Yesterday, the highlight of my day flitted about in the form of a monarch butterfly masquerading as a falling leaf in a local intersection. I embrace, inhale, devour and take great delight in these seconds of beauty caught in the midst of my daily busy-ness. They harness the power of this great planet and concentrate it onto the point of a pinhead for a brief and shining moment. My mind and my body halt in their engagements, sometimes only for a heartbeat or a quick intake of breath, but they are stilled all the same. And I welcome this stillness because I recognize the extreme rarity of its very existence in my life. And I understand the intrinsic value of this stillness as it relates to me as a spiritual being, as it relates to my well-being, as it relates to epiphany. And I wonder who else out there relates to this brand of harmony doled out in quick, highly digestible, necessary-to-quality-of-life bites?
Yesterday, the hope of my day arrived via my iPhone, my Girlfriend who is now devoid of her one eye thanks to the questing sharp canines of my 8 1/2 month-old white lab-mix pup. Like most days, or at least several days out of each week, I talked with Brother Gary. Only, after months of talking with my brother (lowercase), I actually spoke with my Brother. There is a difference, and that difference comes by way of a needle and cooked pills. Over the past six months or so, maybe longer, my emotions have been dulled by blame and anger and apathy. Not my own but that of Gary.
I knew he was in a downward spiral not long after the murder by a patient there at the hospital of a kindly helpful employee with whom my brother was acquainted. It's been almost a full year since that horrific act was committed and changed the inner-workings of the institute . . . and the inner-workings of my youngest brother. For reasons springing from a double-headed source of necessity and fear, the higher-ups clamped down on the rights and freedoms of the patients at Napa State Hospital. Their ability to regularly breathe the fresh air outside the halls of their wards diminished considerably. The presence of the grounds police force increased on all fronts, creating more of a prison-like atmosphere than is desired in a medically-based establishment. Tensions between staff and residents multiplied, with leaking stories to the press and grumblings in the community feeding the gossip fodder, attenuating real life into a Stretch Armstrong version of actual events. In this fishbowl, Gary's emotional and physical health has deteriorated.
I'm not stupid. And the air between me and my brother is always cleared. Neither of us tiptoe around what's going on. That my bipolar heroin-and-meth-addicted sibling had returned to the destructive and painfully familiar source of his lifelong comfort was not lost on me. Though street drugs are unavailable there, there is no shortage of patient- and staff- supplied prescription meds for sale or trade. And Gary lives on a ward where the population consists of either severely mentally ill men -- you would not be off base to picture individuals talking to their inner voices, stumbling along in circles, urinating on themselves, screaming at those around them -- or men not really engaged in their treatment plan. That would include addicted individuals who are not truly ready to tackle their problem.
It's a different animal, this thing of actually dealing with him and realizing the depth of his addiction. Prison did not allow this level of intimacy and awareness between us. I knew he had warts and scars but didn't have to see them almost every day. Because I was more concerned with his survival in prison, I made a conscious decision to accept him, his habits, his methods of getting by, feeling we could deal with all of that upon his release. There was a short period of time in prison, the early months of his short marriage, where he kicked his habit to the curb and stayed clean. That is an accomplishment. But for an addict, the getting clean is merely the beginning. Living with the consequences of that addiction, whether it be hepatitis C or burned bridges, exists as the bigger ongoing challenge. For the loved one of an addict, all the days and weeks and months of the addiction are the ongoing challenge. Maintaining hope in the face of doubt -- whether it is self-doubt, the doubt of friends and family who love me and adore my loyalty but think it misplaced and wasted -- is chief among those challenges. "Keep hope alive!" is harder done than said.
Lately, hearing the ringtone that signifies an incoming call from Gary has stirred irritation within me. If I'm being honest, even a bit of resentment. Sending him pictures or cards, much less ordering a few things here and there, managing the dwindling supply of money gifted to me on his behalf upon his release from prison back in October of 2008, feels more like a burden than a joy. Because those feelings are there, they have to be dealt with. Not ignored but examined. Their basis dug up and aired out. Over the past month or so, my overriding sentiment to Gary concerning his state of mind has been, "If you don't deal with your drug addiction, you will never be able to learn how to handle your bipolarity or develop the skills to overcome your institutionalization." Though his situation is unique, and quite painful, it can not be an excuse to languish, to diminish the core of who he is meant to be, to gnaw away at the taut threads of unity which exist between us. That just plain pisses me off. As anyone who has opened themselves up to relationships well knows, it is possible to both love and hate a thing. I love my brother; I hate the persona he chooses to project to the hospital staff and the men around him. It is demoralizing to imagine him screaming in the face of a cafeteria employee, hurling expletives, his face darkened with rage, the prison ink reflecting back his turmoil, essentially having himself a temper-tantrum because a power-hungry individual who will most likely never change has gotten under his thin skin. The man I support is better than that. He simply refuses to acknowledge this fact because the drugs allow him to wallow in self-pity and bitterness, blaming everyone around him for his lack of progress, his eyes blind to a better future that I can see.
Before Gary called yesterday, I was watching Our America with Lisa Ling -- her show on OWN (Oprah Winfrey Network). This particular episode centered around a drug-addicted couple she had interviewed 18 months previous. Then, they were strung out, thin, looking only for their next score. Upon her revisit at the top of this show, she was stunned to see them both clear-eyed, with meat on their bones, and clean for the past 18 months. But they were still living on the streets. Sleeping in shelters at night. Working where they could get honest money. Carrying around their meager belongings in several bags. Adhering to the judge's orders regarding their decorum as they continue to work toward reuniting with their 7 year-old son who presently lives with a foster family. Listening to their story broke me down into individual units of pain and faith, each one crying for recognition and a need to be reconfigured. I began praying for Gary while my purple-gloved hands continued to wash the pots and pans. The Lord doesn't need a prayer closet to move on a willing heart. And I was on my knees within.
When I answered the phone, I began with a series of questions to each of Gary's short explanations as to why he hadn't called in awhile. Finally, he admitted to being ill in the face of quitting a certain substance he'd been mainlining for a significant period of time. (The cops have been raiding his room every day for weeks since discovering a needle and a makeshift tattoo gun.) I listened as he explained an incident with a fellow client that made him realize he really wanted to be a quitter. Of drugs, that is. "I haven't been one of those users saying to himself, 'I need to quit. I want to quit.' But I am now." There was much more to it all than that but it doesn't need saying here. He wants to leave his ward and start a new program on another ward specifically tailored for users with a true desire to stop using. He wants to live up to the guy living at his core who's only shown his face for brief periods of time to his sister and his mother and maybe every now and again to a prisoner or patient in need. He wants to accept the opinions of the professionals there at the hospital who have repeatedly told him he is worthy and can get out of there alive and intact if he buckles down and does the work.
It's a turning point. If he can stop putting the car in reverse. But either way, it's time that I return to my written contemplations on matters of the heart and mind. Whether or not my brother makes it remains yet to be witnessed, but someone out there may need to read of my perspective and it is simply selfish not to share if even one can be helped through all of this.
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