Tuesday, August 02, 2005

Johnny 99

On Friday I ended up losing what was a fairly important post to me - for a number of reasons. This on top of what turned out to be a stupendously awful day was the proverbial straw. I stayed away from my computer all weekend. I was angry and feeling spiteful. Hated that stupid inanimate object. I am now back at work and am now typing this post in notepad and will save it periodically so if I do end up losing some of it, it will hopefully be not much of a loss. God bless cut and paste.

What prompted me to get my own journal is quite beyond me but I am so glad that I did. Then for someone who has kept uncountable secrets over the last twenty years to suddenly write about them so publicly is again another mystery but one which I have found refreshingly liberating. In many ways I still feel that this journal is part of my private personna anyway but it is actually reaching the point where I don’t think that it would bother me to be “found out”. I mean I am certainly not going to go to any extremes to be “caught” but I don’t think that I would be as shattered as I used to think I would be if someone were to discover my “dirty little secret”. More than anything I think that I am tired of bowing to society’s whims.. Why is this such a “dirty little secret” anyway? I think that society as a whole would be quite surprised to discover that there are junkies out there that by no means are even close to the perceived stereotype. This place more than anything has convinced me of this. So many educated, well spoken, erudite individuals that for whatever reason are caught up in this lifestyle. I feel part of a charmed, if not somewhat battered and bruised, group of people.

Now all of the above being said and cutting right to the chase, I found my private personna staring my public personna right in the eyes on Friday evening. For a brief moment they became one and now, because of circumstance, will probably find it difficult existing seperate from one another ever again. I got arrested for possession of a controlled substance and had the pleasure of spending two and a half hours sitting in a jail cell. Never in my wildest dreams did I think that this could ever occur to me. Why? I am not really sure. Arrogance, I suppose but no other real rational reason. As the officer said to me “Just think of the number of times that you were never caught’” No truer words have ever been spoken. Me believing that my public personna overshadowed my private never considered the possibility of an arrest. How wrong was I?

I feel somewhat humbled and shamed by all of this to be honest but what better place than here to try to come to terms with everything that happened a few days ago. It was a normal Friday evening or so I thought. I had a quick errand to run around 10pm so I dashed out of the house and jumped in the truck. Richey had to strip the carpet out of one of our rental units because one of our elderly tenants had had a heart attack early this week. After he had finished stripping all of the carpet he threw it into the back of the bed of the truck. There was barely enough to even reach up to the sides of the bed of the truck but on Friday evening when I was pulled over that is the reason the officer used for stopping me. Hmmm? I figured that I was in trouble the moment I was stopped because my license is currently under suspension but I had no idea what turn this event was about to take. First of all, there was absolutely no question as to the safety of my load nor was there a remote suggestion of me speeding, driving improperly or anything actually. I think that I got pulled over because I loan my truck to one of my dealers and she has been pulled over a few times in it and this cop just happened to recognize my truck so…No doubt in my mind this young fellow was itching for a promotion too. I could practically taste it.

So anyway, he says why he is stopping me, asks for my ownership and insurance and returns to his vehicle. A few minutes later he asks me to step out of the truck and to empty all of my pockets. OK…kind of confused at this point but I will play along. Nothing in my pockets so he starts sifting through stuff on my front seat. I ask him if he is allowed to do this and he says that he is if I am arrested. I ask him if I was arrested cause he never mentioned anything to me. He then asks me what I know about guns in this city and I reply absolutely nothing. This is the truth. He asks if I do drugs and I responded that I had done drugs before. He asked if I had anything on me right now and I said no cause I didn’t think that I did but as further searching of my truck would discover there was a glasses case with a syringe and a baggie with what looked like speed in the glove box. Not mine but that does not matter apparently. Now he had me with possession. I wanted to scream that this wasn’t really me, that my public personna would never get arrested…no, not the PTA Mom character…I couldn’t do it cause I did deserve to get nailed. I do use drugs and have used continually for the last 20 years and by shear luck have managed to escape the longarm of the law so to speak.

Anyway this cop continued to search but didn’t find anything else but what he found was enough to earn me a visit downtown. Now he was awfully nice and said that I wouldn’t have to stay the night, just the length of time that it took to process my paperwork. OK, fine I suppose. On our drive to the station, he pulls over into a parking lot and turns to me and says that there could be a way that these charges could just disappear if I kniew what he meant. I said that I did but as I was in enough trouble tonight, I didn’t feel like getting anyone else in any additional trouble. He kept asking me about my dealer that borrows my truck like how much product would she normally keep in the house, etc. He asked me about a few other people whose names I recognized but really couldn’t be of any help and why? Because I worked so hard at separating my private and public personna!!!

Anyway after what seemed liked an eternity I was released. I think in total the whole experience took about three hours. I was pretty shattered after all was said and done and I now have an appointment with the judge at the end of September plus I am not to be in possession of any drugs or paraphernalia. Surprisingly enough I didn’t get charged with driving under suspension which is such a big relief actually but I am no longer tempting my fate and have not driven all weekend and in fact until I go and get my license back and not going to drive. You have no idea how tough this is actually - almost worse than kicking dope I think. Obviously I can no longer be so carefree with the contents of my purse. The nice officers were effective in scaring me believe you me. I think that the whole thing still seems really kind of fishy but maybe that is just paranoia. I don’t know.

OK so here I be. Feeling very embarrassed and somewhat ashamed but also confident that I am among (new) friends who will not judge but who will be there with an encouraging word or thought. Thanks to all who took the time to read this.

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