Please don't feed the crack smokers
Where the streets have no shame.
It’s a known fact that the older you get, the more you talk. It’s as if you have to narrate your own life for other people — who, of course, find it so very fascinating.
I’m sure some of it has to do with Death being a dreadful conversationalist. We make noise for the long silence to come.
But you can blow your talking gasket at any age. I’ve known people in their twenties, who can completely drain all of the oxygen from a room without breaking a sweat.
You know who else often suffers from a ruptured tongue regulator? That’s right. Your overly friendly neighborhood crack smoker.
And you know who often bears the brunt of our unseemly chattiness? Your friendly neighborhood convenience store clerk working the overnight shift. Ask my friend Salim, if he’s still around and hasn’t made good on his vows to go back to Syria.
My, did he ever get an earful whenever I paid a visit in the dead of night to pick up a couple of Freezies, a lighter and maybe a glass tube with a rose inside.
Salim’s world is a fantastical place for the crack smoker who comes in from out of the cold. Imagine aisle after aisle of choco-cream-sugar confections. There are fresh-cut melons, too, in case you get the demented craving for something healthy. The slushie machine chirps cheerfully. Come hither, whisper the gummy lips. And there’s the good Cap’n Crunch lording over the cereal section.
But the real destination is even more surreal — the front counter where Salim waits patiently for me to finish my appointed rounds. I’ll bring a few random artifacts to the counter, but it’s strictly a formality. I came here to talk him to death.
He used to be a tank mechanic in Iraq. But his heart is with his wife and a trio of children in Syria. Could he ever save enough to bring them here? And how would they all fit in the single, bug-infested room he rents on the edge of town? No, better for him to get back to Syria. Even if there’s still a lot of fighting, and his brother-in-law lost a leg to a landmine. It’s all very interesting, and he must be terribly lonesome, but it’s my time to shine. So I’ll ask him about the new air fresheners sold at the counter.
“Do they work on marijuana smoke?” I ask cautiously. I think Febreze has left me with a permanent wheeze.
“Sure, my friend,” he says with a wink. “Everything.”
The doorbell might interrupt us. Another junkie might be floating through. Salim and I will fall into silence, as the newcomer haunts an aisle or two. Probably just happy to have the night at his back. Salim and I will stare up at the security monitors. While we’re waiting, he might graciously point out that my pants are on backwards.
The visiting crack smoker might try to horn in on our conversation too. But we give him the silent treatment. I’ll even pay for his gummy worms, just to hurry him along.
When we’re alone again, it’s non-stop chatter. We talk about everything you could imagine, except of course, the obvious — why there might be a jittery, wide-eyed man standing at the counter at 4 am with his pants on backwards.
Well, I must be going, I say eventually. I’ve been away from the pipe too long. Better get back to it.
“Why do you do it?” he asked once.
“Do what?” I was already backing towards the door. I didn’t want this conversation and it was obvious. So we just left it at that. Maybe we’d talk about life’s other landmines next time.
On the walk back to the shambles that was my rented room, I dodge all sorts of shapes and shadows. “Hey!” comes a shout from the back alley. I pick up the pace. Some straggler is always looking to babble wildly. Vacant eyes look up at me from a bench as I pass. Given half a chance, these junkies would talk me to the morning light. I’d probably be into it too, but I have promises to keep and miles to go before I sleep.
It was only much later, when I got clean, that I understood why old people, deranged youth and crack smokers talk so much. It’s not the aging, the deranging, or the drugging. It’s the loneliness. Days and days of not talking to anyone. And when you finally find a willing ear, you unleash a torrent of inner thoughts — not realizing that many of them have gotten old and quite moldy.
Some people don’t like talking to junkies. They’re always in too much of a hurry for them. In early recovery, I passed them by too, but only from a sense of survival. Heaven knows where those conversations could have led.
Mostly, they’re dehumanized. You’ll always pretend to listen to an oldtimer telling you about the fish he caught back in ‘78. It’s the respectful thing to do. Not so much the crack smoker. We’re conditioned to pretend they’re invisible. Pretending they exist is too much trouble for what it’s worth. All they want from us is money. So what? It’s only a buck or two. But I’ll wager nothing is more valuable than an acknowledgment of humanity.
Thank goodness for the kindly overnight storekeepers of the world. The men and women who happen to be, in that very moment, just as lonely as us.