Counting Sheep
Had to hop a plane early Friday morning, so I went to bed early and was wide awake by midnight. That's how it goes when you've just got to get those seven or eight hours of uninterrupted sleep, knowing that after the flight, you'll be driving five hours and better be wide awake. Now, some people count sheep, but I'm not one of those. I count people I've wronged over the years, and all my bad decisions, no matter how minor.
When I was a kid, Pete and I used to walk down to McDonald's a few times a week. Pete lived in an apartment, which I thought was cool, since we lived in a house. We were best friends through most of elementary school, starting with our Ronald McDonald puppet show we performed for Miss Paul's first grade class. That was before she got pregnant and left us for good.
Puppets are one thing, but super glue's another. I discovered super glue later on, and one day as we walked down to McDonald's, I noticed a brick in the road across the street from where the guy who chased Pete and my other friend, Wing, with a heroin needle lived. He wasn't out chasing kids with needles this time, but besides the brick, there was also a gold-colored Chevy Nova parked where it always was. This is where putting two and two together comes into play. I picked up the brick and glued it to the side of the car, but it fell off. So I glued it to the hood, instead, and off we ran.
Once we got to high school a few years later, Pete and I drifted apart. I became a pothead for about a year, till I discovered cross country. During my time as a druggie (frequent pot, angel dust once, acid once) and unhappy loner, I invited another friend over and introduced him to marijuana. I'm not going to name him, but I think it's my fault he later got hooked on heroin. Not something I suggested he do, and had he asked, I would have advised him not to, but still, I opened the door. Luckily, he gave it up, eventually, but my God, what if he had died?
Karma's a b*tch and is often asymmetrical, which is why I figure the reason I've suffered with irritable bowel syndrome for forty plus years and anxiety for close to thirty is because of that brick and the heroin, along with other wrongs I've perpetrated against the innocent ever since I was a young boy.
Maybe I should just count sheep.
