Street Roots • July 3-9, 2015
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took himself to detox, but kept falling back
into the same destructive cycle.
“I just became a full-on alcoholic,” he says.
y the summer of 2013, alcohol had taken
its toll. Frequently feeling ill and having
suffered some ailments,” Sandoval went to
see a doctor. That’s when the blow was
delivered: “You have three months to live.”
I always knew it was going to lead down
that path if I continued,” he says, “but for it
to be smack straight in your face so quickly. I
didn’t know what to think about it.”
Sandoval’s doctortold him all the tissue in
his liver had been destroyed. Without healthy
tissue, it would not be able to regenerate.
This was it.
“I rem ember going to the parking lot and
just sitting there and thinking, ‘What the
fuck Jesse? What did you just do?’ It’s all me,
you can’t blame anyone - it was just all me
and my decisions.”
_ ' .
. . :
P H O T O B Y JO E G L O D E
To the right o f Jesse Sandoval is a carved image o f Tsil, the Hopi character that has become an
His son’s maternal grandmother took him
archetype fo r his new endeavor, Los Roast. Tsil’s nam e translates to “chile pepper.”
to get a second opinion. She drove because,
despite the bleak prognosis he received a
couple weeks prior, he had not stopped
drinking.
liver, then his pancreas wasn’t working
After rehab, Sandoval stayed with his
“I don’t know what I was thinking,” he
properly - on top of it all he was going
sister a few months before deciding he was
says. “If I’m going out, I’m going all blazes of
through severe alcohol withdrawal.
ready to return to Portland.
glory - or I kept numbing myself to the
Astonishing hospital staff, he managed to
“I came back, and I got myself acclimated,
reality.”
pull through, but doctors were concerned
and then went back to work with Los Roast.
Again, blood was drawn. They left the
about the damage inflicted on his central
It was really good to see Marshall, and give
doctor’s office and headed back to Sandoval’s nervous system. He spent his last week at
him a hug, because for all intents and
house in Northeast Portland. Fifteen minutes the hospital in physical therapy, relearning
purposes, he’s that brother I never had, and
later, he was kicking off his shoes while his
how to balance so he could walk and how to
I think it would have been a dam shame if I
then 9-year-old son played with Legos nearby.
hold a fork so he could eat. g
had not seen the potential that we created to
The grandmother went upstairs to Check
“I always had to be reminded df days and
see it through to where we are now?’
phone messages. They had already received
And now business is good. Their jarred
dates,” he says. “They were unsure how
several from the doctor’s office they had just
chile peppers have made it onto the shelves
much of my coordination I would get back.”
left. “Take him to the hospital,” the
of New Seasons and other stores stretching
Memories of his hospital stay are foggy,
messages said. “He’s not going to make it
from rural Oregon and Portland to Seattle.
but Sandoval remembers with clarity a
Their green chile is also featured on the
through the night.”
reccurring vision that still lingers in the back
menus of several Portland restaurants,
“She came running down and grabbed
of his mind.
winning Blue Goose Café arid White Owl
me,” says Sandoval. “She said, ‘Get in the
“I ’m not going to go down the path of
Social Club best and second best green chile
car.’ I rem ember putting on my shoes and -
saying I saw the light at the end of the
cheeseburgers in a 2014 ranking by The
it still breaks my heart - I just turned, and I
tunnel, I just know that when I was not here,
Oregonian. Despite the uncertainty
I feel like some sort of higher power came to
waved at my Son, and I said, ‘Guess I’ll see
surrounding Sandoval’s longevity, the
me, and I saw this image,” he says. “A group
you later dude.’ That’s all I could muster up,
partners are looking forward to opening Los
of sprites looking down at me. As if I was
that will haunt me forever.”
Roast’s first commercial kitchen near
awakening on my back looking up at two
When he arrived at Providence Portland
Cathedral Park.
silhouettes, and some sort of Native
Medical Center through the emergency
American face came clearer and more
room, a bed was already waiting for him. But
defined. I had never seen this image before
all he could think about was getting another
in my life.”
drink.
n the months following his hospitalization,
The image frequented his dreams
“I fought tooth and nail. I wanted to g e t .
Sandoval began to question why he was
throughout the rest of his hospitalization.
out of there so bad - to the point where
still alive.
When he was well enough, he went
code red was called - and they had people
He searched for meaning and for answers,
straight to a drug and alcohol rehab facility in
come in and restrain me,” says Sandoval. “I
and he started to research Native American
Albuquerque. Doctors warned that one more
didn’t care that he said I would die if I left
spirits in an effort to solve the mystery of
drink would literally kill him. This time he
the hospital.
the face that permeated his hospital bed
listened.
“Even though I wanted to live, and took
dreams. He was looking at kachina dolls,
“It’s really disappointing to me how
myself to doctors right before the emergency
which depict spirits in Pueblo Indian
quickly people write off people like myself,”
room, I forgot all of that because the drink
mythology, when he found the familiar face.
he says, “not giving credit to the fact that
made me feel warm and safe, even though
“It sounds made up, but it’s kind of
every
human
being
gives
up
on
something
at
logically, I knew it didn’t.”
creepy. His name is Tsil. He’s a runner and
some point.
Looking back, he says it’s still hard for
basically he’s underneath the Sun God, and
“You can’t just disingenuously write
him to fathom how much the single-track
his role in the Hopi tribe is to go to villages
someone off as a fuck up or someone who
mindset of alcoholism had caused him to
and race kids. In a nutshell, it’s kind of like a
just
doesn’t
care.
I
probably
would
have
gone
change from the person he really was.
rite of passage. If you beat him, you’re
back to drinking if I hadn’t taken a moment
For two weeks, he remained in the
accepted; now you’re older, they get rewards
to
give
compassion
to
myself,
and
to
intensive care unit. Doctors brought first-
and riches,” he explains. “If Tsil wins, he
understand that you do make mistakes.
year medical students to his bedside, telling
stuffs
chiles in their mouths and burns their
“As
heavy
as
it
becomes,
there
is
a
point
them, “This is what happens when you drink,
mouths or throws mud at. them, but it’s in
where you start to turn it around, and when
you will not see this guy in the morning.
celebration, like “Ha ha! You didn’t win!”
you’ve totally succumbed to a substance, it’s
But morning after morning, he was still
The connection between himself, a chile
very difficult to find that starting point -
there.
pepper salesman, and the Hopi kachina Tsil,
your
judgment
is
skewed.
I’m
not
asking
The way Sandoval tells it, his organs had a
who shoves chiles in people’s mouths, was
anyone to feel sorry for me. I made my
“pow wow,” deciding to take turns
clear. Tsil quickly became his archetype - a
decisions.
I
made
my
mistakes.
I
have
to
live
functioning in order to keep him alive. At
picture of Tsil is printed oil the back of
with
them.”
one point his kidneys shut down, then his
B
I
Page 9
Sandoval’s business cards and the spirit’s
likeness serves as his Google Plus profile
photo.
But chile peppers and Tsil haven’t
replaced the drums entirely.
“During that whole alcoholic period, I said
‘fuck music. I’m done with music, I’m done
playing drums,’” he remembers. “I often
think that towards the tail end of The Shins,
I stopped becoming a craftsman. I think
someone who loves their craft always keeps
sharpening their tools, and toward the end
there, I - for whatever reasons - just lacked
the motivation or didn’t see the reason.”
Through recovery he learned his decision
to abandon the drums likely added to the
void he was feeling as he drank himself to
near death.
He got back into playing, took some
lessons, and about two months he ago joined
Portland’s Focus! Focus!, a self-described
“indie fuzzfolk” band led by singer and
songwriter Elly Swope.
ou learn that chemically, your brain just
kind of changes when you’re an
alcoholic,” says Sandoval, “The baseline is
skewed.”
He’s working to mend ties with some of
his old friends, but in some cases, he says he
had to wait for the dust he’s kicked up to
settle.
“Even though I may pot have a lot of
time,” he says, “I t s not fair to those who you
may have shut out because of alcoholism, to .
all of a sudden expect them to give you an
ear.”
“I’ve reached out to James, and James and
I have talked, that’s probably the biggest one
that was on my bucket list in the hospital, I
was like there’s one person I really need to
talk to and it was him.” When the two spoke
in December, Sandoval says M ercer said he
was shocked to hear how far Sandoval had
deteriorated.
He’s also using his time to make sure his
son understands why his father is sick. He
uses the situation he faced the day he
thought he was saying goodbye to his son
forever as a “quality teaching moment.”
“We talk about how it’s important to take
care of ourselves for ourselves. Be thankful
for what you have. Say ‘I love you’ to people
you love. Don’t get so angry at all the little
things. It also helps that when things seem
too hard and impossible, being brave and
dedicated, things start to seem more
manageable,” Sandoval explains. “He
reminds me to take care of myself just as
much as I remind him.”
Sandoval seems to be optimistic, cracking
a contagious smile here and there as he
shares his story from the living room of his
home in the Alberta Arts District.
His health is stable, which he says is the
best-ease scenario. He’s officially applied for
a liver transplant, but isn’t sure if he’ll
qualify. The antiquated organ transplant
system, he says, is a “crap shoot.”
As welcoming and encouraging as
someone closing a bar door and inviting you
in to drink yourself silly may be, he says, that
same encouragement and friendship can be
found in recovery.
“It’s different for me personally, it’s not as
rewarding initially, but there’s something to
be said: It’s really fun stumbling out of a bar
laughing and joking, it’s a whole new
experience walking out of group laughing,
arid bfeittg sobfer.”
*
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