HINJFCA Part Seven

There are those times when it feels as though the universe conspires to thwart your every goal.  Those occasions when you're striving for one thing and the exact opposite occurs.  That pretty sums up my weekend, so I hope you had a better one.  My bad experiences in the SA kitchens will be saved for a future installment of this blog; suffice to say (using a culinary reference of sorts) it feels like my goose is cooked, along with any semblance of my manhood.

At any rate, we're wrapping up the events that led me to that supremely messed up weekend, so let's continue.  After my decision not to join the vagrants and transients of Las Vegas, I started asking around the SA administrative offices for information on any programs they might have that concentrated on helping a person regain an entry to society.  In fact, they have a series of vocational programs, as explained to me by one of their caseworkers.  Once you join the program, SA will foot the bill for your room and board.  This is repaid with volunteer work on the part of the program participant (known as a 'client'), which can involve maintenance work, a laundry detail, or other types of manual labor intended to get the client back in gear for gaining a regular job in the 'real world'. 

When asked what sort of job I'd be interested in, you might not be surprised to find they had nothing in my chosen field of voiceover work or entertainment.  When I said the only job I likely wouldn't be interested in was food service, the caseworker went on to tell me all about their culinary program, which involves a detailed course sponsored by a local college (they offer 7 credits upon completion) with all expenses footed by the state of Nevada.  While I thought she misunderstood my comment about food service (restaurant work has never interested me) I had to admit, the culinary course she described sounded interesting enough for me to agree to give it a shot.  If nothing else, I could use the college credits.

(This might be a good place for your humble narrator to fess up that he is a college dropout.  Never mind from which prestigious schools; I won't besmirch their reputations by associating them with me.  Suffice to say that I never had much patience for the classroom even though I was a good enough student.  But I always felt suffocated in school, and sitting in classrooms often led to panic attacks which made me antsy and also led to Irritable Bowel Syndrome among other malfunctions.  Like many problems in my life, I believe these problems can likely be traced back to an undiagnosed case of depression.  So let that be a lesson to you kids out their:  Stay in school and get your heads examined regularly.)

After reading some literature, I was given some paperwork to fill out.  The paperwork was actually a test composed of an essay question ("Why do you want to join the SA Vocational Program?") and a few problems designed to gauge language and math skills.  As in school, I had little trouble with the language portion of the test.  My problems arose with the math portion.  Even thought it was 5th grade level stuff, I still sweat bullets trying to figure it out.  To be fair I did okay with basic addition, subtraction, multiplication and division.  My arch nemesis has always been fractions, and time had changed nothing in this regard.  Speaking of time, it's been some four decades since I tackled fractions, and I wasn't any good at the stuff then.  What could I do when faced with a problem for which I had no solution?

Easy.  I took a WAG (wild ass guess) -- which turned out to be wrong.  I later found out from the caseworker that almost every applicant was tripped up by fractions, for a reason I detailed above:  It's been so long since dealing with the problems that people forget how to do them.  There's another lesson, kids:  When in doubt about anything always take a WAG.  And take those fractions seriously.  I handed in the tests after taking the full allotment of time and was told to check back in after the weekend (this was on a Friday).  I was a little nervous about that.  Even though the SA beds were only $8 a night, the funds my cousin sent me were running low.  I had really hoped the application might have been approved on the spot.

However, I made it through that weekend hoping that I would be accepted.  Most of the people who took the test seemed to pass and went on to become clients themselves.  One guy who had been in the test group with me had just done a 5-year stint in prison and said he actually was approved on the spot.  This guy ("Dave") was an interesting enough fellow that I'll digress a bit and tell you some of his story (as he told it to me).  The reason I do this is because his story had an interesting -- and somewhat sad -- ending where his SA experience was involved.

"Dave" was a white guy, stood about 5'9, 160 pounds and had reddish-gray hair which showed considerable balding on top.  He was 43 but looked older.  He had been incarcerated for 5 years for check fraud.  He spent his time quietly enough in a cell that had cable TV (basic cable only, but still) for $11 a month.  He said it was his first time in jail and he was understandably scared at being incarcerated.  His cellmate ('cellie') was a multiple time offender (assault, grand theft auto) who knew the system and served as his mentor.  Dave said he actually came to like prison life.  Everything was regulated and he never had to think for himself; he was always being told what to do, and had a regular schedule to live by 24/7, 365 days a year.  He even acquired a taste for the food.

Finally, he was released and in an arrangement with the prison, given a bed at the Salvation Army shelter I was staying at.  In fact, he arrived the same night I did.  As I spoke with him over the next few days, he told me more about himself and his background:  His family was evidently loaded; his father was some CEO of a railroad and his sister was married to the CEO of Verizon Wireless.  He said his mother wired him $500 upon release from prison.  (I never checked on this because I figured it was a lot of crap.  As you'll learn, your humble narrator was wrong.)  A friend gave him $5 to play the slots and he parlayed that into $300 (!).  Add to that his instant acceptance into the SA program (apparently this is common practice with ex-cons) and it seemed Dave was walking along a charmed path in his post-prison life.

Dave often told me how much he wanted to start over.  "I just want a simple life," he said.  He had been into drugs and alcohol, and wanted to get away from all that temptation.  Perhaps get back with his ex-wife who had relocated to Seattle.  He even gave $20 to a number of people he met on the streets and in the SA courtyard.  He said it was his way of starting over and 'giving back' for all his good fortune.  I noticed he started hanging around with a couple -- male and female -- who looked like transients.  It seemed they became fast friends.

One night in the dorms, Dave went on about starting over, his new life, etc.  (He could often drone on and on even though he had good intentions.)  He was especially excited about talking with h is ex-wife.  It seemed she still loved him and wanted to see him again.  The sincerity in his face and in the tone of his voice made you want to root fro the guy. 

The next day I had some errands to run so I didn't return to the SA grounds until 3pm or so.  Dave was there in the courtyard and I thought I'd say hello.  He didn't notice me because he was talking to the couple he had met.  I sat nearby and listened.  As he spoke to his friends, Dave seemed like a completely different guy.  Where he was usually laid back, he was now jumping around frantically as he told his story.  Where he was usually soft spoken he was now loud and boisterous.  His story went like this (bear in mind I witnessed none of this firsthand): 

He had been sitting in the courtyard and people had been coming up asking him for cigarettes.  Dave became so annoyed that "I jumped up in the middle of the courtyard and challenged all those motherf***ers to either stop bothering me about the damn cigarettes or fight me right then and there!  You should have seen everyone, man!  They were totally tripped out, seeing me get up there and call them out!"  Apparently no one accepted his challenge, but a couple of security guards were called over to calm him down.  "Yeah, they said if I hadn't been an ex-con, I woulda been 86'd from the program and from SA."  (The benefits of graduating the penal system I guess.)  Dave went on to rail against the SA program:  "All those people are so beneath me, man.  And the jobs are bull***t."  And here was the big revelation, and perhaps the reason for his change in demeanor (although I suspect some substance abuse):  His mother was wiring him an additional $8,000.  That's some mom. 

With his new found riches Dave said he was going to get an apartment and pay off a six-month lease.  His next move would be to "Kidnap a drug pusher and steal all his drugs.  It's gonna be wall-to-wall meth!  I'm just gonna do drugs for six months straight!"  He told his friends that they'd be living with him in this supposed dope palace.  When one of them asked what they'd do after six months. Dave said, "My mom'll give me more money.  I'll just make sure I'm clean before she gets here, and she'll give me money and a new car!  I'm the baby of the family.  They'll do anything for me!" 

It was amazing to me to witness Dave's sudden swing in mood and temperament.  Hardly 24 hours ago he was singing the praises of a simple life and now he was ready to move in with a couple of strangers and do drugs for six months straight.  Of course, there was always the chance he was lying.  I won't keep you in suspense about how his story ended.  Although I kept expecting him to leave at any moment, Dave actually did enter the program with me.  They assigned him to maintenance duties, but he didn't seem happy about it.  As our schedules diverged, I saw less of him and figured he was lying about the money and the rest of it. 

One night someone told me Dave had disappeared.  Someone had seen him around 11 pm walking toward the SA front gate.  They figured he was taking a late night walk.  But that was the last anyone ever saw of Dave.  There was talk that he had received $8,000 and had given away DVD players to some friends before leaving.  While he gave no inclination that he was on his way out, Dave had evidently been planning his departure for some time; he left nothing of value behind. 

That's the way it plays out for some SA participants.  Some guys actually do walk out and never return.  Dave's story affected me because of his abrupt change in character.  And while I have no right to feel this way, it's like Dave let me down somehow.  (He sure let me down in not giving me a damn DVD player, anyway.)  I guess he was telling the truth about his family having money.  I sometimes wonder what happened to him.  Did he get that apartment with the couple and start on a drug binge?  Will he get arrested and return to prison?  Will he wind up on the street?  I'll likely never know.

But since this is my story and not Dave's, let me return to the main storyline of this blog. The following week I returned for an interview with the caseworker and was surptised to find I actually did well on the math portion of the test (fractions excluded, of course).  At that time, I was given another test (spelling, and I aced it thank you), and another couple of forms to fill out.  After all that, I figured I'd get a decision, right?  Wrong.  I'd have to have another interview with another caseworker; and this one would actually decide whether or not I was accepted into the program (not entirely true btw).  Well, I really was sweating bullets again because my funds were in the danger zone, so I needed a decision quick.

And as it happened, I did get a quick decison the very next day.  And while you know the outcome of that decision, your humble narrator is once again strapped for time here at the library computer.  So this will serve as a natural break, or cliffhanger if you will.  Btw, is this a bad place to point out that this blog sometimes contains explicit language and subject matter?  Okay, in the future I'll post that advisory at the top of the column.  Next segment should bring things up to the present, so bear with me.