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involved, so that wasn’t going to happen. Her mother put the kibosh on that plan with one sentence: “Esther can’t make it up the hill.” There’s always an Esther and she’s not going up the hill.
    The other switch that got thrown the moment I got engaged was the one in my head that dropped the needle into this groove: How the fuck did I get into this? Why am I in this? How do I get outof this? Right up to the day of our wedding I was thinking, “I can’t do this.”
    As I got closer, the fantasy started to take shape: “What if I just walk out on the altar?” That would’ve been amazing.
    Can you imagine if you were up on the altar and the rabbi said, “Do you take this woman?” and you said, “You know what, I don’t! HA HA HA!!!” What a cathartic, profound moment that would be. At that moment everyone you know in your life would think you were a fuckin’ asshole and you would be truly free. How often do you get that opportunity? “Yeah, fuck all of you!” You could just step out from under the chuppah, walk slowly past a crowd of stunned faces, climb onto a horse, ride to Mexico, and become a cowboy. That’s how real cowboys are made. Show up at a bar in Juarez and say, “Hola, amigo. What can I get for this ring?” Clink.
    I didn’t do that. I married her. I married her for the wrong reason—because it was safe. I believed at that time that people got married when they had that moment, when they’re looking at themselves in the mirror and say, “Holy shit. I’m going to compromise my dreams, get fat, sick, old, and die. I kind of want to have someone around for that.” You don’t want to be sixty, fat, sick, and alone saying to your reflection, “Look at me. I’m a fat failure.” No, you kind of want someone around to say, “It’s okay, baby. You look great. Let’s go get some Tasti D-Lite, cowboy.” You’re thinking, “I’m not a cowboy. I missed that window. Ah, Mexico.”
    We were living in Manhattan but when we got married we moved out to Astoria, Queens, to be married people.
    Right away I started to bust out. I had a barrel of monkeys on my back. I liked cocaine, I liked pot, I liked drinking. I was trying to keep it all under control. I was married to a woman who wouldn’t tolerate it but it started to sneak up on me. I was going on the road hanging out with gypsies and freaks and pirates andI’d come back all sweaty and broken saying, “I don’t know. I think I caught the flu on the plane.” It was nuts.
    Yes, pirates. Real pirates. I don’t know what your experience is, but if you’re on a three-day blow bender, you’re going to meet a pirate. At some point after you’ve been up for about seventy-six hours in a strange apartment or hotel room you’re going to hear yourself say to someone else in the room, “Dude, why is there a pirate here?” and that person is going to say, “Be cool. He brought the coke.” And you’re gonna say, “Okay, he’s cool, but does the talking parrot have to stay? Because I’m fucked-up, man. It’s freaking me out.”
    “Marc, there’s no parrot. You have a drug problem.”
    “That’s what the fucking parrot said! Are you two working together? Why don’t you both get the fuck out of here and I’ll talk to the pirate for six hours.”
    I was starting to bring the drugs home. I was not a weekend cocaine user. I’d say I was more like a half-a-week cocaine user. It’s amazing how much you can rationalize when you’re on drugs. I could actually say to myself, “Look, I’m only doing blow Wednesday through Saturday.” I didn’t think I had a problem. I thought I was completely under control. I thought, “I have parameters here. I have a schedule. It’s Wednesday through Saturday.” It took me a long time to realize, “Wednesday through Saturday? You know what, Marc? Regular people never do coke ! It doesn’t even cross their minds.” I would get to the drug dealer’s house early because I thought if I started