Slowly I curated my life.  I dropped the people that reminded me of my heroin half-life and stayed away from places where I had copped.  Those areas were rapidly changing anyway.

 

The former was somewhat easier than the latter.  But it took me the longest to drop the things. “What if I need these things someday?”  So two days before I moved away from  California, I sat on the living room floor of my Silicon Valley home with my pink backpack full of spoons and syringes.

 

I called syringes “fits” and heroin “gear.”  Yes, I used those British affectations because I thought it was cool. Whom was I kidding?

 

There was no more gear in the pink backpack. I had quit two years earlier, but it felt like yesterday. I kept the pink backpack away from people, though not hidden.  Anyone could have been stabbed in the back of the hand with a needle if they decided to rummage in it. It happened to me all the time, I couldn't be bothered to put the caps on old, worn out fits. If one fit was jammed, I'd just toss it in there and fish out another.

 

I was leaving in two days and conscientious enough, I guess, to realize how hazardous and downright scary my pink backpack was, even if stumbled upon in a landfill.

 

So I sat on the sky blue carpet of my Mountain View home, a half a block from Google's second campus, the breeze from the Badlands blowing through the screens of my backdoor.

 

I pulled apart tangles of stretchy knee-socks, my tourniquet of choice. I pulled out blackened spoons that left my fingers covered in soot. You know, you have to be careful with spoons, The bottoms leave a telltale mark on bathroom counters.

 

I pulled out cottons, the little round balls I made pulled off of Q-tips.  They filter the gear when you pull it up in the fit.  There is a condition called “cotton fever” that all junkies know about.  It is said  to come about when one has unknowingly injected a tiny fiber of cotton into oneself.  Every junkie gets it at one point or another.  It is a tortorous full body pain and one is rendered nearly paralyzed for 12 to 24 hours. The cure for it is more heroin, but for most junkies, the heroin is shot up and you are physically incapable of hustling up any money to get more.  

 

My worst experience was three days lying on a mattress on a floor in the Haight.  I couldn't move. I finally  called my mom but of course did not tell her what was going on. I protected my parents from my addiction and lied, and lied, and lied. I told her I was really sick. I didn't tell her I thought I was going to die, I just wanted to hear her voice.  I regret that. I regret that phone call. I must have caused her so much worry.  Not “must have,” I did. I did cause her to worry, and played off that everything was fine the next time I saw her...because that's what I always did.

 

So I sat on the floor.  For hours I broke off the point of each and every fit. I had hundreds as it was easy to get new sterile needles from the San Francisco Needle Exchange. I'd use them until they wore out. I also had a medical “sharps” container they thoughtfully provide junkies so we wouldn't leave used needles in, well, backpacks for instance.  Once closed, the “sharps” box cannot be open unless someone goes at it with a hammer. And it does say “danger” on it. 

 

After breaking off the points, I pulled out the plungers, then tried to break the syringes in half. It was much too difficult. I put the sealed sharps container into the backpack, threw back in the spent lighters, half-burnt matchbooks, and remaining fit remnants, the orange caps and knee-socks and black spoons.

 

The spoons stymied me the most. What do I do with them? I put them back into the pink  backpack. If anyone ever opened this pink backpack, they would immediately know what it was about.

 

Two days, 48 hours before I left my California home, I wrapped the pink backpack in two giant black trash bags and shoved it to the bottom of my garbage can.

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