The Shady Afghan Warlords Whom the U.S. Pays to Fight the Taliban

Young Noble Feat. Rip the General: Smoke the Pain Out

TRIGGER WARNING: DISCUSSION OF SUICIDE IDEATION

You may be saying to yourself:

"Petra, how the hell can a middle-aged white broad relate to what these guys are saying?"

Let me tell you.

I've never experienced living in the ghetto or losing my friends to gang violence. I lived in suburbia--the run down part, not the new subdivision. School violence consisted of fist fights. My school was pretty damned homogeneous. There were a few Latinos, a couple of black kids, and a couple of Asians. For the most part, we were white as white could be. So no, I have not experienced the culture these guys are talking about.

What I do understand very well is this line:

"I smoke the blunt to take the pain out and if I wasn't high I'd probably try to blow my brains out."

I got called Pothead Petra back in the day. My fellow smokers said it with admiration. Those who think that "users are losers" said it with disdain.

I wasn't stupid. I got good grades. I was Goth. I was theatrical. Sometimes the darkness welled up inside me and threatened to consume me. I was sure the Devil was coming to take my soul. I thought I was so bad, so wrong, so filled with original sin that God had rejected me and this is why I felt so bad all the time.

At other times I felt like there was a wild beast inside of me that was trying to rip its way out. This beast really didn't want to harm anybody (although if some of the sneering ones had gotten in its way they may well have lost their heads.) 

The Beast was bored of the lame ass crap that the school was cramming into our brains. It wanted to tear out, jump through the window, and run off down the highway in search of the nearest rock concert. It wanted to drink wine and dance naked and maybe have sex if it found a particularly appealing fellow, but honestly, sex didn't much enter into the thought process. It was mostly about having carefree, wild fun--about being able to at last express what I was feeling inside.

But I couldn't. The wild me wouldn't be accepted, and certainly the gloomy, melancholy, anguished me wouldn't be. So I drank and I smoked. The others who smoked with me seemed to like me well enough, but I don't think they understood me.

I didn't understand me.

I graduated high school, went to college, met a guy, got married, had kids, got divorced, had lots of shitty relationships, trusted the wrong people time and again, and hated myself. A movie was always playing in my head that I desperately wanted to come true. It hurt like all the fires of hell that it couldn't.

It took me what may well be more than half a lifetime to start accepting myself.

Before writing off people like the guys in the video, take the time to try and understand where they're coming from. Take the time to try and understand the circumstances they come from.

Users are not always losers.

I always hated that damn PSA.

I'm no longer Pothead Petra, and I haven't been for a long time. That doesn't make me some kind of saint. 

I now understand the nature of the beasts within me. There's a psych diagnosis for that. It doesn't mean that the things I felt are invalid.

Until we can all start to open our hearts and love a little more, to really love and accept each other, people are going to have to smoke or drink or shoot up or pop a pill to take the pain out. And it's not right to judge them for feeling like that's what they have to do in a world full of pain. 

We can hope that one day they don't feel the need to do those things any more. What we shouldn't be doing is using words like "loser" to describe these actions. Being an addict or hurting so much that you can't see any way except to dull the pain with substances does not make a person a loser. It makes them a soul in need of compassion. 

There's enough harshness in the world. Let's try to understand our fellow travelers a little better before we point fingers and cast judgment.

Peace,

DJ Petra

Pot vs. Meth

How I Was Almost Special

First, read this article. Then read about how I was "almost special." He didn't get away--I threw him back. He wasn't worth of the love I had to give.

I almost let him back into my life. He broke my heart 25 years ago. Came back saying he was clean now, a changed man, ready to make a fresh start. If by clean he meant only doing coke once a day instead of four times, I guess he was. He was estranged from his two oldest sons, had a tenacious relationship with his twenty year old son, and my heart broke for his ten year old. His second ex wife (a woman whom I like, and who had taken him back once herself) wouldn't let him see the boy alone, and I don't blame her. She would only let him visit with his father if one of his older brothers was with him. His first wife (whom I also know and like) wanted as little to do with him as possible. 

He is charming as hell, probably a sociopath, and so adept at playing the hurt little boy. But when I found out he was still doing coke, I told him I couldn't be more than a friend. He ended up with a fellow druggie, a woman 20 years his junior. (He's 56 years old, still acting like an irresponsible teenager.) He doesn't look or act like a bad boy, he has the face of an angel and this "aw shucks" Southern boy manner that could charm the socks off the hardest case (like me.) 

Yeah, my heart broke. I'm not going to lie and say it didn't. This all went down a couple months ago and I've just now been able to start going to sleep without crying or wishing he was there beside me. But I realize now that I don't miss him. I sure didn't need the drama in my life that he would have brought. I miss who he appeared to be. Being with him would have strained my relationship with my own adult son, a young man with a gift for understatement, who said to me, "Mom, let's put it this way. Someone--we both know who I mean--tends to make really, really bad decisions."  So for the sake of my son and my animals, if not for myself, I couldn't let this man be close to me. Even though he wouldn't physically hurt them--he's never been prone to physical violence--the kinds of people he'd be bringing around might. I couldn't risk that.

I've decided that I'm going to spend my life solo--just me and my family and my animals. The few minutes of fake affection aren't worth months and years of pain. I've got my own problems, and the men I tend to attract and be attracted to are just no good. But this guy was the worst of them. He did it to me 25 years ago and he almost did it to me again. I'm glad I got out before fully becoming one of the "special" ones.

Peace,

Tempest

God Damn the Pusher

This is a movie review of the 2011 film Puncture, with a big side helping of Rant.

Puncture is actually a far better movie than I expected. It was difficult to watch in the beginning. Drug abuse upsets me. I'm not a purist and I don't fancy myself to be a better human being than hardcore users. I used to drink heavily, although I was able to quit on my own when the time came. I've used marijuana recreationally, though not in more than 25 years. I used to use prescription drugs recreationally and combine them with alcohol. As I said, I'm not some sort of unsullied angel.

I've never touched cocaine and certainly never done heroin. I've known people who have, and I've known people whose lives have been damaged by having hardcore users in their lives. Twelve years ago, a friend of mine ended up dead from AIDS. She had been infected by her partner and her daughter's father, an IV drug user. (Thankfully, her daughter is fine. She has been raised by her grandmother.)

Addicts can be very charming and charismatic.

I made the mistake of letting an addict back into my life recently. He may have kicked the substances for now, but he's still a womanizer. Fifty-five years old and still can't manage to act like a real man. Just a damn hound dog in heat is all he'll ever be. I should have seen it coming, but I wanted to believe that he'd really turned things around and we could be together. Dumb, dumb, stupid, dumb.

Don't let anybody tell you that fucking everything that moves is a victimless act. The people that sex addicts lie to get hurt. I don't want to hear about how humans aren't wired for monogamy. Fucking be honest about your intentions from the beginning. There is no excuse for lying to and fucking over another person.

I almost didn't watch this movie because of the involvement of Michael Biehn. I'm not particularly fond of his treatment of women. As a sexual assault survivor, I really did not care for his directorial debut, The Victim, which starred his hand puppet/wife, Jennifer Blanc. I could not finish watching that shit. He seems to have quite the cavalier attitude towards sexual assault, seeing it as a vehicle for tittilation. Not down with that shit, not in any way, shape, or form. No sir, violence and sex do not mix in my book. 

I'm also not down with guys who fuck over a good woman to try and recapture their lost youth with some starlet twenty years their junior. Bitch, your youth is fucking gone. You ain't getting it back. Being a man about it and aging gracefully is a lot more respectable than acting like the stereotype desperate middle aged asshat. Great behavior to be modeling for your sons on how to treat women, Buttmunch. Just sayin'.

Fortunately, I didn't have to see much of Biehn's cadaverous, scary-looking self. He really only appeared in the last half hour of the movie. Admissibly, he's an effective actor--always has been. His own drug use probably stopped him from being better recognized in the entertainment world. I've heard rumors that he has been kicked off movie sets for drug use and manhandling his female co-stars. In spite of this, I actually ended up feeling sorry for him after seeing Puncture. He doesn't look well. Years of pumping your body full of the wrong stuff will do that, I guess.

Tragically, Michael Weiss, the lawyer who was so keen on getting safety needles into hospitals and other health care settings, died from a drug overdose. He was so young and had so much ahead. Drugs suck, they suck, they suck, and they destroy lives. What a fucking waste.

In spite of my hatred for hard drugs, I do not believe that jailing drug users is effective or correct. We should decriminalize drugs and work on finding a cure for addiction, which is a disease.

And that's my take.

Puncture is worth the view. I actually ended up giving it five stars on Netflix.

Petra

The Pusher

You know I've smoked a lot of grass

O' Lord, I've popped a lot of pills

But I never touched nothin'

That my spirit could kill

You know, I've seen a lot of people walkin' 'round

With tombstones in their eyes

But the pusher don't care

Ah, if you live or if you die

 

God damn, The Pusher

God damn, I say The Pusher

I said God damn, God damn The Pusher man

 

You know the dealer, the dealer is a man

With the love grass in his hand

Oh but the pusher is a monster

Good God, he's not a natural man

The dealer for a nickel

Lord, will sell you lots of sweet dreams

Ah, but the pusher ruin your body

Lord, he'll leave your, he'll leave your mind to scream

 

God damn, The Pusher

God damn, God damn the Pusher

I said God damn, God, God damn The Pusher man

 

Well, now if I were the president of this land

You know, I'd declare total war on The Pusher man

I'd cut him if he stands, and I'd shoot him if he'd run

Yes I'd kill him with my Bible and my razor and my gun

 

God damn The Pusher

Gad damn The Pusher

I said God damn, God damn The Pusher man.

 

Things I Love and Things I Can't Fucking Stand

I'm working on a story dedicated to one of my writing sisters who is going through a really hard time. I love you, Cie!

The following paragraph isn't about Cie, except that someone who does drugs has brought misery into her life, which she really didn't need.

This photo was found here. It shows the effects of doing hard drugs. This is the same person in all of these photos.

I can't fucking stand what drugs do to people. They take someone who might otherwise be a decent to okay person and turn them into a fucking monster. I don't hate people who take drugs, I hate the drugs themselves. I hate what the drugs turn people into. Also if you want to start looking old and tore up real quick, do drugs. I've seen drugs destroy so many lives. I'm actually not talking about weed here, although too much weed can screw up a person's life too. I'm talking about drugs like cocaine, heroin and meth. An excess of alcohol can do it too. I've seen all of these things tear up people's lives.

For Cie, I want to tell her that it isn't her fault, you can't stop another person from doing things that they are determined to do. I also want to say THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH BEING DIFFERENT! People need to stop trying to make other people into carbon copies. My friend thinks a little differently and she reached out to others for help. Mostly what it got her was a shit ton of criticism and misery.

Most people aren't on your side. It's rare to find someone who is.

We'll get through. You've got at least one friend. Old Wicked Wanda is still here. Don't change you. I wish you could see you the way I do. You'd see a pretty cool person.

 

Fall of 92

Fall of 1992. I was 24 years old. I was in grad school and had gotten my drug use under control, but the self loathing hadn't resolved by a long shot. Obviously, or I never would have stayed with Kent as long as I did.

He seemed perfect, and I believed I didn't deserve perfection. I became a clinging vine. He was smart, handsome, sophisticated, everything I believed I wasn't. At first he seemed like the nicest guy in the world. That was before the verbal onslaught on our six month anniversary that left me in tears and nearly suicidal. I remember begging him for foregiveness. For what? For existing, really.

I remember dancing to this song with him and thinking I'd found true love. That was before all the verbal abuse started six months into the relationship, and the cheating started a week before our first anniversary. I ended up sticking with him for five years, believing that losing him meant losing everything. Instead, I lost myself. In spite of earning my masters' degree, I still felt like a complete failure.

Elmo???