Column: When the opioid crisis hits too close to home

Midway into his deep and true eulogy for Anna Brooks, Pastor Michael Karns of Beacon Baptist Church said something that struck me like a thunderbolt. Anna’s life is not marked by her final days or what was in the newspaper, he said and I’m paraphrasing. She was so much more than that.

Midway into his deep and true eulogy for Anna Brooks, Pastor Michael Karns of Beacon Baptist Church said something that struck me like a thunderbolt.

Anna’s life is not marked by her final days or what was in the newspaper, he said and I’m paraphrasing. She was so much more than that.

Anna was a friend of mine.

And of course I’m the executive editor of the referenced newspaper.

Anna died Dec. 30 from an opioid overdose. I found out from friends on Facebook what had happened, and a couple of days later, we received a press release from police that a man had been arrested, alleging he failed to call for help as she died. Following journalism ethics, I bowed out of discussion about the story because a friend of mine was involved.

Casting aside my editor’s hat, let me tell you about my friend Anna Brooks.

Her friends called her Sweet Anna.

She had the most beautiful smile.

We met when she bartended at a local restaurant where I love to play trivia. Her smile and laugh were so wonderful that I felt the need to tell her stupid jokes because it was so wonderful to see her laugh.

I think her favorite was when I took a bar napkin and wrote on it, “Dear Bartender: My patient, Rich Jackson, requires a beer every 15 minutes or he will die. Signed Rich’s Doctor.”

She laughed and said loudly, “I love it,” and taped it to a wall near the cash register.

Anna told me about her pet bird Buddy, and she told me the pain when Buddy escaped. I thought for a time about driving around where she lived looking for the bird because I knew what it meant to her.

She would cheer me on when I did well in trivia, always not never interrupting the game. Occasionally, I would take the time between trivia games to go get her a coffee from a nearby Starbucks.

One night, she wrote on a bar napkin that the guy down the bar — who was sitting with a date — had stood her up the night before.

I took another bar napkin and wrote, “Anyone who would stand you up does not deserve you.” After she took a photo of that and posted it on social media, her friends took her side, and she appreciated that.

Anna loved her family, particularly their trips to the beach. She was close to her mom and dad, siblings and all her cousins.

When I found out she used, I wasn’t particularly shocked. The vast majority of users are wonderful people who struggle. Only in the movies is the user someone crawling on the floor of a rundown tenement. In reality, it's mostly young kids of middle-class parents.

I work too much, so we saw each other less. We kept in touch on social media, and I watched as she would just post a number, which represented the days she was clean.

But the last time I saw her was in a parking lot when she was clean and talking with friends, so happy and beautiful.

We hugged.

“I miss your crazy sense of humor,” she said.

“Let’s grab some coffee sometime and catch up,” I said.

We drifted away again.

And then she died.

Anna Brooks was more than her addiction. She was more than her final days. She was more than the article in the newspaper. She loved, was loved and beloved.

What Anna needed, what those like her need, is a society that takes the issue of overdoses more seriously and is willing to help them, not chastise them.

Consider that about 30,000 people are dying each year from opioid overdoses.

Then consider after terrorists killed 3,000 people on Sept. 11, in response the United States has spent trillions of dollars and killed 100,000 Afghanis and Iraqis.

Yet out own children are dying — by the tens of thousands — and there are not enough beds or rehab centers or support groups to help them.

In the meantime, we criminalize those who are addicted to drugs by arresting anyone possessing. Imagine if we criminalized the biggest legal addiction industry — alcohol. The United States would have to build thousands more prisons.

I’m sad my friend Anna and I drifted apart.

I’m heartbroken she died because she had more potential.

I’m devastated by the pain of her parents and family. Yet I am amazed at their strength and faith.

We must get serious about the greatest threat we face: the death of a generation of people as wonderful as Anna.

Rich Jackson is the executive editor of the Times-News. He can be reached at 336-506-3030 or at rich.jackson@thetimesnews.com. You also can continue the community conversation with him on Twitter @EditorRjackson and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/EditorRichJackson.