LOWHANGERZ

jackie said she had something nice for me. ;i remember the sweet smell of the flame; the way she took a cotton ball and pulled it into a yarn-like thread and then wrapped it around the end of a stiff wire (from cutting a segment of a wire hanger), creating a "q-tip"8 inches long. she then dipped it into shot glass of Bacardi 151 and touched it to a burning candle. a blue flame appeared - a very clean flame. she asked me to hold it.   then she took the  glass cigar tube that contained a solution of cocaine and baking soda and started to gently wave it over the flame. as she swirreled the tube, the solution bubbled and foamed up.  she kept swirreling the cigar tube and eventually the foam melted back into the boiling water and the solution cleared as a white, tarry opaque blob materialized.  it's consistency was like honey.  after adding a few drops of cold water, the tarry material hardened. soon a solid ball of crack, heard thumping  againts the glass tube.

she slowly poured the water out and used another short segment of wire hanger to pry the crack ball loose from the side of the tube. ;she then turned the tube upside down and the bean-sized rock rolled out onto the counter.  jackie went back into the living room and placed the rocks on the glass-top coffee table.  she took out a razor blade and cut the rock into eight peices.  then took a glass water pipe from her purse and filled the base with cool water. she placed the rubber stopper in the neck and then inserted another glass tube through a whole in the stopper. ;there was a screen (just like the ones that are in a water faucet) that was crumpled up and stuffed into the tube, about 1/4 inch from the end. she placed a piece of crack in the tube, resting on the screen.; she dipped the hanger (which already had a fresh piece of cotton wrapped aound the tip) into the Bicardi and brought the flame towards the pipe.  she started sucking on the water pipe and as the flame touched the rock, it made a crackling noise. the rock melted and  turned to smoke that was cooled by the water pipe as it entered her lips.  she kept inhaling until the rock was gone. ;she held her breath for at least 15 seconds before exhaling the sweet smelling smoke. now it was my turn. she placed another rock in the tube - it was smaller than the rock she smoked - and held the pipe to my lips.  she told me to gently inhale as she lit the flame and manuevered it just above the rock. the smoke was surprisingly smooth and had a sweet, musty taste. not being a smoker, i was expecting to cough, but the vaporized cocaine numbed my throat as it went down my windpipe  . i just kept inhaling until she took away the pipe and she finished whatever was left. i was overwhelmed by the rush - it was the most ecstatic experience of my life - period.  it was right on par with a good orgasm. all i thought about was taking another hit to get even higher. this was what crack was famous for.  it doesnt discriminate - it ruins the life of whoever tries it.

over the years, in a very short period of time actually, the water pipe was replaced by a straight glass tube and the screen was easily made by cutting a small piece of Dobie (a copper dish scrubber) and using a chop stick to stuff it and compress it in the tube.  [this Dobie was copper steel-wool, bought at any super market in the sponge aisle.   and when it is cut by a scissor, little fragments  of copper get sprinkled all over the counter and floor.  this is a sure sign that someone is smoking crack if you see fine, thread-like fragments of copper on the floor or in a corner of a counter.  in a household, the only explaination for those type of copper fragments is  due to cutting a Dobie pad to stuff in the end of a crack pipe].  i would then tilt the tube at a 45 degree angle and place a piece of crack in it and light it. you always had to be careful that the molten crack which slipped through the screen didnt drip into your mouth. this is something that comes with experience, as does using a short piece of a coat hanger, or screw driver, or any other utensil, to scrape the crack residue off the inside of the pipe to smoke it again. it's really not a good sign if you take a hanger out of someone's closset and a segment of the hanger is missing - a crack addict goes through alot of metal hangers.  the residue was a bit harsher to smoke, but once you are out of crack, its amazing how many hours would be spent scraping pipes, pushing the screen from one end of the tube to the other, and smoking burnt screens in order to get another hit. it got to the point where i used a three pipe rotation - i could take a hit, put down the stem to cool, and immediatley pick up a cool stem and keep smoking without waiting for the first pipe to cool off.  it's amazing how this turned into such a ritual - an assembly line to keep the crack coming as fast as i could breath it in.   sometimes i was in such a rush that i would place a piece of crack in a hot pipe and it would melt before i could even take a hit because the screen was still red hot. 

unbelievable how this particular encounter with jackie that night would change my life forever.  ;i mean, it was april 1986 and i was getting ready to graduate medical school in a few weeks. i just smoked crack for the first time and i liked it. i ended up seeing jackie two more times before graduating.  both of those times, i paid very close attention to how she prepared the crack. 

i remember the first time i tried cooking it myself, in ealry july. it didnt come back in a small ball - it stayed tarry and stuck to the sides of the tube. ;i had to scrape it off and smoke the stuff - it was like crystals of sand and sawdust, but i smoked every last molecule of it.   what started out as a once-a-month, recreational weekend use in july soon turned into 4 times a week habit.  this progression happened rapidly, by christmas time i was gone.  the only reason i didnt smoke crack was if i was on call - i mean i was doing a general surgery internship and had to be on call every two to three nights.  but do you really think being on call would keep a crack-head from getting high?  it doesn't.  things got real ugly for me and the patients who i was in charge of.

how many more times?

things will be different on new years day.

).