A Bad Moment I was lying on a thin mattress on the floor. The cupboards crawled with the glistening black shells of thousands of cockroaches. Had I turned on the light they would have scurried away, but there was no electricity in the apartment. I could see my breath, the place had electric heat. I was two blocks from the bridge. A few years earlier a friend of mine had jumped from that bridge, ending his life. I was considering doing the same thing. The only thing that saved me was knowing that my son would have to deal with that for the rest of his life.

Ray was a great guy. You wouldn’t know it if you met him. He’s an older man, homeless, a paranoid schizophrenic. Get him cornered indoors and he might be violent. Actually, it’s pretty likely. I don’t know if Ray is still alive. I haven’t seen him recently and the life expectancy for people like Ray tends to be low. I used to see him all the time.

When I got ADHD meds I lost the things that made me able to cope even with ADHD, now I am getting them back — they will help you as well This is another old piece - I haven't done as well as I thought I was going to when I wrote it In the Beginning Getting diagnosed with ADHD was a big deal, but it still took me a little bit to get meds. When I did it changed everything. I have never been good at getting back to work after being interrupted. Once I had my meds it was effortless. I could get into a fight with my girlfriend and drop back into coding without having resolved the fight. Previous me was so far from capable of that that it never even occurred to me it was possible for a human to do.

I can be a bit contrary at times. One thing that I do, when I’m bored and lonely, is bait scammers. I take up a bunch of their time, and really, it doesn’t have any purpose other than that. The most common scams I see are random people adding me on social media and then attempting to move things into a relationship based on photos. There are others, but this story is about that.

I’m a Mess of a Human Being I’m going to start by talking about some of the ways I suck — it’s essential to my point here. I may have missed a bunch of them. I’m sure that if the people who know me read this, they will let me know. So, I’m a flake. I forget things, miss deadlines, don’t manage to start projects when I should, and don’t devote the time needed to projects—definitely not a good look. I’m scared of conflict to the point where if I think something will lead to conflict, I will lie about it or hide it, even if I don’t think I’m in the wrong (actually, especially if I don’t think I’m in the wrong).

I’ve written about this before, but here goes again — there is a pervasive myth about addiction and recovery. It’s a simple myth. They say you have to hit rock bottom before you can recover. What is rock bottom? People will tell you that it varies by individual, that your rock bottom and mine might not be the same.

Yesterday I talked about how I was failing — this is mostly because it would be unfair to leave things there. My last-ditch effort today worked; now I have to come up with a bunch of money quickly, but I have a roof over my head and will have until at least the 18th of this month. If I can come up with the money, I will actually stay where I live right now.

So, this is going to suck to write, and it sucks in general. Not only do I have ADHD, but I’ve been deep in depression for a long time. Not clinical depression, at least I don’t think so, but definitely depressed as hell. I mean, there are good reasons for it — a whole lot of them.

Zavin was different. He was a giant of a man with flaming red hair. Nothing about him was conventional. He was sweet and kind but always kind of lost. We weren’t that close, but we were friends. This is how I missed talking him out of killing himself.

Once upon a time, I was homeless. It’s not exactly a secret. Hell, I have a publication about it. The thing that isn’t clear is the effect it has, long term. See, that once upon a time still sits on my soul, still wakes me up sometimes.