The Crack House May Not Be What You Think

The movie New Jack City and various television shows give a very vivid picture of a crack house. They depict an abandoned building in a run-down neighborhood where people are dirty and lying on the floor. It implies that those who smoke cocaine disappear for days and live inside the filthy walls of this undesirable situation in order to get high. While that may be true in some cases, it is absolutely not the norm.

Decades ago, I broke my arm and had metal implants and could not drive. When I needed to go somewhere and my husband was at work, I walked or rode the bus. One day I missed the bus and walked to my grandmother's home. During this 15 minute walk, I decided to save bus fare until I could drive again and walk every time I went to grandma's. This was an area of working class individuals and there were some really nice homes and people of means who lived in the area.

I began to notice a lot of people going in and out of one particular home which was very nice to look at and had a manicured lawn. In other words, it looked like the typical American house. There were two decent vehicles in the driveway and out side of the foot traffic, there was nothing out of the ordinary. I began to notice that some of the men and women who frequented this home were the same faces I saw in a neighborhood where I would give a friend a ride to. This friend had told me that a particular house on her block was a crack house. That home was a little less appealing to look at, but still was nothing like what was depicted in the movies and on television.

One day when I was driving again, I gave a neighbor a ride to a home that again looked pretty decent and he invited me to come in while he talked with the homeowner. Once inside, I saw seven or eight individuals sitting at the kitchen table and there were a few others in the living room. Some smoked cigarettes but most just seemed to be waiting for something to happen. I shared this with a man who used to smoke crack and he said that I had been in a crack house.

He explained that there are people who sell the drug to those they trust in order to get enough money to support their own habit. Now decades later, I sadly know of numerous crack houses that were throughout the city where I live. Life happens, people move, get arrested, get clean or die, so I cannot say with certainty in 2019 what anyone is doing in their home. Should you find yourself in one of these homes, you will find the owners are hard-working individuals who simply need money for drugs until they can be free of the chains of addiction. These functional addicts go to work every day, go to church and raise their families.

During my time of walking, catching the bus and giving rides in certain areas of town, I never saw a shootout, or anyone being beaten or abused. I never came across the big guy drug dealer or experienced anything that you see on television. I'm certain that all that is depicted in the media is true, but I am telling another side to the story.

Every day somewhere in the USA, possibly in your neighborhood, there is a home where the neighbors are quiet and hardworking, but they have a secret. They may have associates who gather inside and pool their resources in order to purchase the product that they are addicted to. No prostitution, no women being raped or held captive. No police cars, no raids or anything you may associate with drug addiction. Hard-working Americans who happen to have a monkey on their back, who are looking for a way to obtain a quick fix. A crack house can be as vile as the stereotype or as mild as your next door neighbors that you have no clue of what is going on behind their closed doors.