Denis Johnson's "Emergency"- story about two drugged out losers...

Taking the Drug

            Denis Johnson’s “Emergency” seems to just be a story about two drugged out losers who embark on a hallucination trip.  It seems that their jobs are not satisfying whatsoever as the narrator (Fuckhead) “guesses” he’d been “working in the emergency room for about three weeks” and “with nothing to do...started wandering,” and “often stole pills from the cabinets”  (Johnson).   Georgie, Fuckhead’s friend had been already tripping on drugs, complaining and mopping a perfectly clean floor (which he thought was covered with blood) when he said “There’s so much goop inside of us, man, and it all wants to get out.”  Figuratively, the blood and this statement could represent many things, in which will be explored further on.  Throughout the story, drugs play a huge part in the visions, thoughts and emotions which Georgie and Fuckhead experience and it seems that the strand of drugs could possibly be implying something much deeper rather than simply revealing the mental effects of the substances. 

            While Georgie and the narrator are still at work, they began to take drugs around three thirty in the morning.  Georgie, paranoid that his shoes are soaked with blood said, “What am I going to do about these fucking shoes man?”  Shoes seem to symbolize his life.  His fucking shoes show his frustration about his fucking life.  What is he doing mopping the hospital floor?  Not to mention, the clean floor…  Where is his life going working as an orderly?  These seem to be hidden emotions he is covering with excessive drug use.  The narrator responds by disregarding his friends’ paranoia and grabs some of the pills out of Georgie’s pocket.  He doesn’t answer this question because he too does not have an answer.  There is no direction in the life they are leading so they take drugs.  Another take on this situation when factoring in the quote about the goop wanting to “come out” could possibly be that Georgie has seen the truth that death is inevitable and that life before he knows it will end therefore he dwells on the fact that he is still in his same position and is not meeting his expectations of life.  The imaginary blood on the floor that he cannot seem to fully mop symbolizes how Georgie has seen what others have not seen- that death is upon everyone and the blood in our bodies is bound to come out. His emotional desire to take drugs acts as an alternative to the life he is currently living.  Drugs may represent something deeper, and not just act as substances. 

            Both Georgie and the narrator were zoning on drugs when a man with a knife in his eye walked into the hospital.  The doctor commanded to Georgie, the orderly to assess the patient.  Georgie, high on drugs was unsure if this was his duty and the doctor sarcastically asked Georgie a series of questions: “Is this a hospital? Is this the emergency room?  Is that a patient?  Are you the orderly?  Georgie is obviously high on drugs giving reason for his confusion, but it seems that the drugs are a covering for something deeper. The drugs could represent Georgie’s actually feelings about his job and how he is confused about his life and questions if being an orderly is fulfilling.  Shockingly, Georgie returns from prepping the patient but rather successfully removes the knife from the man’s eye.  It may be because of the effects of the drugs that gave Georgie the courage to do this.  However, it does not seem like that is what Denis Johnson is trying to imply.  It seems that the drugs are being used here in this situation as a factor of motivation to step forward and accomplish something of significance.  Meanwhile, Fuckhead “stood around looking at the charts chewing up more of Georgie’s pills.”  This mindless act of taking drugs shows his lack of care and his desire for escape. 

            Now completely stoned off the drugs, the narrator and Georgie anxiously hangout with “twenty more minutes left to get through” and the narrator gives the reader a sense of what he is experiencing:

After a while you forget its summer.  You don’t remember what the morning is.  I’d worked two doubles with eight hours off in between, which I’d spent sleeping on a gurney in the nurse’s station.  Georgie’s pills were making me feel like a giant helium-filled balloon, but I was wide awake.

Summer symbolizes a time of freedom, a time to take time from work to travel and see the world.  But here is Fuckhead, seemingly stuck here at his job he oh so loves, awaiting his release while tripping on drugs, or this alternative which is bringing him closer to some form of excitement.  The sense of being “wide awake” reveals that the drugs do something great for him, they bring him to life. 

              Georgie says that he wants go to church and the narrator says he wants to go the county fair.  He reassures the narrator by saying “I’d like to worship. I would.”   What is significant here is that they want to do stuff.  Throughout the story, the reader never sees what life outside of work is like for the two, besides their drug related trips.  It seems that there are bound to the hospital, forgetting its summer, not remembering “what the morning is” as if life is passing by them.  Georgie is having a desire to make his life meaningful, by attending church, but this seems pretentious.  It seems forced.  Working at a Catholic hospital, abiding by the standard norms of society that Jesus will bring worth or happiness to life seems to be a reasonable explanation for Georgie’s random urge.  That’s another story, but what is important is that the drugs have urged them to get out and accomplish something.  “Let’s go to the county fair,” the narrator says.  The county fair might bring joy into his life.  There is some desire here or motivation that is driving the two friends to get out and see the world.  It may or may not be because of the drugs but either way it is the drugs that act as a fuel of desire for the two, encouraging them to embrace life. 

When Georgie and the narrator leave work, they depart in a car and begin driving for what seems to the narrator hours, but they come to a quick halt after running over a rabbit.  It was a pregnant rabbit with babies inside of it and Georgie cut the stomach open, “tossing its organs.”  They were “slimy miniature bunnies” that came out of its gut.  This brings up feelings of how Georgie said, “There’s so much goop inside us, man and it all wants to get out.”  The relationship between the two suggests that the “goop” or “organs” were previously still stuck inside but now that they have left the hospital (a place they are bound too), these inner feelings break free.  Also, baby rabbits popping out suggest feelings of rebirth.  Because Georgie and the narrator had taken drugs they were able to see the world through a new state of mind.  The dead rabbit also suggests the idea of death or passing.  This idea that things are passing, surrounding the two friends bring about a sense that life is slipping by Georgie and the narrator causing them to take drugs, or embark on a new path. 

During their hallucinations, Georgie and the narrator see insane things.  The visions they see seem especially miraculous possibly because there actual lives are so dull.  One hallucination that stands out is when the narrator comes across a graveyard and on the other side “the sky was torn away and the angels were descending out of a brilliant blue summer, their huge faces streaked with light and full of pity.”  Here, Denis Johnson creates the feeling of disappointment from the higher power as he describes the angels being “full of pity.”  It seems that here Fuckhead is experiencing judgment and it is making him feel guilty about drug use.   But is Fuckhead just feeling guilty about the drugs?  The idea of death is brought up again here with the graveyard setting as well as the “sky torn away” and the “angels descending.”  Getting the sense that things are dying or perhaps life is slipping away from the two characters and how the use of drugs comes into their lives allowing them to see these visually, exotic images could reveal that drugs are standing for something greater. 

When on drugs, it is interesting how the narrator mentions that “the summer’s over” quite a few times. It could be symbolically meaning that this is the end of an era in his life.  And once the drug trip is over the next day he quotes, “I felt the beauty of the morning.  I could understand how a drowning man might suddenly feel a deep thirst being quenched.”  Perhaps he is the drowning man and with the help of the drugs- or this spirit of embracing life by the hands, he has finally found what he has been looking for. 

On the outside, Denis Johnsons, “Emergency” might seem like a jumbled story revolving around hallucinations and drug use.  When digging a little deeper, one can discover that drugs symbolize something far more significant.  Given that Georgie’s and Fuckhead’s current lives were depressingly meaningless, and with the theme of death reoccurring all around the two, taking drugs is a symbol for bringing a spirit of experience, adventure and even perhaps optimism that will allow them to grasp life before it slips away.  And perhaps this act of taking drugs let them take that knife out of their eyes…
heres a short clip from the film that was made after denis Johnsons "emergency"
jack black does a fine job