I moved to Shropshire and renovated a house my girlfriend had bought. Come the spring the whole garden erupted in opium poppies which I systematically harvested. Cutting them and leaving them to bleed, collecting the opium that comes out white and milky but sets to a soft brown substance by morning. There must have been a quater of an ounce. This was just about clean enough to smoke but breaking off a small pea size lump and eating it would ensure a days dequincy experience. Warm and dream like. If you have ever been on a really long hike, twenty miles or more, once your back home, feet up by the fire, all cozy, well that's the feeling of opium.
This was around the time of lady Diane Spencer's' death. Up in Leeds and I guess all over the country britains cities had been flooded with high quality brown afghany heroin. My best freind up there. The person I would always stay with, along with several other freinds became addicted to heroin around this time. People you would never have imagined touching the stuff fell for the charms of morphia. Richard began selling the stuff which landed him in jail. The drug ultimately killed him as it did most of my boyhood freinds. But during this period I would go visit on two week smack holidays. The first day or two I would be sick as a dog until my body adjusted. The following fortnight would be pure bliss. No worries, no niggles, just a really beautiful state of being.
I would return home and sleep for a couple of days. I had no contacts down in Shropshire and living alone in a cottage in the middle of nowhere formed no habits.
I did begin to drink though. Never having taught before I was plunged in to lecturing at Shrewsbury, Wolverhampton and Birmingham. The stress was too much. The doctor prescribed ssris and sleeping pills whilst I prescribed myself a bottle of whisky a night. To get through the day I would split off the codeine from neurofen plus. In those days the pills were half pink, half white so disposing of the unwanted ibuprofen and collecting the codeine was easy. I have since learnt how to cold wash codeine from over the counter paracetamol and codeine tablets but I don't take codeine anymore.
After undergoing some kind of a breakdown, I moved to somerset.
The next couple of years were very positive. I worked for Fred Baier and hung out with the Pewsey crowd, Gareth and rachel, but also had Alice, my girlfriend of the times network, most of whom were connected in one way or another to the glass studio where she worked for neil Wilkin. It was at this late point in life I discovered what richard refered to as the Middle class drugs, cocaine and ecstasy. To be honest I never liked the coke much, that was more my partners thing but I did like the pills and dancing to music I had previously thought was rubbish. House, drum and bass, garage, with MDMa it all suddenly made sense. And dancing. I'd never danced before. Only thrown myself around at punk rock gigs. I'd still go visit richard every now and again for heroin holidays but still remained unhooked.
I remember looking for heroin people, big issue sellers, homeless without any success on a couple of occasions so maybe I was already beginning to catch the bug. You have no idea how much this drug is going to change your life. You maybe experienced in the whole other pharmacopeia but heroin changes you forever. Once you have had a habit you are never the same again. Changes take place at a cellular level meaning you can never dabble again. You're either on or off from then on.
I met an old freind from leeds who was living in Frome and that was that. I'd buy small bags from bath, Radstock or the traveller site and before too long you know that it's only going to get more difficult to stop, yet you abandon yourself to your fate and one morning you wake up I'll.
No comments:
Post a Comment