One of my hard partying friends had some couples, including me and the Mrs Limp, over for dinner last night. The friend is 47 years old and closing in on 30 years of steady cocaine use/abuse. Nowadays, Id call it use. Probably a daily bump or two and maybe an all nighter once every two weeks. Back in his 20s and 30s, when it was multiple day runs per week, it was abuse.
Throw in the fact that he drinks a bunch and everyone's always assumed that he's not long for this world. He's divorced, no kids, currently has a live in girlfriend and has always been the guy that just lives life the way he wants. Knows the risks of what he does, and chooses to continue doing it. And while there have been countless offhand comments and jokes about him dropping one day, most have been by him, last night it became a little too real.
its about 1:15 AM, still 6 of us there. Hard partying friend is standing there in the living room, talking to me and one other guy, one second and flat on the ground the next. No effort to catch himself. His whole body just stopped, mid sentence, and to the floor it went, hitting his head on the coffee table to boot. My perspective was cliche, 'it happened in slow motion', but Oh ####, he's dead! raced through my mind before he hit the floor. It was arguably the scariest moment of my life.
Then the SOB springs right up, says that he's ok, shoos us all away from him and goes right to the kitchen. He's in there, a trickle of blood coming from the scrape on his forehead, fixing himself another drink, because he had spilled the one he had when he fell and proclaims that he'll outlive us all.
cocaine, it's a hell of a drug