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(I was charged with DUI in the summer of 2001 while I was attending college in Pullman WA. I’ve since had it wiped from my record. This story, an excerpt from my NaNoWriMo novel, begins the day after I was pulled over, just after my arraignment.)

Truth.

The 15-minute drive home went quickly. My brother was curious about my court experience and I gave him a rundown in the least exciting way possible. I was scared. Really scared, but I dared talk to no one about this. After my harrowing experience in court a few years earlier, I desperately wanted this all to go away. Through all this, I knew there was one thing I absolutely could not do: tell my parents.

It’s not that they wouldn’t have helped me. Quite the opposite. I was sure my parents would have hired a real attorney, helped me navigate the system and probably managed to get the charges reduced.

I didn’t want them to.

I a) wanted no financial burden placed upon them for my dumbass mistakes and b) had long been wanting to acknowledge and overcome what was apparently a growing binge drinking issue. But that could wait, because I got laid last night, my brother was here and we had cold beer in the fridge.

We played video games and drank most of that night, determined to travel absolutely nowhere. We had pizza delivered. We watched O’ Brother Where Art Thou at least twice, repeating “Damn, we’re in a tight spot” over and over and over and over. We played more video games, we drank more and we laughed a lot. I wish I could also say that this was the day I was glad to be alive, that I’d change my life and that I’d never drink again. It wasn’t.

Artist's rendition of my mugshot.

I came back to school, bought groceries and settled in before my court appearance the next day. I defrosted some ground beef in the microwave, eager to snack on some tacos and watch movies by myself. One phone call later and I was out the door to play trivia at My Office, a downtown bar we summer school kids visited often on Sundays and Mondays. I had two beers in four hours at dinner and chased it all with a bunch of water.

My court date the next morning freaked me out. The prosecution sat down with me before trial, explained my options for pleas, for treatments and sent me over to the public defender’s office to arrange to take a alcohol assessment survey to determine my level of alcohol abuse. Turns out I treat alcohol like Ike does Tina.

Sample questions:

Have you ever been drunk before 9am?
-Yes, but only a few times and most often when I was still going from the night before.

Have you ever drank multiple nights in one week?
-If the week was three days that answer would still be true.

Have you ever blacked out or passed out from drinking?
-Always loved this one, as you can’t never be totally sure if you blacked out, because how would you remember? Also, yes on the passing out.

Do you often vomit after drinking?
-Not as often as I’d like, as it really helps with the hangovers. But I could totally make myself puke.

Do you drink to excess?
-Why the hell did they think I was here?

I answered them all honestly, eager to get done with all this and back to inner tubes and boats and water and fun. I again went over my legal options with my public defender and he gave me two options, pending the evaluation of my assessment. One was to plead guilty and hope to not get a horrible sentence, the other was to plead down to reckless driving, lose my license for a year, be subject to high-risk insurance ($3500/yr) for three years, plus possible jail time. Neither of these options sounded great, so I asked to wait for my assessment and was granted a continuance.

I hated dragging this out, but what the hell was I supposed to do? I worked a ton on breaks from school and losing my car, even for a few months, wasn’t an option. I drove back to Crescent Bar and explained to Bryan what had happened and waited for the phone call to explain any further options.

That call came the next day, with an invitation to come back the next week to set up treatment. Treatment? For what?

Turns out my honest answers on the alcohol assessment pointed to quite a drinking problem. While I thought of myself as no different than most college students, I realized that I obviously was, as most people don’t black out and most don’t get DUIs. I headed back the next week, curious as to what this meant to my pending legal issues.

Turns out treatment wasn’t a whole lot easier than jail. Sure, there I wasn’t locked into a cell every night, but I was given some pretty serious commitments to hit. Here’s what I was offered:

-Outpatient treatment for a period of two years, staring with four hours a night, five days a week, for two months, then four two-hour visits for two months, then a weekend day, then four day a week, one hour a night sessions for something like six months.

-Twice-weekly one-on-one counseling sessions for a year, frequency to be lessened by counselors determination.

-One AA meeting a week for the duration of my probation.

-Five years, unmonitored probation with once-monthly check-ins with summaries of my activities and random drug testing, to be carried out same day of request, no matter where I was at the time.

-No drinking during the duration of my probation.

Yeah…shit. In exchange for all of this, I’d keep my car, not have to pay high-risk insurance and when I completed the terms, the charges would be dropped. Not having a felony conviction on my record sounded pretty damn good, so I agreed and set a court date in late August for sentencing. I headed home and, three miles from my apartment, was pulled over, handcuffed and placed in the back of a cop car while I watched mine being towed away.

They don’t make it easy, do they?

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I’m having a good Christmas. Most of my loved ones were under the same roof tonight, we all had time for each other and gifts to give, and, most importantly, we were all here. I almost always have a good Christmas.

I can’t imagine what it’s like not to have one. I haven’t lived through a divorce, no one in my family has ever been disowned, no one is in jail, no one has destroyed their lives with poor choices and they are no running feuds with current and future in-laws (yet, anyway). While I’m sure I sound cliched and stereotypically middle class, I feel extremely fortunate for my loved ones.

Up until this year, December 24 has marked the only night out of the other 364 that all five Hursts (Roger, Wendy, Tyler, Bryan and Logan) have slept in the same house, celebrated Christmas morning the same way and had our Christmas tree in the same spot. We may not have many family traditions, but Christmas Eve night was definitely one of them. That changed this year.

Thanks to new additions Sarah (Bryan’s wife) and Nick (Logan’ fiance) we switched things up a bit to accommodate. Bryan and Sarah left to go to her parent’s house, Logan and Nick went to her apartment just down the street. That leaves only me and my sleeping parents in the only home the three of us kids have ever known, and it sure feels weird.

But it doesn’t feel bad. I’m not upset that Bryan and Logan aren’t here, but I really thought I would be. I’m not annoyed by their family demands on their time, but I would have told you that a week ago. Life is changing. All the Hurst kids are grown up.

So thank you, mom and dad, for a great start. Thank you, Bryan and Logan, for growing up with me. Thank you, Sarah and Nick, for becoming part of our family. Thank you for reminding me that I have something here so monumentally great it’s hard to explain to anyone who hasn’t experienced it.

I will never, ever be numb to Christmas. I won’t dread it, I won’t hate to spend time with people and I’ll never take it for granted. I wish everyone could feel this way. I wish for at least one second, you could all share in the acceptance or togetherness or tranquility that I have going on.

Sure, I took a lot of shit this morning about my Vibrams, argued with my dad about salary expectations for a job and went back and forth with Logan all day. These things happen. We all annoy each other. (Okay, I mostly annoy them, but I’m special, right?) And that’s all okay.

So to all our differences, to all our petty disagreements, stupid arguments and pointless battles, I wish everyone a Merry Christmas. From my house to yours and beyond, I wish you all the very best. I wish you all what I have now and what I’ll have in the years ahead.

And to all a good night.

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Dear Santa -

Hey big guy. Been a while. Years and years. Hope you’re doing well.

Anyway, I’d like to say I’m sorry. I’m sorry for ever thinking that once I discovered your secret, that you were no longer relevant. I’m sorry that I dismissed you as a childhood fantasy. I’m sorry that I didn’t see you as a symbol of hope, a rallying point for many of us and a sign that everything is going to be okay.

We can all be Santa.

My dad still doesn’t have a job. He’s 61 years old, works harder and longer than anyone I’ve ever met and cares deeply for his wife and me and my siblings. He’s pretty passionate about camping and hiking and we even race half marathons together now. While I certainly don’t want him to stay unemployed, I’d like to thank whoever gave him some extra time to train and run with me. I was never big on camping or hunting, and I’m glad I’m finally able to share a pastime with him. So could you renew his hope a bit this Christmas? I want him to know everyone will be all right.

I had him watch the Lemonade movie. He liked that. He also attends webinars regularly. He’s trying Santa, but I can’t imagine how tough it must be to have your entire industry change. It’s not that he’s not able to adapt, it’s just, like many baby boomers, tough to even figure out how. I want him to be passionate about something. I want him to love what he does as much as I love whatever it is I get to do daily.

Also, this will be my family’s last Christmas where we’ll definitely all be in the same place. My brother is married, my sister is engaged and me, well, I live a long ways away. We’ve had Christmas in the same house, with the tree in the same place, for now our 29th year. December 24th, up until this year, has been the only day every immediately family member has been in my parent’s house, sleeping. We had a good run, and now that we’re all growing up, things are changing.

My family's Christmas movie.

I’d like something from you, too. I’d like help keeping my pessimism at bay. I call myself a realist, but we both know that’s a stretch. I’m too used pointing out the bad, mostly because I know how to fix the crappy stuff. I want to figure out how to make the good stuff better. I want to be able to pull my own weight, inspire others and build something that outlasts me.

World peace, love and happiness are all important too. If you need to, go ahead and solve those problem’s first. I suggest showing people how alike, rather than different, we are. I learned that very thing this year and turned a few enemies into at least neutral parties. If I can do it, why can’t everyone else? My reasons are just as crazy arbitrary.

I know you’re busy, Santa. Don’t worry if you have a lot of other things to do, because I can wait. I can start doing this stuff myself, too. I can spread hope and joy and cheesy blog posts and hard work and a critical eye and happiness. I have a lot of those to give.

I hope everyone else does too.

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My name on my shirt is better than business cards. Also, say hello to Tamsen Fadal.

I am both the worst, and best, kind of person enabled by social media.

I overshare constantly, but I also offer a cathartic experience to those who’ve had similar experiences.
I criticize daily, but I also connect people and help out in any way I can.
I’m honest to a fault, and can’t get an interview with most local companies.
I’m told that I’m quite talented, yet no one really knows what it is I even do.
I’m loud and talkative enough to get noticed, yet I wear my damn name on many of my shirts.
I get sent products to review and recommend to people, yet I can’t afford to buy any of it.

I’ve read Linchpin. I know how to give gifts, make art and contribute without expecting anything back. I also know how to make people feel small, when I could make them feel like rock stars.

Jason from iwearyourshirt.com (way cooler than I expected) and me in the the worst light EVER.

I always thought I’d be rich by now. I also thought Fight Club was a fantasy movie based on a premise that didn’t really exist. I never worshipped at the altar of Tyler Durden because I actually thought I was him. My parents would probably say I’m living in a fantasy world and that it’s time to stop wearing my Vibrams, shave more than monthly and start working for a company that will pay me a decent wage in exchange for life experiences I’ll never get back.

They’ll probably tell me that it’s time to grow up. I’m not even sure what that means anymore.

Make I’m trying to figure out what scares me.

Anyone else feel like this?

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No, I don't color my hair or my facial hair.

But I’m not. Sure, I may bitch and complain, but then I either set out to fix the issue or forget about it (unless it’s every morning like Pita Jungle). While this year may have not been a banner year for me professionally, there’s plenty to be proud of. Thanks to some prodding from MeYou Health, here are my top three recent accomplishments:

No way I was ever actually that little.

Paid off my consumer debt
I haven’t had my own credit card for nearly eight years, mostly because of repeated mistakes I made during a rather dark time in college. While my total credit card bills weren’t in the five-figure range, they were more than my measly paychecks could quickly pay off and I ignored the statements for years, subconsciously hoping they’d eventually just go away. Turns out, that never works.

After finally confronting the debt issue head on, I’m now completely paid off. Sure, I still owe student loans and all sorts of recurring bills, but no credit card ones, nor have I charged on a card in almost a decade. Oh, I paid off the car I bought from my parents, too. Both are great feelings that felt better than expected.

Dye your hair blond, let it grow out, then cut it and voila! You have something way better than frosted tips.

And then I discovered Vibrams. These not quite shoes, but not quite barefoot, foot gloves made running fun again. They showed me that form is key, walking can be fun and that the more connected you are to what’s around you, the better experience you’ll have. I started a site chronicling my journey at (Almost) Barefoot, write specifically about my toe shoes at MyFiveFingers.com and ran three half marathons, with a fourth planned for January 2011.

Thanks to my more natural running form, I’m stronger, faster and in better shape than I’ve been for nearly a decade, all the while not turning into some starving carcass. Distance running may seem weird for a 5’11″, 223lb guy like me, but it sure suits my lifestyle just fine.

Going to call this one a keeper.

It’s weird how very few accomplishments seem like a huge deal at the time, but when seen in aggregate after the fact, they all seem awesome. Now if only I could channel some of this energy into more clients…

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(Hugh MacLeod’s Gaping Void series is one of my absolute favorites. His latest newsletter inspired me to instantly write this next passage. While there are, um, certain considerations I’ve yet to meet (but I will!), I didn’t want to save what I was thinking for a more appropriate time.)

To Katie-

The smartest thing I ever did was fall in love with you. I know I say it all the time, but the past few months have been tough on both of us as I’ve struggled for clients and we’ve worked together to make ends meet. You’ve never wavered in your support for me, whether financially, emotionally, physically or spiritually, and no matter how many stupid things I’ve said or done, you’ve never even hinted at bailing.

I can’t say thank you enough, I can’t say I love you enough and I can’t do enough to repay what you’ve given me. I wake up every single morning happy you’re there and look forward to every second we spend together, from long, LONG car rides to weekends spent watching movies, even if they’re yours that I think are weird.

You’ve never wanted anything but the best for both of us and have worked tirelessly for that. You mean the world to me and I want everyone to share in that joy. There’s so much to go around.

Love you, Katie.

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(Another excerpt from my #NaNoWriMo novel. This picks up after I’d been jumped by a Vietnamese gang while exiting a party in a neighborhood I’d grown up in. My nose had been broken. Oh, I also couldn’t walk because of a high ankle sprain suffered in my very last Turkey Bowl game. It’s second draft-ish.)

Showered, dressed and unshaven, I limped out to the car with my mom. My ankle hadn’t healed either, but didn’t hurt nearly as bad as the week prior.I could limp decently with the air cast as long as I didn’t step too hard or flex my leg at all.

I looked like hell. I had popped two pills about an hour before we left and felt them hit me just before we got into the car. This wasn’t going to be so bad, right? I’m on painkillers. No WAY this was going to hurt as much as it did to actually get my face pounded on.

The doctor’s office reminded me of a dentist, with a large, gray chair in the middle of the examination room. I’m sure I would have normally looked around to check out the wall charts, but the combination of the Vicodin and my unsteady limping made walking to the chair difficult. I sat down, pulled my injured leg over to rest, and laid back in the very comfortable chair.

The gas was next. The doctor gave me a mask, told me to fill the balloon and after three breaths he took it away. I figured I’d be asleep by now, or at least totally numb. I wiggled my right toes, felt shooting pain up my leg and realized this was going to really, really hurt. I asked the doc about the pain and he told me just to lay back and that he’d be numbing my face soon. Why the hell weren’t they going to knock me out? Was this some sort of punishment for fighting? I assumed it must be, so I tried to relax when the doc told me he was going to give me four shots; one between the eyes, one just under the nose on the super-sensitive part where it hurts to wipe after a while and really hurts to get zits, and one on each cheek.

Holy mother f***er. Shots in my face? Needles? This was goddamn torture and I was going to feel every one of them.

He started with the one in between my eyes, which felt like a normal pin prick. No issue there, but there’s not many nerves up there. His second shot was into the sensitive skin under my nose and it took everything I had not to clench up. I did flinch mightily and some of the fluid got into my eyes. The doc told me to squeeze my eyes shut to wash it out as he left the room.

Now I was drugged, in pain, unable to walk, and blind. Perhaps this quack had messed up his charts and was pulling a Kevorkian on me. My mom asked how I was.

“Not great” was all I could reply.

The doc came back a few minutes after and my eyes were clear. He gave me the last shots in each cheek and then explained the process for resetting my nose. He was going to use a shoehorn of sorts to pop the left side back into place and then would use the instrument on the other side as a mold so he could massage the shattered cartilage on my right side back into place. My nose would never again look normal and I’d probably have some trouble breathing out of it (not good news for a long-time sinus infection sufferer) but it would work. I started to ask about the massaging of the cartilage, but my top lip went kinda numb and I forgot about it.

The left side wasn’t too bad. It sure hurt, but the painkillers had worked really well on that side. I felt my face pop and blood rushing out of my left nostril, which subsided quickly. The right side was nowhere near the same. The second his shoehorn touched my nose I clenched. He slowly pushed it up toward my pain, every millimeter feeling like a burning hot ice pick being shoved into my face. I clenched my fists, arms, shoulders and eventually my legs. Shockingly, clenching my sprained ankle hurt LESS than him massaging my face and my hopes that it would give me something to focus on left me. I heard my mom gasp as she watched my body tighten up, knowing that it hurt like hell just to do that. I whimpered a bit until he was done, trying to hold back tears as I felt the crunching of my cartilage.

It sounded like crunching egg shells.

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Wrote a book for NaNoWriMo. Tried fiction, but a memoir of sorts came out. I have no idea what I’ll ever do with it, but hey, I wrote 50,000 words in one month, so I have that going for me. Here’s an excerpt from when I got pulled over about 15 minutes after I’d just received probation for an alleged DUI. Oh, this is a draft, so if you notice typos or grammatical errors…overlook them.

I drove past, he turned on his lights and I pulled over. What the hell? I wasn’t speeding, I had my seatbelt on and my car was in perfect working condition. My elation from my day in court quickly turned sour as the hillbilly-sounding officer copped an attitude.

“You know why I pulled you over, don’t you?”
“No. I wasn’t speeding, I have my seat belt on. Can I go home now?”
“Don’t get smart with me. You know why I was here, don’t you?”
“Were you waiting for me?”
“Yep. Court attendant called you in when she saw you get into your car.”
“And…? What did I do between here and there?”
“You know your license is suspended, right?”

Oh fuck. There it was. The license that was to be suspended after 60 days had now been suspended and my court date had done nothing to fix that. Turns out that if your judgment is recorded AFTER the 60 days, you have to reapply for your license with the state and the offices were in Olympia. I was now driving on a suspended license, which is apparently a pretty big deal. Well, shit. There goes my probation. There goes my chance at not screwing up. And why the fuck did this guy have to be such an ass?

I told him I didn’t know my license was suspended. He retorted with a huff, telling me that I had been explicitly told this back in the courtroom — if I had been, I don’t remember — and that if I wanted, he could take me down to the station. Yep, he went there. I said no and stepped out of the car. He handcuffed me, suit and all, and pushed me into the back seat of his cruiser. Normally this wouldn’t have been so terrible, but it was triple digits that day and my suit was beginning to get really, really hot. Not to mention I was again scared, completely clueless as to what my options were and watching my small chance for retribution slip through my fingers. Fuck.

I peered out the back window as I watched my car being towed away. There goes my lifeline. Well, no jobs for me. No freedom. And I was surely headed back to jail. While my circumstances were quite different than the holding cell I’d been in two months prior, the back of that cop car may as well have been a cave of abject failure at that very moment. It was then I realized why people commit suicide. While I was still healthy, on pace to graduate in a year and not yet in crushing debt, life looked pretty damn shitty from my vantage point. The cop allowed me to make a call to my ex girlfriend, and I asked that she come pick me up. The cop didn’t offer a ride to the station and as he pulled away, leaving me soaking in sweat in a dirty suit on the side of the road, I screamed.

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The challenge was to write 50k words in one month. It didn’t necessarily HAVE to be a novel and there’s no law that said it had to be completely fiction, either. 28 days later, I hit 50,020 words about my life. I call it “Mostly True Tales From My Somewhat Fictional Life” because that sounds awesome and MTTFMSFL looks ridiculous.

Here’s a recap of all the words I wrote and published since November 1-

-50020 for NaNoWriMo
-2348 words on tdhurst.com
-5069 words for Maciverse.com
-1782 words for MyFiveFingers.com
-1500ish words for PodcampAZ

Writing of any kind is often cathartic. Most of my novel was about stupid situations I’ve managed to get into, decisions I’ve made that have come back to bite me and a lot of shooting from the hip. I’m unsure whether I’ll publish it anywhere, but at least now I have one prerequisite for being an author — an unpublished, unedited manuscript.

Woohoo!

Much thanks to Teel McClanahan. I first discovered NaNoWriMo through him and reading his daily updates on his novel writing me inspired me to get off my ass and finally write a long-form piece on my own.

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