A crackhead is a person addicted to the rock form of cocaine. Also known as baseheads, rock jockeys, crackfiends, rockheads, and dumbasses.

A fat crackhead

You can always tell when a drug addict has a long history of success by their weight. This is true no matter what the drug is, but is especially true for drugs like crack which reduce the appetite and physiologically cause the user to lose weight rapidly. But even with other addictive drugs that don't have these qualities (like heroin), an unsuccesful or only marginally successful user will have to spend all of their time making money for the drug, searching for the drug, buying the drug, using the drug, and starting again before they fall behind. The end result is that there is no time or money for food, and no interest since eating does not help advance the user's primary (usually sole) goal. So, a fat drug addict is a successful drug addict - at least if you don't consider that a contradiction in terms.

I met a man with none of his front teeth at the bus stop today. He was there with a lady about his age, which I figured for mid-thirties, maybe his sister, maybe his girl. We trade cigarettes, one of his Kools for one of my Camels, because a man can't smoke menthols all the time.

"We're hustlers, professional hustlers. We live on the street," he said. He had a bunch of jailhouse tattoos. One of them was a teardrop, coming down from his right eye. That means he killed somebody while he was in the joint, if they do things the same in Texas as they do back East. "I'm a crack addict," he said, unsolicited. "I only do crack though. Not weed, not junk, not even powder coke. Just crack." He stopped to think. "I'd probably do some glass if I got my hands on that, though."

"Dude, meth's some hardcore shit. Meth'll drive you fucking mad." I meant that more as a point of reference than a lecture, and I didn't start in on the crack. Because, in the end, what can you say?

A beat-up caddy pulls up to the stoplight, and a hispanic girl leans out the passenger side window, yells out, "Why didn't you call last night?"

He yells back, "I lost your number! Look, if you still have a room tonight, give me your number again!" She does, and the lady who's been sitting quiet next to him the whole time takes it down, in sharpie on her arm, after the caddy pulls off. Maybe she's not his girl after all. Maybe she is, and they're dealing to the girl in the caddy. Maybe this shit is complicated and none of my business.

I asked him about the teardrop. I'm not sure why; I guess I just wanted to find out if it meant what I thought it did.

"Yeah. It was when I lost my teeth. They pulled my parole and dropped me in the worst lockup in the fucking state, in the middle of a fucking riot. Three niggers started whaling on me, knocked my teeth out, broke my jaw in a few places. Right before I passed out, I stabbed one of the motherfuckers in the neck, with a ballpoint, and it went right through his fucking jugular. Took me three fucking years to prove it was in self-defense. Motherfuckers."

This is the way life goes, sometimes.

Not long after the caddy left, my bus came in and I went home. I doubt I'll ever run into him again. But he'll be out there living his life, just like I'm living mine and you're living yours.

The love of my life became a crack whore

This all started a year ago last month. This girl, whom I had come close to hooking up with in '02, before I had to go to prison on a probation violation, well, I didn't hook up with her then, because I didn't wanna leave her while I had to go do time. The time I had to go do turned into a few years rather than months.

I got out of prison in 12/05, by which time she was locked in a loveless, abusive marriage, with 2 kids by the prick. In feb. of last year, she left him after he had started getting physically abusive, and we became a couple.
Things were great, I had finally found a woman who cared about her kids, went to church regularly, etc. Only problem is, is that I had started using my substances of choice again, which aren't kiddie stuff. The first few times she caught me using the shit, we had huge fights about it, she threatened to leave me, etc., but I would tearfully talk her into giving me another chance. Within two months of us hooking up, she was using all I was using, IV heroin, cocaine, etc.
This went on until early november, when i had to go do a slap on the wrist for a dirty ua. As soon as I was gone, we had made the agreement that she was going to do a detox, followed by a three month inpatient rehab, to get her shit straight and get her kids back. (she had lost temp custody due to the divorce shit).

well, as soon as I was gone, she's living on the street down in the hood, renting her vehicle for crack, selling her cooch, she broke in my place and got my 36"plasma, 2 xboxes, my psp... then she broke in my grandma's and got $300 cash, then she got her cousins checkbook and cleaned out her account... she was coming to visit me when i was in county before i got transfered, maintaining like she was under control, but she was really out there prostituting herself and sleeping on peoples porches in cracktown and shit.
I'm finding out now that I'm out that now only was she fucking for drugs and money, but pretty much just for kicks while she was getting high. I'm devastated by this, of course...I'm just shocked by what a complete change of character she displayed. I thought I knew her, and what she was about, but I could have not been more wrong. i don't live there anymore, but i was down this weekend getting clothes, seeing my son, etc, and she saw her sister and had her sister to tell me that i just need to move on with my life.

I had got with my old drug counseler two weeks ago when i first got out, and got her a bed lined up in a rehab... but she wasn't trying to hear it. she told her sister she's not going to quit yet'. her sister asked her why, she said' i don't know'.
she's living with these street dealers, they're beating the shit out of her and making them work the streets, then taking her money and feeding her just enough dope to keep her jonesing. one of them beat her so bad, she went into convulsions... the dealer had to call her mom at 4 am to come get her... her dad went to get her, but 45 minutes later she had someone come pick her up and went back down there.
what's killing me is lack of closure... I feel like i've been reading the most emotional novel ever, for the past year, and the last few pages are missing. I'm just stuck... I still love her, no matter what she's become, but i can't be with her. that's a first for me... usually a break up is because we can't get along, have different goals, etc, never anything like this.
so whoever said 'tis better to have loved and lost, than to never have loved at all...', well, i don't always agree with that.

The most fucked up part of all, as disgusted as I am by who she's become is that I still have her on my mind almost constantly... I just need to move on, like she says, but I don't know how.