Breathing cold air can make me feel more alive. I’m talking about the coldest of air though, not that bullshit fifty degree air. The 32 degree or lower air that when you inhale, you’re forced to take notice of it. Air so cold that everything else stops for a second and you are only focusing on how it hits your lungs. I have a very vivid memory of it being about 2:30am, I was on the streets of Baltimore on foot and no one was out. It was just me and that air.
I was wearing sweatpants, jeans, two hoodies, boots that had the bottom blown out on one foot, a knit hat, gloves and a winter coat. I ended up sitting on bench, breathing in that cold air. I can almost feel how it hit my lungs. It slowed everything down in my life for about 10 minutes.
I sat on that bench in the middle of the night and thought about where I steered my life to. What my decision making had earned me. I thought about how even when I was abstinent from drugs and alcohol, I never felt free. I was always trapped. Weighted down. Locked up. I could clearly see that this was bigger than a heroin addiction. It was more than injecting cocaine. It was definitely bigger than drinking. I had a problem that was getting lost in the shuffle of life. It was caught up in the cycle. I lost sight of the real issue and turned the smallest bullshit issues into unmanageable problems.
Man it’s fucking cold.
If you put your gloved hands up to your mouth to breath into them to try and warm them up, they get wet from your hot breath. My breath was passing by teeth that haven’t been brushed in weeks probably. My gloves, beat up, yarn woven gloves smelled just like my hot breath. Smelled just like my lost dreams.
It’s getting old to talk about, I know. But in those moments, all I can think about is my son. Can’t believe I walked away from him. Can’t believe I turned into the man I told myself I’d never be. I wanted to always be there for my child and I convinced myself time after time that I could get high (well) for one more day and then I’d get my shit together.
You know when it’s the middle of winter and you’re breathing the coldest of air? Well, your eyes water when the wind hits em.
I may be naive, or delusional, or just flat out reaching here, but I think the events of nights like that were Orchestrated. I feel like the story was being written in such a way that I breathed air that slowed things down for me so I could step out of the everyday hustle of getting high for just long enough to think semi-clearly. To think about in the very least, why I was breathing in the first place.
To not think about myself for the first time in a long time. To think about my son and think about my reason for living. I needed to think about my choices and where they landed me.
It’s fucking freezing when that bus blows passed you, OMG.
So when I’m away from my family, like i am right now, it’s like the air I’m breathing is different. I believe my purpose is to be with them. My 2 boys and my wife. That’s where I belong. Being alone and away from them, breathing this air, even though it’s not cold has me realizing things like I did on that bench. My imperfections. My short-comings. Areas where I could simply be a better husband and a better father. I want to always be better.
I’m getting off this fucking bench.