I'm Not an Addict

I was fifteen when I first found out music was free thanks to the magic of the internet. When my brothers and I finally convinced our father to add the internet service to our household, the first thing I gravitated to was the websites dedicated to music. Yahoo! Music, MTV, you name it; I was in the loop. These websites were just the tip of the iceberg, it sounds cliché but it’s true. Not only were there music websites, but also for free music, movies, TV, and music videos. I was a kid. I was in a candy store. I mooched to my hearts content.

Now, I’m not saying I’ve never bought my music before (Although, I am starting to miss the smell of a new CD case cracked open.) and I’m not condoning such illegal behavior, but, if it’s free, you have to take advantage. Yes, it is illegal, but, sir or madam, there are more important things in life. “Like what,” you say? Well, there’s healthcare, real drug abuse, civil rights, world hunger, I mean, the list of sufferings that humans are plagued with goes etcetera repeated three times. I think music is a universal language that can, at times, solve much of the many problems of the world. Usually, internal problems in a person’s self. But, that’s a good start, no? If you think about it, free music is just like finding money in your pocket that you forgot about. And that’s a good feeling.

By the time I was sixteen, I had heard, read, and even saw with my own eyes the wondrous, even unreal, beauty of Peer-to-Peer (P2P) sharing software. No longer did I need to scavenge the internet search engines for what little morsels I could get my clicking fingertips on. My search time was cut by half, and I consumed. But there was no end to my hunger. A hunger, to which this day, mind you, has never been quite satisfied.

The first of these lovely P2P programs was Ares Lite. Its symbol was a haloed capitalized “A.” It was Mount Olympus. There was a party. I was invited, and the gods fed me from their ambrosia. I downloaded to the point of crashing my hard rive. Long story short, after many system restore points and formatting, I realized that Ares Lite had betrayed me and I infected my computer with an STD, system transmitted disease. And I was also infected, I needed to keep downloading in order to fill my insatiable desire for music…and CD-Rs (recording CDs). Back then, I used Cds and had no idea what an mp3 player was. Needless to say, I had many sleepless nights of downloading and grew fearful for my worsening condition. I blamed the gods, when I should’ve blamed myself.

The next, and the last, was Lime Wire. It was the methamphetamine of all P2P software. It was a bloody needle that would keep infecting my computer on a constant basis. It was my abusive girlfriend that I would keep running to, the hand that feeds and bites, the happy green lime that would shine in the darkness of my room. It was GOD!

After I turned 18, I realized the problems of the software and the consequences that came with it. Through many system restores, I lost family photos, important documents, and personal writings, things that CD-Rs would have been more useful for, other than my greedy music collection. Like most addicts, though I know it is a stretch, I lost a lot of things. This was supposed to be a family computer, but I took over it. I was a tyrant and needed a fix every day. So, after realizing the losses my family was also suffering, I decided, and was convinced by my brothers, that it was time to stop. So much money was wasted on new hardrives when a system restore or recovery did not erase the scars of a virus.

“No more,” I said. I was tired and guilty for having my parents pay for computer problems that I brought upon it. I no longer wanted to be a slave to the P2P community. I no longer wanted my parents to waste their money. Sure, I went through a form of withdrawal and three relapses, but no longer do I suckle from the sour teat of Lime Wire.

So, what’s the point, you may be asking yourself? To be honest, I don’t know and I don’t care, but I’m back to using search engines, blogs, and forums to mooch and fill the endless depths of my Zune. Yes, Zune. (And if you don’t know what that hell I’m talking about in the sentence prior, you really need to get on the band wagon.) And my addiction is no longer in control, facebook is, and Twitter too. But, I’m no longer blinded by the computer screen’s holy light, au contraire, I’m blinded by the fact that I still haven’t admitted my addiction. Until, now.
Music is my drug. Each click and download of a .rar, .zip, and .torrent is an injection of joy. If the music is free, then I too become free. And, if I am free, I am…well, I don’t know what I am. All I know is that music everywhere, it is life, and I’m just living in it.

Hello, my name is P.M.; I’m twenty-one, and I’m an addict.