Editor’s Note: This post includes references to substance abuse, addiction, and the impact of racist public policy on Black communities.
Author’s Note
As often as I can, I offer musical reference in my writing as a way to share the energy and tone I intend for the information I have shared. As a child, I remember my mother listening to “If Only You Knew” by Patti LaBelle on repeat. As an adult, my body recalls the pain of wanting and wanting to be wanted as she played that song. What better way to speak of addiction than to use these same words that have been shared with us, but this time, imagine the unrequited love of a controlled substance as the object of desire as opposed to the loving arms of another person.
I also, as often as possible, say the names of those we want to hold in remembrance. As a Warrior of Light, I seek to honor those that have fallen in the battle of care and indifference by having their names said in love so that their lives were not lived in vain.
I hope you enjoy.
“I must have shot up my lines, a thousand times, looking for that perfect high…” – A song of addiction, in the melody of Patti LaBelle[1]. I hum it often as I remember the essence of my mother. Unfortunately, I was never able to get up the nerve, to tell her the words… Mmm…
My thoughts interrupted on this day, by a text. A grief filled, written telephonic expression carrying heartbreak from a friend, a dad, caught in the battle of “Nurturing a Broken Soul” during the never ceasing, War on Drugs, (started in 1971, still going strong today). His words explained what his heart could not comprehend. His son was gone, dead from a drug overdose.
While my mind was sure that my eyes were mistaken, my fingers wasted no time dialing his number. He did not answer.
The receptors of my empathetic nervous system tingled with calm awareness. A dark energy flowed through his words as I read them repeatedly. This was a man who prided himself on parenting with a purpose. He began his every Monday with his TedTalk, “Children Shouldn’t Have to Suffer” and ended his week with his soap box speech, “I am their Peace.” Not only was he now, without words, but one of his children had suffered, and there was no peace he could give him. Chayo, his eldest, was now a fallen soldier in this war that has no winners. This war has led to mass incarceration, over sentencing with disparities rooted in racism, classism, fatherless homes, and not one example of how it has met its proclaimed purpose of reducing the rate of drug abuse.
This war has led to mass incarceration, over sentencing with disparities rooted in racism, classism, fatherless homes, and not one example of how it has met its proclaimed purpose of reducing the rate of drug abuse. Click To TweetA numb silence broken by my phone’s vibration. It was him. “We just sat, until he spoke speech in the phone.”[2] A guttural bellow escaped his chest with such pure anguish that it called forth tears of parental solidarity from my eyes. Memories of regret from the understanding I never afforded my mom began to slowly stream down my face as I recalled the hollow familiarity of my first loss.
Our first love is something, but our first loss is THE thing. It’s the one that pops our “what does not kill us makes us stronger” cherry. The first love gets us down on one knee, asking for a lifetime of commitment from the love of our lives. That first loss though, it violently, suddenly drops us down on both knees bargaining with forces, seen and unseen. Negotiating to exchange our life poker chips for that thing the Grim Reaper had when he made the mistake of calling the bets of someone we cherished before they had a chance to make good on the soul checks that their lives could not cash.
Our first love is something, but our first loss is THE thing. The first love gets us down on one knee, asking for a commitment from the love of our lives. That first loss though, it violently, suddenly drops us down on both knees. Click To TweetCommunication conveyed as much in intentional silence as deliberate voice. My intention was to allow space for his expression. His deliberation purposed to find the words acceptable as a proper conveyance of his control over tragedy. Faintly he spoke, “I should have expected this.” The intellectuality of his declaration betrayed the seemingly foolish turmoil of his heart.
“I must have rehearsed my lines, a thousand times, until I had them memorized…” Patti kept playing in my head, “but you don’t even suspect. Could probably care less…” I never knew what changes my mom was going through. I was never trained to love someone afflicted with addiction. I mean, I have been taught by society how to judge an addict, but I ain’t never just met someone dope sick. I definitely never knew a deserving dope fiend. They did this to themselves, and they knew the consequences. The government created programs that D.A.R.E.d[3] to tell us about our brains on drugs. I had classmates who did the better part of 20 years in the belly of the beast right out of high school just for knowing where the stash was at, where the cash was at. I wanted to love you momma druggie, but I couldn’t. It wasn’t cool. I had to live an imitation of life so that I didn’t carry the weight of my relation to you. If the established knew how weak you were, they might have thought we were the same, and I wouldn’t be able to get that good office job. Momma, “you don’t know how much I need you…” Patti won’t get out of my head. I was just trying to be there for Chayo’s dad.
'I must have rehearsed my lines, a thousand times…' Patti played in my head, 'but you don’t even suspect. Could probably care less…' I never knew what my mom was going through. I was never trained to love someone with addiction. Click To TweetQueen Mother Sweet Potato Pie extended her voice from my ear to that of the grieving father. Since I wouldn’t listen, she would tell him herself.
“A chair is still a chair…”[4] No baby, that’s Luther (Vandross). Listen to me, Patti. “Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday love…”[5] No, Beloved, that’s Cherelle, and your young king needs more than a Saturday Love. With a presence of commanding accountability, an Oprah like wind cradled his ear and moved his mind toward the soul shift he needed to heal. Sister Winfrey always showed up when a people needed to “turn itself into itself and become Jesus” because we were the only ones who would save.
So often our intellect worked overtime, but love has never grown in the garden of a weary mind. Hard hearted scholarship was the rope that tolerance used to hang itself when just mercy needed to commit suicide. Mental acuity gives safe haven to Voltronic[6] collections of fear and hurt that come together forming an army of conviction that lays dormant, until such time as tenderness and discernment are imperative. It presents as arrogant justification for leaving any man behind.
Intentionality. Deliberation. Prodigy gave me a message, “Darryl, there’s a war going on outside no man is safe from…”[7]
Addiction.
If only ya’ll knew…
This is dedicated to my Mom, in hopes that memories of her will be ones of the God in her and not the battles she could not overcome. When we love someone with addiction we learn to love through judgement, embarrassment, and disappointment. A voice tells us to condemn them, and we have to fight not to listen. So, we learn acceptance. When we lose someone to addiction, we experience that loss twice. The person we knew has died as they have mentally succumb to a chemical dependence. Our love then, inevitably succumbs to a physical death, and that’s a different hurt. If other shoes dropping were a feeling, right?
Anyway, I love my Mom y’all. I loved Puddin, my momma that walked us to the public library and the Civic Center so that we could read books and watch movies. Puddin who didn’t really work while we were kids so the concept of daycare baffled my kindergarten mind. Also, I love Ms. Minnie, my drug dealing momma who was so hurt from abuse and abandonment that she (verbally) abused and abandoned her prepubescent children.
To my Mom, a real one.
[1] This refers to the song, “If Only You Knew” by Patti LaBelle (https://genius.com/Patti-labelle-if-only-you-knew-lyrics)
[2] A rephrase of a line from “It Was All Good Just A Week Ago” by Jay-Z and Memphis Bleek (https://genius.com/Jay-z-a-week-ago-lyrics)
[3] The D.A.R.E. Program is an initiative launched as part of the War of Drugs (https://dare.org/history/)
[4] “A House is Not A Home” by Luther Vandross (https://genius.com/Luther-vandross-a-house-is-not-a-home-lyrics)
[5] “Saturday Love” by Cherelle and Alexander O’Neal (https://genius.com/Cherrelle-saturday-love-lyrics)
[6] Voltron was an animated series from the 1980’s (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voltron)
[7] “Survival of the Fittest” by Mobb Deep (https://genius.com/Mobb-deep-survival-of-the-fittest-lyrics)
