Episode 15: Juls Budau in Prince George, B.C. Remembers Her Friend Blair Lauren

Jenna Keeble 00:00

Unsilencing Stories is a podcast that reflects the voices of people in small towns and communities in Canada, who have lost loved ones to the toxic drug supply crisis. Since 2016. More than 30,000 people have died from fatal overdoses in Canada and that number continues to climb. The risk in smaller towns and communities is much higher than urban areas because of a lack of harm reduction services, and stigma against substance use and people who use drugs. This podcast is part of a community based participatory research project facilitated by Aaron Goodman, Ph.D., a faculty member at Kwantlen Polytechnic University in Surrey, B.C., along with students Jenna Keeble and Ashley Pocrnich. 

The aim was to assist collaborators in publicly memorializing their loved ones and expressing grief as well as challenging silences imposed by dominant media organizations and stigma from society against substance use and people who use drugs. We hope these nuanced stories make it clear why the government needs to be doing more to prevent further deaths. Please note this podcast contains information about overdose death, grief and trauma that may be distressing to listen to. In this episode, you'll hear Rachael McKerracher interview Juls Budau, a harm reduction worker in Prince George, British Columbia, but now speaks about friend Blair Lauren, who died of an overdose in November 2021, in Montreal, Quebec at age 34.

Rachael 01:19

Do you want to introduce yourself?

Juls 01:20

Yeah, my name is Juls Budau. In the punk scene, I'm known as Juls Generic. I live in Prince George, B.C., I've lived here for two and a half years, and I moved here from Vancouver.

Rachael 01:33

Do you have someone in mind that you'd like to talk about for this project?

Juls 01:37

Yeah, I want to talk about Blair.

Rachael 01:39

Tell us about Blair. 

Juls 01:40

Blair was my friend for a really long time, and they were a few years younger than me. They could play any instrument and just everything was self-taught with them. You know, they played every instrument, they recorded music. I just feel like they always had some insane project with some insane skill that they had learned. I always felt like they'd be like, "Oh, I'm like, depressed, not doing much". But then it'd be like, "Oh, I'm in like five bands, and I'm recording this other band and we're organizing like a slow dance fundraiser, dance party. And then also, I'm a bike messenger". You know what I mean? Like, there's always like so many things going on with them.

Rachael 02:21

Yes, I do know what you mean. Where did you meet Blair?

Juls 02:25

I met Blair at the Sikh temple in Vancouver, which is where the punks go to eat for free in Vancouver from Monday to Thursday, 7pm. You can go eat for free there. There's this big Sikh temple, right by like the First Avenue like at the highway exit. So, I think it was 2008 and I went to the Sikh temple and this person Toady was there and I was sitting at the same table as him. He was on tour with his band, which included Blair and I was like, “Oh, where are you guys staying?” and they were like, “I don't know”. So, I was like, “Yeah, you guys can just come stay at my house. Like that's okay”. At the time, I was living at this punk house called The Library, which was right off, right by Trout Lake in Vancouver. It was like, compared to other punk houses of kind of fancy. We had like, clean carpet all over like three stories, like lots of really comfortable places for people to sleep and you could have a lot of house guests. But you could still go somewhere in the house and be alone and not be overstimulated.

Rachael 03:38

So, it was the perfect place for them to crash then.

Juls 03:40

Probably yeah, it was the place where I could always feel like I could invite people to stay for as long as they wanted, and they did stay for a long time.

Rachael 03:48

Were you in contact with Blair? From that time until now?

Juls 03:53

Yeah, like, pretty much like off and on, like, it wasn't like we were like talking like every day or like even every month, but you know, we would talk over Instagram, Messenger. Soon after. So, Blair stayed at my house for a few weeks and then came back. We had such a good time. And like, all we would do was smoke so much pot and listen to very loud, like noise records. Then walk around in the forest and go to punk shows. Then they came back later that summer and stayed at my house again. 

Later that year, I went to Europe for a few months because I thought I was going to live in Barcelona, which was stupid. Then I moved to Newfoundland and then after that, whenever I left Newfoundland, and went to Montreal, I would always see Blair like they would always be like, organizing the show I was playing, or I would stay at their house. Then when I moved to Vancouver, I probably saw them once a year with their parents, or at least maybe their mom and stuff. I don't know, their parental figures, some of them lived had moved to Vancouver. I don't know if you knew that yeah, I got a weird little fact about that they bought David Duchovny's old condo.

Rachael 05:18

That was an amazing fact, thank you for that.

Juls 05:21

And it was like when I was in the 90s like very briefly, I lived in this foster home that was very into The X Files or whatever. I just always think of that as like the quintessential 90s existence and I feel like this condo just had so many elements from that. There were just lots of weird stairs going to nowhere and lots of balconies and vines and stuff. 

Rachael 05:48

That sounds pretty on-par for the course of David Duchovny's films.

Juls 05:52

Yeah, exactly. Condo, condo, condo. Yeah, pretty high up. I forget exactly where somewhere off Denman Street in the West end of Vancouver. So yeah, I did see them, like once a year or so. And then of course not after I moved to Prince George.

Rachael 06:12

When did you hear about Blair's passing?

Juls 06:15

Oh, like, I remember that day so well, because it was in the fall, I was definitely not doing very well. I had really low iron too and most of my days were not good. I remember that day was really good, at first. I was a workforce working a work contract with the B.C. First Nations Justice Council and it was doing frontline work like collecting affidavits from people who've been living in the encampments here and then I l took my dog for a walk then we went grocery shopping. Then my friend Megan Spears texted me and she was like, “Hey, can I call you I have some really bad news to tell you”. And I was like, I knew that someone had died, I had no idea who. Then I was like, “I'm just in the grocery store. I'm just going to finish my grocery shop. And I'll message you after”. And then so yeah, she called me, and she told me it was Blair was like, so devastating.

Rachael 07:17

Were you aware that Blair was a drug user?

Juls 07:22

Yeah, but I am also a drug user. We had very similar like, one of our very last conversations, they were like, they were just joking around. And they were like, I don't remember what it was. But there was just like a joke about me. Because there's like the story about the first time, I ever smoked crack was this girl who went to Harvard, and we smoked crack together in the attic. Blair was making a joke about that and then I was like, “Yeah, you know, I don't, I haven't even done drugs in forever because of the drug supply” and they were like, “Yeah, it's been like a year for me”. So, it's like, we were both like casual. But I think that other people didn't know. 

So right after I had heard about Blair, I was thinking about other people who might not have known. I think what happened was that she had done stimulants or that, sorry, I still think Blair as she, that they had been on stimulants. And then their supply was contaminated like an accidental overdose when they were doing stimulants. And then so of course, it's like, this is my whole life. Well, it's almost so cruel, right? Like, yes, that’s why. Now that it's about me, but I'm just like, I can't believe that this is happening. I just feel like, I'm like, my life and the past three years has been like, like, fraught with, like people who do stimulants and then die. Like my wife, my stepfather was high on meth that when he killed himself, and before that he had been high on meth when he jumped out his window, it like broke his back and I like nursed him back to health and then he just later ended up dying. 

I'm like literally writing a thing thesis about safe supply for stimulant users, like help gets people use stimulants, and like, I just, and like, I didn't even know that, like, you know, it's like when I write that when I'm like writing this thesis and doing all this research. I'm not like, I need to know this information so I can save Blair's life, that just didn't even occur to me. And then I'm like, I just like, couldn't even believe that that had happened. And then, you know, I think everything is political. So of course, I'm like, I can't believe the drug supply and the government. And then Blair's ex-girlfriend is messaging me like, what are you talking about? Like, what do you know, like Rosie, and they've been together for so long. And I was like, “Oh, you didn't know that Blair used drugs?” and she was like, “I didn't know.” And so, then I was like, am I like politicizing things that shouldn't be politicized? Am I like sharing that information in my head? I was and it's just so weird and then I'm like, I feel like those things were discussed like in person and Montreal, and they've like come to a resolution or like, and I'm just like so far out of that conversation.

Rachael 10:14

You're saying that you, of course, you know see safe supply and overdose, and accidental overdose as things that are political. Do you feel that? Because of that, is Blair's death political to you? Is that something that should be shared?

Juls 10:32

Yeah. You know, I think there's like two sides to it. Like, it's like, I'm not sure if you're aware of this group, it's Moms Stop the Harm and they're like a political advocacy group. They push for policy change, and very specific things. And it's based on the premise of their children dying of overdose, and they share their stories and I think that they do amazing work, like, full stop, I'm not going to contradict that. But then at the same time, it's like, I hate that we need to, like argue for the humanity of drug users by being like, here's the children of white middle class people. But at the same time, I'm just, you know what I mean, I want to be like, we need to change things because this is a person that I fucking love, but was like, really important to me.

Rachael 11:20

Do you think that sometimes being public with this information, and thereby making it politicized, do you think sometimes that ends up being at odds with that feeling we were talking about before of how people feel guilty or embarrassed? How do you think that that guilt and embarrassment like, maybe, how does that affect the political?

Juls 11:41

I think guilt and embarrassment stops people from being upfront about that. And it's like, I don't, those are real emotions, and people like Blair's family and people, like close to Blair, anybody else close to Blair, I mean, those feelings are real, and I don't, I don't blame anyone for having those feelings and acting on them. Like, there's, like, you know, I act in ways, like motivated by like, guilt and shame that, like, deep down isn't just, you know, what I mean, I'm just like, I don't like, I'm not like, oh, get like, move. It's political. So, like, move through it, like, I get it.

Rachael 12:19

Maybe both can exist, you know, both can exist together in tandem, but one shouldn't override the other maybe.

Juls 12:27

I guess I and that's like a thing too. It's like, I feel like I'm not part of any discussion about how Blair should be memorialized. I'm just over here trying to deal with the death of my very good friend, who was in my corner in a way, that like a lot of people like weren't, and connecting it to this very real government neglect. And then, never being sure if I'm upsetting people and a touching way, or in a bad way or.

Rachael 13:05

And how do you think of living in Prince George, you know, living in a smaller city? How do you think the sentiment is different? As opposed to like you said, living in Vancouver? How do people approach the issue of drug use, and overdoses differently? 

Juls 13:24

In Prince George and Montreal? 

Rachael 13:26

Yeah. Or Vancouver or any bigger center?

Juls 13:29

I think it’s kind of hard for me to answer that question. One thing that makes it really difficult for me dealing with overdose in Prince George right now is when people who die that you care about or even, they're like, your friend, but you're not really connected to their communities so much and you're like, or because I feel like, like I was working in downtown Prince George for six months, I was working. I was managing the overdose prevention site. And it was pure staff so, people who were drug users were like, my friends and my coworkers and their friends would come in. And you know when people die, I just like don't, I don't hear about it. 

Rachael 14:15

Sorry, what would Blair think of your work? Or what did Blair think of your work?

Juls 14:19

I felt like Blair was always impressed by me. Blair was so impressive, so it was always an honor. And I think that they did make a comment about opening and managing an overdose prevention site in Prince George was like, the punkish thing ever. I wish I could talk more about my thesis with them. Because, yeah, I don't know, I would have wanted to know their perspective because they didn't even really like think about them in the context of my thesis, you know.

Rachael 14:53

And you do now?

Juls 14:54

Yeah, I do now. I do think of like, so we are pushing for these interventions, safe supply, etc., like or like safer pharmaceutical alternatives. And it’s very hard to access those things. Unless you are having like completely like, let your life fall apart, you know what I mean? It's hard. And even with my ex-partner who was an extremely heavy cocaine user, it was very hard for him to access safe supply. He was like, still housed, sort of still employed. I'm like, interviewing all these people. I've interviewed two people this week and I'm like, “What does meth do for you?” and they like, “When it hits me, I feel calmer”. And it's like, all the pieces of the puzzle fit together. Which is exactly how I felt the very first time I did Ritalin, and I'm a person with ADHD, like, I was like, sat down and read a book. It was like, in my head, I could see like, a scaffolding of like, all the topics and subtopics and I was like, this is as smart as I deserve to be.

I think that there is like, a hugely, like, functional part of using stimulant that's left out of the conversation. We just think of meth addicts who just like to party and make bad choices and have bad teeth. And there’s like no 'either', you know, like, either it has a functional thing, or it's good for their brain in a way that other people don't understand, or they're just trying to stay awake because they don't have a place to sleep. But I think that the functional part of stimulant use is left out of the conversation quite a lot. Or we don't want to talk about that as if it glamorizes it or something. I wish I just had a little more of that conversation with them. I wish I understood their brain a little bit better in that way because I you know; we joked a little bit about it. But you know we never used stimulants together like talked about in real life like I don't know we always like just smoked so much pot together.

Rachael 17:10

It's clear to me though from what you're saying is that they trusted, Blair trusted you to be open about using. That's pretty special.

Juls 17:21

Yeah, you know what's so sad is like, the night they died. I got this, it's not the shirt I'm wearing it was a different long sleeve black shirt from this hotline called Never Use Alone in America. And I put like a, an Instagram post, where it’s like, “Who would have thought that in 2021 I like no longer buy band T shirts, just harm reduction merchandise”. And when I think of that, and like, thinking about like band shirts, I always think of Blair. Blair had this huge collection of my shirts for my bands that was just sent to me, which was like, weird. I said I wanted it sent. And when I got them, I was like, why did I say they wanted this? It's so weird. Like, I wish that they trusted me like that night. Even though like, I mean, I've known over 50 people who have died of overdose. I don't really let myself entertain those thoughts too much, because I know where it can go. And it just it just doesn't help like to be like, oh, I wish they had messaged me. Like moving forward. Maybe I should tell more people they can message me but.

Rachael 18:34

What do you think the advice would be from Blair? About being able to heal from this stuff or being able to cope? And what do you think the advice would be for you? From them?

Juls 18:48

I don't know. I don't remember Blair really ever giving me that kind of advice. That was more like practical advice, which just like helped me or like was just like, very encouraging, but I don't really recall like, I don't know. Blair would give you advice.

Rachael 19:01

Yeah. Yeah. I think that their advice was very brief. But their constant, like, just wanting to comfort was like, so pure and all the time. You know, it was like unwavering care and love, you know. 

Juls 19:20

Right after Blair died, Lights posted a song from their Instagram, from like, 2016 and they're playing a Fugazi song I'm so Tired and they like learned it on piano. And what's really sweet is that Rosie found the notebook where Blair had written down like the notes when they were learning it and mailed it to me, which was really touching. But I cried for days and then learned that song, including the solo, which is like a little bit of my I'm like not a very technical guitar player. So, I feel like that was like a good way.

Rachael 19:57

That's kind of like advice though. 

Juls 20:01

Sort of like connected with Blair like post shamelessly over this song. I had never really, I've listened to Fugazi but I never really listened to that song before. I like, pushed myself in terms of like learning, like learning how to play that guitar and like, or play that song on guitar and like recorded. I watched their last music video over and over and over again while crying, I don't know. I felt like I dealt with it in a pretty Blair way. Like just really just went deep into listening to their music. They were able to once refer to me as their punk rock older sister, so maybe that's why they never really gave me advice. Maybe it was the other way. 

Rachael 20:45

No, I can see that. 

Juls 20:48

I fed Blair a lot over the years. 

Rachael 20:51

Took care of them?

Juls 20:52

Yeah. But they always they always gave back like, like, they stayed at my house for so long. And I cook so much food for them and their band, but then they would just like, clean the fuck out of my kitchen. Like every dish done. 

Rachael 21:06

I love that. 

Juls 21:07

Like such a good houseguest.

Rachael 21:08

What a legacy. Is there any other questions you want me to ask you here? Or is there anything you want to talk about?

Juls 21:19

I guess one thing that impacted me with them gone is that I felt like they were archiving my life for me. 

Rachael 21:29

That's so beautiful. 

Juls 21:30

But now they're not here. They just had so many records and tapes I had released, and they had over 10 band t-shirts of mine for my bands. And then yeah, they like Rosie, their ex-partner asked me if I wanted them back or if I wanted the shirts and I said yes because I just I didn't really know the alternative. I didn't know what else to say. Like if I said no, they'd be thrown in the trash like probably not, but I just like what am I going to say? No, no, give them to my other fans. I was just like, sure. Then when they sent the box to me, it was so heartbreaking to just open the box. It was almost like such a return to sender. Like, here's everything you've created and the person who like, loved it so much is now dead. 

Rachael 22:19

That’s your legacy, isn't it? 

Juls 22:21

It's my legacy.

Rachael 22:22

So far, in a box from Blair. Quite poetic. 

Juls 22:28

I also gave them a Margaret Thrasher tattoo.

Rachael 22:31

Do you remember when that was?

Juls 22:33

That would have been in 2008 at one of the times that they came and visited me. It says MX TX like MX PX, but T for more Thrasher. We just thought that was so funny. It's like very faded on the back of their arm.

Rachael 22:49

So, you've been, you know, more or less in contact with Blair for a long time. What is your absolute favorite memory?

Juls 22:58

I don't know if it's my favorite memory. And I don't know why this one stands out so much. But I remember once I was in Montreal for a while. I spent a lot of time in Montreal over the years. And I was supposed to go on a date with someone, but I just wasn't up for it. I just cancelled it and then Blair and I went for a bike ride by the canal in Virginia or wherever and then just laid in the grass. And I was like, “How come we just can't be in love”. And they just shrugged. At the time, I didn't know that they were trans. I think that that like, that was why I'm just too straight. But they just shrugged. And then we're just like, Yeah, whatever. Like, like, in a way we are. We're always like, we had like a very like romantic friendship. Like, there's too much pressure Rachel.

Rachael 23:47

You don't have to share.

Juls 23:48

I guess the takeaway is that it's we all need to be. The responsibility for staying alive is not solely on us. It's a huge government mis-failure. But we all need to be a little bit more careful. Be aware of like what we did, like just leave behind by just being like a little bit irresponsible. Like, we all have connections to phone numbers and apps. Like there's so many ways to keep ourselves alive in case you just like don't know, like, a sliver of like Carfentanil contamination in your coke could be the thing that does it for you. It's like, the concentrations are so high, and I need to remember that too about being careful. And it's like, and just like pushing, I don't know, we've like, like drug use is just still like so shameful and like we need to like, start like really pushing through that.

Rachael 24:49

That's your moment. That's the line.

Jenna Keeble 24:55

That brings us to the end of this episode of the Unsilencing Stories podcast. To listen to more interviews in the series, please go to www.unsilencingstories.com, and if you'd like to share your thoughts on the episode, message us at unsilencingstories@gmail.com. Thank you so much for listening and please share the project with other people you know.