American Outlaw - Jesse James [146]
She smiled at me. “You’ve done so well. I have faith in you.”
Right toward the end of the month, I had a dual celebration: my forty-first birthday and my ten years of sobriety. The residents got together and threw a big party for me, with cake and coffee and everything.
“We’re going to miss you, Jesse!”
“Don’t go!” Phil laughed. “Stay here, man!”
“I would, if I could,” I said, grinning. “This place is the most fun I’ve had since juvie. But I gotta see my kids, man. I’m starting to miss them pretty bad.”
It was true. Celebrating my birthday without my family around me felt lonely. I wanted to be with Chandler and Jesse and Sunny again. They gave my life purpose and joy. They made it make sense.
The following morning, I rose early to take my last walk on the horse trail. As I strode along through the cold desert morning, I scrolled through all the emotions that had been heaping down on me ever since I’d come here: guilt and shame for ending my marriage. Anger and sadness, courtesy of my rough childhood. Guarded optimism, for the hope of a new beginning.
I was scared to leave, for sure. But I’d gained so much understanding here. I felt like I had the tools I needed to get through the rest of my life—or at the very least, the next couple of months, which were gonna be trying.
I hadn’t always been the best guy, or the best husband. That much was obvious. But now that I knew more about what made me happy, that meant I knew more about how to make others happy, too.
I walked faster, my feet pounding the hardpack, my hands stuffed into the pockets of my jeans.
When I make a gas tank out of aluminum, when I weld, I thought, I make sure my hands are spotless. I make sure the table’s clean. I scrub all my tools, make sure the metal is immaculate, so no grease or moisture sucks into my weld and leaves a blemish. It takes a lot of work, a half day’s worth of work, just to prepare.
In the end, my goal is to make a tank that doesn’t leak. I’ve gotten really good at it over the years. I’ve had bikes that have rolled end over end, smashed the tank up like a wad of foil. Not a drop leaks.
I gazed up at the mountains above me. A red sun was starting to rise on the far horizon. Day was coming in.
I’m going to figure out a way, I thought, to put that kind of dedication and detail into building a life.
If I do that, I don’t think it’ll ever leak.
AFTERWORD
I press down on the gas pedal, feeding the engine. I am leaving Sierra Tucson, gunning up 77 North. Wind flies in the lowered windows of the car, cold and clean.
I fumble for the radio, watching the road, searching for the dial with my hand. I turn on the power: static.
I merge onto Highway 79 and open her up. The needle on the speedometer climbs to seventy miles an hour. Then eighty. Then ninety.
My speed keeps climbing. I see it in the dust that hangs in the air above me. One hundred. One hundred five. One ten.
The desert sun is getting low in the sky as I head west.
I slide the sunroof open, and I think about Jesse and Chandler and Sunny. How excited I am to see them. To be with them, as the new person I’ve discovered after the pain and triumph of this last month.
Entering rehab had been like committing suicide. I’d been at the end of my rope in life—pushed to a limit, no end in sight. Some mornings at Sierra Tucson, I experienced a quiet euphoria that I would imagine the suicide jumper feels when he steps off that fateful ledge. Turmoil put him up there, willing to end it all, but when falling through the cool air to his demise? He has to feel some peace and quiet. I wonder if that feeling lasts forever. I hope so.
One twenty, one thirty. My speed keeps going up until the scenery blurs. Cacti streak by my window.
So much has happened in such a short amount of time. It makes you realize just how much of a razor’s edge we walk in life. In the blink of an eye, everything we have can be gone. If I’ve learned anything from the life I’ve lived, it’s that through adversity,