The other night, my husband and I went over to our friends Jay and Bella's house. He works at a cabinet factory that employs mainly ex-cons, and she's a professional pianist. She talked about how, when they first moved to Gig Harbor from Minnesota, she was so desperate to make friends that she looked up the pianists she could find in the area. Professors at Universities and things like that. She cold emailed them, introducing herself and asking if they wanted to be friends. Four out of four coffee dates went well. One of the people is now like her best friend, and the other three all got her jobs. She also went into a board game store on the day it was going out of business. She exchanged phone numbers with the owner of the store and told him she and her husband would be down on any given game night. A couple of weeks later, the owner's wife texted her back and invited them. Now they all four hang out all the time.
Yesterday, my husband, sister-in-law, and her husband all drove around trying to find a covid test. Annie, who I'm spending new years eve with, wanted me to get tested first. A reasonable request. However, places are like out of tests. No walk-ups available. Only by appointment. No appointments available. Also it's snowed here, and it almost never snows here. So places are shut because of the snow as well. We drove all over town looking for a place. We finally went to a med clinic that gave out take-home tests. (Similar to a pregnancy test.) We all four took our tests in the car. I'm not sure we fully appreciated the gravity and lack of privacy of the situation. What if someone's came back positive? But they all came back negative. Only a solitary blue line. We all burst into cheers and song as we revealed our results together. Bumping the car up and down with our dancing. Weird.
Blog Time!
**SPOLERS**
Keefe, Patrick Radden – EMPIRE OF PAIN
Published: 2021
Read: 12/2021
This was a family history of the Sackler family, the owners of the private company Purdue Pharma who made and marketed Oxycontin. Unlike other wealthy business families (Ford, JP Morgan, etc.), the Sacklers have always gone out of their way to distance the family name from the family business. They use the business – an aggressive marketing campaign convincing doctors of the safety and necessity of OxyContin – as a cash cow, and then donate lots of money to art galleries and universities, insisting on various naming rights. When Purdue Pharma eventually caught some public flack for their part in the opioid epidemic, the Sacklers put three non-Sacklers forward to plead guilty. The sentences were lessened based on the family’s connections at the FDA and the justice department. By the end of the book (and pretty close to present day), Purdue Pharma had filed for bankruptcy and found themselves a sympathetic judge. The family has taken billions of dollars out of the company, and it looks like they’re going to be able to keep it all. Activitists, including photographer Nan Goldin, have been on the forefront of exposing the Sackler name. Getting museums and universities to stop taking money from them. To, where they can, remove the Sackler name from their walls. It seems like the Sacklers will leave the situation with their money in tact, but they will lose their good name.
I wasn’t totally in the zone for this book. It was well reported and written, and it’s about a scandal of way bigger proportion than the college admissions scandal. But I didn’t feel all the way in it. A lot of distractions going on in the couple of weeks I was listening to the audio book. (Patrick Radden Keefe himself reads it, which is nice.) It’s odd to be learning about a societal/historical trend that has personally impacted people I know. Two of my cousins got hooked on opioids because of OxyContin. (At least one of them still is.) My cousin Ben had it prescribed after an elbow surgery he got as a college-level pitcher. I think/hope he’s doing better now, but there was a time when my aunt said, “We’re preparing ourselves for the call that says he’s wound up dead. We just can’t assume that’s not going to happen.” He was stealing money from my grandpa to buy… I’m not sure – pills? Heroin? The whole shebang. My other cousin won’t play sports anymore because he can’t afford the injury, and the pain killers, that might come along with that. Both cousins are basically super athletes. Sports have more or less defined their whole lives.
I talked to my mom about the book, and she rattled off a whole list of people in her community who are hooked to opioids. People who’ve had multiple back surgeries or experience chronic pain. It’s terrifying. It seems like quicksand in the boardgame of life. Like in the real boardgame there are all these potential highs and lows you can role – and there are a lot a lot of possible lows. This company, Purdue Pharma – this family, the Sacklers, -- plopped a big sink of quicksand right in the middle of the board. Close to: injury, loneliness, pain. And a shit ton of people fell into it. Are still falling into it. Will fall into it in the future.
Rating: ★★★
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