Tuesday, June 02, 2009

THE MOD SQUAD

The last 4 weeks has been a time of old friendships coming back around again.
There is "Jimi", a buddy from High School who I found recently at NA with 14 years of clean time. He is the same but he is different. He was the Jimi Hendix of LD Bell High School, the only black spot in a sea of white, which made him a real novelty in these parts, and he became a friend, a cohort and back then, seemed to give a carte blanc of coolness to anyone in his proximity.

We used to get high just about everyday together back then, and if we were still in class by lunch, then there was something terribly wrong.
I see him about once a week now, and he is an inspiration to stay clean and sober.
HE IS ONE OF THE VERY FEW TO HAVE 14 YEARS OF CLEAN TIME WITHOUT A SINGLE RELAPSE.

In a meeting a few days ago, near the end of the meeting, someone called on him to share (talk). Jimi usually will talk even without being called on but this day he declined. The dude next to him pokes him in the ribs and says “C’mon, Jimi, go ahead” but Jimi declines again and says in perfect Jimi form
“No, man, I don’t want to mess with anybodies serenity”


I laughed my ass off, partly because it was funny but mostly because he said it just the way he would have said it 35 years ago. Only back then when he said it, he probably had his hand in your pocket, the way he has his in Lisa's here...


LISA, JIMI, AND ME
JANUARY 1975
3rd PERIOD CHEMISTRY CLASS

9 comments:

Lily said...

OMG! I thought John Denver died in a plane crash!

Martijn said...

I'm a complete sucker for polaroids, especially in this overexposed romantic lighting that brings to mind Paul Simon's Codachrome. Your story is good too.

Hey there Steve, I'm back from drifting in France (Provence, Côte d'Azur, seeing things, doing stuff, cycling, painting). Strange thing, I suddenly had to leave. It was that or wait till July, and I don't like July, then there are too many children about the place. Sooo... here I am again, partly rejuvinated, partly completely faded out. I still can't think straight. It's not the language, for while there I hardly spoke French and kept up the English with writing letters to an American pal who lives up in Boise. But I still really missed these three thrilling blogs I follow, and now I see that Dave has packed in altogether and Mike is? Vacation? I haven't had the time yet to see what happened. Is he to the Black Forrest? I'm thinking about leaving myself again. In fact, the day after I returned to Holland I was browsing the Atlas for a new destination. I like to be away with nothing to do. I'm thinking of Germany myself this time for I do speak some German and hardly any French. I have a certain je ne sais qua for German. I'm going to read all your other postings now. John Denver... hè hè hè. Good to be back here!

bulletholes said...

Arrrggghhhh! Lily, you got me! People say "You look familiar to me" and I'll tell them that I used to look like John Denver.
These days though I look like the Gingerbread Man.

bulletholes said...

Ah, Martijn! I've missed you!
davy, well, lets just see how this retirement goes...he is already claiming that he was just thinning his blog down...we shall see.
Mike? Who knows? People are having to work for a living these days with him gone.

you should come to Texas....but wait till fall...its to hot here inj the summer....hell...its to hot here in the Fall!

Martijn said...

I like heat! I really do. I like to walk around in the sun in blazing heat till my head spins. I like humid heat even more. Texas seems a cool place for me. Go rattler hunting (with a camera), drive around in the desert (there's a desert there right?), that sort of thing. However, I have a new gospel and that is Making Things Easy... at least unimportant things to fully concentrate on art and whathaveyou. So this last trip I tried to make everything easier, just driving, camping, doing nothing I didn't wanted to do, no strings attached, no meetings, no deadlines, no pressure. Driving into Germany seems just the right follow-up.

Easy is the word! Take yesterday when I drove home after the first day at the plant. Went food shopping. 'What can I have? I like cooking. How about a steak just now after four weeks of 'easy' food (bread, tins of Boeuf Bourgigon, Cassoulet)... Ah, fuck it, I'll eat pizza.

So that's the thing. Texas is far away and hard to see the easy way, Berlin isn't. But the thought is tempting. An easy life isn't a happy life.

Martijn said...

I forgot to ad my punchline... When people ask me how come I like heat so much I always say: "It's a dry run for Hell". France was hot too come to think of it. I sweated buckets. Especially with the bike-riding. That wasn't easy, in that heat, up those mountains. Holland has zero mountains. And likewise temperatures.

Waterbaby said...

Lisa looks so much like sarah in that picture!

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