AA - Alcoholics Anonymous
October 25, 2023
(0:10 – 1:26)
Good evening. My name is Paul and I’m an enthusiastic alcoholic. I am enthusiastic about
this way of life and about AA and about sobriety, anybody’s sobriety, especially my own.
And I just, I’m enthusiastic about the word enthusiasm. To me the N means within and
theos means God and the God within and I’m convinced that my higher power likes it
when I’m enthusiastic about what he’s given me today and the life he’s put together for
me and I particularly, I like AA and I particularly like people who are enthusiastic about
AA and I don’t think I’ve ever seen that better demonstrated than I’ve seen here this
weekend. I think this is the way a jamboree really ought to be put together and give
yourselves a hand.
(1:33 – 3:26)
This will be the role model to which all future jamborees will shoot for and I also want to
mention Sharon and Pat, our drivers. I find it, I always feel more secure when I say
something nice about the person who’s supposed to take me back to the airport. And I
want to thank you for inviting us and Max and I and for the flowers and the gifts and the
baskets and just for everything and for the love in that.
In fact I even enjoy the fact that this room is a little too small for this. I love it when
alcoholics are jammed together because there’s a, when alcoholics and alcoholics are
jammed together they generate energy and love and I do feel a little bad when I see
people having to stand but then a little voice says to me, what the hell, you’ve got to
stand. I really feel this is totally impractical, stupid and a dumb idea but I feel so much
love in this room and this whole weekend I have.
But there’s one thing that’s been missing as far as I’m concerned. I haven’t seen a lot of
hugging and I know how impractical and stupid the suggestion is but I’d love to see you
all stand up and hug somebody you didn’t come here with tonight. Let’s take a minute
and have a little hug time.
(4:40 – 8:08)
Very good, thank you. You’re good at that too. I’ve enjoyed every minute of this weekend
and actually the best is yet to come.
Debbie’s going to talk tomorrow morning and for heaven’s sake don’t miss that and be
sure to be here. And I’ve enjoyed every bit of this meeting, even the readings before the
meetings. I, you know, we hear them at every meeting and I like to listen for a different
inflection or different wording or something so I can learn something more and more
about that important parts of the program.
But what I really listen, I was a little disappointed tonight because they read it so
perfectly. What I really like to hear are the mistakes. Because, you know, people and
they’re reading it and you hear, yeah, yeah, yeah.
I don’t really hear it but when they make a mistake, what was that? Yeah. And that’s the
part that I really remember. I remember one night I was leading a meeting and I asked
this older woman to read chapter 5 and she read it as, what an odor.
And one time I was reading the traditions and I read it as sought-through prayer and
medication. I heard another guy read it as sought-through prayer and mediation. But the
one I like best is the person that read the traditions, I think it was the sixth tradition, and
he said, the only requirement for membership is a desire to start drinking.
And, you know, that makes more sense to me. Last night Scott asked for this show of
hands of people within their first year of sobriety. Could we see that tonight in their first
year? I think the trouble is with that that I’m not sure that first year is really a newcomer.
In my home group we always have a show of hands of people with their first 30 days of
sobriety. Now I know that it’s embarrassing to you and we don’t do it to embarrass you
but it’s a good way to stay sober by admitting you’re in your first 30 days. Would the
people with 30 days or less please raise their hand? That’s just great, that’s just great.
In fact that’s the way to stay sober in AA as far as I’m concerned. You do stupid little
things that people suggest that have nothing to do with sobriety. Do it because
somebody suggested it.
And we’re glad you’re here. Did you notice the enthusiasm with which you were
welcomed? We’re really glad you’re here because that’s the way AA is. Sobriety isn’t
something you can go out and buy, it’s something you can give away and the more you
give it away the more you have it and so we’re glad to give it to you.
(8:11 – 8:49)
We’re so glad you’re here that we don’t even care that you’re not glad you’re here. In
fact if you’re really glad to be here, if you’re happy, happy, happy, happy, happy, happy,
happy to be here, we may not be able to help you. At least not until you get off whatever
you’re on.
(8:55 – 10:04)
And of course there’s the court card people. I haven’t heard anything about court cards
this weekend but signing court cards, we’re not part of the court system, thank God, but
we do that as a service to the courts. We sign court cards, at least in my home group.
So if you hear from the court card, I was at a meeting down in Riverside, California. I was
going to talk and at that meeting when you’re going to talk they have you sit up at the
front table with the officers and other important people and sitting there waiting to talk
they had the basket with the court cards in it and not having anything better to do, I
counted the court cards and there were 21 court cards at this particular meeting but
only one newcomer. So ever since then I’ve made it a habit to welcome the non-alcoholic
drunk drivers.
(10:16 – 10:57)
We’re really glad you’re here. I, for one, hope you stay here until I get back to the
airport. Oh, I didn’t have a show of hands.
In my home group we always have a show of hands of the almonds. Can we see the
hands? Don’t be ashamed now, put your hands up. Always glad to see Al-Nons at the
meetings, any meeting.
(11:00 – 11:14)
They need all the meetings they can get. Don’t laugh, don’t laugh. You should not laugh
at the Al-Nons.
(11:16 – 11:44)
Our book speaks very kindly of the Al-Nons. It says, they’re not at fault, they seem to
have been born that way. I wouldn’t say that except that I am an avid, full-blown,
participating, enthusiastic Al-Non member myself.
(11:44 – 11:55)
I go to Al-Nons every week. I love Al-Nons. It pays to love the Al-Nons.
(12:00 – 12:18)
No, I do, I love Al-Nons. In fact, one of the most common problems I see is an alcoholic
going crazy in a relationship with another alcoholic. And I listen to their story and I say,
well, that sounds very much like an Al-Non problem.
(12:18 – 12:33)
Have you considered going to Al-Nons? And they’re insulted. Well, I’m an alcoholic. As if I
was suggesting they give up AA and go to Al-Nons.
(12:35 – 13:12)
But the one thing at Al-Nons I do have, I don’t agree with, I have a problem with, and we
shouldn’t really make fun of Al-Nons because we get some of our best recruits from
there. But what annoys me is when one of them, after several years at Al-Nons, decides
to come on over to AA, they think, we’ve got them fooled, they think they’re taking a
step up by becoming an alcoholic. That’s the only place in the world where I ever hear
that.
(13:15 – 13:27)
Anyhow, let’s get away from that for God’s sake. A story in the book, somebody said,
how did I get my story in the book? A lot of people ask me how I get my story in the
book. They wouldn’t know how to get their story in the book.
(13:28 – 13:59)
I remember one guy came up to me and said, how did you get your story in the book? I
said, oh, I paid him a lot of money. But actually, I got a call from, her name was Paula
Carpenter, she’s deceased now, but she was chairman of the committee for picking
stories to put in the third edition of the big book, and she also happened to be the editor
of the Grapevine. And I had sent some articles in to the Grapevine.
(14:00 – 14:16)
The most recent one was an article, No Pills to Alcoholics. It was why doctors shouldn’t
prescribe tranquilizers and other, and pep pills to alcoholics. And when you write a letter
to the articles of the Grapevine, they send you back a letter and tell you how wonderful it
is, and then they tell you whether or not they’re going to use it.
(14:16 – 14:45)
And she said they liked it and they were going to use it. And she ended up by saying,
had I, perchance, had a dual problem with the, meaning, I guess, alcohol and pills, and I
don’t know what gave her that idea. And if I had, had I ever written my story up? And if
so, would I consider sending it in for possible inclusion in the third edition? And I thought,
well, that’s about as dumb an idea as I ever heard.
(14:45 – 14:59)
I thought that was about as brilliant an idea of me writing up my story and sending it in
for the book as for me to come to AA in the first place. I fought both of them as hard as I
could. And I just, I didn’t even answer her letter.
(15:00 – 15:06)
Well, then she called from New York because the deadline was coming. And she said,
had I written it? And I said, no, I hadn’t. I hadn’t had time.
(15:06 – 15:15)
I lied and I said I hadn’t had time. And she said, well, she’d extend the time. And I still
didn’t do it.
(15:15 – 15:27)
And then, oh, then one of the girls that worked in the office, other than Max, was a
professional typist. And she was on the program. She thought it’d be fun to have written
the story, which maybe later on appeared in the big book.
(15:27 – 15:30)
And she says to me, why don’t you write it and I’ll type it. We’ll send it in. So I said, OK.
(15:31 – 15:33)
And I sat down. I wrote it. She typed it.
(15:33 – 15:41)
We sent it in. And we got a message from New York that it was too late. They had had to
have another printing.
(15:42 – 15:46)
They ran out of books. And I thought, that’s great. That’s the last I’ll hear about that.
(15:46 – 15:52)
She said, we’ll put it in the grapevine. So they put it in the grapevine. It was in July of
whatever year it was.
(15:52 – 16:13)
And the only thing, they put it in as I had written it, even with the title, the original title,
which was Bronze Moccasins. It was based on the fact that Max had had my moccasins
bronze for my seventh birthday. And anyway, I got to thinking about, gee, I really loved
those moccasins.
(16:13 – 16:42)
I always thought if I remember where they came from, I wouldn’t have to go back and
make another pair. And I still love those moccasins, even though they’re not nearly as
comfortable as the others. And the only thing, the only thing they changed in the story,
as I sent it in, was they took one word out, the word alanonism.
(16:42 – 16:55)
I said that as Max was reaching the terminal stages of her disease, alanonism, I thought,
you know, we have a disease. It’s a really horrible disease, but at least it has a name. It’s
called alcoholism.
(16:56 – 17:10)
Their disease is so screwy, they can’t even think of a name for it. I thought they ought to
call it alanonism, but they took that out. I guess they thought alanons were too sensitive
or something.
(17:12 – 17:30)
But anyhow, that’s the way it was in the grapevine. I thought, well, that’s the end of that.
Well, sometime much later, when you have an article and you send it in the grapevine,
they put it in the grapevine, a month ahead of time, whether you get a subscription or
not, they’ll send you a copy so you can see what it’s going to look like.
(17:30 – 17:55)
And you get this extra copy of the grapevine. Well, quite a few months later, years later,
I forget what, the central office called my office and said to Max, does the doctor know
that his story is in the new edition of the big book? And they said no, and I had to go out
and buy. I already had a book.
(17:57 – 18:10)
And I had to go out and buy another one just to see my own story in the thing. I thought
that’s pretty chintzy. And they had changed the story, I mean, changed the title.
(18:10 – 18:23)
And to me, that’s the only clue as to why they wanted it. I think they wanted to show
that you could be a professional and still be an alcoholic, or you could have a drug
problem and still be an alcoholic. And that’s just a guess on my part.
(18:23 – 18:40)
And I think also trying to show that if you had a drug problem, that didn’t make you not
an alcoholic any more than if you had just an alcoholic, that alone. I mean, if you had
drugs alone, that doesn’t necessarily make you an alcoholic. I mean, it’s not the same.
(18:40 – 18:50)
I think that’s what they were trying to show. But this is not only an anonymous
organization, this is a secret one. That’s just my guess, I would say.
(18:51 – 19:20)
And I just feel, people ask me, did you feel real spiritual when you wrote that page 449?
And I have to stop and think, and I think, well, I felt real spiritual a couple of times when I
was drunk. But when I was writing that thing, I didn’t think, oh boy, people are really
going to understand this page 449. None of that stuff.
(19:20 – 19:32)
I just wrote it and there it is. And I didn’t think it was a good idea when I did it, but it’s
been a tremendous privilege for me to have done that. And I feel very, very privileged.
(19:32 – 19:50)
I should say that my name is Paul, and I’m a very, very privileged, over-privileged
alcoholic. But that’s the story of that, anyhow. Now, where do I go? As I said, I was being
here, I thank you all for that, and welcome to all the other ones.
(19:53 – 20:19)
The other day I was thinking, somebody was going through some old stuff, cleaning out
some cupboards and some drawers and that. In fact, the meeting at my last Al-Anon
meeting, the topic was miracles. And I got called on, and I wasn’t expecting to
participate, and all of a sudden I was called on and I was supposed to talk about
miracles.
(20:19 – 20:48)
And I said that my thought was that a miracle is whatever you think it is. I was raised to
believe that the church had to analyze the thing for months and months at a time, and
then they would decide years later whether or not that really, really was a miracle or not.
But in AA, it becomes almost a miracle is a situation in which God wishes to remain
anonymous.
(20:50 – 21:21)
And a miracle is in the eyes of the beholder. And I was saying how now we were cleaning
out these cupboards and drawers at home because Max never throws anything away,
and we’ve been accumulating stuff for 60 years, and the stuff we’ve been accumulating
is mostly hers. And we have been discarding this stuff and getting rid of it, and we’ve
been doing this for about two weeks now, and we haven’t had a single fight.
(21:22 – 21:49)
Now that, ladies and gentlemen, is a miracle. As a matter of fact, Max and I, the first part
of this year, our last anniversary last December, we decided that this, our 60th year, was
going to be the best year of our marriage. And we made that bilateral agreement.
(21:49 – 22:29)
And we’ve been working on that ever since, and not finding fault with each other, and
not referring to the past, none of this, how come you always, or you never, or not even
pointing out to the other person they’re wrong even when they are. And we’ve been
together, this December, it’ll be 60 years. You’re nowhere near as impressed as we are.
(22:34 – 22:58)
In fact, Max and I met when we were four years old. My father, without even asking my
opinion, gave up his job as a druggist in Canton, Ohio, and he bought a house-drugstore
combination in Alliance, Ohio, and I grew up in a neighborhood drugstore, and better
living through chemistry was a way of life. It’s true.
(22:59 – 23:45)
They didn’t have Medicare and all that at that time, and when people were ill, they’d go
to their friendly neighborhood druggist and tell him how they felt, and he would sell
them something to make them get well, or something to make them not care that they
weren’t getting well, which is what doctors do today. And I grew up knowing that if I
didn’t feel well, or there was something wrong, there was always something that you put
in your system to make you feel better, and better living through chemistry was a way of
life. And that was important to my future life, but not as important as the fact that next
door to the drugstore is where Grandma Genslein was raising her orphan granddaughter
Maxine.
(23:46 – 24:01)
And she was raising Maxine, and she also had two alcoholic sons, and they were
alcoholics. The Genslein boys were alcoholics. And later on, Max was raised by an aunt,
and she was married to an alcoholic.
(24:02 – 24:31)
And so there was all the alcoholism in Max’s side of the family, and there was none in my
family. I’m an alcoholic by marriage. I wasn’t an alcoholic when I married her.
(24:39 – 25:07)
I was talking about cleaning out the drawers, and I saw this card that somebody had sent
me. I don’t know what this occasion was, but it was a card where you’d cut part of it off,
and it showed this doctor in a surgeon’s scrub suit, and mask, and so on. And he had a
tank of nitrous oxide gas, and a hose, and a mask, and he was about to give himself a
little gas.
(25:07 – 25:55)
And the reason this guy, this other doctor, had sent me this card was because he
remembered my story that I had told. You know, on the list of things in the book, of
things we have tried, one reminded me that way, way back, way, many, many years
before I became an alcoholic, I was trying to do something about my drinking. And I was
reading a medical journal, a psychiatric medical journal, and it had an article on how
they thought that carbon dioxide inhalations were a good treatment for psychoneurosis.
(25:56 – 26:10)
That’s what psychiatrists do. They’re always looking for chemicals to put into us people
to make life easier for us to live it, and get along better. Well, they don’t realize we’ve
tried everything there is.
(26:10 – 26:37)
But here was an article that says if you breathe enough carbon dioxide inhalations, it’s
good for psychoneurosis. And I thought, well, I’m certainly not one of those dumb
alcoholics, but I do have a bit of a drinking problem, and I might have a tinge of neurosis.
I would have to try this, but I thought, well, I can’t go to some doctor and say, I’d like to
get gassed.
(26:41 – 26:59)
And while I’m here, I didn’t know any doctor that knew more about it than I did. I just
read the article. The thing about carbon dioxide is, it’s like that idea of putting a plastic
or other pillow or bag over your head.
(27:00 – 27:19)
The more carbon dioxide stimulates your breathing, the more carbon dioxide there is in
the air, the harder you’ll breathe. And the harder you breathe, the more carbon dioxide
you’re putting in the thing so that you just breathe harder and harder and harder and
harder and harder and harder and harder. And the lights are flashing, and the lightning’s
going, and the bells are ringing, and the thing’s on.
(27:19 – 27:42)
And finally your brain explodes, and you pass out. And I thought, by God, that ought to
be good for something. Well, I couldn’t go to any doctor, as I said, and tell them I wanted
that, besides I didn’t know that they had any carbon dioxide.
(27:43 – 27:59)
So I called up the gas company and I ordered a tank of carbon dioxide gas. And the guy
drives up in this great big truck, and they’re used to delivering it to hospitals, but here
he brings it to our home. And he brings it.
(27:59 – 28:11)
It must be as big as a man. It must weigh a couple hundred pounds. And he has it on a
dolly, and he rolls it up to the front door of the house and says, where do you want this? I
says, well, at the head of the bed in the master bedroom.
(28:20 – 28:51)
And, you know, where the devil would you think I’d want it? So here I have the tank of
gas, and I have the hose, and I have the mask, but I had one little problem. And that is
that once I breathe hard and hard and hard and the lights flash, and the bells ring, blah,
blah, blah, and I pass out, I don’t know what would happen if he doesn’t take the mask
off. And there’s nobody around that I could get to take it off except Max.
(28:52 – 29:01)
So I get it all set up. I go in the bedroom. I’m in the living room, and she’s watching
television, and I say, I’m going to put this on.
(29:01 – 29:40)
I’m going to breathe harder and harder and harder and harder, and the thing’s going to
happen. I’m going to pass out, and when I pass out, would you please take the mask off
and turn the gas off? And she said, all right. So after a full evening of drinking and pillstaking, I decided it was time to go to beddy-bye.
(29:42 – 30:29)
I lay on the bed, put the mask on, and turn the gas on, and I breathe faster and faster
and faster and faster and faster and faster and faster and faster, and the lights are
ringing, and the lightening’s flashing, and blah, blah, blah, and the bells are ringing, and
all of a sudden, boom, my brain explodes, and I pass out. When the next commercial
came on, I had to go to bed. Anyway, it didn’t work.
(30:36 – 30:44)
I tried other things. I tried all kinds of things. In fact, I had no trouble quitting drinking.
(30:45 – 30:59)
I had trouble staying quit. The thing that bothered me the most was, I think one of the
things that bothered me the most was, I’d wake up in the morning and think, oh, my
God, I did it again. I did it again last night.
(31:00 – 31:07)
This is ridiculous. This drinking is, this is ridiculous. I mean, this is bad for me.
(31:08 – 31:12)
My blood pressure’s up. My cholesterol’s up. My blood sugar’s up.
(31:12 – 31:17)
I’m taking diabetes pills. I’m taking uric acid pills. All this time, I’ve got diarrhea.
(31:18 – 31:31)
I’ve got nausea and vomiting. I’ve got an ulcer, and I’ve got skin diseases, and my hair’s
falling out, and all these things. I mean, this drinking is not good for me.
(31:32 – 31:37)
I’m going to quit. I’m going to quit. That’s it.
(31:37 – 31:39)
I quit. This is enough. This is enough of that.
(31:39 – 31:45)
I quit. I quit. I’m glad I quit.
(31:49 – 32:04)
This is going to be a better day. I’ll close one eye so I can shave, and take a few pills so I
can get to work. I go through the day and not drink.
(32:04 – 32:11)
I think, boy, I’m sure glad I quit. I’m glad I don’t drink. I wish I’d have done this a long
time ago.
(32:12 – 32:21)
I’m glad I quit. I go through the day. I’m glad I don’t drink anymore.
(32:23 – 32:36)
And on the way home from the office, the car would stop at a liquor store. And in the
morning, I’d wake up, and I’d think, my God, I did it again. I did it again.
(32:38 – 32:57)
It was as though somebody quit, and somebody else kept on drinking. I had not had the
slightest discussion with myself as to whether or not I was going to change my mind. It
wasn’t as if I changed my mind.
(32:57 – 33:31)
It was as if somebody else changed their mind. In fact, it’s as if I was going through life
on a tour bus, and as if the driver would drive for a while, and he’d stop and go to the
restroom or something, and one of the passengers would get up and start driving
without having asked the driver where we were going. And different people would drive
at different times with no communication with each other, and at the end of the thing,
we’d wonder why we never got anywhere.
(33:34 – 33:54)
In fact, my life’s been like that ever since. You’re sitting there very attentively listening,
and I really appreciate that. But there’s a lot of people here, but there’s not any more
people out here than there are in here.
(33:59 – 34:20)
You’re very quiet, but up there, I’m trying to talk in a sensible, kind of a train of thought,
as they say it, or something like that, or a sensible little train, and one of them will jump
up and start saying, well, talk about blah, blah, blah, blah. And before I can even think
about it, the other one says, no, no, don’t talk about that, talk about this, blah, blah,
blah. And before I can talk about that, a third one jumps in, no, no, don’t talk about this,
don’t talk about that.
(34:20 – 34:36)
And pretty soon, they’re fighting among themselves about what I ought to be talking
about. And you have no idea how distracting that can be. And I’ll say, oh, shut up up
there.
(34:38 – 35:09)
And they all shut up, and I can’t think of anything to say. In fact, I’ll go through the day,
and at the end of the day, my body will go to sleep, and my brain will say, no, let’s lie
here and talk about it for a while. So I’ll get to sleep, and about three, four, three o’clock
in the morning, they’ll say, hey, wake up, we’ve had an emergency meeting, and we
need to talk to you.
(35:17 – 35:35)
You know that thing, you thought you handled so well today? It wasn’t like that at all.
Wait till morning, you’ll find out. And I’ll think, oh, God, I don’t want to listen to that stuff,
and I’ll roll over and go back to sleep.
(35:38 – 35:58)
And just as I’m about to lose consciousness, I’ll think to myself, boy, I’m glad I’m not
thinking about that anymore. And one of them will say, oh, I’m glad you’re still awake.
We’ve decided you’re one of the dumbest people we’ve ever worked with.
(35:59 – 36:20)
You keep doing the same dumb thing over and over again. Let’s spend the rest of the
night flying here and making lists of stupid things you have done. There are people up
there that have an opinion on every side of every issue.
(36:21 – 36:33)
Nothing is simple. There are at least two sides to everything. Even my relationship with
Max doesn’t depend on what she does.
(36:34 – 36:50)
It depends on who I listen to who tell me what she does. There’s one of them up there
that’s obsessed with her. As long as I’ve known her, he’s been obsessed with her.
(36:50 – 37:22)
He loves to watch her and tell me what she just did and make comments on it. Did you
notice the tone of voice in which she just spoke to you? He’s obsessed with her and he
doesn’t really care that much for her. But, you know, there’s another one up there that’s
just as obsessed.
(37:22 – 37:32)
He’s watched her just as much and loves to report back to her. He’s got a softer voice,
but he thinks she’s just wonderful. He thinks she’s got a great sense of humor, very
spiritual.
(37:33 – 37:43)
He thinks she does a great job. He likes to remind me that she’s the one that kept
coming to AA meetings when I wasn’t going to go anymore. She used to go by herself.
(37:47 – 38:10)
As I say, my life with Max doesn’t depend on what she does. It depends on which of
those guys I listen to as to what she does. My sobriety depends on when I listen to the
people who want to see me sober and the one person up there that represents my
disease that likes to see me drink.
(38:13 – 38:25)
I hear a lot of stuff up there that’s ridiculous. A lot of this stuff is illegal. And a lot of it is
lewd.
(38:29 – 38:44)
I’m absolutely delighted that you can’t hear what I’ve got to listen to. You may not like
what you hear, but you’re better off than what I’ve got to listen to. It goes on and on, day
and night.
(38:48 – 39:13)
There’s one up there, as a matter of fact, it seems like there are many of them, maybe
it’s just one, but there’s a lot of talking and he’s afraid. He’s afraid of everything. No
matter what it is, to lead a meeting, to speak at a meeting, to come to AA, to sponsor
somebody, to ask somebody to be your sponsor, whatever it is, that you say, oh my God,
don’t do that, you’ll screw it up, and they’ll all laugh at you.
(39:14 – 39:19)
And everyone has been that way all my life. Oh my God, don’t do that, you’ll screw it up.
You can’t do that, you can’t do that.
(39:20 – 39:43)
And yet I find that here in the program I’ve come to realize there’s a voice up there that
says, man, with this program, as long as you’re sober, you can go anywhere, do
anything, face anybody, and nobody can hurt you. Nobody can hurt you. In fact, there’s
no way anybody can hurt you except to get you drunk.
(39:44 – 40:13)
And this program is so strong, so vibrant, that nobody can get you, no circumstances can
get you drunk. And my life depends on who I listen to in those voices, not, and I hear a
lot, I say, lewd and illegal things, and I hear a lot of nonsense, but I used to fight all those
voices, but now all I say is, well, thank you for participating, now if you’ll sit down, we’ll
call on somebody else. Or sometimes they get the thought, and I think, you guys need a
meeting, let’s go to a meeting.
(40:20 – 40:41)
So, anyhow, I don’t know why, but I ended up in the nutwork. Not very funny. Somebody
asked, what kind of doctor you are? And I was an internist, a specialist in diagnosis, as a
diagnostician.
(40:42 – 41:16)
When doctors had patients, they didn’t know what to do with them, they weren’t getting
well, they’d send them to me, I’d make a diagnosis, tell them how to treat them, and I
was a consultant. But I was getting sicker and sicker, and I had convulsions a couple of
times, and I was losing weight, and I had daily headaches, and a sense of impending
insanity, and I was getting sicker and sicker, and I thought, my God, you need a good
medical workup. Can I see a good diagnostician? Well, I was the best diagnostician I
knew.
(41:17 – 41:41)
I did some lab work on me, I did a bit of physical examination, I sat down and had a
consultation with me. I remember the headaches, and the convulsions, and the weight
loss, and the sense of impending insanity, it was obvious. I had a brain tumor, and I
would die, and then you’d all be sorry.
(41:43 – 42:18)
And you’d think, you’d laugh, and yet I was under the care of the most prominent
neurologist in Orange County, and he was treating me with Dilantin and Phenobarbital
for epilepsy. And he didn’t think to ask me if I drank, and I didn’t think to tell him. And he
had trained at the Mayo Clinic, and so what he decided to do, that I must have a brain
tumor, he sent me back to the Mayo Clinic, and Max was talking about that at the
meeting this afternoon, and that’s where she went and squealed to the neurosurgeon.
(42:27 – 42:57)
And you’re laughing, but the truth is, so she squealed to the neurosurgeon, and that’s
how I ended up in the nut ward of the Mayo Clinic. And as they say, you were laughing
when several years later, I was talking at an IDAA convention, International Doctors in
AA. Isn’t that an impressive title for a bunch of drunk doctors? And I told this story, and
he was on the staff at the Mayo Clinic, and he did what he’s not allowed to do.
(42:57 – 43:38)
He went back, he went to the record room, he pulled my record and got out the letter
that was sent to the doctor that sent me to the Mayo Clinic and sent me a copy of it. And
what it said was that the doctor in the final report said that it was too bad that Dr. Oliger
suffered from a condition which is much too common in our profession, alcoholism and
addiction to medications, and one for which we have no adequate treatment. It never
occurred to them to send me to AA, and at that time, they didn’t even have an
alcoholism treatment program, even though it’s a big Mayo Clinic.
(43:38 – 43:51)
And later on they did. I don’t know if they still do or not, but I would still be sitting there, I
guess, if I hadn’t signed out of the place. But they didn’t know what to do with me, and
this was back in the end of 66.
(43:55 – 44:09)
And I signed out of that dump. No, I mean, I did. It was at Christmas time in 1966, and it
might be a Christmas, the Mayo Clinic might be a good place, but don’t go there at
Christmas time.
(44:10 – 44:30)
If you get in a nut ward at Christmas time, and they make you iced Christmas cookies. I
remember the woman in white came to my cell and marched me down the hall to the
Christmas cookie icing party. She would steer my hand into the icing, and we’d smash it
onto a cookie.
(44:33 – 44:44)
I don’t have any cookies. We crumbled before I told her what she could do with her Goddarned cookies. And I went back to my cell.
(44:46 – 45:05)
And I signed out of that place, and you can’t sign out of a nut ward unless you have
somebody to sign a receipt for you. And there wasn’t anybody there except my two little
kids and Max, and Max wasn’t being very cooperative. Finally, I told her, by God, if she
didn’t sign me out, I’d never speak to her again as long as I lived.
(45:06 – 45:17)
And that got her. She’s lived to regret her decision. She signed out, we left out, went
back to California where they treat me with more respect.
(45:21 – 45:35)
And the thing I liked about icing Christmas cookies was when I was a little kid back in the
line, my oldest sister had a thing about Christmas cookies. She had a big thing about
icing the prettiest. They had a Christmas cookie decorating contest.
(45:36 – 45:53)
And she had cookie cutters. She had Christmas trees and reindeers and angels and
saints and slanders and all this cookie crap and Christmas stuff and all kinds of sprinkles
and toppings and all this stuff. And we’d have a contest to see who could ice the
prettiest Christmas cookie.
(45:54 – 46:17)
I did not like icing Christmas cookies when I was a little kid back in Alliance, Ohio. And I
didn’t like icing Christmas cookies when I was a big-shot doctor on the nut ward of the
California. Went back to California, went in to, saw this, told the neurologist about the
nut ward.
(46:18 – 46:45)
He spent, he said, he sent me to see a psychiatrist there at home and the psychiatrist
talked to Max, talked to me for 45 minutes, talked to Max for 10 minutes and locked me
up in the local nut ward. And they wanted me to make leather belts. They were real
fanatics on the leather belts.
(46:48 – 47:11)
You make a leather belt, by God, it’s part of the program. I’m sure even to this day if you
had a Senate investigation of that place, I bet you’d find that people have been there for
years and they won’t let them out until they make a leather belt. They used to even try
to convince me that the quality of my life would improve if I learned how to make a
leather belt.
(47:13 – 47:35)
I didn’t understand the philosophy and besides, I didn’t understand the instructions,
which wasn’t my fault. That was all that dumb occupational therapist because I’m always
told if you don’t understand a thing well enough you can explain it to me so that I
understand it and you don’t understand as well as you’re supposed to. She explained it
to me three times and I wasn’t going to embarrass her by asking her to explain it to me a
fourth time.
(47:38 – 47:59)
Oh, and the thing about the psychiatrist that they sent me to, he put me in a nut ward.
To me, it’s an illustration of the power. One of thousands and thousands of stories I love
drunkologues because they’re all illustrations of the power of this program.
(48:00 – 48:42)
But this was an illustration of the power of the program in a non-alcoholic. This man is a
psychiatrist there in town and he, when he was in training to become a psychiatrist,
somebody got the idea that he would be somehow a better psychiatrist if he went to two
or three AA meetings as part of his residency training program. And he went to these AA
meetings and he was so impressed with what he saw in AA that that now is his favorite
activity to run around with his butterfly net and capture alcoholics and send them to
Alcoholics Anonymous.
(48:43 – 48:57)
And then he won’t even see them for the first year. After a year of sobriety, if they’re still
flaky enough, then he’ll see if he can help them. But he says he will not try to do for
somebody what AA can do better than he can do.
(48:57 – 49:26)
He’s a real promoter of Alcoholics Anonymous just because of going to those few
meetings. And anyhow, there I was sitting in the network commiserating with myself at
the series of misdiagnoses and poor medical management and bad breaks. A nice guy
like me was accidentally in a place like that.
(49:29 – 50:06)
Well, I was thinking these thoughts, I thought, dumb psychiatrist who couldn’t say that
my problems were strictly marital walked up behind me and wanted to know if I’d be
willing to talk to a man from Alcoholics Anonymous. And I thought, God almighty, don’t I
have enough problems of my own without trying to help some drunk from AA. But I could
tell by the look on his face that he thought it was a good idea.
(50:07 – 50:20)
And I don’t know if you know that or not, but happiness on a network is having a happy
psychiatrist. And I was willing to go to any length to make him happy. And I said yes.
(50:21 – 50:36)
In no time at all, this clown comes galloping into the room, yelling at the top of his voice,
My name is Frank and I’m an alcoholic. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. I was real embarrassed for
him.
(50:42 – 50:50)
Why don’t you lower your voice, man, for God’s sake. People all think I’m a nut. Why
don’t we leave it at that.
(50:53 – 51:05)
And he told his whole story. All I know was it was in a loud voice and it was long. And I
don’t remember any of it except how it ended.
(51:05 – 51:14)
And he ended up by saying, Well, that’s my story. I’m going to a meeting tonight. Would
you like to go along? And I said, Hell no, I wouldn’t like it.
(51:15 – 51:27)
But I’ll go, because I figured he’d go back and squeal to that dumb psychiatrist. We went
off to the meeting and I don’t know what meeting we were at. I don’t know how many
meetings we were at before I knew what meeting we were at.
(51:28 – 52:00)
But I know that meeting had a profound effect on the psychiatrist. He now is suspiciously
real interested in my case. What’s this about a book? What’s this about AA? What’s this
about steps? What’s this about meetings? How often do they have meetings? What other
kind of meetings do they have? When are you going to the meeting next time? I thought,
My God, I’ve got me an alcoholic psychiatrist.
(52:05 – 52:25)
He’s ashamed to go, so he’s sending me. I had no idea how many meetings I’d have to
go to before I could get him sober, but I asked Frank to take me every night, and Frank
was very good about that. He should take me every night except Friday.
(52:25 – 52:38)
Friday he thought maybe he wouldn’t be, he thought he might be having a date with his
now wife Carolyn. And I thought, Well, that’s a crappy way to run an organization. Now, I
reported him to the psychiatrist.
(52:40 – 53:00)
You’ve got somebody else to take me on Friday night, and I went tough enough, I got
enough brownie points, finally got discharged from the hospital, I had no intention of
going back to AAA again. Why would I go back there if I’m not an alcoholic? The only
problem I had was that Max liked the meetings. She’s not even an alcoholic, but she
liked the meetings.
(53:00 – 53:06)
I’d say, Let’s go to a movie. She’d say, No, no, no, let’s go to an AA meeting. She thought
they were funny.
(53:12 – 53:45)
Of course, once I found out she liked them, then if she wouldn’t shape up, I decided I
wasn’t going to go to AA anymore. But she did, she couldn’t drive the freeway, and she
was afraid of driving it, but we lived in Anaheim, we went to meetings in Laguna Beach,
so we wouldn’t run anybody we knew, and she couldn’t drive that far, but she could get
in the car. If you have any drinking problems, come on in.
(53:57 – 54:15)
You want to be careful, this is a contagious disease. You’re liable to catch it, and that’s
how I got it, because I wasn’t an alcoholic. Anyhow, she went off to the meeting by
herself.
(54:17 – 54:50)
Have you ever had that, have you ever been in that position, on a Saturday night, you’re
sitting at home, drinking, while your non-alcoholic spouse is off, laughing it up at an AA
meeting? I thought it was very rude. I had to go back to find out what the alcoholics were
laughing about, and it didn’t make sense to me. God, they were laughing at things they
ought to be ashamed of.
(54:51 – 55:07)
They would cry at things they ought to be laughing about, and it was weird to me. But I
used to keep going back to the meetings to see what she was doing, and trying to figure
it out. It took seven months.
(55:08 – 55:48)
I went to meetings for seven months, and I went to one meeting too many, and I turned
into a very mild alcoholic. Right about that time, some woman stood up at an AA podium
and said that, she says, I was judging me by my intentions, and the world was judging
me by my actions. And I was sorry she said that, because I am undoubtedly one of the
best intentioned people you’ll ever meet.
(55:50 – 56:23)
No, really, I’m very proud of my intentions. Very proud of my good intentions, but when I
set aside my intentions and just looked at what there was to look at, she said, I didn’t
like what I saw at all. But I was, my most prominent attitude and feeling and impression
of being around AA was, I was ashamed.
(56:24 – 56:33)
I was ashamed to be here. I was ashamed for them out there to know I was here. I was
ashamed for you to know I was here.
(56:34 – 57:03)
And I was even ashamed of you and your simplistic little itsy-bitsy goals. Yeah, I
remember specifically a big healthy husky young buck of a guy said, if I don’t drink
today, I’m a success today. And I said, oh my God.
(57:06 – 57:16)
Big damn deal. You didn’t drink a beer today. Isn’t that great? You know, that’s the way
you think when you’re still drinking for God’s sake.
(57:19 – 57:59)
There was a lot of that. I was really ashamed of the tiddly goals you had and you
congratulated yourself on these things. And the one day, one day, the thought occurred
to me, if this is the bottom of the barrel and this is so nothing a goal, how come you
can’t achieve it? And it occurred to me that if it’s so simplistic, so stupid and so minor
and if I can’t accomplish that, I can’t accomplish anything.
(58:00 – 58:22)
If I can’t make it here, if this is the minimum, this is the bottom and I can’t make it here, I
have no foundation on which to build anything. And it finally became my goal to be a
successful member of AA. Of course, then they kept saying, stick with the winner, stick
with the winner, stick with the winner.
(58:22 – 58:30)
And you don’t do that as much as you used to, but they used to say stick with the
winner. And I thought, well, okay, I’m going to be a winner. But if I’m going to stick with
the winners, I need to go to winning winners.
(58:30 – 58:45)
So I talked to Chuck C., who at that time was sober about 100 years. And I said, what’s a
winner? And I was surprised that he had to think about it. And he said, well, I guess you
have to die sober.
(58:47 – 59:04)
Die sober? I mean, I don’t, I’ve never been enthusiastic about any accolades so I had to
die to win. I had planned for years and years and years to be a saint. And I was really
working on my sainthood.
(59:04 – 59:24)
And I’d even gotten a big, thick book of the lives of the saints. And I was reading through
it to find out which one was going to be my role model. And I was real enthused about
being a saint until I read someplace that you couldn’t be a saint, the church didn’t
declare you a saint until you’d been dead for 300 years or something.
(59:24 – 59:34)
And I thought, oh, crap. I lost my sainthood right there. You laugh, you don’t take me
seriously.
(59:35 – 59:58)
I was, I had a, I took sainthood so seriously I had a humility belt. I had taken a leather
belt about so wide and I’d put tacks through the belt with the points pointing in. It wasn’t
the belt that you used to hold your trousers up, you put it underneath your clothes so
that the tacks dug into you and you’d bleed.
(59:59 – 1:00:23)
And I got tremendous humility out of that belt. You’d bleed and the blood, you could feel
it running down your thighs and it’d go into your shoes and if you wore it long enough
there was enough blood that you would squish as you walked. I got tremendous humility
out of that belt.
(1:00:24 – 1:01:03)
I never wore it because it was uncomfortable. I was sincere. Anyhow, I thought, well, I
won’t be a winner, but I’m going to be a successful member of A. I didn’t talk to anybody
else about this, I didn’t make an issue out of it, but I decided I was going to be a
successful member of A. And over the years I’ve, to some extent, changed my definition
of what a successful member of A is, but essentially I don’t know any successful
members who drink or use drugs.
(1:01:04 – 1:02:31)
So, I’ve had to say, so even to this day, even to this day, that’s my goal, and if I have to
make a, when I make a decision of which course to take on something, instead of doing
it the old way where I figure, now, if I do this, you’ll do that, but then maybe you won’t,
so maybe I’d better do this, and so, but then again maybe I’ll do this over here, and what
I did, depending on what I thought you were going to do, depending on what I did, which
is, in case you don’t recognize it, it’s a manipulation, and if you didn’t recognize it, you’re
not even an alcoholic or an Al-Anon. But, in fact, I remember at one of my early Al-Anon
meetings, a woman said, the more you try to control another person, the more you are
under that person’s control, because if how you feel or what you do next depends on
what that person does or does not do, whatever it is you’re trying to get them to do or
not do, then if you follow that, you’re an alcoholic for an Al-Anon. So, anyway, and so
today, instead of doing that, I only have one half of the equation, and all I have to ask
myself is, what’s my motive? What’s my motive in doing this? And I operate on the thing,
if my motive is right, and I leave the results up to God, and I turn out exactly the way
they’re supposed to.
(1:02:32 – 1:02:48)
It may not be the way I would have picked it to turn out, but it turned out the way it’s
supposed to. And so I only have one half of the equation. I don’t have to worry about
your half, and on my side, all I have to do is figure out, what’s my motive? Pardon me,
and love is always the right motive.
(1:02:50 – 1:03:18)
Okay? And one of the things I know is that usually I’ll think, well, love is my motive, and
some of my little voice will say, yeah, but you also want this, you also want that. And the
truth is, I have lots of motives on any one thing, but I am the one that decides, what’s
my main motive? In fact, I like the idea that, well, that’s a dumb habit. I look at my watch
to see what the time is.
(1:03:18 – 1:03:37)
I know it makes you feel better to know I’m checking the time. I know it makes know I’m
checking But the truth is, I don’t know what time I started. So you’re screwed, you know.
(1:03:46 – 1:03:53)
Okay, feel good as long as you can. There you go. I like the theory.
(1:03:54 – 1:04:35)
I read this book called Well, it goes clear back to A Course in Miracles and a lot of other
things, but the people who know about such things say that there’s really only two
emotions, only two basic emotions, love and fear, and all other emotions are just
variations of one of those two. And I like that simple, I think simplifying it like that. And I
can ask myself, if there Because my whole life before the program was based on the fact
that I did things because I was afraid not to do them, or I didn’t do things I ought to do or
wanted to do because I was afraid to do them.
(1:04:35 – 1:05:05)
And I had a fear-based life. And that’s not conducive to a lot of joy and happiness. And
today, as I understand, I do what’s the loving thing to do? What’s the loving thing to do?
And I ask myself the question, how much are you adding to the total love in the world
today? And in AA, I’ve listened to hear people say, define love.
(1:05:06 – 1:05:46)
I remember one night, I, one evening, I thought to myself, what’s love? I wonder what
Chuck Segal thinks love? And I called him up, and I said, what’s your, what’s your
definition of love? He says, it’s the same thing at a level of love. I said, what’s He says,
it’s action. Bang! And he hung up.
(1:05:47 – 1:06:35)
Love is action. I remember Don Gee saying, love is an active concern for another person.
person’s welfare, an active concern for another person’s welfare, which we, it’s
something we are, that’s us, that’s our program, an active concern for the welfare of
newcomers and of each other.
That’s how we show love for each other. Speaking of Nanji, I remember him saying on
the third step, the third step, so the new third step is made a decision to return our will
and our lives to the care of God as we understand Him, made a decision to do that. He
said that he had not made a single mistake since taking the third step.
(1:06:37 – 1:07:37)
He had not made a single mistake since taking the third step. He said, my higher power
has done some really stupid things. Speaking of the third step, I really spend a lot of
time on the third step.
Now I pretty much combine the third step, which is just a decision, with the eleventh
step, which we sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact
with God. When I did the third step, the first time I did the third step, I was on my knees
in front of my sponsor. I recited the third step of the third step prayer.
The third step prayer is, God, I offer myself to Thee to build with me and to do with me
as Thou wilt, relieve me of the bondage to self and so on. In fact, I’ll say that first thing in
the morning, I’ll say it often during the day. Max and I say it when we pray together.
(1:07:38 – 1:10:52)
If I’m going to do something that I’m a bit apprehensive about, I will say to God, God, I
offer myself and this situation to You to do what You will with it. In fact, people will say to
me, you still get nervous when you have to talk. I say, well, I don’t think of it as
nervousness, I think of it as anticipatory anxiety.
And I don’t really get nervous because I say the third step prayer. I say, God, I offer
myself and this situation to You to do with as You wish. Now, I would like to turn out this
phenomenally successfully.
But if you have it in your mind, if this is the night you’d like to see me make a complete
ass of myself, if that’s the way you want to get your jollies, at least one of us will have a
good time. As a matter of fact, the third step, I remember the first time I really did the
third step. And I said, God, You take this day and You do whatever You want with it.
And You have come into my life whoever You want to come into my life. And You have
them say whatever You want them to say. And You have them do whatever You want
them to do.
And I’ll know that whatever happens this day and whoever comes into my life and
whatever they say and do, I’ll know that’s Your will for me this day. You go, have a good
day, and I’ll have a good day. And I thought, my God, I wonder how He’s going to handle
all the power I just gave Him.
I had visions of thinking, I’ve been wanting to get You for a long time, boy. And yet, you
know, my experience has been that never on a day that I have said that has He ever
taken advantage of it. Nothing has ever happened that seemed to happen by mistake
that day.
But anyhow, the other thing I did, I did the third step on my knees. But I thought, you
know, that’s a contract between me and God. And it’d be so easy for either one of us to
just quietly rescind that contract unilaterally.
I thought that would be harder for us to rescind the contract if we had more witnesses.
So I went before my then three home groups, and in front of them, I recited the third
step and the third step prayer, thinking that if there were more witnesses, it would be
harder to cancel the contract. I don’t know if that’s true, but that’s what I tell myself.
And I felt a little bit better having that many witnesses to the contract. But a thought
occurred to me, that’s just something in, that’s just verbal, just a verbal contract. I’d like,
you know, a contract, really, I’d rather it be in writing.
And so I went to a business supply store, and I bought a blank form for setting up a
limited partnership. And I filled it out, and I gave God a 51% controlling interest in my
life. And he became the general partner, and I the limited partner.
(1:10:54 – 1:12:06)
And I felt much better because, as I could see, that he had it in writing, that he was in
charge. But there was one more thing that happened, one more thing came up, though.
All that really showed was that a partnership exists.
It doesn’t show the terms of the partnership. It doesn’t show how you handle things. You
have to have it in writing as how to handle the problem before it comes up.
So I had to set up the terms of the partnership. I got a piece of paper, drew a line down
the middle, and on one side I put down, what’s God’s responsibility? And on the other
side, what’s my responsibility? Because I knew, I wanted him to know that I knew what
his responsibility was. And essentially what it narrowed down to was that he’s in charge
of worry, and I was in charge of work.
And the way it’s turned out is that he doesn’t like for me to even help him with the
worry. And he never does a damn bit of the work. So I tell him, you peddle and I’ll steer.
(1:12:06 – 1:12:22)
I mean, you steer and I’ll peddle, is what I mean. You steer and I’ll peddle. And for God’s
sake, watch where you’re going.
I don’t like some of the places we’ve been. And that’s the way that goes. Oh, look at my
watch to make you feel better again.
(1:12:26 – 1:20:30)
Another thing about this business of love, that I’ve read someplace that love is making
the other person feel important. Notice how often we do that in the program? We make
the newcomers feel important, they are. We make each other feel important.
We make the people that are participating and doing the work feel important because
they are. We make each other feel important by just remembering names, which I have
a terrible time doing, and by being attentive to each other’s welfare and so on. I thought,
with Max, that should be easy for me to make her feel important.
And I thought, I’ll do things that she’d like to have done for her. Max likes to wake up to
a, well, that’s not true. Max hates to wake up.
When she does wake up, she likes to wake up to a hot cup of coffee on her bedside in
the sand. Now, she doesn’t like hot, hot coffee, and she doesn’t like cold, hot coffee, but
she likes this hot coffee with three ice cubes that haven’t melted yet. It’s important that
they’re not melted because if they’re already melted, then she wakes up to a problem.
It’s just, didn’t you put the ice cubes in this coffee? Anyway, I get up before Max. In fact,
the whole world gets up before Max. I go into my computer and I write a letter to God
and I say, Dear God, here we go again.
You’ve done a good job. Keep up the good work. And I do automatic writing.
I write as fast as I can, no punctuation and no grammar things and not even reading
what I’m doing, but just automatic writing. So that I know that he knows that I know what
the problems are down here. I figure he can handle them better if he knows that I know.
So I’ll end up telling him, have a good day and I’ll have a good day. And I go and take
care of our little Alla dogs. Then it’s time for the Queen to wake up.
I go to make her coffee. She doesn’t need brewed coffee. She likes instant coffee, as
long as it’s Yuvan instant coffee.
And she has a certain cup she likes and that’s all right. And she doesn’t like it too strong.
She doesn’t like it very strong.
She likes a level teaspoonful. She doesn’t like milk at all. She doesn’t like the liquid stuff.
She likes powdered cream. Lots of it. Two large heaping teaspoons full of cream.
A level teaspoonful of Yuvan at the bottom of the cup. And then you don’t boil the water.
You take the water from a hot water dispenser.
You have to hire a man to come and he has to drill a hole about that big in the stainless
steel sink that replaced the perfectly good white porcelain sink that was there. But you
need the hot water dispenser because it dispenses water at just the right temperature
for putting three ice cubes in it. And as the water is going in, you swish the cup around
because she doesn’t like it if it cakes on the bottom.
And you don’t want to use the spoon because she might want another cup and you want
a dry spoon. So you don’t use the spoon. You swish it around.
And you don’t want to fill it too full because you have to leave room at the top in order to
put the ice cubes in. And you don’t drop them in and boom all over the place. So you just
slide them in slowly.
And you take that into the darkened bedroom. And you be very careful where you’re
walking because if you walk on her high-heeled shoes and your bare feet, it’s very
painful. And you want to be particularly careful as you go up along her side of the bed
because those glossy magazines are very slippery.
And when you get to her bedside stand, you don’t look for a bare spot. You just look for a
level spot. And you set it down and you walk out and you don’t cheat now.
You don’t do anything to accidentally wake her up. You walk out and you hope that she
wakes up before the ice cubes melt. Now all of that is the easy part.
The easy part, the hard part is you can’t expect her to appreciate it. Because Chuck C
always said love is for free and for fun, for free and for fun. If you expect anything in
return, it’s not love, it’s part.
If you expect them to appreciate it, it’s not love, it’s part. Free and for fun, free and for
fun. Pretty harsh rule, I thought.
But I can’t complain. I have to admit, it’s very cooperative. I’ve never known her to
appreciate it.
Anyhow, I could summarize this whole thing in a few sentences. My life started way, way
over there, 81 years ago. In fact, wow, he’s right.
You’re not really as impressed as I am. In fact, that distracts me to have something you
have to throw in here. This is my bragging story.
This has nothing to do with AA and recovery. Newcomers, don’t listen to this. But I am
the only 80-year-old I know who has worn out his treadmill before it wore him out.
Five years ago, I bought a treadmill, and I don’t believe very much in service contracts,
but I thought, treadmill, I think I’ll buy a service contract. I went and bought the service
contract, I wore out the tread, and they replaced it. Wore out the main bearing, they
replaced it.
Wore out something else, they replaced that. The company that made the treadmill then
went out of business. But I reminded them that that did not run my service contract out
of business.
So they said, you’re right, you go back to Montgomery Ward, you pick out the best
treadmill you can find, we’ll pick it up and deliver it, we’ll pick up the other one and take
it away, and I now am in the process of wearing out my second treadmill. As a matter of
fact, about a month ago, my service contract came up for renewal, I paid up for the next
three years, and I can’t give up my treadmill running until July 31st, 2002. I don’t do that
so I’ll live longer, I do it so I’ll enjoy being here while I’m here.
(1:20:30 – 1:20:49)
It’s my own personal Prozac, as a matter of fact. I haven’t had a good suicidal depression
since I started doing that. I love depression, I mean, depression has a lot of redeeming
social value.
(1:20:50 – 1:23:24)
It does, because it takes all those problems, it takes all those problems and just gathers
them all up and just brings them down to just me. I have a little trouble deciding
between when I’m depressed and when I’m wallowing in self-pity. But anyhow, that’s my
personal story.
The point I started to say was, before you interrupted me, was that my life started way,
way over there, and it was on a downhill course. All the time prior to July 31st, 1967. It
was not a straight line down, it was up and down, just enough ups to keep me confused.
Ended up in the nut ward of the hospital that’s on the staff up. That wasn’t bad enough, I
had to go to AA. I went to AA for seven months, went to one meeting too many.
I picked up this contagious disease, and my life, I finally, on July 31st, 1967, I accepted
the fact that I, of all people, even though I had nothing to do with it, had never decided
to be an alcoholic, didn’t do anything to make me an alcoholic, but I really, really was a
very mild alcoholic. And since that moment, my life has been getting better and better
and better. My disease is getting worse and worse and worse.
And so really, when they say it’s a progressive disease, they’re not kidding. I’m much
more alcoholic today than I was then. I even have a little pill problem maybe.
I was never addicted to pills though. I never abused the pills. I never ever took a pill
unless I had the symptom.
I did, I either had it or I could feel it coming on. Every pill I took was prescribed by a
doctor and taken according to directions. And I don’t want to advertise them, but I do
want to mention amphetamines.
I mean, I owe them a certain debt. I don’t know that I could have had the stamina to
have completed my pre-AA training period if it hadn’t been for amphetamines. Because
it did affect my hearing and I couldn’t listen fast enough to hear what I was saying a lot
of the time.
(1:23:34 – 1:23:44)
My disease has been getting worse. You know, it’s a progressive disease, but it’s also a
progressive recovery. And my life has been getting better and better and better.
(1:23:44 – 1:23:58)
And it’s not a straight line up, it’s up and down, up and down. But when it goes down, I
know a lot of things I can do to get it to go back up again. I call my sponsor, work with
more newcomers, read the book, work the steps, go to more meetings, start a new
meeting.
(1:23:58 – 1:24:24)
You find somebody to sponsor. There’s lots of things to do. Or do nothing.
Just sit still and wait. Like Winnie E. Dow used to say. It’s the only Bible quote she ever
used.
The Bible says, And it came to pass. The Bible does not say, And it came to stay. And I’m
convinced that when people like us hurt, we either drink or grow.
(1:24:25 – 1:24:39)
We either drink or grow. When we have a problem, we do not end up, when it’s over, we
don’t end up where we started. We’re either better off or worse off, depending on what
we did about the problem.
(1:24:40 – 1:25:01)
And if we just don’t drink and hang on, we grow. So all pain becomes growing pain. But
my life today is better than it’s ever been.
It’s much higher on this side than it’s ever been. And as far as I can tell, the only thing
that determines how high I can go is how long I can stay around doing the things I’m
doing. And even doing more of the things I’m doing to keep it on an uptill curve.
(1:25:02 – 1:25:37)
Because I want everything this program, no, I can’t say I want everything this program
has to offer. Because I don’t think anybody, I’m sure nobody can live long enough to get
everything this program has to offer. But I want as much as I can get.
There’s so much more to this program than just recovery. I mean, just sobriety. There’s
just no limit to it.
I want all I can get. The point I wanted to make was the point of the V. One little act of
acceptance changed the course of my life from getting progressively worse to getting
progressively better. And I find that that’s the way it is with all the things in life.
(1:25:37 – 1:26:12)
The things I resist keep getting worse. And once I accept the fact that that’s the way it is,
and just go with that, it gets better. It gets better.
It doesn’t get better until I accept it. And I thought, you know, as smart as I am, and as
good looking, you know, how? Why did it take me to that age before I accepted an
obvious fact? And the only thing I could see is that I was confusing acceptance with
approval. I did not approve of me being an alcoholic.
(1:26:12 – 1:26:25)
Therefore, I would not accept it. And because I wouldn’t accept it, there was nothing I
could do about it. But once I accepted that reality, that fact, the act of acceptance is
empowering.
(1:26:26 – 1:26:54)
Because then we have choices. Until I accepted it, I had no choice. Once I accepted it, I
had choices.
What am I going to do about this? And now today, I thoroughly approve of the fact that
I’m an alcoholic. Approval followed acceptance didn’t precede it. And today, I approve of
me being an alcoholic.
I like being an alcoholic. I don’t take credit for being an alcoholic. Because I don’t know
that I did anything to make me an alcoholic.
(1:26:54 – 1:27:04)
Some people might say you’re an alcoholic because you drank too much. I think I drank
too much because I’m an alcoholic. I have the impression that that’s what alcoholics do.
(1:27:05 – 1:27:24)
So I’m not proud of being an alcoholic, and I’m not ashamed of being an alcoholic. But
I’m mighty proud, mighty proud indeed, to be a sober member of Alcoholics Anonymous.
I think that’s just absolutely tremendous.
(1:27:25 – 1:27:48)
And I thank God for AA, and I thank you, AA, for my sobriety. God bless you all. Thank
you.
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