Got me a boat and went out to the lighthouse. Came pretty close to throwing myself off, I felt so rotten. Cried all day and night. Worst night of my life.
At night, from where we slept, as kids, we could watch the arc of the big light, intersecting with the signals from the other lighthouses. And in between there’d be stars, a million stars. All night long the boats would pass by. Whisper past like ghosts, rippling the water.
Unmanageable
In the deep dark night of the soul the liquor stores and bars are closed. She reached under the mattress; the pint bottle of vodka was empty. She got out of bed, stood up. She was shaking so badly that she sat down on the floor. She was hyperventilating. If she didn’t get a drink she would go into d.t.’s or have a seizure.
Trick is to slow down your breathing and your pulse. Stay as calm as you can until you can get a bottle. Sugar. Tea with sugar, that’s what they gave you in detox. But she was shaking too hard to stand. She lay on the floor breathing deep yoga breaths. Don’t think, God don’t think about the state you’re in or you will die, of shame, a stroke. Her breath slowed down. She started to read titles of books in the bookcase. Concentrate, read them out loud. Edward Abbey, Chinua Achebe, Sherwood Anderson, Jane Austen, Paul Auster, don’t skip, slow down. By the time she had read the whole wall of books she was better. She pulled herself up. Holding on to the wall, shaking so badly she could barely move each foot, she made it to the kitchen. No vanilla. Lemon extract. It seared her throat and she retched, held her mouth shut to reswallow it. She made some tea, thick with honey, sipped it slowly in the dark. At 6, in two hours, the Uptown liquor store in Oakland would sell her some vodka. In Berkeley you had to wait until 7. Oh, god, did she have any money? She crept back to her room to check in her purse on the desk. Her son Nick must have taken her wallet and car keys. She couldn’t look for them in her sons’ room without waking them.
There was a dollar and thirty cents in a change jar on her desk. She looked through several purses in the closet, in the coat pockets, a kitchen drawer, until she got together the four dollars that bloody wog charged for a half pint at that hour. All the sick drunks paid him. Although most of them bought sweet wine, it worked quicker.
It was far to walk. It would take her three quarters of an hour; she would have to run home to be there before the kids woke up. Could she make it? She could hardly walk from one room to the other. Just pray a patrol car didn’t pass. She wished she had a dog to walk. I know, she laughed, I’ll ask the neighbors if I can borrow their dog. Sure. None of the neighbors spoke to her anymore.
It kept her steady to concentrate on the cracks in the sidewalk to count them one two three. Pulling herself along on bushes, tree trunks, like climbing a mountain sideways. Crossing the streets was terrifying, they were so wide, with their lights blinking red red, yellow yellow. An occasional Examiner truck, an empty taxi. A police car going fast, without lights. They didn’t see her. Cold sweat ran down her back, her teeth chattered loudly in the still dark morning.
She was panting and faint by the time she got to the Uptown on Shattuck. It wasn’t open yet. Seven black men, all old except for one young boy, stood outside on the curb. The Indian man sat oblivious to them inside the window, sipping coffee. On the sidewalk two men were sharing a bottle of Nyquil cough syrup. Blue death, you could buy that all night long.
An old man they called Champ smiled at her. “Say, mama, you be sick? Your hair hurt?” She nodded. That’s how it felt, your hair, your eyeballs, your bones. “Here,” Champ said, “you better eat some of these.” He was eating saltines, passed her two. “Gotta make yourself eat.”
“Say Champ, lemme have a few,” the young boy said.
They let her go to the counter first. She asked for vodka and poured her pile of coins onto the counter.
“It’s all there,” she said.
He smiled, “Count it for me.”
“Come on. Shit,” the boy said as she counted out the coins with violently shaking hands. She put the bottle into her purse, stumbled toward the door. Outside she held on to a telephone pole, afraid to cross the street.
Champ was drinking from his bottle of Night Train.
“You too much a lady to drink on the street?” She shook her head. “I’m afraid I’ll drop the bottle.”
“Here,” he said. “Open your mouth. You need something or you’ll never get home.” He poured wine into her mouth. It coursed through her, warm. “Thank you,” she said.
She quickly crossed the street, jogged clumsily down the streets toward her house, ninety, ninety-one, counting the cracks. It was still pitch dark when she got to her door.
Gasping for air. Without turning on the light she poured some cranberry juice into a glass, a third of the bottle. She sat down at the table and sipped the drink slowly, the relief of the alcohol seeping throughout her body. She was crying, with relief that she had not died. She poured another third from the bottle and some juice, rested her head on the table between sips.
When she had finished that drink she felt better, and she went into the laundry room and started a load of wash. Taking the bottle with her she went to the bathroom then. She showered and combed her hair, put on clean clothes. Ten more minutes. She checked to see if the door was locked, sat on the toilet and finished the bottle of vodka. This last drink didn’t just get her well but got her slightly drunk.
She moved the laundry from the washer to the dryer. She was mixing orange juice from frozen concentrate when Joel came into the kitchen, rubbing his eyes. “No socks, no shirt.”
“Hi, honey. Have some cereal. Your clothes will be dry by the time you finish breakfast and shower.” She poured him some juice, another glass for Nicholas who stood silent in the doorway.
“How in the hell did you get a drink?” He pushed past her and poured himself some cereal. Thirteen. He was taller than she.
“Could I have my wallet and keys?” she asked.
“You can have your wallet. I’ll give you the keys when I know you’re ok.”
“I’m ok. I’ll be back at work tomorrow.”
“You can’t stop anymore without a hospital, Ma.”
“I’ll be fine. Please don’t worry. I’ll have all day to get well.” She went to check the clothes in the dryer.
“The shirts are dry,” she told Joel. “The socks need about ten more minutes.”
“Can’t wait. I’ll wear them wet.”
Her sons got their books and back packs, kissed her goodbye and went out the door. She stood in the window and watched them go down the street to the bus stop. She waited until the bus picked them up and headed up Telegraph Avenue. She left then, for the liquor store on the corner. It was open now.
Teen-Age Punk
In the sixties, Jesse used to come over to see Ben. They were young kids then, long hair, strobe lights, weed and acid. Jesse had already dropped out of school, already had a probation officer. The Rolling Stones came to New Mexico. The Doors. Ben and Jesse had wept when Jimi Hendrix died, when Janis Joplin died. That was another year for weather. Snow. Frozen pipes. Everybody cried that year.
We lived in an old farmhouse, down by the river. Marty and I had just divorced, I was in my first year of teaching, my first job. The house was hard to take care of alone. Leaky roof, burnt-out pump, but it was big, a beautiful house.
Ben and Jesse played music loud, burned violet incense that smelled of cat pee. My other sons Keith and Nathan couldn’t stand Jesse—hippie burnout—but Joel, the