dragged... (Part 31)

                 My Name Is…

How in the hell did I get to this place in my life?  My father was a hardworking man who slaved away at two jobs to make sure that we had a roof over our heads, food on the table, and cloths on our backs.  We may not have had all of the extras, but we certainly had everything we needed and Christmas was always magical for us kids.  I was the oldest of three children; I had younger brother named, Avery and a sister named Detria.  They were both alive and doing well, though I hadn’t talked to either of them in over five years.   Moms died when we were in our teen years and it pushed our old man over the edge. 

When you lose your soul mate, it cripples your spirit and something dies in you; he was a perfect example of that for me. From what I understand, she died of a brain aneurism.  He woke up one morning and she was laying there in the bed, ice cold, beside him and he howled for over an hour in anguish over the loss.  We were old enough to know what had taken place, but still too young to understand the ramifications of her early death.  The day they covered her coffin with dirt was the same day that he died – we didn’t know it right away, but mentally, he was shot. 

Between the excessive boozing, reckless gambling, and relentless skirt chasing is where we fit into his life and you could imagine that, with all of that activity, we were no longer the apples of his eye…no, we became the thorn in his side and he used to tell it to is repeatedly – and we got a triple does if he was drunk.  After eight solid years of abuse, his frail body eventually gave out on him and he died in the same bed that she did; I was the one who found him.  He was lying on his stomach, with an assortment of liquor bottles spewed about the room.  The tramp that was with him when he died had nerve to try and cash in on our misfortune by claiming that they were married. 

My father’s brother, Marvin McNair, attorney at law, stopped the trifling heifer dead in her tracks and she scurried out of our lives after he threatened to have her ass hauled off to jail.  This was after she had shacked up in our home for a month after his death.  She even tried to play the distraught widow at the funeral and my Aunts, Cousins, and other relatives almost beat her ass down at the cemetery.  I tell you, it was then that part of me died.  As hard as uncle Marvin tried to make those teen years normal for the three of us, it was futile. 

The day I turned twenty one, I hauled ass and had disappeared off the family’s radar for over nine years.  Thanks to my boy Nick, my uncle Marvin was now back in the picture and when he laid eyes on my ravaged appearance, it knocked him to his knees.  “My brother’s baby boy, what has life done to you?” he asked, tears streaming down his face, looking up at me from his kneeling position. 

I shot Nick an icy stare and mouthed the words “How could you allow him to see my like this?”

He shrugged his shoulders in a helpless manner, and I knew that I really hadn’t left him any choice.  I cradled my uncle by the back of his head, looking up into the sky, and I felt embarrassed.  When I fled from home back then I was fleeing to find my fortune and make a name for me in this world but, instead, I wound up with an unhealthy appetite for Cocaine, booze, and drag queens.  I couldn’t blame anyone for the predicament I wound up in except for myself. 

I had been lucky this time, coming out of my binge with only a large bump on the back of my head and a bruised ego.  In a matter of weeks I had gone from this suave, debonair, slick dressed cat, to a shabbily dressed junkie, in need of a bath and some serious drying out and, little did I know it that was the exact plan that my uncle had for me.  I didn’t know it right off, but we were standing in a strip-mall parking lot which was also the site for an anonymous Twelve-Step Meeting.

“Let’s go in now,” My uncle suggested, rising to his feet, and taking me by the hand. 

“Go in?  Go in where?” I asked, defensively. 

“A safe place for you to begin the healing process,” Nick said. 

“Healing process?  Oh, hell no, I know you don’t think that I’m getting ready to go to one of those meetings where you stand up in front of total strangers and tell all of your dirty little secrets…please tell me that’s not what you’re asking me to do,” I said, stopping in my tracks.

“You’re as sick as your secrets, nephew.  Instead of dealing with your emotions back when your father passed, you ran away from them, and now look at you…a handsome young man, with so much life still to live, following in the footsteps of your father, and I would hate to see you fall off like that…he gave up Maddox…are you trying to give up too?” He asked me, taking my hand affectionately. 

I was so overwhelmed with past and present emotions until it felt like I was about to pass out.  I started making a strange howling noise, similar to the one my dad had made when he was in the room with my mother’s body.  I was grieving, finally, but I didn’t realize that I was doing it; the only thing I knew is that I was out of character and I didn’t like feeling that vulnerable. 

“Nick, you were supposed to be my boy…you contacted my uncle and now look at him…he is so upset and my family didn’t need any more hurt, nigga…they didn’t need any more pain, nigga… how could you? HOW COULD YOU?” I asked him, turning away from my uncle and walking over to him. 

I grabbed him by his shirt collar, “How could you let him see me like this, I’ll kill you!” I swore out loud. 

“I didn’t do this to you, bro, you did it to yourself,” Nick told me, grabbing my arms and removing them from his person. 

In all of the commotion, a small crowd had started gathering around us, but before it could turn into an all out scene, the doorway where the anonymous meeting was taking place swung open, and this tall, white, man wearing gold, wire-rimmed glasses appeared in the doorway, smiling.  "This is where the healing begins, my friend, are you ready for the challenge?” He asked.

I looked at him thinking to myself, “Who in the fuck is this freak, and why, out of all the people standing there, would he be asking me if I were ready for a challenge?” I was beside myself. 

“He’s a friend of mine,” my uncle confessed.  

“I told him about you and he wants to take you under his wing, be your sponsor, let him help you, Maddox,” my uncle said, putting his arms around me, walking me over to the doors of the meeting. 

When I got a peek inside I saw people of various races and sizes; some were dressed in business suits, others were dressed similar to me, and some looked flat out homeless. Once I had gotten a hold of my senses and had taken a gander at the occupants in the room, I decided to put my best foot forward and try.  

Nick and my uncle were at my side, and both took a seat on opposite sides of me. I suppose that we had arrived  at the beginning of the meeting because there was a role call going on and when my turn came, I stood up and said, “My name is Maddox, and I am an alcoholic junkie”. 

I hoped that this would be the beginning of a new life for me. 

Elixir, where are you baby? I asked myself, but did I really need to be wasting any energy on trying to salvage anything other than my own life?  I suppose time would tell…

I shifted my train of thought, sat back in my chair, and listened to various ones tell their stories of how alcohol and drugs had destroyed their lives.

“…when the state took away my three babies…I knew I had reached the bottom…” this one, full figured, brown sistah said. 

“…I prostituted myself for drugs and alcohol…” this young, Latin, male said.  I knew he was young, but the harsh scars of time were on his face and he looked rough. 

“…after delivering my baby in a hotel bathroom, still dripping with blood from between my legs, all I asked for was the crack pipe…I knew things had to change…” this fairly attractive, gaunt looking, white woman said. 

Testimony after testimony…

Confession after horrifying confession…

I realized that I could wind up in all of those places that they had been, and I was determined to get a handle on my addiction before it got a handle on me…

I am Maddox McNair, drug addict/alcoholic…