Some People Never Really Change

Some people never really change – at least not for a long, long time. I’ve known people like this and I’ve probably been one of them at some point or another. However, by saying "some people never really change" I am referring to people that never really try change for the better. Allow me to explain:

The other day I was typing the names of people I have known in my past into a search engine to see what, if any, information about them would come up. One of their names popped up and I clicked the link, only to find this about them:

"[name] of [street], [city]: Possession of a controlled substance, methamphetamine, state jail felony."

This person was once a roommate of mine as well as one of the first best friends I made in college and I was there, in her life, when she got onto the wrong path that has now led her to the jail she is in today and let me just say... I HATE what drugs can do to a person – it can hurt everyone around them:

[To save her from further disgrace I will call this former roommate "Jen" in place of her real name] Jen was one of the first best friends I ever made in college – I know that is a special thing since it has often been said that we make some of our life long best friends during college. When we became friends, I was very excited because I was beginning to see the truth behind that saying. Jen and I would laugh about one day having to room together in a nursing home as we had roomed together in college. We’d get to have wheelchair races and tell each others kids about all the silly things the other had done in earlier years. It still makes me kind of sad to think that those days are never going to arrive. Not too long after these fun ideas, Jen’s life began going downhill...

Frail. A few months later she began looking frail. Often, Jen would come into our dorm room throwing up and not wanting to go to tennis practice nor be around anyone. I had no idea what was wrong with her so I would leave the room and let her have her peace. She hated school and skipped classes a lot. She wanted to hang out less and less with all her "old" friends like me – the people who actually cared about her life. Her new friends were from the Dallas area, hard-core druggies. I remember one of them bragging about the fact that he had AIDS but was still sleeping with girls who were unaware of it.

One night Jen came in and asked me for a dollar bill -- luckily I didn't have one but our other friend did. She then went into our room, stood right in-front of me, rolled the bill up and snorted cocaine through it. I was in shock. It hurt me to see that. So I said to her, "Jen, please don’t do that," and she lashed out, "you’re not my f****** mother!"... this was the beginning of many "pleas" and fights with her. Several nights a week she’d be tripping off of acid and crank. It was very scary and sad for all of us, mainly the tennis team, who were her friends. We knew that stuff could be deadly in large enough doses.

Here’s a poem I wrote about it during all this to illustrate things:

I REMEMBER:

Staying up so very late,

talking through the night.

Standing by you thick and thin,

taking your side no matter what.

Laughing with you like a sister

and partying when we were bored.

Watching you change in little ways

and seeing you drift so slowly away.

Asking you what had happened to you,

knowing that you wouldn't tell me.

Seeing your brain cells snorted away,

feeling the hurt of being your friend.

Telling you to say "no" the next time,

but seeing you hide from me that day.

Holding rusted memories in my hand,

praying for God to make this world right.

Still laughing with you like a sister –

but picking out a black funeral dress.

By. Hollylovebug

That is how all of us -- her friends and family -- felt when all this was going on. Sad, very sad. One of the big reasons I hate drugs is because they change a person into something they’re not – I know because Jen’s behavior changed drastically. I had not known her to be this way before – and the other’s agreed. I had had enough. I gave her the chance to apologize and change her way but she refused. The drugs had taken over her mind and body. I didn’t know who she was anymore. I ended the friendship that she had begun ending – it was just too much to handle. A few weeks later she got kicked out of school for missing too many classes (I had tried to get her to go to them but she cussed me out for that too). I didn’t say goodbye or anything because I didn’t see the point of saying goodbye to someone I didn’t even know [anymore].

I wonder if she ever sits there in her cell now, with all of that free time on her hands, silently crying to herself, "God, help me. I have thrown away so many people in my life. Forgive me." I hope she does. Maybe this is the only way she can come to know the error of her ways.

- Holly