I have to admit, though, that maybe my attitude was bad. I guess now these people have to be my friends or something. This is like a joke. If there is a God, he’s like Shecky Greene, throwing me in a Ramada Inn with a bag of cocaine and then putting me back here again. Well, at least it’s a very dramatic story, and I’ve got some good characters to work with here. And this is my version of a breakthrough, so I don’t want the clouds to open and God to drop me a note. I don’t want to be religious. Something in between what Julie is and what I usually am is probably the way to go.

I mean, I would like to have some friends, but I want to have the cool people in AA as my friends. No smiling jerks, no zealous, crazed Republicans. I don’t want to be a Republican. It’s so uncool to be what some of these people are, and I hope they don’t expect . . . Okay, I won’t take dope again, but I’m not gonna become a Jesus freak. That’s it. You have to draw the line somewhere. I won’t do drugs, but that doesn’t mean I’m gonna replace them with hearts and flowers. Forget it.

I’ve got to talk to Suzanne before she leaves. There’s a park outing in the morning, and I’m gonna go up to her and . . . It’s no big deal. I shouldn’t make a big deal or I’ll get all pressured and freaked out. But if I don’t talk to her I’ll beat myself up for the rest of the time I’m here. I can’t miss any more opportunities. And she’d talk to me. It’s like the changing of the guard of the new drugless generation. She’s going out and I’m staying in.

I’m sure there’s a lot of things we have in common. We could talk about not liking Stan. We could talk about Carl. We can’t talk to Carl because he never shuts up, but we could talk about Carl. I don’t know, and Sid. I could ask her if she misses Sid. Hey, we know a lot of the same people . . .

DAY TWENTY-NINE

At lunch Wanda said to me, “God, I really envy you being in all those movies. You really have it all.” I liked the concept of being envied by someone in a drug clinic while actually in a drug clinic.