Dale Earnhardt Sr., died on the final lap of the 2001 Daytona 500 race...10 years ago yesterday. I happened to be watching the race that day. It was late on a Sunday afternoon and I was running a machine and a packing department on 3rd shift meaning I had to go into work that night.
So as soon as Michael Waltrip crossed the Finish Line, I turned down the sound, closed my eyes and fell asleep. I woke up an hour or so later to the news that the Intimidator was dead. It was just another surreal event in what was becoming a life of surreal events.
Though still 4 years off, my marriage was already feeling oddly out of sync. 9/11 was 7 short months away and then the whole world would change...
I'm not saying that a Dale Earnhardt's death at one of America's Greatest Auto races foretold the coming of tough times but I oddly felt that way personally and I haven't a clue why. Perhaps that was just the way I was feeling in general. I was living a lie...just as all practicing addict/alcoholics are. You have to to stay drunk/high all the time...the truth would bring suspicion, an argument...TROUBLE.
You can't have that...trouble interferes with your drinking...no, better to "finesse" the truth a bit and then everything will be fine. So that is what I did...all the time. To the point that I really didn't know what was truly real and what wasn't. And it became so natural to lie, it just slipped out...effortlessly.
The problem was my memory was heading in the other direction, it was less effective and I started to forget what stories I had told..and TROUBLE came to town. Of course I just fixed THAT trouble with more lies and the drinking continued.
Is it any wonder that I had a premonition of sorts foretelling bad days to come? I was a walking bad day to come. My life itself should have been a warning that all was NOT well and actually it was: to my friends, my family, my employer, my wife...every one got it but ME. My X got the hell out of Dodge. She saw it and was sober, lucid enough to heed it's warning. Me...Not so much. I continued to drink, to take drugs...lots of drugs.
And the rest was history...
But for me, the "Bad Times" feeling I had for a long time leading up to the bottom falling out of my life began 2/18/2001, with the death of Dale Earnhardt Sr. It is a tad strange that I associate the two but I've often thought about how I just felt that event was the beginning of the end for me.
And it was: the beginning of the end...of my old life. Story, as it always is around here: To be continued...
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