Addictions suck it up

ADDICTIONS

Last night a very surreal dream in which I was smoking marijuana and hiding from someone who wanted to steal my stash.

The last time I smoked marijuana was in the summer of 2005 when I was  taking radiation treatment for a lymphatic tumor they found when I had my major abdominal operation in 1997.

The radiation treatment had me starving beause anything I ate was immediately thrown up and even the smell of food nauseated me.

I was taking four treatments a week for six weeks. The young woman who was conducting the radiation treatment was also a blues fan and she had a quick look at my 8x10 portfolio and admired a picture of Gate Mouth Brown so I printed up ten off the three rolls of film I had for that artist and gave them to her.

On the next day when I came in for my treatmen she asked me for a film can and filled with UBC's finest.

It was a Tuesday and at 17:00 hrs., I was to stand in for Bud Osborn at our weekly poetry meeting. We all read the poems we had prepared and then I invited every one to my studio at 1067 Granville Street to have a toke.

I borrowed cigarette papers from the guy in the next studio who was stoned every day smoking at least six Jamaica sized joints per day.

I rolled three joints and we lit up and were soon giggling like idiots and getting the munchies when we fled the studio and gathered at a Burger King outlet and I wolfed down three Whoppers.

The downside of the whole situation was the 72 hour surreal nightmare where every thing seems to be in slow motion.

I haven't smoked a joint since and the only narcotics I've had are the Valium soup they give you when you go for a colonoscapy and assorted pain killers prescribed by my GP. ( most of which have side effects worse than the original pain) Most GPs are merely pill pushers for Big Pharrma.

I have beaten my two main addiction, alcohol and tobacco, for many years now.

In the Hood there is a rash of fatal ODs from a synthetic opiodes and every day there is another body in the street who isn't going to make it.

Most of the addicts started out from drugs prescribed by their Doctors.

Something similar happened to me when I was in the Armed Forces

I went in for a knee operation on my left leg. My kneecap was removed and the three ligaments were repaired (an eight hour operation) and the pain killer prescribed was Darvon twice  a day, the drug was supposed to be non-addictive but it was.

I was let out of hospital for 45 days of sick leave and physio therapy and no follow up with the Darvon, I had a two week withdrawal session which I sure wasn't prepared for.

At a certain level pain and stress are nature's way of letting you know that you are still alive so suck it up,  stay calm, and carry on.

JWL