MARKET FOR DRUG TREATMENT REMAINS STRONG

A MAN NAMED Robert pulled up next to me on a courthouse bench to tell
how he got into a fight with a guy in front of Lexington Market and
wound up at Central Booking and, while going through intake, a surly
corrections officer threw away Robert's weekend, take-home supply of
methadone.

I was sympathetic about the methadone. I don't know why anyone would
deprive a recovering heroin addict of that medication, even while
incarcerated. We wouldn't deprive him of insulin if he were a
diabetic, would we?

But, that point aside, as I listened to more of Robert's story, I
found my sympathy waning. After his brief stint in jail, where did he
go? He went back to Lexington Market. What did he find there? More
trouble. He found "hoppers who wanted to beat me up," drug addicts
who wanted to exact revenge for Robert's role in the earlier
fisticuffs.

As I listened to Robert tell the story -- the next part was about how
he got a knife and stuck it in his gym bag for protection and some
teen-age fink saw him and reported the concealed weapon to police --
my mind wandered to the gorgeous fresh fish display at Faidley's.

And the fried clams and steamed shrimp at the Crab Pot.

And the stacks of fried chicken and western fries.

And the incredible array of Asian food at too many stalls to mention,
and the mounds of produce and cold fruit salad. I thought of the
devil's-food cake at Muhly's, and the perfectly roasted turkeys
inside glass cases.

I thought of all that's great and good about Lexington Market, and
how it's a shame that guys like Robert cannot visit the place without
incident. Or find a good book and go read it in a park somewhere. Or
find a job that would occupy more of their time. Or, at the very
least, buy a lunch -- say, the $2.80 lo mein and teriyaki chicken
special I found in the Lexington Market arcade the other day -- and
take it elsewhere.

Sigh.

All easier said.

Drug addicts rarely manage to seek, find and keep steady employment.
The ones who get into treatment find the passage from addiction to
recovery difficult, with jobs hard to secure, friends from the old
life clinging, and relapse always a threat. Until the passage to new
life is complete, and recovering addicts find work and adequate
housing, a lot of the old hoppers are limited to roaming the city
streets, and seeing way too much of each other. Bad things happen as
a result, and men such as Robert, who keep returning to old haunts
and keep messing up, make it harder for the rest of us to enjoy
certain places, such as Lexington Market.

Still, Robert's sordid story aside, things are a lot better around
the market than they were just a few years ago -- just as it's also
true that thousands more Baltimoreans are getting treatment for drug
addiction. There is a connection. There is hope.

I keep returning to this theme -- clean up the drug addiction and you
save the city -- but there's nothing, day by day in Baltimore, that
seems more true or more constant.

As for Robert, I offer my consolation on what happened to your
take-homes. But, please, for your own sake, and the sake of all who
hold Baltimore dear, get a new life.