Person:Patrick Lindsey (1)

I was present at the death of PSL, and have a copy of his obituary from the ARKANSAS GAZETTE.

At some point before his death, PSL wrote the following autobiographical statement, possibley for Alcoholics Anonymous:

I was born in L.R. Ar. on June 26, 1951. My earliest memories are mostly happy ones but there are some disturbing ones. My family consisted of my Mom & Dad & two brothers, one a yr. older & one 2 yrs. younger. Although I wasn?t filled with fears as a child I can remember some strongly. My dad worked for an insurance co. as a claims adj. so we moved a lot when I was a child & he was away a lot. I didn?t realize it till I was older but his drinking & running around caused him to be away a lot too. I was the happiest when our family was together & there was harmony in the family & I spent a lot of time trying to keep peace in the family & trying to control things I couldn?t, I still do this, I like to make people happy, I guess it?s a form of people pleasing. I was scared & uneasy when my dad was gone, I remember he came back one time & he had had a car wreck & was all bandaged up & I was really scared & I cried a lot because I thought he was going to die I must have been 5 or 6 at the time.

My idea of what family life should be like came from T.V. I thought everyone should act like the families on Leave it to Beaver or Father Knows Best or something. Later on I would compare my family life with my friends families & I wouldn?t like to be around fussing & fighting. I guess I had a hard time accepting reality & I still do. I always wanted relationships between people to go smooth. Most of my childhood was fairly normal I guess, as far as my wants & needs I got all I needed & most of what I needed as far as material things. I always felt closer to my dad growing & I guess my brothers were closer to my mother. My dad & I shared a lot of interests like sports & fishing & things & I would hang around him and his friends & my uncles every chance I got. I wanted to be grown up & do grown up things real bad. My conception of being a man was a real macho one. You had smoke, drink a lot & cuss & like football.

I can?t remember being a bad child. I wasn?t bad to steal or lie just mischievious & easily misled by peer group pressure. I did well in school, it came pretty easy for me & I didn?t have to study much to make passing grades. My brothers on the other hand studied all the time & were honor students. A lot of my teachers would compare me with my older brother who they also taught. Later on in high school they called me an underachiever because I would just do enough to get by. I really didn?t resent my brothers achievements because I had other interests that I did better than them in like sports. Now that were grown I sometimes feel inferior because of these successes but I don?t let it bother me much. I always went out for all sports but never was willing to pay the price to be a great athlete even though I fantisized about it. I pretty much gave up organized sports in the 11th grade when the coaches started to put what I thought was too much emphasis on winning & I again was unwilling to pay the price & was already drinking & smoking quite a lot. I was about 13 when I first got drunk, I know I was in Jr. Hi School. I had been around alcohol as far back as I can remember since my parents both drank, as did my aunts & uncles, & my parents friends. I figured it was pretty socially acceptable, seemed like everyone did it. Although drunkenness was looked down on I had seen plenty of people drunk. I had tasted alcohol many times but the night I first got drunk my parents had gone to a football game in Texas & my granddad was staying with my brother & me. I found a bottle of vodka under the kitchen sink & drank what was left in it (about a little over a ½ pint) real fast & chased it with water. It burnt like hell going down, but the warm glow spread over my body immediately.

I felt great, I had always lived in fantisies & being drunk seemed to make me feel real comfortable & okay about myself. I was alone but I felt I had discovered something that was great for me. All thru my drinking career I drank alone & some of my most enjoyable drinking moments came when I was alone. Something about the secretiveness of it all & getting away with something no one knew. The next morning I had my first hangover & swore & promised if I could get over it I wouldn?t do it again but I think I knew I was lying because I had enjoyed the way I felt so much. I started drink every chance I got. My dad we keep a ?tapper? keg in the icebox & every opportunity I got I would fill up a qt. jar with beer & drink it. Drinking seemed to make me whole, I was comfortable alone or with people & since I lived in fantisies a lot it made them better. As far as stealing during teenage years I stole booze & cigerattes from my parents & once stole a bottle of booze from some neighbors. My conscience didn?t bother me that much but I remember having nightmares when I stole the booze from my neighbors I guess from fear of being caught. I went ahead & slid thru high school, doing just enough to get by & graduated in 1969. (My drinking increased in high school, almost every weekend & during the week I would borrow my parents car on the pretense of studying at a friends house & drive around & drink, so my pattern of drinking alone was becoming well established).

I started college at Hendrix in Conway where my Dad went & intended to be a lawyer like him, I guess I wanted to please him & make him proud of me. Before I went to college that fall I worked for the Erie Lackawana R.R. in Hammond, Ind. that summer. A guy I grew up with got me the job. He was into some hard core theft & even I didn?t actually steal the stuff I was a lookout for them. We worked 3 to 11 in the yeard & my share of the loot was a 13? color T.V. & some cash from some stolen tires. Again my conscience didn?t really bother me but I feared getting caught. I also started using drugs that summer of ?69. That fall I started college at Hendrix in Conway. I did okay at first.