by Steve Chapman

Created on: November 22, 2010   Last Updated: November 23, 2010

Remembering JoJo

I had just turned 18 the first time I moved to the beach, and 10 years later, having left there for 7 years, I returned for what one was more run at that boardwalk. It was different this time though. The ocean sounded different, the air smelled more like the salt water I watched crashing onto the shore each morning as my 2 SEAL buds and I started most days bright and early, and after my own workout, I'd watch my one friend "Curl", as he would run 200 yards, in deep, soft sand, detour over to the grass and do 100 crunches, get up and do it again. The guy was a machine.

I had started working my way out of an addiction, and had made some wonderful friends in that process, my favorite being my friend JoJo. We had been inseparable for about a year, and life really seemed more meaningful each day.

Then came Monday night, a night all of us in our group, planned to meet  outside the Methodist Church, right on the beach. But on this night,eight,nine, then ten o'clock came and went as those of us who had shown up wondered what had happened to JoJo, our friend who had not been seen. Finally we called it a night, somewhat perplexed and concerned, hoping the morning would bring an answer to the whereabouts of our friend. It did not, but the afternoon did. Our friend JoJo had been seen drinking with strangers, and had then disappeared. We checked his place of business, a highly successful publishing company, where his secretary, knowing his "pattern, seemed unconcerned, until several more days passed, and still no JoJo.

Understanding the science of locating people, we set out, each day, my friends and I, looking for our friend, After three weeks, we had to admi,t we had met our match. Addicts that don't want to be found, usually aren't.

And then came the "tip", a heads up he had been seen entering a beachfront hotel, and off we went, mission on. The manager seemed uninterested in our concerns, and refused us a key to his room, but found that $10 was enough to get the housekeeper to let us in, which she did, Entering his room, reality and the hard edge of an ugly drug and alcohol addiction was simply impossible to ignore, and smell, like death hovering over a new and helpless victim

Walking to the first bed, looking down at JoJo, I saw what is often called, lights on, no one home. After checking his breathing and pulse, I made my way to the bathroom where the shower was running. While several of our friends checked JoJo, I encountered a large, nonpaying

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