A CRACK ADDICT TELLS WHAT THE DRUG DOES FOR HER

In preparing a follow-up to my interview with a crack dealer, I sat down
over the course of a few different days with several addicts to try to
understand what their lives were like. The answer? Pretty bleak. The central
theme of their lives is struggle. The all-consuming has consumed them. They
are locked into this Sisyphean task, forever rolling stones uphill and
chasing them back down for the amusement of their particular god.

The dealer I interviewed earlier was right; the fact that these dramas
aren't being piped into your house on "Must See Thursdays" is a huge
financial mistake for the networks. This is "Survivor: Lost In America,"
"The Great Race," "Cops," and "Days of Our Lives" meets "Friends" in hell.
This is what reality TV should be. At least we'd be learning something
useful about ourselves as a species. This is the hunter-gatherer at work: a
nomadic group of people who follow their quarry as it migrates from dealer
to dealer with the police in constant pursuit. Forget about extreme sports;
if you want see somebody truly living on the edge, you don't have to drive
far. They say that using drugs will make you paranoid, but if you use drugs,
then odds are somebody really is out to get you. For these people the worst
enemy is within. I'll call the subject of this interview "Jane Doe."

Flagpole: Do your parents know you use?

Jane Doe: Yeah. They haven't ever seen me, but they know.

FP: How do they feel about it?

JD: They hate it. My mom, she understands more than she used to. Which is...
cool, y'know. I'm pretty honest with my mom. She don't like it at all,
y'know, and she preaches to me about how I need to quit. It's hard to
explain it to her, 'cause it sounds real easy when she tells me what to do,
but it ain't. It's just one of those things.

FP: Whom do you admire?

JD: I admire my mom, because she's always... she's just always so good!
She's worked hard all her life, and like, when she set a goal she'd go and
she'd do it. When she starts a job or a project or something, she's full
force into it and you know she's gonna do it, and she takes care of her
family. "I was born with a silver spoon in my mouth: it took my spoon, it
took my children, my husband, my home, my driver's license, my car, my
VCRs."

FP: How much does your habit cost?

JD: You mean money-wise? [Laughs] It's cost me a lot lately, more than
monetary. Some days it's different: some days $20 or $30, sometimes $200 or
$300 a day. It costs you more than money, though. It costs you emotionally.
Personally.

FP: What is the emotional cost?

JD: Everything. It can amount to life if you let it. A few years ago, I
would've never guessed I'd be where I am now. I try to tell myself, if I get
to thinking too much on it, I try to tell myself that everything happens for
a reason, but I just don't see any reason here. I also tell myself that at
least I've never been to jail. Being on drugs is like prison. It's just a
prison within yourself. And I don't hurt people, or the only person I hurt
is myself.

FP: What has crack cocaine cost you?

JD: I've lost my pride, my self-respect, my dignity... I grew up around
people who loved me, and it took everything they had built up in me or
invested in me, and everything I had made of myself. I was born with a
silver spoon in my mouth: it took my spoon, it took my children, my husband,
my home, my driver's license, my car, my VCRs.

FP: So, you've lost everything.

JD: I've lost a lot; I've almost lost myself. I don't figure no gain in it.
This is ground zero. I can't understand why I keep going back to it. It's
the nature of the drug, I guess... the nature of the beast. I don't know
what I've gained other than a life experience, which in a way is a good
thing, I guess.

FP: Do you want to quit?

JD: Part of me wants to quit, but then that devil's in you, telling you,
"Oh, just a little bit more." I know I need to; I want to. I want to for the
future, cause I know I ain't never gonna have shit and be truly at peace if
I don't.

FP: Where do you see yourself in five years?

JD: I wanna be working, be at a steady job for once, have a normal life you
know? See my kids finish school.

FP: And be off drugs?

JD: [quietly] Yeah.

FP: Is it worth it?

JD: No! Hell no! A lot of people say they're chasing that ultimate hit, or
people think you're trying to fill some hole you got in you, but I don't
think that's it. I don't feel loved by it or nothing. A lot of times to me
it just seems like an anesthetic, or a way to just put off reality for a
while. I don't have to feel other things. When I smoke, I'm away from all
that, but for that it's not worth what it does to you. But your conscience
don't bother you much when you're high. It's a self-medication technique,
and even the chase is part of the need you're satisfying.

FP: How does your habit affect your self-esteem?

JD: Chops it down like an ax! I used to shoot up cocaine, but the pipe is
worse. People think shooting up is the worst, but crack has done more to
destroy me.

FP: How do you feel about your suppliers?

JD: All of 'em ain't bad, but you got a lot of young punk-ass motherfuckers
that are just cutthroats. It's all just greed and money to them, and they
don't have a heart.

FP: Do you feel like they're taking advantage of you?

JD: You take advantage of yourself. They ain't got no pistol to your head.
You can't blame nobody but yourself.

FP: How do you feel about the police?

JD: They all right when they just doing their job, but you got some of 'em
that try to be superman, and a lot of 'em are crooked as hell, but all
police are different. Personally, I've always had good experiences with the
police; they've helped me, even when they had every right to lock me up.
They know we use; they have friends and loved ones and family that use, too.

FP: Should it be legalized?

JD: No. I feel differently about marijuana; it should be legal, but cocaine?
No.

FP: Do you think it being illegal makes it harder to get?

JD: [laughing] No! If you got the money, I can get it in five minutes, day
or night. Mind you, sometimes it is a job, a job and an adventure! You got
to deal with wives and neighbors, flexers in the yard [a flexer sells fake
drugs], young punk-ass motherfuckers! [Laughs].

FP: What is a reasonable penalty for possession?

JD: If you're an addict, I think a reasonable penalty is something to help
you with your addiction, because over half of the crimes that people are in
jail for are associated with addiction. It's a battle for hearts and minds,
not guns and life sentences. We got to get to the root of the problem, to
the person's heart, and help them overcome addiction. They don't care
whether it's legal or not, 'cause they're following their addiction. The war
on drugs should not be a war on us, on people. It should be a war on simply
the drug. You must differentiate, because everybody's got an addict in their
family. Everybody knows someone with a dependency problem, whether it be
drugs, alcohol, gambling, sex - in some cases even religion.

FP: What is a reasonable penalty for sales?

JD: I don't know, because it's their life. A lot of them people, it's all
they know and it's the only way they can survive. That's their survival
mechanism like the addiction is ours, in a way. Everybody's different, so I
couldn't determine that.

FP: How do you feel about the drug war/policy in America?

JD: They're bringing it in here, why are they fighting it?

FP: Is it something you think other people should try?

JD: Hell no!

FP: Why not?

JD: Because it's dangerous. When I first heard about it I never thought I
would end up in the position I'm in, and I've seen a lot of my friend's
lives just go to shit because of it... a lot of family... I don't know what
it is... they put something in it.

FP: Do you think we should be more open in talking about drugs and addiction
with our children?

JD: I never would have tried crack cocaine if I knew how serious it was. My
ideas about drugs were very naive. I smoked pot; I took acid, and I knew
that it was not something that could overcome me. So when I tried cocaine, I
thought, "Hey, it's all good." I didn't recognize that my savings would be
depleted and that my marriage would be wrecked and that my children would be
taken.

FP: What goes through your mind when you see a first-time user buying or
doing it?

JD: I've only seen that one time, and I got my ass kicked for fighting so
hard to keep these guys from letting a girl try it. She was a young girl. I
fought hard, too. I don't know. I couldn't believe those sons of bitches
were gonna just give her... I mean they see what addiction does to people! I
begged her, "Don't do it! Don't even try it! If I can save you the pain and
suffering that I went through... " but she did it anyway. It was horrible.

FP: And yet you endorse dealing?

JD: Not to no new person. All the people that I deal with I've known for
years, and they're gonna do it anyway. I don't promote crime, other than
that I know it's illegal, but as an addict, I'm gonna use. I think that
essentially, if you're selling the poison, you should sell it with the
warning label on it: "This is a highly addictive drug. I'll help you out,
but you gotta hear the lecture first."

FP: Some people aren't so idealistic.

JD: No, some people don't love their neighbor.

FP: What would you like to tell the world?

JD: Don't be naive about experimenting with something as serious as this. If
our generation avoided this, then the next one will be better off. We pass
it down environmentally and genetically. As far as addiction goes, if you've
got an alcoholic or an addict parent or grandparent, the cards are stacked
against you. You're just waiting to trigger disease, an actual disease, a
chemical imbalance in your brain that will set you off for life. Recognize
life can be so much better and more peaceful with realness in it, rather
than altering your mood with chemicals: drugs, drinking, anything.

FP: Is there a solution?

JD: Love.

FP: Is there anything you think is misunderstood?

JD: Society seems to think that if you do drugs, if you use crack, you're a
bad person. Obviously not all people who do it are bad; there's a lot of
good people that do it. It's not about good and bad, it's about sick or
healthy. The world needs to know that love covers a multitude of sins --
that's mine and yours. And if you genuinely try to find something good about
everybody and love them, then you will learn from every single person: crack
heads, retarded people, crazy people, the people you don't like - who just
get on your nerves right away.

If you look, you might find something there, and then you try to work with
that to love them through -- whatever -- and to make yourself a lovable
person. Because that's the only thing that's gonna keep me from killing my
brother, from hurting my brother and from allowing my brother to go hungry.
You know what I mean? I may not like you, but let me try to love you.