The Sober Experience
Recovery and mental health, spirituality and life. We will be sitting down with people in and out of recovery who have helpful tips and shared experiences to provide better love and understanding on this earth. There will be a wide veriaty of topics discussed and after each interview there will be another reflection episode where I can analyze what we spoke of and what sticks to mind.
The Sober Experience
From Bath Ave to Blessed : Frankie's Path to Peace & Purpose
Frankie's journey from the vibrant streets of Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, to the dimly lit DJ booths of Bay Ridge is as captivating as it is raw. Growing up in a family with a mix of strict routines and lively interactions, Frankie found himself at the crossroads of academia and mischief. His story takes a dramatic turn as he describes his fascination with the intriguing Bath Avenue crowd, where organized crime posed an irresistible charm. Through his candid narration, we get a glimpse of his life as a class clown, his connection with his stepfather, and the tumultuous path that led him into the heart of New York City's nightlife.
As Frankie transitioned from owning a pizzeria to becoming enmeshed in the nightlife as a DJ, a new narrative of substance abuse began to unfold. The episode chronicles his battles with addiction, from alcohol to cocaine and ecstasy, painting a vivid picture of the highs and lows that dictated his adult life. Relationships, both personal and professional, became victims to his choices, with a poignant story about the impact on his family and the eventual legal consequences that followed. The episode highlights the constant tug-of-war between the allure of addiction and the pressing need for sobriety, offering a raw, unfiltered look at his struggles.
The path to recovery is fraught with obstacles, yet Frankie's journey stands as a testament to resilience and acceptance. His experiences with Alcoholics Anonymous shed light on the power of community and the importance of being surrounded by those who understand your struggles. Frankie shares how engaging in rehabilitation activities and embracing a life of honesty and self-awareness have granted him a sense of peace and gratitude. The episode closes with reflections on freedom, service, and finding joy in everyday experiences, serving as an inspiring reminder that change is possible, even from the darkest of places.
Hey everybody, welcome back Sober Experience. I hope you guys are having a good week. Like and subscribe and share on all podcast platforms. You know we've been getting more messages. Everybody wants it. Where's all the fucking interviews, bo? So you know we've been blessed to get graced by a guy who's part of one of my home groups that I've known for a long time and you know he's really turned a lot of corners in the last year. And you know he's really turned a lot of corners in the last year and you know I couldn't wait to really sit down and get to know him on a different level than I do now. And here's our brother, frankie. Frankie, say hello, hey everybody, how are you?
Speaker 1:All right, frankie, it's bizarre. I got to make pretend I don't know you because everybody, nobody knows you, except for me and you right now. So first things first, where you from.
Speaker 2:I'm from Brooklyn, Bensonhurst.
Speaker 1:All right?
Speaker 2:Do you have any siblings, or was it? You're an only child? What was the last? I have a half sister. When my mother remarried, she had a daughter and my father remarried and I have a stepbrother and stepsister.
Speaker 1:All right. Is everybody in the neighborhood or do people spread out?
Speaker 2:No, my brother is out in Jersey somewhere. I really don't talk to him much. My older sister stepsister she's in Goshen, new York, and my little sister, the one that I'm close with that I grew up with, she's in Brooklyn on Dyker.
Speaker 1:Nice, nice. So you stayed with your mom, or was your dad around?
Speaker 2:What was the story? So, growing up, my parents divorced when I was about three and my stepfather came into my life, which I usually, when I'm referring to my dad, I'm usually referring to him. So my father was in my life, but my stepfather was really the one that I lived with and the one that basically raised me. When I was on his insurance, you know, he got my teeth done for me, nice.
Speaker 1:Yeah, what was he like?
Speaker 2:A good guy. He works in housing. He works in Marlboro Projects. When I was little he worked in Queensbridge. And good guy, Not one of us.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Well, good, you know listen. And your mom? What was she like when you were growing up?
Speaker 2:Strict, strict. She was a tough mom. Fun, but still pretty tough. She worked in the Board of Ed.
Speaker 1:She worked in the schools. And how were you in school? Did you play sports or what were you like All?
Speaker 2:right. So I was good in school, but I was definitely like a class clown.
Speaker 2:Right, so good in school, but bad behavior, bad behavior yeah, but not like a violent bad behavior, More of a class clown disruption. You know I didn't play any sports in school but I did play outside. I played. I was in karate, I played baseball for St Francis Cabrini, I played football in Parkville first and then Parkville was a little slow for me. I went to the Hurricanes in Marine Park and that was rough. That was good stuff. Yeah, I did everything. I was in gymnastics. I did a lot of stuff.
Speaker 1:Is it because you had a lot of energy or your mom wanted to keep you busy?
Speaker 2:I think just my mom wanted to keep me busy, to be honest. Yeah, well, we played sports in the backyard all day too. You know, I grew up on Shaw Parkway, you know where it is there, and in the backyard they have the. It's a, there's garden apartments and they have a big backyard, big grass from like end to end, and we used to play tackle football back there, manhunt. It was a lot of kids growing up. A lot of kids there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so did you guys typically just stick with the neighborhood kids?
Speaker 2:or did you make friends elsewhere? The kids that I grew up with on my block, like in the immediate area it's funny because I always think about it they went to Catholic school. I went to public school. We used to play Army when we were kids and my best friend next door always said I'm going into the Army when I turn 17. I'm going in. And he was in St Francis Cabrini and then he went into a Catholic high school and he wound up going into the military.
Speaker 2:He just retired as, like a general, like he really went with it with his life, yeah, and he stayed with the kids that were still into sports and still going to these Catholic schools. I strayed off onto like Bath Avenue, but it was a different crowd.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so I was going to. So how did yeah? So how did that different crowd? Was it just something that, like it was kind of like pulling you a little bit. That way they look like they're having more fun with different older guys. Like what was it? If you had to think back and guess, so, Bath Avenue is pretty much known for its reputation.
Speaker 2:Anybody that hears it knows that it was a lot of organized crime. Banff Avenue had all the little social clubs. You had all the wise guys outside. You had the cars, the money. You know. I like that. Everybody feared them but respected them. It was something I was really drawn to and I wanted to make an impression with these guys. I wanted to be in with that crew, I wanted to run around and act out and yeah. So I gravitated towards those kind of guys.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but in those ways, like, especially when you're a young person, you know acting out is rewarded is rewarded, you know they're just like oh man, look at this little guy yeah he's fucking crazy. Yeah, and I know. I mean I went through the similar things, uh, when I was growing up and, um, I didn't know I needed that until I got it. You know that kind of attention from people you admire, all of a sudden like I matter.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:You know, in this world that's bigger than, like you said, bigger than my backyard and my friend, who's a lovely guy, but he's oh, I'm going to go to the army, I'm doing this and you're like what? I want to go to the fucking shoot dice or do some other shit over there.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's funny that you say it like that rewarding part, because I never really thought about it until you just said it and like, for instance, so once we were in this, uh, we were in Bay Ridge I'm a little bit older now, but I was I hung out with the older guys so they got me into the bars and clubs and stuff that you know you needed to be either 18 or 21, but I was like 14, 15, 16 and, uh, I was just turned 17. I remember because I was in faces and there was this pool table there and I was just turned 17,. I remember because I was in Faces and there was this pool table there and I was dancing on the pool table and one of the guys he's actually still a pretty big club promoter and pretty much he's pretty involved in stuff still to this day Anyway, he saw me. He's like oh, I'm bringing you to Mexico with me.
Speaker 2:No way, and I was like really, so it was spring break, but all three spring breaks. So it was spring break, but all three spring breaks, so it was like college. So there was three weeks of spring break. I went to Mexico for three weeks and I was 17. I remember you didn't need a passport at the time. I needed my birth certificate and a note from my mother.
Speaker 1:Wow, yeah, what was it like over there.
Speaker 2:Uh, it was. I got paid to go to Mexico and promote clubs and they went to be a scooter and I would just drive around Mexico all day just promoting clubs and getting to the clubs for free and drinking. My drinking was really heavy but I never touched a drug. I remember I was in La Boom and I was drinking and I would take like a Valium here and there, and this was before Xanax were popular.
Speaker 1:the V-cut tokens and so he was like they were yellow. Right, they were yellow, blue, different milligrams. Yeah, I used to get the yellow ones, yeah.
Speaker 2:So he put I thought it was a Valium that he put in my mouth, right, and he's like, all right, enjoy it. It was a hit of ecstasy and this is in like 97, 98. And I was like I made myself actually throw up. I made myself throw up in the garbage pail because I was just focused on alcohol at that point, that was, and I drank literally not one drop of water the entire time I was there. I drank. They had 32 ounce Coronas there.
Speaker 1:And I drank those from morning until night. Well, just in general, was there something that made you stay away from drugs?
Speaker 2:When I was younger, I took acid.
Speaker 1:How old were you? 14, 15.
Speaker 2:That's like 8th grade right, no, like 9th, 9th, 10th. I graduated high school at 17, so 15,. I was that's like eighth grade, right? No, like ninth, ninth, tenth. Yeah, I graduated high school at 17, so 15,. I was probably in 10th grade, right.
Speaker 2:So I took acid and I had a really bad trip. I had to go to the dentist and my mother made me a dentist appointment and I thought I was just going for a cleaning. So I told my boys they were meeting up, we're going to go to Coney Island and meet under the boardwalk and just smoke and drink. So I took the acid and when I got in the chair I didn't know I had a filling to get done. So I was just like, all right, by the time he's done with it, the acid will kick in and I'll leave.
Speaker 2:So the Novocaine was on me. Now the acid hit me and the Novocaine wears off and I didn't realize how deep the filling was. I thought I grinded my teeth away. So I was sitting there bucking out. I'm looking at. This girl was there. She had a compact mirror and there was a mirrored wall and one of the bars there and I was sitting there with the compact mirror looking at my teeth, thinking I grinded my teeth away because the little pieces of the filling were falling out. So ever since that it was the worst experience of my life and I didn't. I stayed away from any like drugs that were tripping, drugs like mushrooms or ecstasy. I didn't want anything to do with it.
Speaker 1:Yeah so, but were your friends like messing with that stuff and you just had like self-restraint and be like no, I'm not doing it.
Speaker 2:Yeah yeah, kind of. And when I came back from that trip, basically I'm like the guys that I hung out with. So I was from Banff Avenue, there was a lot of guys from 13th Avenue and they all had money. I didn't grow up with a lot of money. You know. My parents both worked for the city. We had everything we needed. They didn't have everything I wanted. These guys I mean they came from higher, you know, they had a lot more money, so they would steal money from there. I would never took a dollar from my mother's wallet. First of all she would have killed me. Second of all, she didn't know what he had. These guys would go in and steal like $200, $300, and they started doing coke. And I remember them.
Speaker 2:I remember sitting in a basement one day and I had a. I smoked a lot of pot then and I was smoking a blunt and it was like chronic. Back then they didn't have like all these different weeds. Now it's regs and killers, right. So I had a blunt of killers and I'm smoking and nobody's hitting the blunt. They're all sitting around the table and there's an ashtray on the table and I go to clip the blunt because it was by myself and the ashtray started wobbling and there was a mountain of coke under it and I never wanted to ever touch cocaine. I wanted nothing to do with it. Then cocaine, I wanted nothing to do with it. Then this is back, you know, when I was a teen late teens.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so when did that change?
Speaker 1:In my twenties, mid to late twenties.
Speaker 2:So uh I had a pizzeria on Bath Avenue and, uh, one of my buddies, he was selling Coke and he would come to my pizzeria to bag it up.
Speaker 1:How'd you get into the pizza business?
Speaker 2:Sidetrack my buddy owned a deli on Bath Avenue down a little bit a couple blocks down and we hung out. My alcoholism was still at this point was crazy. I would go in his deli, just hang out. I'd get a quarter pound or half a pound of turkey and drink a case of Michelob Ultra, because I was always into fitness, like trying to keep myself fit. So he then carried his Michelob Ultra. He bought the Michelob Ultra just for me, him and I just for me. Hanging out in the deli, drinking beers became tight and we business ventured together. I was working at this time. I had a job, what I do now, same job, I'm in the same career, but this was like a side venture that I wanted to do.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So what was owning a pizzeria like for an alcoholic Miserable?
Speaker 2:I didn't want any of the responsibility that came with it. It took away from everything that I wanted to do. He eventually wanted to leave, probably because of my behaviors, but I told myself at the time it was because he was going through a divorce and he didn't want to do it anymore. It's probably because I wasn't helping out the way I needed to or what he expected of me to do.
Speaker 1:Right, because a business requires you to kind of show up, especially in food business business Long hours, seven days a week. It's not a good job for an alcoholic.
Speaker 2:Definitely not. And so back to where I got introduced, to the drugs. I met a girl and she was like do you know any way that you could get me some cocaine? I was like yeah, I know exactly where. And she was like you want to try some? And she took out her boobs. She threw it on her boobs. I was like I'll definitely try it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. How do you say no to that?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I did that and I didn't like the way it made me feel.
Speaker 1:How old were you?
Speaker 2:25.
Speaker 1:You stayed away from coke for a while.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. So in my 20s and I didn't even like it when I first did it and she continued to do it I actually broke up With this girl. She was like 6 feet tall, like 5'11, 6 foot, real pretty girl, crazy body, but I would take her Like to my family's house For parties and her mouth she used to get that jaw, you know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:And I would see at a family party her jaw was wigging out and I'm like I'm not into this. You know, I don't like this whole cocaine thing.
Speaker 1:And.
Speaker 2:I got rid of her and I actually broke up with her. We worked together and the office. I sent her an email, like she sat like across from me. I sent her an email and I went to a and another girl's from the office calling me. She's like what did you do? She's in here flipping out.
Speaker 1:But that's how we leave things. We light a fire, we walk away.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so what happened next?
Speaker 2:I met another girl and I don't remember exactly the point, the tipping scale of me enjoying cocaine, but it came, and it came fast and it came hard.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And I was DJing in clubs. Now I was in Bay Ridge. I DJed in all the spots in Bay Ridge Like Monday night. I was a resident at Muses. I did the place Echelon, but this was like a quick stint, but I was in it and I was not a DJ. I just walked in and said I'm going to be a DJ now and I just DJed.
Speaker 1:And I was good at it.
Speaker 2:And somehow in there, that lifestyle, I started selling drugs and I started doing it. That and ecstasy I fell in love with, Absolutely fell in love with.
Speaker 1:Do you remember the time that you took it and was like, oh, this was not like the last time. The last time?
Speaker 2:I took it and was like, oh, this was not like the last time. The last time I took because it wasn't acid I really thought it was going to have the effects that is. That's what I'm saying yeah, no, but it was warming and and like my, I was, just it was. I gotta say, till this day now, I never even think about a drink. The one thing in my head I always said wow, I actually missed ecstasy. Yeah, yeah, it's true. I never really talk about that either.
Speaker 1:Probably should. You didn't know. I mean for me, just being honest, I didn't care for it. And my wife, she laughs when I tell you know, we tell our regular stories and we just be who we are and for us it's not a big deal, but for a regular person they're like huh, because I told my wife it's the truth. I said, um, you know, I didn't, I didn't really like ecstasy.
Speaker 1:I probably taken it like I don't know 20 times to make sure that I didn't fucking like it. That's how many times I've taken it. And I was like I would take one and I didn't like it and I'd take three. They had the barrels, I would take them. And then the reason why I didn't like it was because the next day I was so antisocial I didn't want to get out of bed. It just had a real bad effect on me the next day. So I just never really took it. But I did take it like about 20 times to make sure.
Speaker 1:You know, I swear to God and it's funny because you know I think about that stuff now. I mean, look, whatever he was nobody personally to me in my life but like you know, like fucking Irv Gotti just died Right and the, his whole label, and all those guys. They were eating E-pills during that Whole time that we're talking about In the 2000s. They all said the same thing Him, ja Rule. All of them Eating fucking Five pits Every day and, like, dude, that shit puts holes In your fucking brain. Yeah, you know. And now this guy he was in his mid-50s, he had diabetes and five, eight years of ecstasy holes in his fucking brain and now you wonder why he gets strokes. You know what I'm saying?
Speaker 2:There was a movie that came out I can't think of the name, it might pop in my brain, but it was about a Hasidic Jewish kid and he was smuggled and it's a true story. And he was having the Hasidic Jewish community bring in pills from Amsterdam or whatever, but he was telling them it was a medication for the Jewish community that America wouldn't allow. So they were smuggling in two cases and it was a great idea to get it through customs because nobody was checking these guys. But the guy that was bringing it through him, I knew him and I was getting hits for like $3 each at the time.
Speaker 1:I think it was pie?
Speaker 2:No, no, definitely not, if I could think of it.
Speaker 1:But I know what you're talking about. I want to say Requiem, but it's not. No, no, that was another crazy one. No, that one the mom with the fucking shaking refrigerator.
Speaker 2:I can't.
Speaker 1:I watched that movie one time. I watched that movie one time. You know what's funny when I was young.
Speaker 2:I remember that brought back so many memories just now, holy crap when he takes the TV and goes down to yeah, I used to take my video games and go down to the Peddlers in Coney Island where he would take those same Peddlers there and sell my video games. Then I go up to Mermaid and I go to Moms and Star and I get nicks and dimes. But that's like, that's when pot and I stopped smoking pot December 21st 1997. Right, I just remember the day I had a bad head, it got me paranoid, and that's when, like, liquor really took its toll.
Speaker 1:Right, Because then now it's not just like whatever, now it's on, yeah.
Speaker 2:And drinking wasn't really it was uh. I was able to drink at home, not in the house so much, but my stoop, like my friends, as we were older we could drink 40s on my stoop yeah and uh, you know, I remember I just I absolutely loved alcohol. I loved everything about it. I didn't know I was alcoholic, so to speak but, I, knew I drank differently than everybody else.
Speaker 1:Right, yeah, I think that's the. They always say. That that's the. That's part of the disease is that you know you can drink in a way that other people cannot. And so you look, you're like, wow, this guy, he's in trouble, he's pissing on himself, he's throwing up, he's whatever. Me when I drink, it's like a stimulant, like I drink, and I'm like you know, 10 drinks, I'm ready to go. Yeah, and most people, if they can even have 10, they're going to be on the floor sleeping.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I could drink for days without you know. I'm saying without sleeping, without stopping. Yeah, absolutely, and that, and. But I learned that in recovery, holy rollers, that's the name, that's the name of the movie. Yeah, yeah, for some reason I thought there was another, there was no. They were coming through the, uh, through the, through the airport, with all that stuff in their suitcase I remember, yeah, yeah, that was a while ago. Sounds good, all right, so then. So alcohol's taking off. You're taking drugs, ecstasy, cocaine, djing, spiraling.
Speaker 2:Spiraling.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:But I held a good job Right, so to me it was okay.
Speaker 1:Right, you still living at home at the time?
Speaker 2:No, I, it was okay, right, you still living at home at the time. No, I moved out early. I moved out my late teens Right, and I was forced out.
Speaker 1:Did you stay in the neighborhood or where'd you go? I went around the corner. No way, yeah. Yeah, I got an apartment around the corner.
Speaker 2:Hi, mom, stolen over for dinner, but yeah so the drugs. In the club scene I met a girl. This is the mother of my daughter. I met her. She had two children. When we got together I said to myself this lifestyle has to go. I need to be focused. She has children. I loved her. I still love her. That lifestyle had to go and it became secretive now.
Speaker 1:Was she also partying too, or no?
Speaker 2:Not at all. Half a glass of wine.
Speaker 1:That's not a good partner.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so you know, but she had her kids. She still had her family in Staten Island. She worked so a lot of the in Staten Island. She worked so a lot of the time she wasn't around as much, so I snuck it. I snuck it, but she knew. And that's when I first found AA. That was my first trip to AA.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I went in to AA for basically a coke problem.
Speaker 1:Yeah, did she tell you to go or how did you find it?
Speaker 2:No, you know what? I don't even remember how I found it, but my little sister came with me, the one that lives in Dyker. She took me. I couldn't hear a damn word. Right, I was at Free Spirit. Yeah, and they had the fans going yeah yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:I couldn't hear a word. But I gravitated towards this one guy. I I don't know there was something. I heard him and his message was like and I remember him growing up he was a maniac and he had like I think like nine years sober or seven years and I was like that guy's sober. I can't believe that, right, and I wanted to know more.
Speaker 2:You know I wanted to know more. I wanted to make my ex happy and I tried for the first time time. But I wasn't willing to give up everything. I wasn't willing to talk about any of the problems that I had with my girl to my sponsor. Like I tried. I tried to get a sponsor, I did the meetings, but I wasn't ready to let go of still hanging out with certain people.
Speaker 1:Yeah, like the basics, like people, places and things, Yep so tough.
Speaker 2:And I would do my inventories on. You know, and I was introduced to inventories on my second step. When I first came in my first step, I was on it for like two months. I even snuck a couple of beers in between. I never said anything.
Speaker 2:I would say I got this many days sober and he would say at the end of the week I'd read both my inventories and he'd say so you had no problems with Trish, none whatsoever. And I was like, yeah, but I don't want to tell you about them. So I was holding on to things. I didn't know how the program worked. You know, I still wanted to work things my way. I wanted to. I manipulated everything my whole life.
Speaker 2:I actually graduated high school with a high school diploma and did not deserve it. I went to mini school, which I was supposed to get credits that go towards a GED. And at that time is when they opened up off-site educational schools and I had 35 credits, but they weren't real credits that go on your transcripts. But when I went to the mini school, I took my friend he was signing up and I went with him and they were like you have 35 credits, you're going to go for your GED. They were like just come for half a year, we'll get you those five. And I graduated with a regular diploma, right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I mean, the thing is that also, you know, I had a similar story. I had a problem getting out of high school. Then I ended up getting out early because I was sent to a place. But you know, we don't, it's not even that number one. We obviously we don't know how, to be honest, but I think that we also don't. We don't know how to be ready. You know what I'm saying? Like, if you wasn't ready to share that with the guy, you just there's nothing he could have said to you. You know what I'm saying. You don't, you wasn, there's nothing he could have said to you. You know what I'm saying? You, you don't, you wasn't ready. You were ready to do this thing and not knowing that, this thing is fine, but it's only going to get you this far, you know. And then what happened? Like, eventually you ran out of road.
Speaker 2:Well, he was like a very, very like like big book like big book oriented.
Speaker 1:Yeah, buy the book because he's you know, it saved his life maybe.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so what I heard from him was the very thing that's keeping you sick is you're not telling me and I'm not going to be able to help you. What I heard was break up with your girl.
Speaker 1:That's what I heard.
Speaker 2:So, I made a choice. I was like it's either leave her and do AA or stay with her. So I opted to stay with her Right and I stayed sober for a couple of weeks. You know, just on.
Speaker 1:White knuckling it. Yeah, and the little bit of information that you had and my life got good for those couple of weeks.
Speaker 2:it did, it did and uh, then I still knew that there was that hope there. Like I watched it I saw a little bit of change, but I totally turned my back on it and I would pop in here and there when I got really like bad, I'd pop in, come for a little bit you know you saw me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I always loved seeing you. I didn't like seeing everybody. I felt like you know.
Speaker 2:But honestly, it's the only place where I feel like I came and even though I was coming back, I knew nobody was judging me. Oh, I know, I knew it, like my heart actually knew it.
Speaker 1:Well, because the thing is now, you know, because you're on this side, you don't see somebody and you know they're whatever they're at, they come back. You're actually happy to see them, yeah. And they don't believe it. They're like oh my god, are you okay? You made it back. You know, have a seat. Yeah, get some fucking cookies, get some coffee, relax, you know. So you bounced in and out for a while. How were things going with the lady when that was going on? Is this when your daughter was born? No, not yet.
Speaker 2:We were still living in Brooklyn, things were okay. You know, we always had our little fight, but my alcohol always took me to like the extreme, like I would just like disappear and be like you know.
Speaker 1:I'm buying you a present.
Speaker 2:I'm here waiting for it to be made and she's like no, you're not, You're out drinking.
Speaker 2:You know, it was just a calamity of the same thing over and over again. I was the guy that I had to be drunk with anything and everything that we did. We'd go to somebody's party and I'd bring booze, but for me, basically, like nobody would be drinking that much. Well, we'd go pumpkin picking and I had to have a bottle on me and I had to stop at the New Jersey liquor store because they had different liquor than Staten Island. Did so now we moved into Staten Island and I tried AA now in Staten Island. Did so now we moved into Staten Island and I tried AA now in Staten Island.
Speaker 2:It's like nobody knows me out here. I could start it over and see if there's some new faces and try this again. And Staten Island I really didn't like because my head was there was a lot of people in AA that were doing drugs, their drug story, their drug story To me. Now I stopped doing coke, you know, at that point I cut it out of my life for a while and so to me. But it was a lot of pills, pills, a lot of opiate epidemic there, and I never took pills.
Speaker 1:It just wasn't my thing.
Speaker 2:And I used that as ah, they don't know what they're doing. It's different Alcoholism. And I used that as ah, they don't know what they're. It's a different. Alcoholism is very different. They don't know yeah, not realizing the solution what they were talking about and everything was the same, but my mind, my disease, was telling me something differently and I was just not willing to go to any length. I wasn't Right.
Speaker 1:And eventually, you were not willing to be wrong.
Speaker 2:No, Eventually it took me over to the point where I gained a ton of weight.
Speaker 1:I quit One of the times I saw you you were big and you were never big, I know. You were like always in shape, I know. And then you looked like. No offense to you, but you looked like somebody who used to be in shape. Like you know, when you see a guy like, oh, that guy looks like he used to be in fucking shape, like he used to have arms, I don't know what happened.
Speaker 2:I mean like fast too. It happened fast yeah, and I kind of I was like ooh, my ex is beautiful.
Speaker 1:I'm not surprised and I don't think I actually think I met Possibly.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I was with her a long time and she was probably just sick of my behaviors, sick of my physical look. I always used to tell her if you ever get fat, I'm breaking up with you.
Speaker 1:I would always say that like an asshole.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but you know it got to the point where. All right. So I would always try to control drinking. You might have heard me say this before. So I would get a bottle, put it in the fridge and say, look, I'm just going to have one drink tonight. And in my basement we had all these animals. I had mine, an iguana. I had a fish tank in the basement and it had the gravel in it, the glass gravel. It had fake plants in it. It had the bubbles going.
Speaker 1:But there was no water in it and glass gravel. It had fake plants in it.
Speaker 2:It had the bubbles going? Yeah, but there was no water in it. I had it filled with vodka. So I would just go downstairs and scoop out of a cup of vodka out of the fish tank, because she would start finding me falling asleep with bottles tucked behind the couch. And bottles. I would forget that I even left the bottle. I didn't even remember drinking that bottle.
Speaker 1:Right. And it got to the point where I had to have some liquor in the fridge too, because I'd start to wake up with a little bit of shakes, it was. It was getting scary, yeah. So what happened next?
Speaker 2:We wound up splitting up and, um, was it bad? It was. It wasn't brutal, but it was bad. It wasn't. You know it was. It wasn't terrible, but it wasn't great either. And we got into a domestic dispute. No hands Like I wasn't. You know, it wasn't like that, it wasn't an abusive relationship. But she left and I was just alone. I was in this house alone. We had my daughter. Maybe three years early Now my daughter was born. She was a preemie and she was in a NICU for like three months.
Speaker 1:How did that make you feel?
Speaker 2:I was part of raising my ex's children and I always wanted my own kids and kid kids. I never thought I was going to have one. She didn't want more kids and I love children, you know. I love just being there for them and watching them succeed and I love I wish I was loved as a father. Though they liked me, they might have loved me as their mom's boyfriend, you know, because I was there for them, I tried to be there for them and be a good guy, but I never had that love, you know, and I really wanted it. And when my daughter was born, I didn't know she was going to make it and I felt like I was outside of my body for a long time, just to go to work, to go to the NICU, just to hear them say she's stable, she's stable, there's nothing they can tell you it's. So they can't really give you anything because they don't know.
Speaker 1:Right, you give time, time.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I drowned that out with drinking, but I was always the guy that could drink and get up and go to work the next day, you know. Yeah, so, uh, I drowned that out with drinking, but I was always the guy that could drink and get up and go to work the next day, you know.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And be in a position in an office where they knew what was going on. But I was so good at what I did that it was kind of accepted a little bit, right, you know. And uh, the when it got really bad is then I got arrested like three times in four months. Stupid things, little things at first, and then one big arrest and I was looking at facing some small jail time.
Speaker 1:But jail time.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and.
Speaker 1:More than a weekend.
Speaker 2:More than a weekend and I was in Rikers Island and my bail was $150,000 and I said that's it. I'm doing this bid there's no way I'm getting out and it was during COVID and the judge.
Speaker 1:And you had already split up from your kids, mom, yes, and then you just went on a tear at Solo Dolo.
Speaker 2:Yeah, at home drinking myself to death, no work. I was going to be a professional drug dealer. I said, listen, I got a good business. That's all I'm going to do is sell drugs. I make more money than I did when I worked. I'm home, but I was dying. I mean, my alcoholism was morning till night bottles, and then I just started drinking Everclear Because nothing was strong enough to get me drunk anymore.
Speaker 1:Did you feel the progression? Or you just woke up one day like holy shit, this is my life.
Speaker 2:I watched the progression and I watched the fun times turn into dark times. But it hit me, the real plummet was quick, like really, really quick.
Speaker 1:What about mentally? I don't even know where I was. Mentally I was so fucked.
Speaker 2:I was so fucked. My brain was delusional, like I thought I was the man too on the outside. I played like I was this man, I was this big time, you know tough guy. I would sit home and cry. I videotaped myself crying Hours like hours on end. I wanted to just die. I kind of kicked my family away, my mom and dad here. I kicked my sister away. I love my daughter more than anything in this world and the one thing that I wanted so much I lost so fast and now I would watch my little girl go inside the house because she couldn't be. They really didn't want her around me, even though Rightfully, so yeah yeah, I still thought I was a great father.
Speaker 2:You know, I did play with her. I did, I did. I was in a bad guy. I was always a good guy, but I wasn't present. I was in another world.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I used to drink Clico champagne and do heroin and play Mario Kart with my son, thinking that I was being a dad. Yeah, and then like the guilt of me living like that, and then I'd take him to Toys R Us, but I'd get whatever you want. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:You know, yeah, and we'd just be like whatever, you want five games, get five games, you want another one, get another one. Right, and like you know it was wrong, yeah, but I was sick. You know what I'm saying? I was sick, so when did the end show up? You said you were in Rikers.
Speaker 2:I was in Rikers Bail $150,000. Were you detoxing in there Because it sounds like you were drinking a lot. I definitely. I thought everybody had diarrhea when they woke up in the morning, right, I thought that was just a normal thing. I did detox a little because I did defecate on myself.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:Going through. I did. I had a I don't know how I snuck my pants off Again, very manipulative. I wound up being able to get into the spa where they change your clothes, but it wasn't even my turn yet. I was like, see, oh, come on, do me a favor, like I just have a way. A gift of gab that I was able to manipulate to get changed real quick.
Speaker 1:And but I stunk, I was maybe maybe also maybe they took pity on you I, I don't know, I don't know. Possibly I don't think so, though if I saw somebody, I'm like all right, this guy's gonna get a pass yeah you're a funny guy, all right, come here. You shit yourself, you fucking big baby.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, because you were big.
Speaker 1:How big were you at this point? 300.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you were like 5'6" 5'4" 5'4" 300.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no good.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no good, and you don't have tits or anything. It's like, that's like man weight. Yeah, yeah, unhealthy. Dude you could have got a heart attack stroke. Absolutely, 100%, absolutely, especially if you're just like just drinking around the clock, you're like pickled.
Speaker 2:My feet were so swollen. It looked like a cartoon character. Like it was just like a, a big bubble of a foot with little toes sticking out.
Speaker 1:Was anybody trying to intervene?
Speaker 2:Everybody did.
Speaker 1:Everybody.
Speaker 2:I was not hearing it. I drank, that's it. This is what Frankie does. Frankie is an alcoholic and that's it. I am going to just get over it.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:If you don't want to be in my life, fuck you. If you want to be in my life, you know I drink. The people that were in my life that knew I drink were drinkers.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Because I was the guy to drink with.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I actually mesmerize even some of my friends that might be alcoholic. They're like I don't know how the fuck you did it.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Like I don't know how you did it, how you survived.
Speaker 1:So you make it out of Rikers, and what happens?
Speaker 2:next I lose the house that I'm in.
Speaker 1:All right.
Speaker 2:So SWAT kicked in my door and they wrecked my house. I was in the area of where my trouble was and my mother came through and said I didn't know she paid my bail. I had a phone number and they said here, bail. And they gave me a metro card to go over the bridge and I'm thinking I know this number. It was my little sister and the one from Dyker and my mom and sister picked me up and my mother said listen forget you're not going back to the house I was like first thing I said I was like can I get a beer?
Speaker 2:Literally, I said it jokingly but hoping that she'd actually give me like a yeah, okay, we'll stop and get you one. But that wasn't in the cards. So she gave me the choice of you're going to come live with me, you're going to lose the weight, you're going to get your hip done, because I needed a hip replacement too. I couldn't even walk. I couldn't walk Like I have osteoarthritis and my ball joint was totally missing. My hip effused, my pelvis and thigh effused and my ball joint was totally missing. My hip effused, my pelvis and thigh effused together and the ball joint was totally gone. I was overweight, couldn't walk and my mother said you can stay here, I want you to lose the weight, I'll help you. And one thing no drinking. And I said, all right, my mother was taking care of my nephew, my sister's son, so she was gone all day.
Speaker 2:My dad worked the second day left. I went right to the store Not the liquor store yet, because it wasn't open yet. I'd start and go get my Tallboys a Schmier North Ice. I'd pound about three, four of those until the liquor store opened. I'd get a bottle. I'd chug the bottle and have it by 3 pm. So I drank as much as humanly possible from 8 am to 3 pm and then I'd have that. Then I'd have to sit there and first off not be around them, because I stunk and fight alcohol all night. I can't even get anymore. So I was in like this hell. And my mother knew it, my dad. I would sometimes sneak bottles home and I'd hide them in my hamper and if I'd go out for a little bit and come back there would be a bottle just sitting on my dresser.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you'd be a fucking asshole, by the way.
Speaker 2:Yeah, fucking asshole, and my daughter would come stay with me every weekend and I would go out with my daughter and go to the park and make sure I was loaded up with alcohol at the park, but still do everything. I'm the great dad, you were over there at Dyka. I would go to Dyka, I'd go to 17th Avenue, I'd go to Bay Street. I was just like a fucking homeless guy with a home with his little girl. Good daddy of the year. You know, Oof hurts, yeah, yeah it hurts.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and my parents went away for an extended weekend and I got a gallon of Everclear and I said this will last me the weekend. So now I'm going to get the hip surgery. I started to lose weight. I went on keto so I would drink Everclear and Crystal Light.
Speaker 1:There's no carbs, yeah, responsible. No bagels.
Speaker 2:Only Everclear, so Everclear Crystal Light. And before they even left for vacation. Right, I said this bottle last night, I'm already tapping into it. They didn't even leave the house yet and I'm already boom, boom, boom sipping it. I killed the gallon of Everclear in like four to six hours Done. I didn't even leave the house yet I'm already boom, boom, boom sipping it. I killed the gallon of.
Speaker 2:Everclear in like four to six hours Done, I don't remember. That was the only I might have blacked out before, but nothing of circumstance. You know I was. But I, this one, my daughter, saved my fucking life. She called her mother and said Daddy is acting crazy. Her mother or sister I don't even know who came to get my daughter, I think it was her sister came picked up my daughter. My ex called my mother and my mother said I'll deal with you when I get back.
Speaker 2:It took me about two days just to sober up from that and she told me when she got there. She said you're either now I'm on probation I never got sentenced without that arrest I wound up getting probation out of it somehow. And she said I'm either going to tell your probation officer that what you're doing or and you can go back to Rikers, do your time, or you're going to rehab. And I was like no, please. I begged. I was like I'll just go to meetings, I'll go to meetings, I'll do it, I'll do it. And she's like no, she's like no, she goes, get out. I'm going to bat you out.
Speaker 1:That's literally what she said to me.
Speaker 2:I'm going to go inside grab a bat and hit me in the head with a bat. And she doesn't talk like that. And my mother has experience with this too. And my mother is a long time 17, 18 years hasn't touched a drink. So she one of the women that's in the rooms helps people get into it. She's telling me, frank, now she's trying to sell me on it. The anger went away and she consoled me and said it's St Christopher's, it's a good place, I promise you go there Now, I had my hip replaced.
Speaker 2:I lost the amount of weight to get it, but I was still drinking, but I had the hip replaced. I just had the hip replaced about a month and a half before this. So I'm still on a cane and she's like you're gonna go to rehab and I, finally, I I gave him because basically I had to. I really I had nowhere else to go. I I had no job, I had no home, I had no car, no kid, no girl, me on the couch, I had a room, but and uh, I went to saint christopher and a miracle started my journey.
Speaker 1:How old were you?
Speaker 2:I was 43. So I went. My sober date is April 24th of 2023. So I'm just about 22 months sober now.
Speaker 1:So what happens when you get to St Christopher?
Speaker 2:All right, when I get there. I it was very strict. They had a lot of. You had to dress a certain way, you had to was very strict. You had to dress a certain way, you had to have a job, you had to be up for dinner at a certain time breakfast, lunch, dinner, online, quiet. You had to go to every meeting, you had to attend groups and I just seen a lot of people like this is my fourth time here. Fifth time I was like I don't want this, I can't do this, I don't want to come in. This is my life now. I was such a successful Remember I was DJing in Atlantic City. Donald Trump was there, tom Brady was there, paris Hilton, and I had all this money and a job and a pizzeria and life. And now I'm in rehab with nothing and I said I can't do this again.
Speaker 2:There was this guy from 20th Avenue. I knew him from 20th Avenue. I was from Bath Avenue, so our crews actually used to be for when we were younger, but he's sober a few years and became a security guard up there and we became one and he was like listen, I said I don't know how to do this. I was like I miss my daughter so much. My daughter throughout all. This is my life. Like I love this kid more than anything ever.
Speaker 2:And I was crying to him and he's like there's a hill up there called Serenity Hill. He's like, go up there, try to meditate for a minute, two minutes. I went up there and something came over me. I didn't have a spiritual awakening, but I had an experience and I said I'm going to be okay. I'm going to be okay. And I said, frank, just do this. And everybody's telling me you're going to be a better father when you get back. You're going to be this when you get back. And I said I'm sticking with this group here that was trying to get which. I're going to be this when you get back. And I said I'm sticking with this group here that was trying to get sober, which I still talk to these guys these days. I was just telling my mother about 7 out of 10 of them that I hung out with. They're still sober now.
Speaker 1:That's beautiful.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so while I'm in there, I followed the rules. I became a law-abiding citizen, basically up there, like I did what they told me to do. I participated, I focused on AA and one of the guys there. I asked him will you help me, like sponsor me here? I want to do this work. I know that there's something in this work that has to be. You know, I said I can't do this anymore, and it was Father's Day and I get a letter from my daughter Now you're allowed three phone calls a week, but me manipulative I got five.
Speaker 2:I was able to get the phone every day. I manipulated that too and I would just call my daughter for 30 seconds like real quick, baby, I love you so much, please don't be mad at me. Are you mad at me? Please don't be mad at me. And I get a letter from her on Father's Day and it says Daddy, happy Father's Day. I miss you so much. I drew you all these pictures. And she says I'm not mad at you, stop asking me. I'm so happy that you're getting better. She goes just promise me you won't do this again. And I said I can't. I couldn't make a promise. I knew me. I've tried this so many times. And I said I'll promise that I'll do everything that I'm taught to not do it again. And I stood the rest of the rehab time there, really reading, doing groups, two AA meetings a day and staying with like-minded people.
Speaker 1:People places and things, but on the good side of that coin, yeah, and my daughter is on the way home from rehab.
Speaker 2:So I went into my second step with the sponsor. He said that's as far as I could take you To a third step sorry. He said this is as far as I could take you in the work. You don't get a sponsor when you get back and he goes and everything. I kept hearing people that were leaving that day get to a meeting as soon as you walk out of here. The success rate is X amount higher if you just go. So instead of going to see my daughter, I went right to Free Spirit. I passed over Staten Island. I went to 20th Avenue. Free Spirit moved over to 20th. I went there. I met with little Danny and I said hey, frank, I'm an alcoholic and I just got out of rehab, and that's where this journey began until now. And then I ran into you guys at our little place.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And you know, to see you and Chris was just like man. These guys are still fucking sober and the smiles got bigger and you just actually.
Speaker 1:You got smaller.
Speaker 2:I felt the love from you guys.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Like you guys yeah, like you guys I finally felt like accepted somewhere and for people that know what it's like to be on the other side, like not the guy that goes to the Army, that was ready straight edge from day one. You know, I'm with the Island of Misfit Toys that found a way out and I watched you guys and I got my sponsor and I dove into the step work and I got my commitments and I open up a meeting every Friday. I'm there every Friday. I missed it once in the past 22 months and I did the work and I reach out to alcoholics every day and the job that I quit. I got back. I got my daughter and my life full swing.
Speaker 2:Like you know, I'm moving back to Staten Island, got the apartment, I got a new car and these are material things, which is great. I mean, you want these things. You said something the other day that I wanted to be like oh yeah, it's so awesome, but I didn't want to jump in while you were talking uh, like the vacation, I don't really need a vacation. I'll go on vacation for my daughter. I want her to experience something, but I don't need it. I have a life that is so fantastic today.
Speaker 1:Every day is a fucking vacation yeah, I don't need to run from it. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:I'm literally looking at you, I'm smiling at you, right?
Speaker 1:now, that's the truth.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I feel like just it's amazing, like what I was given back is so amazing and the people that are in my life now.
Speaker 1:So when you're doing the work for those of you who don't know, that means the step work it's a lot of accountability. Sure, you know what I'm saying when you're doing that stuff. And then you know when you're like bullshitting. And you have these moments where you're like, oh my god, I'm not bullshitting, yeah, you know what I'm saying. And and for me, those were pivotal moments for me, like as I was, because you remember what we were saying before. Like like we didn't know how to be ready.
Speaker 1:Like nobody teaches you how to be ready, so just one day you ready, and then how to be ready. Like nobody teaches you how to be ready, so just one day you ready, and then how to be honest is what the step work does. It teaches you how to be honest and see the truth about yourself, no matter what it is, and what you can do to change that truth. You can be like this is what I did and if, if I don't change, then that's who I am. But if I change and I just start making a little different choices, maybe I start going to bed earlier, maybe I start doing all these different lifestyle things, I start calling other people, I start letting people get to know me like a little bit at a time.
Speaker 2:Know then that's who you are now, if I didn't clean up that aspect, those parts of myself or the wreckage that I caused. There's no way. I don't think I'd stay sober, like if I just hung around and, you know, stayed with sober people. It might feel good for me, but I'm the type of person that I'm very I'm always causing some sort of chaos somewhere, that somebody has something on me like. So I always have to go out of my way and feel this, you know, knot in my stomach, like for instance now at work. You know, when I was at this job, I was there for years and I was always doing something outlandish and I had to make sure, at work, like these people, I didn't, I didn't fuck with them because they have something on me and or I'd be right in the crowd gossiping. I changed all my ways around and I don't do anything to put me in that position anymore and I just walk free. Like I walk free.
Speaker 2:If I made an error and I was ready to just cover up the error, I could, I could have hit it. I didn't have to tell the customer I made an error. I could have, because I don't want anybody, but I just said you know what? I made an error. I reached out to the customer I said I'm sorry I under-quoted you or something. Here is the real quote and I didn't have to start the lies and start the deception. It's just so nice to live in just like this free space because I know that it sounds crazy, but I know I'm protected Like I walk. I live life today knowing I'm really just protected.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, I feel the same way. I'm protected by the lifestyle that I live because there's no, there's no dishonesty. Yeah, in that way you know what I'm saying so like, which means that if something doesn't go my way, then that's actually just life. It's not something that I set in motion by jerking somebody around or by lying to my wife or doing something, you know, whatever. I didn't set those chains, that I didn't set that in motion, and that's where the freedom is, where it's just like. I don't have a lock on my phone, I don't have one.
Speaker 2:You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and that's like it's a beautiful thing. What's your relationship like with your parents now? Excellent.
Speaker 2:When I made amends to them, my mother. What was?
Speaker 1:that like.
Speaker 2:First of all.
Speaker 1:Your mom is the greatest you know. I love your mom so much, oh my.
Speaker 2:God, yeah, thank you. She loves you too, actually. I speak about you a lot in my house.
Speaker 1:That's why I appreciate that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, she told me it was pretty easy actually.
Speaker 1:She made it easy on you. She could have pulled out the fucking checklist. Yeah, you know what she said to me.
Speaker 2:Frank, just keep doing what you're doing. You are the best you've ever been in your life, which was incredible.
Speaker 1:It's hard to even take that from a parent, right? Yeah, because it was always a piece of shit before that yeah, just even you know, you almost wanted them to just be like yeah, it's okay and just like leave it. But when they say something really nice and it's real, yeah, I wouldn't even have known how to respond.
Speaker 2:My dad was like okay, like he was more uncomfortable than I was.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah, but you did it for yourself too, because you want to be somebody with integrity, that you can look them in their eye and be like I know, I screwed up but, I also know I tried to make it right and every day after I'm trying to make it right.
Speaker 2:You know, you talk about a lot too, how normal people that don't have what we have don't have what we have Right that they've got the checklist. Like you said, my little sister's going through something right now and the company that she works with is downsizing or whatever's going on, that her and her husband both work for the same company and they might be losing their jobs and she is torturing herself daily about it, stressed out, which I get. There is stress. You always have to be concerned. But when before I got this job, I didn't. I had a decent job but I was just getting by. But I said, if I don't get the job, I went for the interview and said, if I don't get it, it's not the end of the world. I'm here today, I'm present, things will work out and I just enjoy the moment that I'm in now.
Speaker 2:I was always so in. I couldn't just complete remedial tasks without my brain being on overload and thinking it was the end of the world. And I'm talking about something as simple as going home to write a money order to pay a bill. And if it didn't find the place, if the money order got lost, oh, forget it. The big if. Yeah, if the money order was lost and I had to actually go make a phone call or do something. I was like I need a drink first, yeah, but then the drink spiraled into more and I just never got it done. And this was a pattern for 20-something years.
Speaker 1:That was a lifestyle. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So how do you be there for her? Because she doesn't have the tools we have, because she doesn't need them in the way that we need them.
Speaker 2:I tell her, I relate to me, I use me as the example. I never tell her what she should do, I just tell her how, look at everything that I had and what I went to. Look at everything that I had and what I went to and I was willing to basically die of alcoholism rather than rather than I don't know, but to come. I've come back from it and instead of living in this right now it didn't happen yet. You know, try not to. I just try to give her some advice. But you would put it on me to see how I was. And she knows what I do, she knows about my room, she's so proud of me, like she is so happy for me, and she knows I was just, I was a broken person. So I just try to say, if I could do it, believe me, you could. You're a smart girl, you know you're a smart girl, you know you, you, you have other options, I'm sure, if this does come up.
Speaker 1:And I said I wish you were an alcoholic. That's what I told her.
Speaker 2:I said I wish you're an alcoholic, Cause you could come here and try to do this and see, because I can't push any sort of God on her. She's not religious, you know. My God is a different God and uh, you know I don't like to say pray, I don't jump into that realm with her. But in the same breath somebody else in her life is not healthy, physically healthy and in the conversation we were talking it came up about that person and they're like, oh lucky she didn't have to go through XYZ today to get this done and it was a decent day I go.
Speaker 2:That person that you're talking about right now, you know, just think they're okay that they're alive today. You know you don't have to worry, you're alive, you have a beautiful son, you have a roof over your head. You know it's not everything, but I could see her taking a toll on her and she cares about me so much and I love her a lot. So I've been praying all day for her and actually I'm not saying my prayer work. But she got a little bit better news today and I was like, all right, see yesterday, all that sadness that you were in you didn't have to live that we're only given the now.
Speaker 2:And, like all right, see yesterday, all that sadness that you were in, you didn't have to live that. We're only given the now and that's what I really. I live by each moment. I pray a lot, and not those like formal prayers, I just talk to God, you know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, most of the time, my prayers are just like thank you, yeah, yeah, that's like a whole thing, and it's similar to, you know, watching something play out, like you're watching it play out with your sister and then, however it ends, your job is to just not be there, like I told you.
Speaker 1:So no, never, you know like it's like listen, it's good or bad yeah, of course, listen, because look, if she got fired today, that's good news. And she finally got. Of course, listen, because look, if she got fired today, that's good news. And she finally got the fucking phone call. Yeah, she don't have to worry no more. If she didn't get fired, that's also good news. So, either way, it's good news for us. We just want like when I was a kid, and then we'll wrap this up in a few.
Speaker 1:But like I couldn't handle. I couldn't handle problems. So it'd be like junior high school, whatever. I'd be like yo I don't want to say people's names because some of you fuckers listen. They'd be like they're going to get you. Like fourth period, they're coming. This guy and this guy because of whatever you know the whispering game when you're fucking 13 or 14 years old. I would get so much anxiety that I would go and I would find one of them right then and I would set it, set it on them and more than one time they didn't know what was going on, like that was just people talking shit. But I couldn't handle the anxiety. I'd go there. They'd be like Jay, what the fuck are you doing? I'm like yo. You said you gonna come see me.
Speaker 1:They're like bro, what are you? What are you fucking?
Speaker 2:crazy.
Speaker 1:We got football practice. I'm like all right, like of not knowing, and now I love and I live in the not knowing Because of this lifestyle, like I live there and it's just like we said, either phone call would be a good phone call Because it doesn't matter, it's not even that it's going to be okay, it's already okay.
Speaker 2:I just love waking up, being a free person today.
Speaker 1:Free of everything, like I really gave it all over to God. Love waking up being a free person today. Yeah, free of everything, yeah.
Speaker 2:Like I really gave it all over to God.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And I said I just want to be of service to somebody today and do the next right thing. I really just try to do the next right thing all the time and there's little things I fell short of. But I've actually even recently a couple of things which I won't get into. But I've actually even recently a couple of things which I won't get into, but I've changed them and I smile about it. Now, when I don't do it, I'm like man, this is good life.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you got to enjoy the experience. Yeah, it's all on the menu. It's all on the menu, all right, anyway, thank you guys for listening.
Speaker 2:Thank you for having me, Jeff.
Speaker 1:Yeah, frank, you're the man. I'll see you every Wednesday and see you on days before that, don't forget. Everybody. Like and subscribe on all podcast platforms. Share these episodes with your friends and we'll see you on the flip side. Peace.