The Cripple and the Junkie

Sit down and let me tell you the sad, sad story of two of my neighbors. I have a general rule on this blog not to trash talk people I know personally, but since both of these people are dead, I think they're fair game. I'll call them C for the Cripple and J for the Junkie.

First, let me explain the players. I lived on a house on a corner. The house on the other side (actually a trailer, but let's not quibble) was home to a neighbor who was a heroin addicted wife beater. Just coincidentally, J grew up in the same neighborhood as my husband. When my husband recognized J he knew we were going to be entertained.

And he wasn't wrong. There were junkies wandering in and out next door, cops making periodic visits, their three toddlers wandering around the street half-dressed, yelling and screaming from him or his wife or both. At first, I had a lot of sympathy for Mrs. J. I mean, J would drag her around by her hair. Once he got pissed off and beat her car with a hatchet or sledge hammer or something. I'm sure she probably felt trapped and helpless, but if my husband did anything like that to me, one day he just wouldn't wake up. We'll leave it at that.

The story just gets better from there. The street we lived on was actually a T, and the person who lived on the top of the T was an alcoholic, diabetic, paraplegic. He ended up in a wheel chair when he got drunk one day and ran his pickup off the road. He shouldn't drink at all, since he was a diabetic, but that didn't stop him, even after the accident. He just sat around drinking all the time. He took such bad care of himself my husband was constantly going over there because he wouldn't bother eating and then his blood sugar would bottom out. Once he thought he was flying, and sat up on the couch holding his arms up like Superman saying 'Look at me! I'm flying!'

A little helpful hint if you ever need to raise somebody's blood sugar. Mayonnaise. A couple of big spoons of Mayo will pop that blood sugar level right up. Plus it's fun to watch the looks on the person's face. First, they have the crazy look of somebody headed for the nut house. Then they get a confused look when they realize something cold and squishy is in their mouth. It feels like pudding, but it doesn't taste like pudding. What could it be? Then there's the look when they realize they have a mouth full of Mayo. A mixture of shock, horror, and Mayo-drool. Believe me, it's priceless.

Now, where was I? Oh yeah, the big fight. One day my husband and I were minding our own business when there was a knock on the door. It was C's son, about 12 or 14. He wanted to know if we knew what happened to C. We didn't know anything. He said C was on his way to the hospital. We thought he must have had another blood sugar episode, but his son said it looked more like somebody had beaten him up. We had been watching a movie on TV, and my husband had been cutting some vegetables for dinner on the coffee table while we watched the movie. With a great big chef knife like the psycho killers always use in scary movies. Don't forget about the knife.

My husband goes outside to talk to C's son and his mother, who was outside still trying to figure out what was going on. I stayed inside because there really wasn't anything to see. An ambulance had already taken C to the hospital, so we couldn't ask him anything. The next thing I know my husband, C's mom and son all come rushing into the house and shut the door. J had gone all Deliverance. My husband said J came walking out from his trailer with a shotgun saying he was going to kill everybody, or something like that. When he pulled the shotgun down and aimed it at them my husband decided they should all head for cover.

We heard a boom, and the house shook a little. We thought he shot the house with his shotgun, but then there was another boom and the front door came flying open, hitting C's mom in the shoulder. Luckily, he didn't have the shotgun, he had just kicked the door open. My husband told C's mom and son to get out. Meanwhile J is pulling a real pathetic Kung-fu act on my husband. My husband probably weighed 175-200 pounds, and J might have weighed 120. Maybe. And he was a lot shorter than my husband. Plus, my husband used to actually take marshal arts classes, not just watch marshal arts movies. So while J is kicking his legs around like Beavis, or was it Butthead, did in the movie when they were dancing, my husband was trying not to laugh.

Remember the great big chef knife laying right there on the coffee table. So did I. I was afraid Psycho J might see it, too, so while my husband was trying to wrestle J down I grabbed the knife and just tossed it under the couch. Then I noticed my dog. Now, he's half pit bull, and at the time he was about 2 or 3. He had always been a big marshmallow, but I was afraid he might suddenly develop a protective streak. I don't know if I was more worried about my dog getting hurt, or biting my husband on accident, but I hustled him outside. I couldn't think of anything to do with him, since his leash was still inside, so I just put him in the car.

By this time my husband had gotten fed up with J and just picked him up and carried him out to the front porch and body slammed him down onto the ground and basically sat on him. I still remember J telling my husband he was going to count to ten or something and then he was going to kick my husband's ass. My husband said go for it, but J realized he was full of hot air and just went limp. My husband got up and J took off, then my husband went to go check on C's mom and kid.

I went over to C's house, and for some reason his son had climbed up in a tree in their front yard. I don't know if he was just trying to get a better view, or if he was hiding. I started walking down the street to C's mom's house about 3 houses down, when C's son starts yelling that J is trying to burn my house down. See, I told you this was going to be a good story.

Now, I need to stop for a second and give a little more background information. We had a nice screened in front porch, with a porch swing and BBQ pit. Yes, I know, we really shouldn't have had a BBQ pit there in a screened in, covered porch, but we used to do a lot of pretty dumb things. Ok, ok, we still do. We would sit out there and I would swing and my husband would cook and then we would both eat and generally have a good time. It was a real nice porch. I wish we had one on our present house, but that's beside the point.

So, back to the story. Obviously, J was higher than a kite. He decided he was going to burn our house down, so he picked up what he thought was a bottle of lighter fluid and sprayed it all over the carpet inside the front door, and then picked up a box of what he thought were matches and started flicking them onto the carpet. I came running back and started yelling at J that the cops were coming and he better get the hell out of my house. Eventually he did leave and I walked onto the porch to see if he had started a fire or not.

This is where it gets really funny. Sure, we had a BBQ pit on the front porch, but it was a gas pit. We didn't have any lighter fluid. What J thought was lighter fluid was a spray bottle my husband used to baste and tenderize meat. And remember, we used to eat out on the porch, so there was a box of plastic utensils out there. A box about the size of a big box of kitchen matches. So I look in the front door and see the carpet is all wet and there are plastic spoons laying everywhere.

My husband came back and started looking for J. He picked up a broom that was on the porch and snapped it in half to smack J upside the head with if he found him. About then the cops finally show up and find my husband walking around ready to beat some ass. It took a few minutes to convince them he was the victim. J was hiding under our camper over by our garage. They finally drag him out and take him off to jail.

Did I mention we have hick cops out here? Before stun guns became so popular our cops used to actually use cattle prods. Now they are more advanced and have all the fancy cop gear. My husband drove by the ambulance station one afternoon and saw the cops having tazer practice. Apparently, before they are allowed to actually use the tazers on suspects they have to learn how to use them, and what the effects of being tazed are. They do that by tazing each other. So my husband got to kick back and watch a bunch of cops all electrocuting each other. Sweet.

We never did find out why J beat up C. All we know is that, in order to beat up a cripple in a wheelchair, he had to sneak up from behind and slam his head down on a carburetor, or whatever car part C had been working on. It almost took C's left ear completely off. J got convicted, not for beating up a cripple, but for kicking in our door. The cops said since he kicked the door in, instead of just turning the knob and walking inside, that made it a home invasion. Instead of getting the hell out of dodge while J was in prison, Mrs. J stood by her man and waited patiently for him to get out and resume beating her. Eventually he managed to OD on heroin. Rumor has it he had a needle in each arm, but that might just be a local urban legend.

C eventually died, too. I don't know if they ever actually found out what he died from. He was just a pathetic drunk, like you would see in a gutter on Skid Row somewhere. He didn't pay attention to his blood sugar, or his personal hygiene. My husband refused to give him a ride because he smelled so bad it took weeks of daily doses of Fabreeze to get the stink out of his car after the last time he gave him a ride. To quote my husband, he smelled like a dead man's ass. Plus, it wasn't just poor grooming. Sometimes he would loose control of his bowels and just shit all over himself. Nasty. Not sweet at all.

There, I told you it was a sad, sad story. And stinky, too.