Bad Advice

I went to confide in a friend of mine as to what I should do. She said that I highly recommend that you check in at the first Alcoholic rehabilitation center immediately. I unsoundly took her bad advice.

You see when I was a young man deciding what I truly wanted to be in life, especially when I was old enough to get served at any State Liquor Store. I never envisioned that I would wind up living in a homeless shelter 977 miles away from where life was once simple and a few drinks a day kept the wicked away.

Yeah, it was 4 days after my 40th birthday and I would seek help for my addiction to alcohol and other mind altering substances. Besides, I refused to spend another winter in Cleveland the mistake by the lake.

I sold my 1998 BMW (Black Man Working). My hood emblem was altered somewhat by my irritated alcoholic ex-girlfriend. (No names please) The W was destructively removed and replaced by a black permanent marker to a capital U (Black Man Unemployed). It didn’t matter that the car refused to shift in gear, had a long-cracked windshield dead center, and my dual exhaust system had more holes in it then the stories told in the Watergate Investigations. I got $940.00 for it. In one of my many blackouts. I forgot that I purchased a rebuilt engine 2 months prior for over $3,000.

My license was suspended, and my tags had expired on my 39th birthday. At the time of my excursion in search of a rehab center it was a blistering 18 degrees below zero in the shade. The wind was howling like Mr. Wilson screaming at Dennis the Menace.

When I arrived at the Cleveland Greyhound bus station drunk as a skunk I didn’t know where I would go to get help to learn how to drink, respectively. Like a divine intervention out of the mouths of babes I asked the information clerk for a one-way ticket to Tallahassee, Florida.

I happily drank Convenient Store Margarita’s from Cleveland to Birmingham, Alabama when reality suddenly hit. I thought that I mistakenly purchased a ticket to the north pole as cold as it was while I was looking out of the icy Greyhound bus window.

The only reason that I realized I was down south was because I kept hearing people who talked similar to Whoopi Goldberg in The Color Purple by Alice Walker. By the time I reached my final destination I was drunker than Otis Campbell on The Andy Griffin Show. Twenty-Seven hours after I embarked on this journey I finally arrived at downtown Tallahassee, Florida.

I was expecting to see bikini clad women, sandy white beaches, alligators, Disney World, swamps, skyscraping luxurious hotels, Tony Montana and Juan Pounce de Leon and the Fountain of Youth.

Unfortunately, when I returned from the bus depot restroom, I thought that I had been dropped off in Stephen King’s movie The Langoliars. Believe it or not there wasn’t a sole or soul in sight for over 3⅔ lunar seconds.

I had forgotten that I asked this blind Tallahasseeian lady for the directions to the whereabouts of any cheap motel’s location. I just couldn’t remember did she point her red and white walking stick north or south. As far as I walked lugging my 33 lb. backpack, I got to thinking she must have pointed in the direction where former unemployed slaves could pick cotton for minimum wages of the early1600's. Seeing cotton fields for the very first time, actually blew my drunken induced mind. I always thought cotton grew on trees, as a matter fact I never gave a Woodsy the Owl hoot where cotton came from.

I hankered a drink worser than Woodrow of Sanford and Sons who most times needed two 4 fingers shots of Ripple wine after talking and sleeping with Aunt Esther. "Woodrow, you came here with teeth... Do you wanna be leavin' with teeth?"

Follow the yellow brick road a voice inside my head beckoned all of a sudden. I didn’t see any Munchkins, just a few vagrant wino’s sleeping on green metal benches at Lake Ella. Just like roaches’ scatter when the lights are turn on, I recalled the blind lady telling me to go north young drunk man on Monroe Street.

The first motel I got to wanted $75.00 per night. If I could have spoken Korean, I would have told that illegal alien that I didn’t arrive on a banana boat without a green card or by the USS Enterprise Starship NCC 1701 D star date 11-24-2019. Had I known that her rates would be the cheapest I’d get? I would have stated in clear ghetto fabulous slang that I truly enigmatically  임시변  (apologize) for thinking she was Korean. You see, I happened to arrive the day that Florida State played the Florida Gators in which is a college football state rivalry game. All the motels were charging (special events rates) triple of what one usually pays. By the time I found the 4^th motel my feet felt like I had driven Fred Flintstone’s car to Bedrock Tallahassee. Yabba Dabba Doo.  I ended up settling on a rate of $154.00 per night.Three Dog Nights or Days later my personal stash had depleted faster than MC Hammer’s singing career (No names please) and spending money. I had no choice but to seek accommodation at a residence I could afford until I sobered up to get in a rehab. With only $2.37 cents to my name and my head pounding as if it was inside the drums of Ringo Star. I would have gladly accepted lounging at any bed bug infested shelter.

Somewhere or sometime during my drunken stupor I heard a Channel 6 WCTV news anchor lady tell homeless people that the temperature would drop to below 30 degrees and they can seek shelter at the SHELTER as long as they got there by 6:30pm. I must have written that information down because in a shaky hieroglyphic handwriting I had an address.

The pounding on my motel door awakened me from one of the most bizarre dreams I ever had. I’m a demi-god in Michael Jackson’s Never, Never, Nederland Peter Pan like amusement park. I’m a 7 feet 7 inches alien humanoid with a head bigger than the Frosty the Snow Man Aunt Becky. My best friend is a 376-year-old 3-legged retarded dragon named Puff McBlunt. (No names please). The Nigerian cleaning lady boldly stated in broken Swahili that checkout time was 4 hours ago. Did you mean Nairobi time I shouted back with my slurred accent? I quickly showered, packed and caught the first bus polluting the air south. Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson had nothing on me as I was determined to find that shelter. I followed homeless people and all their worldly possessions on their back and pushing stolen shopping carts to the infamous the SHELTER. Looking back, I must have been following Winnie-the-Pooh's friend Eeyore because those unhappy sad faced homeless carpetbaggers weren’t in any hurry to get there. Eeyore is a character in the Winnie the Pooh books by A. A. Milne by. He is generally characterized as a pessimissic, gloomy. depressed, anhedonia old stuffed donkey. I’m still a little drunk, well okay, I’m still a lot drunk. The double vision kicked in and I seen quad-triple homeless vagabonds sitting on picnic benches beneath a shanty, under a multicolored gazebo, and wall to wall homeless people everywhere my blood shot eyes could see. They all had one thing in common and that was that, they all displayed that faraway look in their eyes as if they were aboard Jules Verne’s 20,000 Leagues under the Sea prehistoric submarine. It didn’t take me to long to acquire that look either. It also didn’t take me long to find out how things were operated around here. Stand in line and shut your homeless mouth was repeatedly shouted at me. The sign in for a bed line was so long that I seriously thought I was waiting in line to ride Frozen Fever at Walt Disney World (a 300-minute wait time) and that the dying Fidel Castro had once again released all his so-called political prisoners to United States of Florida for another Freedom Fratello. The average person throughout their lifetime spends five years waiting in lines and queues where roughly six months of that is waiting at Homeless Shelter lines. This gives the average homeless happy person 319 months 2 weeks 4 days and 12 hours left to live. The 13-foot gate locks at 5:15pm and 6:45pm respectfully. It reminds me somewhat of the lyrics to the song, Hotel California. Yeah, and I was thinking to myself… This could be Heaven, or this could be Hell"…Welcome to the SHELTER…Such a lovely place (Such a lovely place) … So, it’s time to grow an ugly face… Plenty of room at the SHELTER... Any time of the year (Any time of the year). The last thing I remember… I was running for the 13-foot chained locked gate… I had to find the passage back… To the place I was before… "Relax,” said the bed sign-in man…"We are programmed to receive… You can check-out any time you like…But you can never leave!

I staggeringly stood in line until I was allowed to register for a bed, the temperature had dropped from 67 degrees to under 33 degrees. You don’t get a bed upon being a new arrival or a first timer as they refer to you. Although there are privileges for being there for the first time. On your first visit you get to stand at the head of the homeless class, and you get first squatter rights to a bed on a 2inch thick mat on the kitchen linoleum cold floor. The mats are placed so close together that even a great Starkest Tuna like Charlie Tuna would feel uncomfortable. It didn’t matter to me because I fell to sleep before the kitchen lights went off. I awake around 4:44am to relieve my full to the capacity bladder. My feet were icy cold for some strange reason. Yeah, someone had taken my expensive Belvedere Genuine Crocodile Skin Shoes and brand-new J.C. Penney’s Argyle socks right off my swollen feet during my comatose drunken sleep. My backpack was gone along with all my worldly possessions. All I could think of at that moment in time was “They Shoot Horses Don’t They”?  A novel by Horace McCoy in 1935. Where was the famous detective Charlie Chan when you needed him and his  number 1 son most? They didn’t get my wallet because I had placed it inside the motel Gideon Bible I used for a pillow. There was no need to complain upon death ears, so I went back to sleep until the kitchen lights were abruptly turned on at 6:50am. Can you imagine waking up and not knowing how or why you landed in the movie Poltergeist? Don’t go toward the light.

The unprofessional staff at the SHELTER must have been trained by Adolf Hitler’s, Gestapo SS Leader Heinrich Himmler. (No names please) None of the staff member acted anything like Colonel Klink or Sargent Schultz of Hogan’s Heroes. I see Nothing!  I know Nothing! I got Nothing and No love or sympathy or reimbursement for your cherished belongings. I did get told to stand in line and shut your mouth hobo bum!

Some albino looking man with red eyes (No names please) offered me a pair of size17 inch bowling shoes. He must have thought I was auditioning for a Viagra or Cialis commercial. Beggars can’t be choosy although I felt like Leon Coffee a rodeo clown in the movie Stir Crazy. That was the conclusion of day one at the SHELTER.

Five days have passed since I truly discovered that there really isn’t a Wizard of Oz and I’m finally getting inside track as to how things are run around here.  The requirements to getting a real bunk bed goes as follows: You must return to the SHELTER for 15 consecutive painstaking days just to get on the waiting list.  I’ve heard that many of the permanent residents have been here as far back as the grand opening in 1995.  There are a little over 80 beds for well over 253 homeless degenerates’ men per night. Many sleep in provided sleeping bags outside on picnic tables or up under the gazebo, tree roots on the lumpy ground and by the side door.

I really can’t blame the ones who enjoy sleeping under the stars and from escaping from being wedged between two loud snorers, two rapid firing gas passers, two cigarette coughing smokers and human body odor so foul you won’t want to eat without a respirator and feet that smell like they’ve been dipped and basted in bat droppings.   

There are two urinals, three toilets, 3 basins, four showers and 4 mirrors.  The bathroom smells like an outhouse used by pigs.  Sorry Arnold Ziffel of Green Acres, but it’s true.  Breakfast is any time after 7:30 am.  It all depends on what type of mood the Gestapo forces are in.  The basic morning meal is stale bagels or stale pastry, a small cup of watery coffee and a hurry up and eat and get the @#$! out.  Doesn’t matter if it’s sunny, freezing or raining cats and dogs.   At some time after 9 am the day room is open.  There’s only enough beat up chairs for about 17 of the 40 or so, who enjoy watching TV that you can’t hear.  If you happen to fall to sleep, you’ll be banned forever. I wasn’t sleep Master Pete the hangin Lip (No names please) my eyes were open! It stays open until 11:00 am.  Lunch is at 11:30 am.  Inconsequential bag lady’s women first!  The line is so long that a policeman has to control the line before anyone will be getting served.  I’m not going to mention what food has been donated and I’m surly not going back in line to wait for seconds. Back to the day room until 4pm.  They allow the first sign in group back into the prison yard I mean Shelter yard by 5pm.  The jailer stands by the 13-foot gate to lock it exactly a 5:05 pm sharp.  You’ll just have to get back here at 6:30 pm.  Why, Master Lip (No names please), when I’ll be standing in line for over an hour before you let me sign in.  Didn’t I tell you about asking questions? Yes, sorry Uncle Tommy!  Dinner is served between 7:30pm and 9pm.  Lights out with or without showering. There are 4 tables, 2 tables have 18 chairs and two have 13 chairs.  I’m number 167 and how long do you think it’ll take me to get my dinner ration?  Yeah, enough time that the bread stales if it isn’t already.  Oh, I forgot to mention the going back outside for prison breaks, I mean cigarette breaks.  You couldn’t pay half these folks here to escape, they got it so darn good. That’s just a little-known fact how things go around here at the SHELTER.  Do you think you could look forward to that each and every day? I know that the new 3 Homeless Stooges could! I just hope I don’t wind up wearing a strait jacket at Florida State Hospital (FSH) is a hospital and psychiatric hospital in Chattahoochee, Florida. Opps, my drunken insanity is starting to kick in.  

Before I forget I must tell you that there are homeless multi-bag carrying women who share the same facility.  You can look behind Let’s Make a Deal curtain in the men’s dorm behind curtain number one and see them in their thongs, skivvies or less.

I had gotten so caught up with the alcoholic environment that I truly forgot why I came to Florida in the first place. It wasn’t until I seen what the police can and will do to homeless drunks that’s when I finally seeked the help I truly needed to stop drinking. How could that friend of mine lead me to a place where there were so many people just like me? Real bad advice!