gash in his head and is laid up in the hospital for the time being." And that's all we knew -- for the time being. Personally, I felt bewildered. I had only recently started to hang out with Kevin, and so I didn't know his personality all that well, but I had experienced a little tingle in the back of my head from time to time when talking to him (I like to call it my bull-shit detector) Yes, I thought Kevin was probably a bit of a habitual liar -- a lot of people are. I know because I used to be one of them. So, I tell G that I don't know what's going on, but if K-dog was just blowing us off he probably would have come up with a little better story than that and that he must really be hurt.

A little later on GMoney gets a call back from Kevin and they talk for a minute. Gary says that he and I will be over to visit, somtime tomorrow, and that's that. But as of now we get the full(er) story. As it turns out it, wasn't just a seizure and a fall down a flight of stairs that caused Kevin's swift demise, but cocaine and a whole lotta that.

**I'd like to take a moment from this story to tell you another. I've lost a good friend to coke. It's not a fun drug (not like drugs are fun) and I've seen it mess up a few people's lives. This kind of habit is the kind that makes theives out of honest people, and destitution out of abundance. The only thing it knows how to do is rape, steal, and kill.**

So, we go. And we hang out with Kevin. And the story changes at least three times in the course of an hour and a half. Of course, he's on a lotta pain medication, and muscle relaxers, and sleep inducers, and anti-inflammatories. So he's pretty much only half there, half of the time. But, it's apparent that Kevin has a bit of a problem. I mean when I asked him if he was going to do cocaine any more, he shrugged his shoulders and muttered "I dunno." After a seizure, three fractures, and splitting his head open he's not sure if he wants to give up coke. It infuriates me.

But I can't leave just him lie there. It's a BPD, you know? My heart too often trumps what my good sense is telling me, which in this case is "leave this shit to someone else, because it'll find some way of pulling you down too." Kevin needs help, but it doesn't necessarily have to come from this bleeding heart. But, like I said before, I can't. I can't leave him lying there, bleeding to death on the cracked pavement.

So, I've seen the kid every day now for the last few days. He's in good spirits and has a decent range of mobility. But I really think that he's going about the whole thing pretty loosey-goosey. He's not really paying any attention to what the doctors and physical therapists told him - moving around too much, not wearing the back brace nearly enough. But he did flush what he had left of the white monster. I watched it go down the drain and a little ball of hope sprung up inside of me.

. . . .sometimes I feel trapped in my compassion for others.
I'm often glad that I am.

-d.