Behind These Lies a Truth Remains
(a drunken story about the extremely talented and revered singer/songwriter Jason Molina)
Behind These Lies a Truth Remains
(a drunken story about the extremely talented and revered singer/songwriter Jason Molina)
During Covid, and almost four years ago now, we moved into a 780 square foot house in north central Florida. The city proper is laid out into four quadrants (NW, SW, SE, NE) and lots are small. The quadrants are intersected with Main Street running north and south and University cutting east and west. The central downtown area is very small and is gradually being overrun by the ever-growing university. In all four quadrants the average house surrounding the college is roughly one-thousand square feet. We have never seen so many tiny houses in one town before. Of course, ostentatious gated communities have spread to pretty much completely surround this little college town. Like the rest of the country, typically large and tasteless homes are preferred by those who can afford them and usually sit on manicured chem lawns spotted with plants and trees not at all indigenous to the area. But these abominations are nowhere within our proper city limits and its original four quadrants.
Upon moving to this town in 2020 and getting to work renovating the house, we were immediately introduced to our single neighbor living directly across the street from us. We learned she was once a smart and productive woman. Unfortunately, in no time at all, she also showed us she has a drinking problem. Of course we did not know this when we moved in. She appeared to be normal, though a bit eccentric, which was fine by us. But she was anything but normal. Over the last four years we have seen her in and out of Veterans Administration treatment centers paid for by us taxpayers, which would be great if these centers actually worked. It has been my experience with being sober for the last thirty-eight years that regularly attending twelve-step meetings after treatment is the only hope for real success. You can quit drinking, but without the rest of recovery the abstinence of alcohol results in a person basically being on what’s called a dry drunk. Of course, there would be many who would want to argue this fact but they are generally people who just aren’t aware of how diabolical the abuse of alcohol really is. Alcohol is a sneaky trickster.
Simply said, the only way to stay sober is to not drink, followed by being completely honest, making amends, sharing your secrets, stories, and concerns. AA meetings provide a safe and anonymous forum in which to not only hear yourself speak some rather bizarre initial bullshit but to hear others do so as well. Belonging to a community built on sobriety helps to keep you honest. And after four years of observing my neighbor across the street it became clear that the treatment centers were merely a place for her to dry out, have a sort of vacation, get her body pumped back up with vitamins and decent food, and her health restored enough for her to begin drinking again soon after being discharged.
It became obvious that our neighbor also had a severe problem with the truth. She lied about so many things including that she owned the house she lived in. She did not. She was a renter. And after she first returned home after a stay in a treatment center I occasionally offered a suggestion or two, but she rarely took my advice when it came to not drinking. She just couldn’t stop. I surmise a twelve-step program would eventually consider her a person perhaps unconstitutionally capable of staying sober for good. She appeared to be a hopeless cause. But she didn’t have to be. No amount of her crawling on all fours, or even wearing just a diaper while she drunkenly gardened outside, seemed to make her desperate enough to get some help and finally change. She recently almost died and was moved by her family into an assisted living home. I bring her story up because it resonates with a book I have just finished reading. The book deals with the sad life and death of a brilliant young musician. Which brings me to write a bit about the extremely talented and revered singer/songwriter Jason Molina who suffered from this same disease.
Jason Molina: Riding with the Ghost by Erin Osmon, Will Johnson (Foreword); 179 pages, Kindle Edition; Published May 15, 2017 by Rowman & Littlefield Publishers; Language: English
…Jason Molina’s story is a paragon of this Midwest isolation and pride. A musician reared in the heart of the Ohio Rust Belt with a big, singular voice, he both shunned his humble roots and wore them like a badge of honor…
I discovered Jason Molina and his Songs: Ohia moniker in the 90’s shortly after I learned of Will Oldham and the Palace Brothers. I followed these bands as well as other contemporaries such as Appendix Out, Red House Painters, and Arab Strap. I listened as Jason Molina eventually segued into Magnolia Electric Company and produced a body of work that is amazing if one was to seriously delve into all of it. Molina’s songwriting gift was remarkable and his tenor voice was like no other.
…He was the type of person to have a lot of acquaintances, but not very many close friends…
It was obvious from reading this book that Molina had a wide range of contacts as well as their revered and loyal respect for his talent, not to mention his spirit and personality. But he never let anyone in that close, and every acquaintance knew a little bit different Molina than the others. My partner and I met Jason at the apex of his Songs: Ohia period and right at the very segue of the birth of the now-renowned Magnolia Electric Company. We hosted the band overnight at our home in Louisville, Kentucky while they were touring the new self-titled album that none of the new band members had a part in creating. But Jason wanted a new band to tour with and these likable and talented musicians became the core of what would be recognized as Molina’s crowning achievement. According to the book, Jason must have already been secretly drinking but on this particular night in Louisville the band was superb and our overnight visit with them in our home was pleasant and without incident. Jason was communicable with me, humble and engaging, and we talked extensively about literature, significant others, and my own battle with alcohol. He was such a smart and charming man. His own personal demons never came up in our conversation. But I shared mine, and then the following morning we fed them all a hearty breakfast for the road.
…Molina began dreaming up his imaginary root beer stand, the Frosty Nickel. His plan was to open it in the tiny shack that still stands mysteriously empty across the street from Secretly Canadian’s headquarters at 1499 West 2nd Street. Though the idea never became a reality, Molina told a fan in 2004, “the old Frosty Nickel is our root beer bar in southern Indiana. It is hidden but we’re doing fine. The old boxer Magpie Mac came in and gave us an autographed pair of boxing gloves.” There is no way any of that could have been true…
It was disheartening to me to read about how much Jason Molina lied, told tall tales, or kept his drinking a secret until he could no longer hide it. As much as I revere and respect the members of all of the associated bands, the recording engineers, label mates, and peers I feel they failed Jason in not learning more about alcoholism and addiction. They attempted in their own way to get the man sober. And they sacrificed plenty to do so. But there was plenty of blame dished for the medical profession’s failure to cure him, but nowhere in the book did I read about any twelve-step programs or how hard it is to seriously engage oneself in their own personal recovery. Repeatedly going to treatment centers is, for most addicts, a way to get a bit of health back so you can again resume using. Jason proved time and time again that drinking was more important than investing himself in his recovery. And recovery isn’t easy. It’s not just about not drinking. It takes a severe commitment. It also takes surrendering to a power greater than yourself, which is hard to do if you have a strong ego and a public persona you feel some special need to protect over your own sobriety. This thinking is delusional.
Being admitted to a hospital for a few days to dry out just keeps the vicious cycle turning. After reading about each of Jason’s stays in treatment I never once learned that he continued on in a program such as AA. After being discharged his friends and family would just make tough rules for him to follow, and Jason would always just simply lie and plot another way to get around them. It takes years of sobriety and daily personal inventory to achieve any semblance of a life Jason could have happily lived with. And the pain of always being honest and revealing one’s secrets and foibles takes courage along with a desperation that few of us are willing to expose. Patience is another key element that is necessary in recovery. It took me every bit of five years of hell while not drinking, going to meetings, being honest with myself and others, making amends, and persistently trying to get back to the person I truly was and wanted to be. The slogan, “It gets better” did not apply to me for at least five years. For those first few years all I could achieve in my sobriety was to not drink and go to meetings.
There is nothing easy about investing five years of a person’s life in a quest to get back to where it all began. And it is by observing those who have gotten their lives back, listening to their stories, and realizing that perhaps their hope and experience will one day pay off. But in all honesty it’s the only way to start over and get your life back. I took my last drink thirty-eight years ago last Easter Sunday and I feel terrible that Jason couldn’t manage to do the same. The recovery slogans are silly and simple, but they fucking work.
“If you don’t drink you won’t get drunk.”
“Don’t complicate a steel ball.”
“One day at a time.”
“Keep coming back, it does get better.”
…On March 16, 2013, at 7:12 p.m., a fifty-five-year-old man named Michael Pettijohn called the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department to report finding Jason Molina dead…
Jason was only thirty-eight years old.
Thanks for sharing this
Wow, powerful. Alcoholism is serious and kills.