In the last 12 years as a songwriter (wow, 12 years!) I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about what responsibility I have to the world. Not, necessarily the world like mother earth but the world like the people all around me. The people the I love and the the people that I sometimes overlook. As I’ve said in earlier posts, I believe that it’s important, when possible, to speak or stand up for others who don’t always have a voice of there own. I’ve learned that there will be times for all of us where we can’t stand up for ourselves and we’ll wish that someone was there to stand a long side us. I guess if I’m honest the song “letters from a friend” is the retelling of one of the first times I had to see someone stand alone, and wished I would have done something…  

Once upon a time I was a pharmacy technician. I know, It’s hard even for me to believe. I was a pill counter for almost a year of my life. I worked for my closest family friends in the world at their story and everyday I’d show up, put my lab coat on and count away. We had an extremely diverse set of  customers because of being located right in the middle of downtown. One of our more faithful customers was a gentleman who was struggling with heroin addiction. He’d come in almost everyday and buy a clean needle for 15 cents and then he’d leave.

You could tell on his face that he felt ashamed and uncomfortable when he’d come in. As best as I could I’d try to engage him in conversation but sometimes he just wasn’t reachable. It was like he was too broken to talk.

I worked with lots of amazing doctors and pharmacists in my time at the store. Most were great but one day a pharmacists who seemed to think very highly of herself decided to make a spectacle of this broken man. He came in at his usual time but for some reason on this day it was terribly busy. He stood patiently in the back waiting his turn, trying to not draw to much attention to himself, when all of the sudden this pharmacist speaks out in a loud voice to belittle him. In front of everyone she thanked him for not being stupid enough to spread diseases around by using dirty needles and that she wished that someday he would stop being a junkie. It broke my heart for him because all she saw him as was an addict. She dehumanized him infront of everyone to make herself feel more righteous.

What amazed me was that without a second thought his response was “you know I love you girl, but I’m just trying to work on myself”. Then he walked out and didn’t come back.

It made me question myself and how I was seeing the people around me. Was I actually seeing them as equal human beings or just as the vices that held them. And were the vices that held me that different from the ones of the people around me. That’s when the song poured out. The song is just as equally about my own struggle with addiction as it is with his. I suppose that’s one of the main things all of us humans have in common, struggle.