Monkeys

Jake paused as he walked through the front door and landed in the middle of a huge crowd that had descended on a friend’s graduation celebration. Car keys were gathered as a bowl was passed filled with an assortment of pharmaceuticals. The kids weren’t drinking the sparkling punch, that had been thoughtfully provided or the assorted vegetables, shrimp rolls and chips, but were busy downing draft beer from a keg hidden in the back yard out by the pool.

The music was loud and the living room was filled with energetic dancers some of whom were clenching onto each other so tightly that they resembled fighters in an MMA fight. Upstairs the bedrooms were all occupied as Renee slipped into the only bathroom that wasn’t being used. She locked the door behind her and slipped into the bath tub with a single edged razor blade in hand. Carefully but painfully she began to cut her arm until she began to feel better about herself.

It was Friday afternoon as Harold clocked out of the service station where he had been employed for the past thirty years. He turned and walked exactly thirty steps to the liquor store, as he did twice a week, to purchase a half gallon jug of vodka. While sitting in his car Harold cracked the plastic cap and glugged down several swigs of the crystal clear liquid. Soon his anxiety began to melt away as he shifted the car into drive and pulled out into traffic with the open bottle between his legs. 

 Harold sat down in his easy chair and pushed the button on the television remote as the familiar face of the channel 8 news caster filled the screen. Harold had downed half the bottle and began to forget about his day, life and the frozen dinner that he had haphazardly placed on high in his toaster oven. 

William shut the door of his office and began to pour over the daily briefs. He had several cases to hear today as he sat on the bench in the local courtroom. His mind wheeled as he thought about a case involving a family with several young children whose lives had been endangered.   

William could feel the arteries on his neck tightening as he unlocked a drawer on his desk and retrieved a mirror laden with pure white cocaine. William had the mirror in his right hand chopping the chunks with his left as the phone rang. The sudden loud noise had startled him sending the mirror with the last of his cocaine falling to the floor. Frantically, he fell to the floor still clad in his coat and tie and began picking up the white crumbs which had fallen into the carpet fibers. 

There was a sudden knock on his door as the secretary announced “The chief of police is here to see you sir!”

Theresa had worked as a paramedic for the fire department for ten years where she triaged patients who were injured during automobile accidents. She had injected morphine into many people who were severely injured and in intense pain. Sometimes there was a little morphine left over, which was supposed to be logged back into the narcotics locker, which she began taking recreationally.  

Months went by as her morphine experimentation blossomed into a full blown addiction. Soon Theresa, who never had called in sick, began missing work. Her log entries too began to dwindle as more and more morphine began to come up missing. She eventually lost her job, family and began living out on the streets. 

Jim worked hard all of his life in the construction field where he would drink many cups of coffee and pounded down energy drinks while he worked. At night he had trouble sleeping so he started smoking Marijuana to help him go to sleep. Soon he needed something stronger so he got a prescription for sleeping pills and began to take more and more tablets as time went on. After a freak accident at work Jim started taking pain pills but after his injury had healed he continued to use them.

One night Jim forgot that he had already taken his nightly pills and overdosed on his pain meds. While he was asleep his heart stopped and he died. Unfortunately Jim lived alone so his body lay undiscovered for several days.

Life can be hard enough without living with a monkey on your back. Closing a blind eye to the monkey we carry around while masking our pain doesn’t help solve any of our problems. Keeping secrets only hurts us and keeps us away from the truth which separates us from God. Let us begin to trust in God and have faith that He can take away the monkeys from our lives.