Yeah, you live in California. I live in Red State America. We’re hip deep in pot, meth and pills and all are very cheap. You have me beat as to how many addicts I work with. This spring I’ll teach a class at the county jail and another at the women’s prison. Yes, most of them will be addicts, though I don’t address that head on. I teach the kind of thing I write about here, people skills, life skills, emotional skills. Addiction treatment per se is above my pay grade.

In Red State America we treat addicts by pursing our lips and looking down our nose until they commit a crime then we throw them in prison. (It’s the same with the mentally ill.) It’s a horrifically expensive way to address addiction and, of course, massively cruel. However, in the god fearing American heartland cruelty is a feature not a bug. (I may be a tad bitter. Don’t mind me.)