A Slice of Prison U. S. & World News
“ It’ s A Hard-Crack Life”
It’ s a hard knock life for crackheads! Or is it?! Two months ago I met this straight up die hard crack head. I mean seriously, the guy was in like, in his 40s( he could pass for 60s) and every time we were let out for meals( here in prison) he had hilarious stories about his life as a crackhead. The funniest ones always consisted of dope-dating. Anyhow, I came out of my cell to head out to the Prison Music Room a few days ago and he says;“ Hey man, I’ m going home in a couple days, I’ m discharged.
I say;“ Man, why the hell you telling me? You gonna send me canteen money?” He says;“ Hell, No! You crazy! How am I supposed to get dope if I send YOU my smoke money?” The crackhead has a point. So I asked him;“ Are you really going to go back out there and suck on that crack-pipe again?!” He goes,“ You damn right I am!”
“ So,” I asked him,“ Are you really going to go back out there and suck on that crack-pipe again?!”
He goes:“ You damn right I am!”
Fast-forward to the night before he gets discharged. We are out for recreation. I head straight to the universal weights, unaware that the crackhead was following behind me, looking for information. I turned around and there he stood right in my face. I said;“ What the hell do you want now?” He says;“ Man, do you got a paper and something to write with?” I said;“ Does it LOOK like I have something to write with?!” He shook his head and said;“ Man, whatever!” I just couldn’ t see what the hell he would need to write down, especially since he was just a crackhead who couldn’ t wait to get out and smoke. I told him to ask someone else. He did. He got what he wanted. As I was exercising, I looked up occasionally to see what he was doing. I was curious. I watched how he went from one convict to
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another with his ready pen and paper in hand, as if he were just
about to write something. Finally he made his way back toward me and when I got within earshot I overhead what he was asking other prisoners. I couldn’ t help but to bust out laughing so hard my gut hurt! The crackhead was going around saying,“ Say, my brother, can you help me out? I’ m trying to find out where I can go get good dope and not get robbed!” I went over to the guy, still laughing. I looked at him and said;“ Really!” He quickly shot back by saying;“ Man, you don’ t know how hard us smokers got it out there. Those young guys always are trying to rob us!” He means the young dope dealers.“ We gotta find a good dope house we can trust. I don’ t like being robbed of my next hit! Do you know any dope house addresses?”
I looked at him like he was crazy and shook my head in disbelief. And I thought smoking dope was taking the easy road. I guess being a dope-fiend isn’ t so easy after all. It’ s a hard-crack life! But it’ s ironic, really …. A crack head doesn’ t want to get robbed but the majority of them spend a lot of their time robbing and stealing from others to pay for their next hit. Plus, it’ s fairly understood that you can’ t trust anyone at a dope house. Maybe crack heads are delusional …. Yeah, that’ s it.
Edward Malave-Otero # 379083 W. C. I. P. O. Box 351 Waupun, WI 53963