John

I got up this morning to do a project helping John hang drywall. I would be driving and John didn't have a license, so I'd need to pick him up. I picked up some sandwiches and Gatorade at the IGA a couple blocks from my house, then drove across town and made it to John's at a couple minutes after 7.

John has a small house. A camper is parked in the back and there was a bike laying in the front lawn. The door was open but the screen door was closed, so I got out of the car, walked up the sidewalk, and knocked. I heard voices inside. John came to the door and told me to come in for a few minutes.

"Are you ready to go?" I asked. "Do you need to load up some tools?"
"Are we taking the van?"
"No. My car." John's eyes were glazed and I could tell he'd already been drinking or had started the night before.
"What tools do I need?"
"I don't know. Mark said you'd know what tools you'd need."
"Okay, give me five minutes. We'll pick up a 12-pack on the way."
I looked at him, registering his body movements, the unsteady shuffle and sway and thought about our drywall project ahead, standing on ladders, handing up 30+ pound sheets of drywall, and just shook my head.
"Don't tell me what to do," he said, then paused. "Well, I'm taking at least one anyway."

I then noticed John's friend who was sitting on a couch to my left. "John's an alcoholic," he said. "So am I. You okay with that?"
"Okay," I said. I turned back to John. "I'll go out to my car and give you some time to get things together,"
"My name's Rick," the other guy said, and shook my hand. "Can you feel that?" he asked.
"No," I said, not sure what he meant.
"Energy. A strong grip." I didn't feel either, but pulled my hand out of his.

I called Mark. "John's drunk. What do you think?"
"I'll be over in just a minute." In the meantime John had grabbed a pitcher of tea and toolbelt, and gotten in the passenger side of the car. "Let's do this," he said. Rick followed closely behind.
"Let's wait here for a minute till Mark comes I said."
"I'm not going to go to work today, Rick."
"What do you mean?" he said. "Sure you will."
"No. No, he's called the cops because of my heroin."

Mark arrived soon after, John was taken off the job, and went into the house and began playing his electric guitar, badly. He had once been one of the best drywallers in the business, and had been sober for a six month stretch recently, and some of the old skills had come back. I felt guilty and angry. I didn't want John working drunk, but hated to see him lose the job. I felt angry that John blamed me.

I haven't seen much of John's world, and have only experienced it around me, not directly lived in it. I lived above a couple bars in Lincoln when I was in college, heard the songs sung on the street at 2am after closing time. I lived next door to a prostitute in Springfield, and saw her men come and go or was awakened in the middle of the night when the windows were open. I was awakened one night to knocks on my door and two kids were standing outside, asking me to call the cops because their dad was upstairs with a cord around his neck on the balcony, and they were afraid he'd jump.

No conclusions, just thinking out loud for now.