Eternal numb-shine of the cracked-out mind

Addicts are always looking to forget themselves.

Ever wake up and find yourself a little confused? Like, you don’t know where you are, or even who you are.

Most of us manage to retrieve our factory settings in just a moment or two. But for some reason, crack smokers can have particular difficulty in accessing their identity after emerging from sleep mode.

About a year ago, while ‘vacationing’ with a couple of crack-smoking associates in Niagara Falls, I lost my default settings. I had rented a room, as a space to get high and exalt in each other’s fake friendship.

But only a couple of hours in, I begged the innkeeper for a second room. It turns out getting very high in a very small room with a couple of pseudo-strangers is more difficult than you might imagine.

The second room turned out to be such a relief from their company, I immediately fell asleep on the couch.

A sudden knock on the door nearly sent me tumbling to the floor.

Who could that be, I wondered.

But wait. There was something else.

Who could I be?

It’s true! I had no idea where I was, who was knocking at the door and WHO THE HELL WAS I?

Knock, knock.

I opened the door to a woman in a bathrobe with a lapsed dye job, angry sores around her mouth and a crack pipe.

“Hey,” she said, slipping past me. “Close the door!”

Still unable to process what was happening, I sat with her at the table.

She breathlessly explained that someone named “Cal” was making her uncomfortable and she left him in the room and wanted to hang out with me instead.

Okay, I thought. But who…?

“Can I have a toke?” she asked, pointing to some dope scattered on the table.

As she was loading her pipe, I regained a few snippets of my identity. I was definitely an addict. I had a fight with my mom recently. I think she kicked me out. I have a dog named Luna.

This recovered data filled me with sadness. I would have liked to cry. But the woman across the table was telling me something that seemed important — and I still didn’t know who she was.

“You know, Cal is planning to rob you, right?” the woman asked.

“Me? Why?”

“You trust me right?” she spoke through billowing smoke. “I don't lie or cheat.”

There was another knock on the door.

“Don’t get it,” the woman hissed.

“Who is it,” I whispered, terrified.

“It’s me, Cal,” came the voice at the door.

“Don't! Don't! Don't!” the woman shrieked.

“I can hear you,” the man at the door bellowed.

I peered into the peephole. One giant eyeball peered back at me.

BANG BANG.

I opened the door a crack.

“Get out of my way, jackass,” said a burly man with tiny eyes and low-hanging ear lobes.

A moment later, both strangers were sitting with me at the table — both stuffing their pipes to capacity.

My mind filled in a few more blanks. Cal was a homeless guy from Hamilton. And the woman, who hasn’t stopped talking? That’s Macey. I remember her from the alley too.

I had invited them on this little trip as a treat for us all. Crack smokers so rarely go on holiday.

I remembered too, that I really did get in a fight with my mother. It was bad.

Now, I’m a certified drug addict at a cheap motel with a couple of people pretending to be my friends. I remembered not to trust them.

Finally, I remembered to be sad.

I wished I hadn’t downloaded that last bit of data. If only I had set an earlier restore point — like one of those halcyon summers between school semesters.

Everything I remembered as being good in my life, from a mother’s love to a dog’s kisses to hope itself was gone, replaced with —

“Do you want this?” Macey interrupted, holding a pregnant pipe to my face.

Maybe it would help me forget again.

“Yeah.”

I could never manage a complete memory wipe. Or even a rewind. I just ended up making more bad memories that I was forever trying to purge.

At the time, that dingy hotel room seemed to be my whole life. Until, I found the courage to walk out the door, and go clean.

We’re all the sum of our memories. The bad ones don’t disappear. Instead, fresh memories grow around the dark patches.

There’s no ‘eternal numb-shine’ of a cracked-out mind. But it’s never too late to grow enough bright memories for a spectacular comb-over.