The Diary of Our Love

Chapter 105

January the 17th.

James went for a meeting with the band, and I was at home working on a project for my biology class. I was at my third year of college and the month after I was gonna have my exams to finish the first semester, so a pretty tough time was on my way. The happenings in the latest months have been tough. My marriage was still strong but I was just too anxious for James to go to rehab. I knew it was going be a tough time for him but was back to his bad habits. He was back to drinking, even though he tried not to do it every day. He was back to the pills, and that is many pills a day and hopefully he was not back to women. It didn't seem like it to me, to be honest. He had a second meeting at the facility meanwhile. When I heard them calling I thought it was time for him to go. I was so happy and then I even got a bit disappointed when I found out it was just for another meeting. James came back home devastated though and closed himself in the bedroom not coming out not even to have dinner with me.

I don't know what happened in that meeting because he never told me. I insisted with him to talk, but he always refused to tell me, and even if I was dying to know, I decided to respect his choice. I never thought it would take so long for him to be called for good. I wondered quite often if there were so many people waiting to go to rehab. This was how silly my thoughts had been concerning that matter. I knew I was being selfish, but to me, my marriage came first than anything, and it was tough to live with him like that. But I was hanging in there as I promised I would, and I couldn't deny James had been trying, but I guess his life style was just too destructive in some way. I then realized that there was much more to change than just the drinking. There was a whole life style he needed to change in order to get better.

I leaned during this period that his main problem was Metallica. We were fine. Despite all his falls, I was there for him. I knew by then all about his problems and I knew he was trying to get better, so I had to support him the best I could. Nevertheless, Metallica was ruining everything, and he sure didn't know how to deal with his problems but drinking them. So where to begin?

Napster ended up being a bit dramatic for them. Lars showed up in court with a list of thousands of people who have downloaded their music for free. Eventually, Metallica won the battle, but it caused a back lash of fans with CD's being burned in the middle of the street to show their indignance. Lars ended up being the only one giving his face for this, which I thought it was terribly wrong, and James ended up blaming Lars for their shitty situation with the fans. In fact, I think Lars would have needed more support from his band mates, but as usual he took all the bullets by himself. Then, there was the playboy interview. James made his in our house. As he never talked about it, I bought the magazine one morning on my way to college and read it right before I went to class. I couldn't believe what I was reading. It was the mirror of how disconnected the band was, of how distant they were from each other, and the hate between James and Jason being as clear as water. In my opinion, with James being a bit disrespectful towards Jason. "My back hurt too much, so it won't be me.", when he was asked about if he was going to let Jason do his side record, he said someone had to bend their back, or "I'm not his travel agent." Were some of his quotes directed to Jason. I was a bit disappoint in James.

The hatred between them grew every day, it became more alive than ever. There wasn't a time where James and Jason wouldn't end up fighting. Adding to all that, Metallica's management, aware of the difficulty the band was going through, suggested that they'd hired a mentor to help them go through their crisis, and this was just the end of the line of Jason's patience. He couldn't accept the fact that they were going through therapy. Phil Towle was known as being very good in making groups work. I didn't know at the time if he was going to be able to do anything for the band. Truth is, when they started the meetings, Jason didn't show up to any. James was also against it. Deep inside I knew he was afraid that he had to talk in front of the others, and he hated to show his feelings, or to show a softer side.