The Basketball Diaries

I saw the film the Basket Ball Diaries at about the ages of 17 & I can honestly say I was put of drugs for life!

 It is very dark, deep & disturbing true story of how a young boy (Jim Carroll) dips into drugs at the tender age of 13 starting on the small stuff in school, but ending up totally & tragically dependent on them. He has a bright future ahead of him being especially good at basketball & literature, however his addiction to drugs destroys these dreams when he gets kicked out of school & ends up homeless, squatting with other drug addicts & prostitutes. He has no job, no money, no home, no possessions & no future. The only thing he does cling onto is his notebook. As his drug addiction spirals out of control he still manages to frequently record thoughts & feelings in this notebook, in which he unknowingly created The Basketball Diaries. It includes diary extracts from the age of 13 to 16, documenting Jim's addiction to heroin,  his high school basket ball passion & how he ended up prostituting himself in order to fund the 'drug money'. The book was published in 1978 & later made into a film in 1995 starring Leonardo Dicaprio. Towards the end of the film he returns to his mothers house to try & get some money from her but his mother, afraid & protective of her crack addict son, calls the police & slowly his heroin addiction eases off in prison. He later went on to preform readings from his literature, created a punk band in 1978 & later returned to writing in the 1980s. 

"I was just gonna sniff a bag but one guy says if you're gonna sniff you might as well pop it and another guys says if you gonna pop it you might as well mainline." - Jim Carroll, on heroin, The Basketball Diaries.

"First, it's a Saturday night thing when you feel cool like a gangster or a rockstar- just something to kill the boredom, you know? They call it a chippie, a small habit. It feels so good, you start doing it on Tuesdays... then Thursdays... then it's got you. Every wise ass punk on the block says it won't happen to them, but it does. " - Jim Carroll, The Basketball Diaries.

I find Jim Carroll to be a extraordinary human being, taking a very honest approach to showing people the reality of drug addictions. I find it very inspiring that he managed to kick the habit & concentrated on his raw natural talent of writing, creating a solid foundation for himself which promised a bright future. If you haven't seen The Basketball Diaries I highly recommend it to anyone who's interested of the affects of drugs & also the creative side of what they can give you.

The reason for my posting on The Basketball Diaries is because I feel it links into my research on people becoming free of drug addictions. I also learnt a lot from the film on drug addiction itself & how easy it is for people to fall into drugs & to get to a point where it seems almost unimaginable to become clean.