Andrew Warren
Hertzog CCR 092
9/17/2014
The Kings of Manitou
Some people look at me
now, and they think I have it all together. They think I am just a normal,
clean cut, blue collar citizen. I don’t drink. I don’t party. I work all the
time and barely go out. That’s what they think anyways. If only they had known
me a few years ago. It would be a whole different story. You see, I was a
senseless, out of control, raging alcoholic. I pulled the strings of people and
manipulated them like puppets. I lived a fantasy life style and Manitou was my
kingdom. And what I thought was fun and not a problem, was actually destroying
me.
December
31st, 2010, it was 11:45 pm, at a very rowdy New Year’s Eve party at
the Ancient Mariner in Manitou Springs, Colorado. The place was packed! People
were shoving and pushing, and making their way towards the bar to get their
drink of choice for the New Year’s countdown toast. They looked like a bunch of
rabid piranhas all cooped up in one tiny wooden barrel. I had just got off work
late that night and had begun to swim towards the bar as fast as I could to get
a much needed drink myself. Getting the bartender’s attention was near to
impossible. Then out from the far right hand side of the bar, I hear a guy yell
“We need shots! I’m buying!” Those two
phrases were music to an alcoholic’s ears. I rushed right over to that guy and
yelled back, “You’re my boy blue!” He starred right at me, paused, and said,
“You’re the only one who can call me that!” “Get this guy one too!” He was a
very skinny looking guy, with small black dreadlocks tied up on top of his
head. He had a face like Groucho Marx, with big bushy black eyebrows, thick
black reading glasses, and a magician like goatee. He then began to pass out a
tray of shots to everyone, like Santa clause throwing candy out to a pool of
hyper kids on a Macy’s Christmas Day Parade float. The countdown had begun.
5…4…3…2…1 HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! Everyone yelled out in unison. We all drank and
slammed our glasses down onto the bar and yelled really loud. That was the day
the devil bought me a shot.
Now, a lot of us can go out and have a few drinks, have
fun, and go home. No problem right? Well, it was a problem for me. And my
problem was about to get worse. Alcoholics like myself can’t have just a few
drinks, we drink until the money runs out or the well has run dry. After that night, I woke up the next day and
the crippling hangover was streaked with sunlight. My mouth was dry, and
screaming for water. I looked at the long ash on the now extinguished cigarette
still between my fingers and wondered, how the hell did I survive that night? I
flopped out of bed and checked my pocket. There was a little crumbled up bar
napkin in it, with a phone number scribbled on it, and the word, “Blue”. Ah
yes, my memory seems to be coming back now. I never called Blue. The writing
was hard to read on the napkin. I did see his face in a few bars from time to
time. He would stop by and say hi, he would chat for a bit and walk off. We
made each other laugh. You know how someone really gets your humor? Well he
did! He would say something completely “off the wall”, and while others would
look at him puzzled, I would burst out laughing. It was like he was saying out
loud what I was thinking. I remember one time at one of our favorite watering
holes, there was this girl who we were talking to that had a mousey face, and
talked very fast with a valley girl lingo, in a high pitched voice. She would
say words like, “for sure”, and “totally” a lot. She reminded me of a drunken
chipmunk. As soon as she walked away, Blue turns to me with his two front teeth
protruding from his mouth and quickly repeated the words, “For sure! For sure!
Totally! Totally!” And I lost it! I almost
had my drink come out my nose! I knew right then that we were going to be best
friends. Later that night, Blue had explained to me that he was moving away to
Wisconsin and it was fun hanging out with me the past few weeks. I was kind of
bummed out. This was the first time I had found a good friend in a long time.
Winter was long and boring. I missed hanging out with
Blue. But time went on, and in the spring I moved to old Colorado City. There
was this liquor store a block from my house which, a Seven Eleven, and a new
Deli opening soon. When it became closer to summer, I went to the liquor store
and as I was stepping out of the car, I hear a faint voice yell from across the
street, “Shaggy!” (That was my nickname, due to my long hair, long beard, and
70’s style clothing I wore a lot.) I looked up, and there was Blue! I excitedly
yelled back, “You’re my boy Blue!” I ran across the street to the Deli and high
fived my best friend. He told me he had moved back and he was working at the
Deli. This was awesome! But this would be the beginning of a sinister downward
spiral that any poor bastard could easily get trapped in. Guess who was about
to step foot in that trap?
Blue and I hung out that night at my new place as soon as
he got off work. I was living with a girl whom I was dating at the time who was
also a very wicked alcoholic. And every time Blue and I would hang out there
and get intoxicated on the “magic brew”, she would get really frustrated and
yell at us a lot. It got so bad, because I would never spend time with her. I
choose my drinking buddy over her. He said to me, “Move out man, you would be
so much happier without her.” One night while sitting alone with her, we got
really drunk and everything was fine until I said “Why don’t you like my
friends?” “You never let me have any fun”. Then she got really loud with me,
and violent. And she told me that if I wasn’t happy then just go! So I grabbed
a backpack and stuffed it with clothes, a change jar, and a tooth brush. I went
into another room and called my friend Tommy to come pick me up. I walked back
into the room, sat down quietly and waited. Tommy honked his horn and I grabbed
my gear and headed for the door. She said, “Where the hell are you going?” I
looked at her and said quietly, “I’m leaving you”. And before she could say a
word, I left. Tommy was in a band and was living in a tiny band space. I had to
sleep in his van for 3 days, because the floor of the band space was so
uncomfortable. A girl at work had heard about my situation and insisted I stay
at her cabin in Manitou. She was never there and I agreed. I was working at the
Craftwood Inn at the time, and Blue had called me a week later looking for a
new job. I got him a job working with me, it was nice to have a good friend in
the kitchen, going to war with the servers and cooking on the line of fire and
hot grease. I told him that I finally left my girlfriend, and I almost had
enough money to get my own place. I went to go look at this apartment that was
a small hobbit hole of a place. It had one room, kitchen and bathroom on one
side, and a bed room on the other. It was perfect for me. And dirt cheap! I
didn’t have much, no car, no other bills; I lost almost everything during the
break up.
The day finally came, I got the apartment! I was so
happy! I felt free. I felt like I just came out of a long stressed induced
coma. I ran to work and as soon as I got there, before I could say a word, Blue
looked at me and said “You got the place!” He could always tell by my facial
expressions. I said, “Hell yeah!” We were bouncing around that kitchen like two
idiots that just won the lottery. The next morning, I got up early. Noon is
early to a drunk by the way. I went to some of the local shops and bought this
cool Alice in Wonderland tye dyed tapestry, some incense, Christmas lights,
groceries, a huge jug of sangria wine, and a bunch of assorted micro brews and
shots. I called Blue, and told him that our clubhouse was all set up. It looked
like a perfect man cave if I ever saw one. He came over immediately after work.
We celebrated and drank ourselves silly, played video games, and went bar
hoping later that night. Blue decided that since we both had the next day off
that he would just spend the night. I had a chair that would fold out into a
one person cot, so that became his spot. It was the most fun I had in years. We
both had the next day off and we decided that once we got up the next day, we
would go get some lunch and hit the bar scene. And we did. We would eat, then
have what’s called “The hair of the dog”, which is basically a nice hard shot
of liquor to kill that hung-over feeling. Our poison was Jager bombs. It would
just get us going. People always say, “Drink responsibly”. Our first drink of
the day had the word “bomb” in it. If that isn’t pure irony, I don’t know what
is. This became our daily routine. He worked with me and now he was practically
living with me. We did not have cars. We did not have any bills, other than my
rent, which was really low. Our work was right up the road in walking distance,
including the bars, shops, general stores, and of course the most important,
the liquor store. We had it all. This began, “Shag and Blue’s excellent summer
extravaganza”. And that is exactly what we called it.
We tore up the town every night. They had turned us loose
into the streets of Manitou, two liquored up hippies with no cares in the
world. Our routine of constant bar hopping to the same bars at the same times
turned us into “predictable” regulars. There were bars that as soon as we
walked in, they would immediately start pouring our drinks without us having to
tell them what we wanted. One bouncer at the Townhouse Lounge would say to us,
“Look who it is, it’s Jesus and Moses, the kings of Manitou!” and he would
proudly open the door for us. And Bartenders loved us. We spent so much money
and tipped enormous. Our first week out we spent over $500 a piece on just
going to bars. We bought people shots, and made people laugh. We could walk
down the street, and people would shout out our names. We walked proudly with
our heads high, or stumbled in most cases. And Blue was a silver tongue devil.
He could talk me into anything. If I wanted to take a break from drinking, he
would say, “You will be fine man, we are warriors”. If I was running low on
money, he would find a way to get it. We occasionally stayed at my apartment
and just hung out there. I remember once he said, “Let’s try shrooms!” And I
was feeling a little weird about that, but he talked me into it. And we were
tripping a lot. So now on top of drinking, we were getting into psychedelics. I
could write a whole book on the crazy trips we had, but that’s another story. I
remember one trip we had where Blue was sitting in front of the television,
which I had set up to play CD’s and show a kaleidoscope of colors. There was
dub step style music playing, while Blue was air drumming to the beat. He
started to look like a little demon. His dreadlocked head looked spikey like a
giant pinecone. I kept yelling at him to turn off that music. And he just kept
his back turned and kept ignoring me. It was though he was in some sort of
malevolent trance. This caused me to panic and yell, “Stop it”! He finally
looked back at me and gave a devilish smile, and put on some Grateful Dead, and
that seemed to calm me down. I think that may have been the last time I did
that wicked drug.
As the summer went by I started to notice that our
appearance was rough. We looked like two scruffy, dirty, hippy zombies. It was
affecting my work. It got out of control. There were times I almost got fired.
And he would try to justify everything. He would say things like “It is fine
man, we are functioning alcoholics”. “We get our jobs done and we don’t hurt
anyone”. I would bring home groups of
strangers after the bars closed. We would have after parties, and I had stuff
stolen from me. My best friends and co-workers would tell me I was a mess. And
I would just brush it off. Many months went by and it was New Year’s again, and
I was at the Ancient Mariner where it all started. I remember a friend of mine
walked in, she was a bartender there, and she had a friend with her who I was
very interested in. It was like a movie when I saw her, time had stood still
and everyone in the bar faded in the background. She was the most beautiful and
most classy woman I have ever talked to. We talked for a bit, and I told her to
friend request me on Facebook. The next day I was kicking myself because I
didn’t ask for her number. When I went to check my Facebook, there she was, and
there was her phone number. I asked her out and she agreed to go on a date with
me. She told me she was bored and had nothing better to do. We started to spend a lot of time together.
Blue, didn’t like it; I started to see less of him. He eventually quit the
Craftwood. I felt like a new man, except one day while I was on a date with
her, we went to the Manitou Mardi Gras, and she got to see the drunken master
side of me. I made a complete jack ass of myself. And she didn’t like it. She
was the first person in my life that clearly said, “It’s either me or the
booze”. And I agreed that I needed to quit drinking, she meant a lot to me. It
was substantial to my health. I even shaved off the crumby old beard. As we
were dating I would sneak a few drinks here and there, and she would catch me,
and there she would get upset. So I went about 4 months sober, I was doing
great! When out of the Blue (no pun intended) called Blue. He said to me, “Come
home to Manitou, you don’t belong there.” “Have a drink, one won’t hurt”. And
as my girlfriend was going to work that day, she kissed me and told me she
loved me. And I gave her a hug. And as soon as she left, I went to the liquor
store, got all buzzed up, packed up my stuff in my car, and drove to Blue’s new
apartment and stayed with him. I won’t get into all the details, but I was
there for about a week. We spent all my money. He was getting eviction notices.
I felt like crap again. It wasn’t the same happy fun time anymore. This was
dark. And one day as I lay rotting on Blue’s couch, I said “Give me a sign God,
give me a sign that I’m not supposed to be here.” She texted my phone 5 minutes
later, “I am pregnant.” I packed my bags and quickly got the hell out of there!
I’m damn lucky she even considered taking me back. But we were still a new
couple, and I didn’t want to mess this one up. When I got home I erased and
blocked Blue from any way of contacting me. He was toxic. And that’s when I
truly realized, what we thought wasn’t hurting us, and what we thought wasn’t
bad for us, was really killing us.
the person on the left is "Blue" ...
