2003; Second St., downtown Ann Arbor, Michigan:

There was a lonely drunk man living upstairs from me - nothing unusual, most of the renters in that house were separate from society in one way or another.

Crack addiction
Alcoholism
Prostitution
(in my case) Isolation from my "old life."

The guy, I never knew his name, drank himself to death one night in his rear second-floor room while the Guatemalan guys who rented the basement were busy cutting each other up with knives and broken Bacardi bottles.

We didn't know he was dead until 2 days later, while my neighbor and I sat and smoked a doobie as the EMTs, dressed in HazMat suits and tanks went in to remove the body.

I said "Hi" to this guy a few times over the almost three weeks he remained alive while residing in that house - I know there wasn't more I could do for him; in his state, he wanted to be dead and was beyond the reach of anyone - he put himself there.

The vibe I picked up from that man was gray to black; madness, depression compressed to the density of hysterical catatonia, a feral need to escape what he believed to be an endless dark tunnel the walls of which defined, for him, an unalterable and insatiable existence.

It's a sad thing to see the evidence of there being only two types of people in the world - those who choose to care, and those who choose not to. For me, this man's death provided a lesson of intent; one that made me look at my own choices, comparatively inoccuous as they seemed, and reevaluate my purpose in accepting my next breath and the responsibility, and more importantly the opportunity to care that it implies.

Every Junkie's like the setting sun.
-Neil Young