A Bad Way to Start the Day

Yesterday was a really enjoyable day. After work I ran into an old friend at the market and it was a genuinely good moment- like a mutual :" wow! not only can I not believe that you are still alive, but you actually look healthy!"

It was reassuring to see someone else who lived through the 'party years 'and came out more or less intact- it really was. I went home feeling good about the present and hopeful about the future, which is a fairly new and unfamiliar mindset for me, but one that I enjoy a lot and could really get used to.

I wrote to friend about how happy I was - and I wasn't even high.

I must be pretty well-adjusted, I congratulated myself.

That was a jinx.

This morning I couldn't find my wallet or my work IDs. They are always in the same place, so I never look for them until it's time for the bus.

They were not there.
I missed the bus.
I looked everywhere- nowhere to be found.
I missed the next bus.

Owww...my stomach starts hurting. No fair!
My guts are on fire. I feel sick.

I know it's just stress, but knowing that doesn't untie the knots in my bowels, it just makes me angry at myself for letting the stress bother me so much, which makes the knots constrict, which makes me angrier at myself...so I distract myself with nightmare scenarios about what is happening with my wallet and ID , which I was certain had fallen into the wrong hands.

Called my bank. No activity on my account. Good.

But one of my passkeys is for the Federal Reserve Building. What if some psycho uses it to get inside and does some crazy shit that I get blamed for? I know it's pretty damned unlikely that such a thing would occur , just like I knew that my heart probably wasn't going to stop beating in the next ten seconds- but it didn't stop me from feeling these fears.

I was going into panic mode without knowing it- and I really should know better.

Then the phone rang.

I should have known better to answer it, but I thought it was work and I needed to call in anyway.

It was a collection agency. From a medical visit in November that should have been workman's comp. It was all straightened out by my former employer- they asked me for the bills and told me they'd cover it, since it was on-the-job. I had all the paperwork saved- I had mailed it months ago, but kept copies just in case.
I told the agency that I'd fax that stuff directly to them and they said fine, no problem.

Well, damn. I can't find that paperwork anywhere. It must be with my wallet, which I can't find either.
I'm shaking and sweating. The panic is here.
I've let it get to me.
All the crap I've been through and a little thing like a lost wallet is going to break me?
That sucks.

I take a pill and walk around the block. I feel the chemical comfort , just as warm as the sunshine on my face. I smile at a jogger and he smiles back.

I pet someone else's cat.

I look at a bucket of spilled paint on an otherwise pristine and newly renovated porch. There are sneaker prints, yellow on gray, in a sort of tip-toe circle around the spill. What a mess.
Bummer for them, but it cheers me up for some reason.

When I return home, I feel almost human. I call my old employer- they say :"don't worry, just have them send us the bills, we'll get it fixed- it's only $65, we'll cover, no sweat".

Hey! That's pretty cool! I still can't find my wallet though.

And it's too late for me to go to work. I'm out a day's wages and I'm too tranquilized to be very productive.

The phone rings again. I answer without thinking, that's how mellow I am.

It's a Focus Group company that I have done a number of Focus Groups for. At a FG, a group of demographically correct persons are presented with products and asked to evaluate them.

One time I tasted unmarked sodas and told them I disliked them all, which was true. I got $50 and a box lunch for those opinions.

Another group was comprised entirely of male whiskey drinkers.

( note: if a FG company calls you, tell them that you use whatever product/service they are asking about, even if you don't. If you are not a potential customer , they won't select you)

We were presented with a great number of experimental bottle and label designs and asked to rate them on a scale of 1 to ten and give a short explanation as to why we did or did not like them.
Our group were all expecting to be sampling the products , not looking at labels, but we set about doing as we were asked. They were paying $100, after all.

One of the bottles - I forget the brand, Old Overcoat, I think it was- was a 'novelty' design, shaped just like an American football with a spout at one tip and a small square base at the other. It was full of brown liquid and really did look like a football standing upright on a kicking tee.
About five seconds after the instructor left the room, one of my groupmates started making little feint passes with the football bottle- we knew we were being observed, but I am sure we'd have started tossing that thing around if we weren't under adult supervision...anyway, when the instructor came back and asked for our ratings, we all started laughing.

One gentleman raised his hand.

"Y'all need to make that football bottle outta plastic. That glass is gonna bust upside somebody's head."

"Upside some...?", asked the instructor.

"Yeah. Like when you're playin' catch.", I chimed in.

A younger kid bipped himself on the forehead with the heel of his hand to illustrate what we meant.

"So...you feel safety may be an issue."

"Liability too, " said the man who wanted the plastic bottle.


Anyway, I just found out that next week I will get paid $75 to spend an additional $75 on stuff I get to keep at a well-known Big Box store with a local HQ. This company recently laid off most of it's best salespeople and replaced them with scrubs. It was in the news.

As a result, service sucks and sales are down. Who could have guessed?

My mission is to "mystery shop" and report back on my experience for a total of $150 in cash and prizes- so I'll make up the money I missed at work today- and I never would have gotten the call if I'd gone to work. So at least that worked out. Whew!

Fuck. I might as well get my birth certificate and SS papers and head down to DMV and get a new driver's license- then I can go to the bank and cancel my debit card and withdraw a few bucks until I get a new card.

So I walk out to my car- which I see I have left unlocked- and there they are.

My wallet and IDs, on the passenger seat where I left them last night.

Post Haste

Yesterday the police went and found my father at the rented hovel he drinks in. It's supposed to be a store and it's not zoned for residential use but they don't seem to care- the small-town cops know all about my dad... they confirmed he was still alive, still drunk and still an asshole. He asked to be left alone and I shall respect his wish.

He told his mother he wants to die.

I don't want to die and it kills me when I talk to him, so I'll not speak to or of him again, save to say thanks to all my bloggy pals who have sent wishes, hopes and prayers my way.
Thank you .

I told my Grandmother that I can do no more and she accepts that, so now I can move on.

----------------------------------------

This weekend was good- fun times on the radio and really good NFL games, not to mention some intriguing flirtation- man, instead of whining about being single, I should be thanking my lucky stars for the carte blanche provided by my total lack of commitment...must be pheromones or something...more on this once the dust settles.

Busy, busy, busy.

Bears.

Plans

Tomorrow morning I'll do my radio show and then I'm calling the police.

My father , who is over sixty years old , has disappeared on another drunken bender.
Last November I went to the weird little cottage that he calls an antiques shop, my grandmother was worried because she hadn't heard from him for weeks; when he drinks he lives at the shop despite it having no shower, kitchen or bed.

He was a filthy , drunken mess but I got him to his mother's house and he stayed sober until a couple weeks ago, but he's gone again and his mother is worried. Really worried.

She should be. I think my dad is dead. Forty years of hard drinking has to catch up, he looked like hell even when he wasn't drinking, like he was 80 and could barely walk.

This is what he does: He sits in a tiny building with the doors shut and "closed" sign up, and he drinks himself into oblivion for weeks until finally someone from church, the police or the family goes and pulls him out of his ruin.

This might last a month, then he goes away again.

I can't do it again. I told my grandmother I can't do it again. I cannot. If he's dead and I find the body, I will break.
I feel strong and ready for the inevitable, but not enough to discover his body.

I have been through that before and I'm not ready to do it again. I'm not even ready to think about the last time. Sometimes we forget things because we have to and I'm not sure digging out all the details is always a good idea.

It's a surprise to me that my grannie hasn't called the police herself, but she never wants to...we used to have a family friend on the force who would check on Dad, but he got sick of dragging Dad's drunk sorry ass home, and I think he'll stop being nice and just take him to jail next time.

Which is exactly what I want. He needs to be forced into a de-tox center and being AWOL for nearly three weeks is cause for a missing persons report. When they find him , he'll either be dead or so completely fucked-up they'll put him in de-tox and Psych Ward , or at least I hope they will.

I can't take it anymore. I've tried and there's nothing I can do. This is my last effort and I'm doing it by telephone, going to call my police friend and ask him to take a rescue squad to Dad's hovel and drag him out- I hope they will- I have learned of a recent injury Dad incurred while drunk, so I hope I have enough info to convince them to check on him one last time.

There are some things I can do and there are some things I can't. And I can't deal with this situation. I don't have the training or skills or knowledge to manage someone who is this far gone; I'm only 16 months into being sober myself and I'm in no position to intervene-again.

I have talked this over with the Twin and we agreed that I might as well wait until tomorrow so I could do my show and maybe we could watch the Bears game before we got the call back from the town police.
If that sounds cold, you don't understand how many desperate emergencies that turned out to be just another drunken binge- how many people from the church and family have wasted words on him...I'm done and so are all our family friends. Only my grandmother still cares, so I will do this for her.

I'm doing my show, then my laundry and I'll wait till halftime of the Bears game.
I'll call the police during halftime, that way I won't interrupt their viewing either.

I hope they put my father in rehab and make him stay. He won't go on his own- the church will pay but he won't go. We'll see.


At least it'll be a great game tomorrow- I'm a Bears fan, but I'd have a hard time being sore if New Orleans won. If anyone deserves a morale boost, it's New Orleans.
It's a win/win game.