My wonderful wife, Mary Esther, and I just returned from a visit with the surgeon who will be operating on her back. It’s much more involved than we thought it would be, and we are meditating every day just to help us cope. We’re trying to keep it in the day, but we can’t help…
Running on Empty Part 2: Doctor Shopping and Crowbar Dodging
The pharmacist had grey hair and his glasses rested down on a bump in the middle of his nose. The woman working the counter came over and I handed her the scripts. She asked me for my address and wrote it on the scripts. I hated when they did that if they didn’t cash them…
Can’t go home-but why would I?
But why would I want to return to what was never a home in the first place? Today I have a home. I live with a family, my wife Mary Esther and her mother, and they love and nurture me in ways I can depend on. My birth parents brought me into the world, took…
Rats In The Meadow: The Wilding
Alan and Phil caught the attention of the shop-keeper while Andrew and I stuffed our pockets full of candy bars. We wanted to be well-stocked for the trip into the Jersey meadows. Alan paid for the sodas and we walked out of the store. We had nine candy bars in all. It was a good…
Letter From Utuado, Puerto Rico
You once said “My reward for this life will be a thousand pounds of dirt shoveled in my face.” You were wrong. You are seven pounds of ashes in a box; a Puerto Rican flag wrapped around you next to a red brick from the house in Utuado where you were born, all crammed…
A running diary of suboxone withdrawal
August 12, 2018 I’m in the third day of my Suboxone withdrawal and starting to feel it. I have night sweats, my appetite is diminishing and I’m only sleeping five hours at night. I’ve gone from three Suboxone a day down to one-half of a Suboxone a day. It’s a familiar feeling because I used…
The Ruins of Pahokee
Suddenly the dreams come. For a second there is the face of Ar Lain Ta laughing and then I am back in Pahokee, Fla., with my wife. She stares at me with her giant eyes, the corners of her full lips are turned down, she is dark with the bite of the tropical sun as…
Finally, I Am Where I’m Meant to Be
Saundra came to Rosie’s Place about six years ago, at a low point in her life. Circumstances had led her to lose her housing, and she made the wrenching decision to separate from her teenage son while she became homeless and went through the process to find new housing for them both. She says that…
Labor Pains and Growth in Recovery
Spare Change News is proud to present the second installment of its new monthly feature, “In Their Own Words,” which highlights the work of writers who meet at Rosie’s Place. In late 2014, Rosie’s Place, a community center for Boston’s poor and homeless women, started a memoir workshop. The intention was to have the guests,…
This too shall pass
Spare Change News is proud to present a new monthly feature, “In Their Own Words,” which highlights the work of writers who meet at Rosie’s Place. In late 2014, Rosie’s Place, a community center for Boston’s poor and homeless women, started a memoir workshop. The intention was to have the guests, as they call the…