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The story exemplifies some of the craziness that can happen en route to a better answer to the problem. These events happened a couple of years after the great change that came about in my life. The change happened back on Jan. 16, of 1984. This was the date that I got sober. A couple of years after the change I did manage to live in a house for a while. My first try at this didn't last, but I think you might get a kick out of the story anyway. Usually someone else is paying the rent and I just hang around because I am so interesting to be around. I wouldn't want to deprive someone that really found me interesting. Why should I deny them the pleasure of my company.
The story that I am about to tell is just one of the many reasons that I am so interesting. As was mentioned earlier, I was a hair stylist before taking up hoboing. First I was a stylist of ill repute. Later my repute got better, but my emotions had been trampled. Never in my hairdressing career did I give such an expensive haircut as I did as a hobo. The reason that I mention this now is to get you ready for telling you about the $5,280.00 hair cut. This hair-cut paid the rent on a house for a year. I turned this into a flop house for recovering Alcoholics. This amount of rent was supposed to have secured the place for one year. The details of this transaction where somewhat mind boggling.
I must go back to a fist fight that I almost had with a dry drunk who was hanging around a club for recovering alcoholics. This was a club that I frequented a lot in early recovery.
This guy was a high bottom drunk. To my knowledge, he had never been homeless in his recovery. Homeless people think a little differently sometimes. What I mean to imply is that they think a little different than people do who live in houses. I have a little advantage over some of you who live in houses. I've lived both ways. I have lived in a house and in a tent. There are advantages both ways.
Ben was chewing the fat with several of his redneck work ethic buddies at the recovery club when I entered to make a phone call. At this particular club, there is a payphone. The phone has a blackboard beside it. Whoever is there takes calls for everyone else. In other words, whoever shows up at the club takes calls that comes in. They write down the message on the board. Then, who ever that was called for can come in an get their message. They in turn reciprocate for someone else. It makes a great informal answering service for people trying to put their lives back together.
In this manner, one sobering up alcoholic acts as an answering service for the others and the blackboard becomes information central. This helps considerably. Most of us in recovery do not arrive intact. We arrive at the point of recovery with no money and no home. Our family is all mad at us and we have very few real friends. If we don't help us, then who will?
Ben probably is one of those people best described as one of the redneck variety of alcoholic. This is just my observation of him. Actually it is probably just a judgement on my part. If I really understood Ben I probably wouldn't have almost got into a fist fight with him. We would have had an interesting conversation about our different life- styles and different modes of action, and that would have been that.
Ben was a little different from me in several ways. He worked and was married, owned a vehicle, paid rent, lived in a house, and had a little money. He bathed regularly and was a member of the recovery club's foundation. As a contrasting type of recovering person I lived in a tent and bathed when it was convenient. As for transportation, I walked or hitchhiked most places. I lived out of dumpsters and had little money to spend on anything, much less foundation dues.
We were, however, both in recovery. We both were at the same recovery club. I some how got the feeling that Ben, in some way, actually looked down on me and my life style. At any rate, something must have been bugging him that morning. He had for no good reason chose to make an enemy out of me. I didn't want any trouble. All I was there for was to use the phone and go to a meeting. I was about to pick up my blackboard messages and return the calls.
Ben looked at me and kind of snarled in a rather condescending way. "I don't use this phone for my personal business.", he said rather disdainfully. Proudly he continued, "...and the club as my answering service." It kind of hit me wrong, and I glared back at him and snapped," Well, I do! Do you have a problem? " "I'm going to go before the foundation and have you bared from the club. What do you think of that?" he snarled! "I think that if you want to throw me out of this club you better get on your feet because if you don't I am going to wipe the God damned floor with you! That is what I think!", I said as I shoved his chair and waved my fist angrily in his face. With that he jumped to his feet. Robert, who was sitting at the table also, quickly moved between us to attempt to prevent the fight in the club. There were a few choice words that transpired and then the situation cooled back to normal.
It had not exactly worked out that way in actual practice. In actual practice those people would could afford to pay were not doing so. When they did it wasn't anything commensurate with the quality of work that I was putting out. If there is anything that will get an alcoholic drunk quicker than holding a resentment I don't know what it is.
In fact, I was so mad that I had said I would never do a haircut again on any basis. I would make my pocket money the same way that I had before I sobered up, by picking aluminum cans out of the trash. The aluminum cans could be sold to be recycled. This is not a way to overnight wealth. It will get you some pocket change.
It was not surprising then that I gave Phil the answer that I did when he ask me for the haircut. I told him, "I wouldn't cut your hair for $5,000 dollars, Phil." Word had gotten around that I was pissed about this matter.
Phil instantly anticipated my answer. My answer didn't upset him in the least. Instead, he came back at me like this, "I know where you are coming from, Fred. I believe I would feel the same way you do if people tried to take advantage of my good nature. How about let's make that haircut worth $5,280.00." I stared at him blankly, and then asked him in startled jest, "Is the extra money because you want your moustache trimmed also?" "Now that you mention it, my mustache does need a little attention. I need to talk to you about something, Fred. Why don't you bring your shears over to my house. I will fix us some supper and we can talk about a deal that I think you will like."
"OK", I agreed, "but wouldn't it be cheaper for you to just get a haircut at the beauty School? They will shampoo your hair for you and trim your mustache for about $5.00. Why do you want for me to give you this expensive cut, not that I doubt for one moment the value of my haircuts? After all, I do good work."
Phil was feeling rather resentful about the whole matter. That particular house, in fact, had about five wraparound notes on it before it went back to the original mortgage. Phil was angry with Eva Dean because Phil thought she had influenced Nancy to leave him. She should have kept her nose out of Phil and Nancy's business. He was also mad at Nancy. Still, Nancy had trusted Phil enough, though she was leaving him. She had decided to let him take care of the sale of the house. She knew that Phil would have his own interest at heart. He would get a good price for the house. So, she had unwisely quit-claimed the house over to Phil. He could handle the details of the sale. She had not planned on Phil being as pissed as he was.
He decided not to sell it because he didn't want his ex-wife to get anything out of the sale. He was determined, in the final settlement, to spite her and Eva Dean. This turned out to be a windfall for me. To top this off Phil put the finishing touches on the deal by putting a lien against the property in lieu of work that another buddy of mine did on the fence. He removed the back fence for the price of over $4,800. That amount would have to be paid by the owner regardless of who ended up with the house. This would have to be paid after all of the repossession took place. This would have to be paid if the house ever sold. This made the house look like it wasn't worth repossessing.
I don't know how many layers of wraparound notes the house went back to before a little lady showed up on my door-step. She purported to be the owner. When she showed up at my door she was escorted by two policemen. They were asking what was I doing in her house. Her House? What did she mean her house? My papework was in tact. What did she mean bringing policemen to a house that I had a legal lease on paid up for a year? I showed the paperwork to the cops, being careful not to let the paper leave my hands. "I can see that you plan to hold on to the paperwork, don't you?", asked one of the cops. "Yes, I do.", I replied, "Wouldn't you?" The cops proceded to attempt to give me legal advice. They said that everything was in order, but that I would have to move when the bank got around to repossessing the house.
"I don't need legal advice on a civil matter from a cop.", I replied. "What I want to know is why the police are in my house. Is this not a civil concern, anyway?" They agreed and left. By this time I had already turned the house into a sober flop house for my recovering drug addict and alcoholic friends. All of my friends were crashing in there.
At this time, I am now living in doors. This story was about my first try in recovery to solve my living problem. It also tells about an attempt I made toward achieving one of my goals which was to provide living centers for recovery.
I can go into the details of this later. I've got a plan that I may need your help with. Let me go ahead and say just a little about the living center idea that I already mentioned. We can go into the idea in some kind of depth later on in this book. It is enough for me to say that before I sobered up I spent a lot of time being drunk, high, paranoid, homeless, and living as a hobo.
That anyone should have to be homeless is enough to make a feeling person angry. By my writing all this down it helps me vent some of my anger. What I am probably angry at is my choice to be homeless. Living in a tent isn't really homeless. It may be close, but not exactly. There are definite advantages in both lifestyles. I won't go into detail about this at this point. We will save that for later. We have quite a lot of stuff to cover in this book. I don't want to make this book so big that it would be hard to lift.
I would like to make a comment about my concern about the plight of the poor. It might be somewhat selfish to make this comment. I feel very rich indeed. The person who feels poor usually works for years in a job that he or she doesn't like. They do this in order to save up money so that they can quit work.
I was barely into the second month of the lease when I got the message from Sol that he needed me in Abilene, but that's what the next chapter is about.