Live and Learn, or Not

I’ve said: I was too young to be a Beatnik, but I was too old to be a Hippy.  However, that did not deter me from experimenting with various mind-altering, or perception expanding, substances.  Not always experimenting with, often just mindlessly using.  In my circles cocaine was unavailable at that time, but amphetamines, ‘diet pills,’ were very popular.

‘Diet pills’ kept you awake, and they made you want to talk.  And because they kept you awake, you could drink more before you fell asleep.  So whatever you talked about made less and less sense to everyone but you.  Because I was only a recreational user, I had no regular supplier for pot or pills.  I had to depend on chance meetings, and sometimes that would result in scheduling problems.

Like the time at O’Reilly’s, just before closing, a friend ‘laid a couple of hits of speed on me.’  That’s how we talked in those days.  That meant he gave me two diet pills, which I swallowed immediately with a gulp of beer.  It was just before 2AM.  I had anticipated the evening’s festivities to move to someone’s house or apartment at closing time, as so often happens.  But it didn’t happen that night.  Everyone went home.

I had no one to talk to, and I really felt like talking.  If I went home everyone would be sleeping.  No one to talk to there.  So I took a taxi to the George Webb’s on South 13^th Street.  They were open 24 hours, and it was a popular spot for a late-night snack after the bars closed.  There were plenty of people to talk to, but it was just meaningless chit-chat.  I couldn’t get a serious conversation started.

Not until the after-the-bar crowd had left, and I began chatting with the lady behind the counter.  The hour or so after the bars closed was a busy time, then it was quiet until about five, when early morning breakfast crowd began showing up.  She didn’t mind having someone to keep her company.  And I just wanted someone to talk to, to talk at would be more like it.

But I must have shut up occasionally.  Because I learned a great deal about her family, and about much she hated working the late shift at George Webb’s.  It seemed to me that although she was less than enthusiastic about her job, it did give her a reason to be away from her family for a while.  Once she got started she babbled on more than I did, and she didn’t take any ‘uppers’.  She probably didn’t have the opportunity to converse a lot.

Besides pepping me up, and making my mouth work over-time, amphetamines also made me more knowledgeable, more perceptive.  At least I thought it did.  She kept my coffee cup filled while we talked back and forth for a couple of hours.  I don’t recall precisely what we talked about, but I’m pretty sure I probably made thought observations and offered helpful suggestions.

There were certain cleaning chores that were part of my companion’s duties that weren’t getting done because we were talking so much.  The morning shift would be arriving soon, and the place hadn’t been cleaned up from last night.  The lady leapt into action behind the counter, washing, wiping, rearranging, and I lent a hand too.  I swept the floor, and then gave it a quick once over with a wet mop.

I said nice talking with you, and I headed home.  One of my sisters was preparing to leave for work when I got there.  While she got dressed, I made her a nice bowl of instant oatmeal.  Then I went to bed, approximately 24 hours from when I got up.  I fell asleep pondering what I learned from this latest experiment.