“Turn  My Nightmares Into Dreams”-With The Rolling Stones’ “Sister Morphine” In Mind  

By Bart Webber

Slade Jackson always had a running nose these days, always sounded like a foghorn too. Yeah, you don’t even have to think another thought because you know without blinking an eye that the brother, the broken down from hard times in Vietnam brother, is up against a big fat jones and does not know how, does not care to know how to break the fucking habit. Funny in ‘Nam (only guys who have actually been there are entitled to use that shorthand for the hellhole as a few of his friends from the old days, from the old neighborhood, like Ben Bailey learned when they tried to emulate him on that sacred term and got nothing but icy stares for their efforts) Slade had been among the “alkies” and not the “dopers” in the division of the who did what to take away their pain, take away their constant fears, take away the dirt and grime too in the company out in the “boonies” of the Central Highlands of stinking ‘Nam.

Slade had almost naturally been revolted by the mostly black brothers and Hispanic hermanos when they lit up their damn blunts and he would get the second-hand smoke in his face when they wanted to taunt the alkies. Otherwise he got along with the brothers and hermanos, he had to almost every one of them were better soldiers than he was and couple wound up saving his young white ass when the deal went down. Had naturally been back in the old neighborhood around 1965 when it became time for the young bucks to come of age in the drinking world attached to whiskey and beer. And deeply imbibed the alkie culture that went alone with the booze. But enough of that because this story is about dope, dope pure and simple. Yeah, Slade and his corner boys had laughed about the stupid beatniks and their dope who had better not come around their neighborhood, or else. (On that beatniks thing the inner suburbs were well behind the time since what they were objecting to were the early hippies on Boston Common with their long hair, beards, guys, weird clothing like granny dresses for women, their vacant dope-tinged stares and their free love, free sleep out on the Common, pan-handling ethos, and not the beats who were by then with their cold ass jazz, berets, black attire and indecipherable words passe, ancient history, gonzo.)                 

But that was then and this was now, the last four years now he had descended to the pits of hell (his term in his more lucid moments less frequent now), had run to sweet cousin cocaine, the good girl, and an occasional jolt of horse, the bad boy, when the money was fresh, or when he could cadge some credit from the “fix-it” man (also less frequent now). The trail down had started simply enough after coming home, coming back to the “real” world after the hellhole of Vietnam (also a term reserved for those who had been there although Slade would not give the icy stare when those who had not been there said the word), after the few months in the hospital at Da Nang recovering from that bastard Charlie’s stray spray of bullets that caught him, purple heart caught him, in the left thigh and had left him with a lifetime limp and some pain on wet or humid days. He had come back expecting no hero’s welcome after all his years were 1969 to 1972 long after almost everybody but the weird generals had given up the ghost of war and heroes, had received none but almost from day one back he was anxious to get away, anxious not see family and the old neighborhood boys. Had moved on in his head, moved on in his pain. Needed to seek kindred, needed to have some fucking peace in his head if anybody was asking  (when he went to the VA for some help he put the matter more elegantly although with results that made it clear it did not matter if he said “fucking” or “go fuck yourselves”).      

So Slade had drifted away from hometown Riverdale a score or so of miles outside of Boston, had had one job after another until he hit the West Coast, the place where he had landed after having come back to the real world and had thought about when decided he needed a fresh start. Trouble was he couldn’t find any work, couldn’t find any unskilled work for which he was fit having dropped out of school in the eleventh grades except maybe bracero work in the fields which was below his dignity (he told somebody that he had had his fill of “spics” in the Army anyway and hoped he never saw one again although as soldiers they were fine, better than him anyway), couldn’t hold the few day labor jobs that came his way. Started drinking heavily, mostly cheap day labor wines (“What’s the word, Thunderbird, what’s the price, forty twice”), and hanging around parks with guys, some fellow vets from ‘Nam but mostly older guys who had been around the block one too many times. A loser only made worse by his thigh pain acting up more and only made worse by his deeper alienation from the real, real world.

One day he was in San Luis Obispo having hopped a series of local freight trains working his way down from Salinas (where he had done stoop labor with the “braceros” after all so you know where his head and soul were at just then) when he stopped in the “jungle,” the hobo, tramp, bum hang-out along the railroad siding when he met John Arrowhead (an appropriate moniker for a man who was one hundred percent Native American, an Indian), who had served in ‘Nam with the 101^st Airborne who told him he was heading down to Westminster south of L.A. to join what he called the “brothers under the bridge.” At first Slade did not understand what John was speaking of, though the cheap wine he was drinking and cheaper marijuana he was smoking had fogged up his head. Then John explained that there were maybe one hundred, one hundred and fifty guys, all ‘Nam guys who could not face the real world coming back and had joined together under a railroad bridge and created their own world, their own commune if you wanted to put the situation that way. (John did not, could not express his thoughts that way but that was how Slade explained it to Ralph Morse, an old high school corner boy and fellow veteran, one night when he had come back to Riverdale because he had no other place to go to “die” as he said to Ralph when asked about why he had come back to town). 

Slade decided that he would hobo his way down to Westminster with John to see what was up, to see if the brothers under the bridge could make him feel like a man, like human being again. The night before Slade and John left John passed  Slade his cheapjack joint and while in the past Slade had passed a million times when a joint or pipe had been passed around that night he was feeling so blue about his prospects that he did his first weed. Nothing to it but he slept soundly, or as soundly as anybody sleeping on the ground in a hobo camp could, for the first time in a long time.

A few days later arriving in Westminster after having flagged down three freight trains to get there and warding off a bunch of punk kids in El Segundo who wanted to “hassle the bums” Slade could not believe that these brothers under the bridge had created their own world outside of town. Had created a tent city but more importantly for the first time in a long time he felt at home. So when somebody passed him a joint, a “welcoming joint” the guy had called it (a guy from the notorious 26th Division in ‘Nam) he took a handful of tokes without a second thought. That, when somebody had asked him later when he made his first of about ten tries at “detox,” was when he charted the beginning of his slippery slope ride down to the gates of hell. There had been so much dope at the tent city (brought in by guys who had connections in Mexico and old connections to the Golden Triangle opium trade in Vietnam) that it became impossible for him to resist if he had wanted to resist when the dope train started.              

Slade went along okay for a while, felt at home, felt he finally belonged somewhere, and fuck, finally found some relief for his physical pain that was acting up the longer he suffered under it. Got some relief for the pain in his head, something to put out the fire in his head (not his way of expressing the matter but Ralph’s shorthand way of putting it many years later when the subject of Slade Jackson came up among the surviving corner boys who had known Slade in sunnier days). He worked hard to help keep the place in shape, in as good shape as any band of brothers living out in the winds could do. Then one freaking night (Ralph’s expression, not Slade’s) the whole world collapsed, the cops from about seven different units local, county, state who knows maybe federal this before every law enforcement agency had the particular agency emblazoned on their slickers so it was hard to tell descended on the camp and ran everybody who could be run off off, ripped down the tents and communal dining areas, everything. Arrested a few guys who had outstanding warrants against them and that was that. Gone.

A few days later Slade having lost contact with John Arrowhead found himself in El Cajon down south of San Diego in a rundown rooming house filled with stinking braceros and street winos who had enough dough for a flop for the night. He had been busted up some by a night stick-wielding cop with nothing but rage on his face so Slade was in some pain. He asked one guy, a dark Spanish-looking dude if he had any dope, weed, to clear his head. No weed. This was in the days when cocaine was just coming up the Mex pipeline in big bricks, kilos rather than ounces. That dude connected with somebody he knew and a few hours later he was back showing Slade how to cut the stuff, how to do blow by using a mirror and a razor blade to cut it up and taking a rolled dollar bill and snorting it up your nose. Slade’s first reaction was a jolt, a rapid beating of his heart like he was going to have an attack. That jolt did not last that long but after that first attack subsided he felt no pain in his thigh, felt no anger in his heart. He grabbed the razor blade and diced up another line. You know the story from there, or can guess it. Know the end too.                              

But no you don’t know. Don’t know how sweet cousin made his days go by faster, made the ‘Nam nightmares that had plagued him, had robbed him of his sleep, had made the night sweats go away for a while (even he admitted before he got to be a too far gone daddy in the days when he at least accepted the idea of “de-tox” that it was only for a while, only until the effect subsided). Then reality hit, the reality that to keep an even keel he needed more dope and more dope meant more money, and there was not enough money in the world to curb his hurts. He hustled first cons, then himself. Became a sneak thief and stole everything that was not nailed down. Finally winding up as usually happened with a guy with a big habit acting a stupid “mule” for Ronnie Romero, the big connection guy in El Cajon.           

One night he had been out at a park after bringing a load of goods over the border when a middle-aged guy, a be-bop kind of guy, what in the old days in places like New York City and Frisco town they called a hipster, hipster meaning cool back then sized him up and asked him if he wanted to “get well.” Get back on top. Slade, now so deep into the drug scene that he was game for anything said sure. That max daddy hipster put the first, although not the last needle in Slade’s arm. He had a rush ten times greater than any cocaine boost had ever given him. Somehow he knew for a while that he had better not go to the mat with horse, with boy. And for a couple of years he would do a hit on occasion while working for that hipster around town selling his wares. But in the end he forgot the first rule-the seller does not test the merchandise. And so there was a direct correlation between his increased horse use and the lessening of his cousin.          

No one knew Slade was dying when he came back to Riverdale after many years absence, after shedding a pants full of weight, after failing his last chance “de-tox” at Smiley VA Hospital in Frisco. But Slade knew before the end because he told Ralph one night that he had heard the “noise of wings,” a phrase he remembered from a childhood hymn, Angel Band, that had always impressed him because previously he had believed that those angel wings were silent. One night they found one Slade Jackson, purple heart Vietnam War veteran in a back alley humped up in a pile. The cause of death-heart failure. The real cause-Slade Jackson could never get enough dope in his system to turn his nightmares into dreams.