Devils & Blue Dresses: My Wild Ride as a Rock and Roll Legend

beginning, and my chances of finding the courage, strength, and faith to go on was being drawn from an empty moral reservoir.
    In some instances it takes more courage to end your life than to continue on in a situation where the end result is a foregone conclusion. It was the fact that I had sacrificed everything and everybody for self and ego that I now stood alone with nowhere to turn. People who could have cared were afraid, because I had put so much space between us, always making sure to never let anyone get too close.
    I had never been instilled with enough fear of God to keep me from making my choice, so I went to the kitchen, took out a quart of beer and swallowed it down. I then went to the bathroom and took out of the medicine cabinet two prescription bottles. One was a brand new prescription for thirty ten-milligram Halcion, and the other was filled with twenty-five twenty-milligram muscle relaxers. I threw them down and washed them through with some vodka. Then I went back to the bedroom, pulled out a quarter gram of THC, and snorted it down.
    Going back to the bed I stopped to get a pen and paper so I could tell Kim I was sorry and tell my children I loved them. Isn’t that about the sickest thing you’ve everheard? It is for me, and I was the one who did it. When I felt the lethal combination start to take hold I began my letter to Kim. I was sad, but relieved that there would now be some peace. At least for me. As I continued to write my letter, I felt myself slipping away. I couldn’t write anymore and I lay my head down on the pillow and said goodbye to the world.
    As if Woody Allen had written the script, Kim returned unexpectedly early and dragged my limp, unconscious body to the car and rushed me to Botsford Hospital. When I first awoke I saw the hoses used to pump my stomach and the I.V. dripping life-saving fluid into my veins. Then I turned my head sideways and saw two uniformed state police officers. They asked me over and over where I had gotten the heroin. I didn’t have any heroin and hadn’t had any for well over a year. Finally they left.
    Kim came into the room and stroked my hair as I lay there realizing I had failed. I began to cry and she said not to think about anything or to worry, that she would take care of everything. Uncle George and Aunt Erika had again offered their home as sanctuary and we drove back there in silence. Some days later we all drove back to the apartment and moved out all of our belongings.
    Prager tried to exploit the incident for laughs, but to his disappointment not everyone was willing to share anymore. The hospital was kind enough to list the occurrence as an accidental overdose and would eventually lose the records altogether.
    The hardest part of the aftermath was the lingering perception by many, as advanced by Prager, that I didn’t have the talent or the courage it took to become a huge star. According to him, the suicide attempt was unfortunate, but only served to underscore my weakness under his demanding management. The idea was that I couldn’t handle the pressure. Yes, I could, and had under Bob Crewe. I did, however, have difficulty handling the targeted and hateful pressure directed at me for the sole purpose of destroying me. The idea of not being able to handle the pressure was Prager’s representation to his cadre of hyenas as he pled his innocence of culpability in the matter. I reject that and call him what he is. A coward. I know, because I was cut from the same cloth. The premise that you must attempt to destroy someone to get them to produce your desired result is evil by concept and nature. So, dear Bud, alas. You were evil. I am not at all sorry to report that he died in 2008.
    This is about paybacks in a business that lacks morals and ethics, and I don’t mean politics. If he was anything at all, Prager was persistent and the punishment continued.
    The easiest part of the aftermath for me was my willingness to commit to the notion that I no longer wanted to chase success. That was probably because I was too stupid to realize I had already achieved it. Some months prior to the suicide attempt, Kim and I had taken a train trip to Denver, Colorado to see my older sister, Nina. This was at the height of Prager’s efforts to shine the spotlight on me. As we walked throughthe station and approached the platform, I was so paranoid that I actually carried with me an unsheathed and loaded rifle that I held close to my side. As we