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Kindle Notes & Highlights
Many years passed before I learned of other ways to access the healthy and limitless part of my mind that psychedelic drugs had opened in my youth. In 2001, deep into a Vipassana course, a few days into silence and ten hours a day of meditation, I found myself in a psychedelic state.
I realized a profound simplicity of purpose, my focus crystal clear, I saw the beauty in all, and was overwhelmed with love and gratitude for all the joy and pain in my life. In that moment, I learned that no drug was ever necessary for a mind-opening experience.
Something awakened in me. I realized music could jar people out of their comfort zone, challenge them as to the very meaning of their existence. All the times in my life I’d wanted to disrupt things, to shake things up, and I now saw it being done in the healthiest way. Real alchemy. I fell in love with punk rock.
That was everything I wanted. To arrive out of the shadows and slip quietly into something so heavy and important. To belong.
Ha! A teenage Anthony could talk his way out of anything. I swear to you, if he went to hell he could convince Beelzebub to let him out, and if he went through heaven’s gates he might convince the little baby Jesus to let him go enjoy a quick little afternoon in hell to get his ya-yas out, as long as he promised to be back by dinnertime.
The three of us drove along for a few miles making small talk, when Dawn says she has to pull over for a second. She stops the car by the side of the highway, gets out, and disappears behind some bushes. A few minutes go by and Anthony and I are exchanging puzzled looks. Next thing ya know, a dude pops out from behind the bushes in lumberjack shirt and Levi’s and says in a manly voice, “Hi, I’m Don!” Hahahaha, the guy changed out of his woman’s look to go back home to his wife! What a genius. He drove us a ways more down the road before bidding us farewell. Kindness comes in all shapes.
We needed to sleep. My mother had once told me that if I was ever caught out in the cold, newspaper made great insulation,
Left with love and admiration for him. Left with the confusing pain of all that was unresolved. And the absolute knowledge that love is the only thing that counts in the end.
a heroin hangover is the fucking worst. It took quite a while to figure out that the hangover was worse than the high was good, that it was a losing bargain, and stop.
Art: Mike, you know we don’t let any little white motherfuckers in the Messengers, this is black music. White people are always stealing everything. Me: What about Chick Corea?
Thelonious Monk was once asked about what kind of music he liked to listen to, and he replied, “I love all music.” The journalist persisted, asking, “Even country music?” Monk said, “What part of what I just said do you not understand?”
I was saddened but I knew switching was the right thing to do.
The fact that I escaped my drug-using days without catching HIV is one of the most fortunate developments of my life. My lord, the anxiety and fearful projections I experienced years in the future when waiting out the week for the results of my HIV test. This was back when HIV was a death sentence. Phew. Yikes and phew, I am lucky to have gotten out of that absurd crapshoot alive. Guardian angels, my sweet angels, thank you.
When the stars threw down their spears And watered heaven with their tears —William Blake
Oh, the comedown.…one always has to pay the piper one way or another to get back in to the real world. I made it home safe.
But my crush on Maggie was electrically charged. She was the wild one I wanted. Hard, cold, sarcastic, and mean on the outside, but I knew if she would just let me past those violent gates, the most tender and vulnerable love lived within.
It wasn’t just the tension between them that made me feel terrible. The slightest hint of unease between people I care about has always caused me extreme discomfort,
I’ve been saved again and again by angels all around me. Not just from the insane stupidity of banging blow, but from becoming an aimless flounderer.
All my life, during times of change I take solace in water. Scared, heartbroken, confused, hurt, and angry, I plunge my body into oceans, lakes, pools, and bathtubs to find peace and faith. Fortifying me, wiping the slate clean, this baptismal act guides me again and again, helping me to tap an infinite strength.
Life is but a dream; It’s what you make it Always try to give; Don’t ever take it —The Harptones
Not until this moment did I realize I’d never felt a heart-opening magic like this while playing before, nothing else had come close.
I’ve been blinded by the intensity of the fear, and deaf to the chorus of loving kindness. I’ve acted like a fool and hurt myself. Only faith can save me. In my injured and depleted state, I walk back into the light,
It’s been twenty-eight years since I stopped drugs and dedicated myself to a spiritual path, but those hard drugs I did, the heroin, cocaine, and meth, they hurt me bad, it took a long time to really recover from ’em. I hope for you that you don’t waste your energy there. Even the weed. Man, I was way too damn young for that shit, it made growing up a more difficult challenge than it needed to be.
You will come out the other side stronger and kinder than ever.
From when I was a tiny little tot I have felt alone. Sometimes I’m cool with it and sometimes, um, not so much. I emerge from my solitary place and try to contribute something beautiful to a world that seems hypocritical and cruel. It’s hard for me to relax and trust.
The Master and Margarita—Mikhail Bulgakov Of Human Bondage—W. Somerset Maugham Jane Eyre—Charlotte Brontë The God of Small Things—Arundhati Roy Slaughterhouse-Five—Kurt Vonnegut Jr. The Slave—Isaac Bashevis Singer Against Our Will: Men, Women, and Rape— Susan Brownmiller Jazz—Toni Morrison Coming Through Slaughter—Michael Ondaatje True History of the Kelly Gang—Peter Carey
