AA - Alcoholics Anonymous
January 14, 2024
(0:24 – 6:41)
My name is Joe W and I’m an alcoholic. It’s an honor and a privilege to be here. I’d like to
thank Tom O for chasing me down and Chad for taking care of me since I got here.
I do want to say something to people in very early recovery if you have a couple days or
a couple weeks. Boo! That’s so much fun to do that. I have a musician friend who you’d
know but I’ll keep him anonymous.
He came to our men’s group meeting in Los Angeles and he said, I don’t know if I’m an
alcoholic but I’m tired of getting pepper sprayed all the time. So I don’t know why you’re
here if you’re new. Maybe it’s a deal you made with the judge or maybe your family gave
you an ultimatum.
Maybe your job’s on the line. But if you’re here at this point in the disease, you’ve had all
the fun you’re going to have. I would advise sticking around.
I’ll tell you my story, what it was like. My father was killed in active duty in the Army Air
Corps when I was a year and a half old. He was a flight instructor for the first operational
jet.
And I would question the word operational. He was 24 years old. And my mom was like
21.
So I didn’t have a dad. My mother was very scared. And so she was really strict with me
because I was all she had.
And she would use her tone of voice to get me to do things. And if she yelled loud
enough, I would get scared. I would get scared.
In those days, there was still polio. I remember when we took the first polio vaccine,
people my age. And in those days, you know these child behavioral words, attention
deficit, obsessive compulsive, Asperger’s, autism.
I had that. They didn’t know what it was. It had not been medically figured out or
diagnosed yet.
There was just all the normal kids and me. And I was what I was just a difficult kid.
There’s one in every class.
I was all over the map. I could not finish tasks. I couldn’t express myself or my feelings.
And I really had trouble interacting. And I was scared because I knew I was different than
the other kids. I didn’t know why.
Couldn’t do mathematics, simple mathematics. I’d get confused. I couldn’t finish my
homework on time.
And so I was faking it. I was pretending nothing was wrong, doing the best I could, and
just hoping that everybody wouldn’t figure out that I didn’t know what I was doing. My
mother remarried when I was about six.
And my stepfather was wonderful to me. He took care of me good, except he was a
brilliant lawyer. And he would make me feel guilty, methodically, legally, brilliant mind.
I didn’t And I got pretty comfortable. I settled in. And my parents told me we were
moving.
(6:43 – 7:28)
And we moved to Columbus, Ohio. And there was a whole class that had been in the
class before together. And there was me.
And I had to start all over and make new friends and figure it all out. Faking it. Faking it.
And so I became really shy and just kind of looked at the ground a lot. But if I got scared,
I would act out. I would like kind of, oh, elective Tourette’s syndrome.
(7:31 – 9:16)
Just to take the focus off of me, the fact that I didn’t have a clue what was going on. And
Columbus was really good. The one thing that I was was musical.
My mother was a musician and studied classical piano. And there was always music
around. She played it night and day, and I listened to the radio night and day.
And before I even played any musical instruments, I was memorizing songs. And I knew I
was musical. That’s the one thing where I knew what I was doing.
So all of a sudden, I’m comfortable and my family moves to New York City, junior high
school. And I go from a vacant lot day in Columbus to wide open fields and kick the can
and neighborhood and running around with the other guys. I fit in pretty good with them.
And they said, well, you know, that’s just Joe, when I was silly, to a third floor, two
bedroom apartment in New York City. And I had to start all over again. The class that I
was in all knew each other.
I was different. And I had to learn everybody and a new scene. And New York City is not
Columbus, Ohio.
(9:17 – 10:04)
So I had to do that. And again, I continued. I couldn’t turn stuff in.
We’d have a science fair. And I was the only guy with no project. I forgot to tell my
parents that I even had a project.
And I couldn’t do math. Terrible at homework. I was making enough grades to pass, but
that was about it.
New York City was great, except then we moved to Montclair, New Jersey. And I had to
start all over. High school, make all new friends, start all over again.
(10:04 – 11:06)
And I learned kind of how to make people like me. Because then I felt safe. So I would be
funny or stupid or distract the teacher.
If the teacher turned around to write something on the blackboard, I’d be throwing stuff
at people and making faces. Because I was so scared. Because I was so scared.
In junior high school, I taught myself how to play guitar. Ukulele, actually. And then I got
a Sears Roebuck guitar for about $29, and I played that.
(11:09 – 11:48)
And I had got a couple chops. And we had a talent show. And when it was time to play
the talent show, I went out on stage with a trumpet player.
And I couldn’t play. I was shaking, hyperventilating, totally confused. I couldn’t play.
I was so scared. And that was a traumatic experience. Now, a lot of people have that the
first time on stage, and they never play again.
(11:50 – 14:15)
So I didn’t play for a long time, but I kept learning guitar. And in high school, I got in a
band. Except I couldn’t really play.
I stood in the back, and I looked at the floor, and I faked it. And because the other guys
drank beer, I had some beer. And I played pretty good.
And I thought to myself, wow, this is the missing thing. This is the answer. I can do it
now.
And the seed was planted. I can do it. Alcohol works.
It works great. And a couple beers, just so I could play, go on stage and play, worked for
a while. It worked good in high school, because that’s all I needed.
But the seed was planted. I was accepted at Kent State University in 1965. So I had to
start all over.
So I went there with my one guitar and my beetle boots, and I went to a dorm. And I
eventually made friends with the other musicians in the town. And that summer, I didn’t
go home.
I stayed to play. And we played downtown. And I had my beer and all.
Now, I am aware of other substances. Okay? And I’ll just talk about this once. I
discovered some other drugs in college.
(14:15 – 16:01)
We all did. My whole generation did. And one of them was cocaine.
Now, I say cocaine, because cocaine is in the same chemical family as Ritalin. Ritalin is
what they give attention deficit kids now. And I came across cocaine.
And holy smokes, I had clarity, and I could focus. You know? I really could. The Ritalin
part of it was a whole different thing.
And that was it. I have found the answer. I’m good to go.
And I started writing music at that point. Now, I’m not going to talk about other
substances anymore, but I wanted to get the Ritalin in there. So, you know.
Yeah. And in case you’re wondering, one of the things that attention deficit obsessive
compulsive people do is to go back and forth when they talk. In case you’re wondering
why I’m doing that.
So, I started writing. And Kent was great. I got in a band called the James Gang, and we
played downtown.
(16:05 – 16:36)
We played in JBs, and it was a great time for everybody. Kent was the place to go. That’s
where the girls were.
And there was a bunch of bars, and there was a bunch of bands, and people would come
and hear you. And that’s where I got to put in my 10,000 hours being on stage. And I was
writing music, even though we were doing cover songs.
(16:40 – 16:59)
And that seed sprouted. Okay. An album came out called James Gang Rides Again.
(17:02 – 20:24)
And I met a bunch of other rock and rollers. One of the scariest things that ever
happened to me was that Keith Moon of The Who decided he liked me. And we stayed up
for a week one night.
And he taught me the finer things in the art of hotel damage. One time we were riding in
his car in England, and we stopped on the way to the next gig. He had a Rolls Royce, and
we stopped at a gardening place.
And he ran in, and he bought some garden fertilizer and some charcoal. And then we
stopped at a drugstore somewhere else. And when we got to the hotel, he mixed that
stuff all up.
Right? And he put it in a prophylactic. And he flushed that down the toilet. And it went
down two floors and blew some guy’s toilet off the wall.
You know? We’d be at a bar, and I would have a drink, he would have a drink. He would
pour his drink on some guy’s head, hand it to me, and take my drink and walk away. I
met all those guys.
And guess what? We all drank brandy and ginger ale, and we were rock and rollers. We
were. Rock and roll musicians had a kind of a get out of jail free card.
As long as we paid for the hotel room, you know, we could work something out.
Sometimes I had to get across the state line before the maids actually opened the door.
And that went up to about 1970.
And I was at the shooting. And I knew Jeffrey and Allison. And Kent died that day.
It was never the same. So, I left, and I decided to leave the James Gang and get out of
Ohio. And I went to Colorado.
(20:28 – 20:35)
And got a band together, starting all over. I got married. That was a hoot.
(20:41 – 20:51)
And put a band together and started a solo career. And that did pretty good. Until I ran
out of money.
(20:54 – 21:56)
And we put some records out. But two things happened. Finally, I had a hit record.
Rocky Mountain Way came out in 1973. And that was good because I could continue to
pay the band. In 1974, my wife had a car accident going to school with my daughter.
My daughter’s name was Emma. And I was on the road. But I got a phone call.
And my daughter was in surgery for six hours. And the doctor said, we’ve done
everything we can. But she had traumatic head damage.
(21:57 – 22:06)
My wife was in a coma with broken ribs. And injured internal organs. So, I had to decide.
(22:08 – 22:55)
And the doctor said, look, we can tell you what. She ain’t going to make it. But there’s
this kid that needs corneas to see.
And there’s this other kid that needs a kidney. What do you think? And I went in and
talked to my daughter. And I made the decision to shut it down.
Because she never would have got out of bed. I got a second opinion. But she was pretty
much brain dead.
(22:56 – 23:51)
She was alive as long as the machine was on. Anyway, I did that. And some little kid
could see.
And another kid got a kidney. But I said, God, you did this. God, you did this.
And I made myself the victim. And I got mad at God. And I stayed mad at God for a long
time.
And I drank. And I had this attitude where I didn’t care about nothing. I put out an album
called So What.
(23:54 – 24:38)
And there’s a song for Emma on that. But that’s about the worst thing that can happen is
you lose a kid. And I did.
So I continued to work at my career. But I just didn’t have it. My marriage was pointless
at that point.
My wife tried to commit suicide a couple times and on and on and on. Anyway, the
marriage split up. And I just didn’t have the strength anymore to do it.
(24:38 – 24:51)
To do it. My heart wasn’t in it. And right about then, the Eagles asked me to join them.
(24:53 – 25:29)
And kind of saved my ass, because I just had lost it. I had lost momentum on being a
solo rock star. I didn’t want to do that anymore.
I was mad at God. And in 1976, Hotel California came out. And achieved an amount of
success that we never dreamed of.
(25:32 – 25:43)
And so the big run was on. We got famous. We started selling a million albums a month
for 10 months.
(25:46 – 26:46)
And we were really good too. I may not do impress you. It just was so healing for me to
be in a band again.
Instead of being the leader and being in charge and having to write everything myself. I
just got so much comfort from being in a band again. It felt really good.
And guess what? Basically, we could do anything we wanted. So we did. And the drunken
madness continued.
As long as we sold records. And it really took its toll on us. Over a five-year period, we
put out another album.
(26:50 – 28:52)
But you know what? That started off totally artistic. And it mutated. The more records we
sold, the more important we got to the business part of the music industry.
And we ended up being our own corporation. And we spent a lot of time doing business
rather than writing music together. And we started not to agree on everything.
And we all were partying heavily. And it was more important to the record company that
we give them… You know, we could have farted and burped and they would have put it
out. They just wanted it because that was their corporate corridor.
And we lost our perspective totally. And we started really not to get along. And we
started to play bad.
So we just plain stopped. In 1980. And that was my whole life.
That was my whole life, that band. And my whole life stopped. Except I kept going.
I kept going. I drank and partied like the band was still going. And from 1980 to 1994, I
started a gradual decline.
(28:54 – 30:01)
And very gradually, alcohol, which was now vodka, straight out of the bottle, and other
substances, convinced me that I couldn’t do anything without it. Not music. Anything.
I couldn’t do without it. It was the only thing that mattered. Not running out.
Vodka became my higher power. And that seed that had been planted in me in junior
high school would be flowered, except it was a big weed inside me. And it ate a hole in
me where love had been, where compassion had been, where caring about somebody
else had been.
(30:06 – 31:48)
And I made myself the victim about everything. And I was mad. And if something good
happened, it’s because I thought of that.
And if something bad happened, it’s because you didn’t listen to me. And I burned
bridges all over the place. I stopped making music.
Didn’t matter. Stopped writing. Stopped playing.
Didn’t want to play live anymore. The only thing that mattered to me was not running
out of alcohol. We played this dry county in Texas.
And I woke up and it was like Sunday morning. And there were no liquor stores open on
Sunday. And I was out.
I was out of vodka. So what I did was, well, I ended up with four hotel rooms because I
drank all the mini bars one at a time. And then I’d go get another room.
But I made it through Sunday. And my health declined. Everything declined.
I didn’t care about nothing. I started hanging out with not very nice people, you know. I
didn’t wash.
I didn’t care. Drank. Got thrown out of, I’ve been thrown out of some of the funniest
hotels in the world.
(31:51 – 32:00)
And guess what? It got worse. And I’m talking to you newcomers. It got worse.
(32:01 – 32:16)
And that was bad, but it got worse. And then it got worse than that. And then it got
worse beyond your wildest imagination.
(32:18 – 32:41)
And I always thought I had that card in my back pocket where if I really needed to, I
could, I could stop. And I realized that card didn’t work. Vodka had a, vodka had a queen
and I had a 10.
(32:43 – 33:48)
And I ended up this godless, hateful thing. And the reason I’m here is because I hit
bottom before I OD’d. A lot of my buddies OD’d before they hit bottom.
And I ran with some, some good ones. Most of my friends are dead from those days.
Pellucci, boy, was he fun.
One time we went to a restaurant in Chicago and he wanted to show me Chicago
because he’s so proud of being from Chicago. So we went to this restaurant and they
wouldn’t let us in because we had jeans on. And he talked to the owner and talked to the
concierge and, you know, don’t you know who I am on Saturday Night Live? And offered
to let us in.
(33:48 – 33:58)
You know, $600, $600 bills. And you can’t get in with jeans on. And we weren’t even
hungry.
(34:03 – 34:53)
But John said, I know what to do. I know what to do. Come on, come on.
So we got in the car and we went to some all night place in Chicago, like a truck stop.
And the next thing I know is we’re in the alley and he’s got black spray paint and he’s
painting my jeans black. And I said, John, what are you doing? He said, shut up, shut up,
shut up.
Here, now you paint me. And we got in. Except they were like these, these one of a kind,
like, I don’t know, Queen Anne period chairs that had needlepoint on them and stuff.
(34:54 – 35:11)
And when we got up, our butts were jeans again and the needlepoint was all black. So
we had to leave fast. And there’s great stories like that, you know, I remember those.
(35:13 – 36:38)
But here I am, he’s dead. And here I am. And I’m this godless, hateful thing.
Now, that’s what it was like. That’s how I came in. Okay.
I didn’t care about nothing. I weighed maybe 140. I didn’t have a license.
I didn’t have a car. I didn’t care about anything. I had sores all over my face.
I didn’t really live anywhere. I didn’t do music anymore. Nobody in the music business
would have anything to do with me.
And the guys in the Eagles, Don and Glenn, came to me and they said, and this was
1994, 1993 actually, they said, well, you’re going to die. But we’re thinking about putting
the Eagles back together. We can’t do it without you.
And we can’t do it unless you’re sober. What do you think? And I said, well, if anything’s
going to get me sober, it would be that. So I’ll sure try.
(36:38 – 36:46)
That’s the best reason I had. That’s the only reason I had. Except I knew I was going to
die.
(36:47 – 37:00)
From my dead friends, I saw me right at the end for them. And I knew I’d had it. So I
went into rehab.
(37:02 – 37:12)
In February, February 28th in 1994. And I didn’t like anything. I didn’t like anybody.
(37:12 – 37:36)
I didn’t trust anybody. I didn’t trust God. And I thought you guys were like some cult, you
know, like, like, sold books at the airport.
Those people. I thought you guys were just some kind of weird people. I didn’t, I was
afraid of straight people.
(37:37 – 38:59)
I was afraid of sober people. I, you know, I didn’t know what sober was. I thought, this is
the end of the world.
I’ll never be able to play guitar again. I’ll never be funny. Life is over.
I’m just going to wear a tie and go to work every day and come home and go to bed. So I
stayed because maybe the band might get together. I was supposed to go in for like 10
days and I was going to change my socks.
I was going to like gain a little weight, do my laundry, get some people off my back, you
know, and then maybe go out and pretend that, well, maybe I can just get back to the
beer like junior high school, knowing full well that that wasn’t what was going to happen.
So after about 10 days, I decided to stay longer. You know why? I can’t say my life got
better, but my life stopped getting worse.
(39:11 – 39:19)
So I went to some meetings. I went to some men’s meetings. I was too distracted at
mixed meetings.
(39:21 – 39:48)
Well, I went to men’s meetings and I met these guys, these old crusty guys with 30 and
40 years who all bet 10 bucks I would never make it. They lost a lot of money. But I
listened to them because they were funny, you know, and they had lives and they made
sense.
(39:50 – 39:58)
And that’s what I wanted. That’s what I wanted to do. And I said, I don’t know about this
God thing.
(39:59 – 40:49)
And they said, well, it ain’t going to hit you like a bolt of lighting. You’re not going to just
wake up one day and hi, I’m God and everything’s great. That’s not going to happen.
God will help you if he is sought, not found. So seek him. Ask him for help.
I never incurred to me. Say, okay, God, well, I met you, but you know, I’m in a little bind
here. So I’m going to pretend that you’re God and that I can actually talk to you and we’ll
see how that goes.
(40:52 – 42:17)
And I kept going to these meetings with the men and they all knew my name and I knew
their names and I felt good at the meetings. And I discovered that the worst, most
embarrassing, degrading, awful story that I had, somebody could top. Yeah.
And if something happened to me that made me really want to drink, somebody in there
had been through it and knew what to do. And that happened numerous times. And I
realized after all those years, I am not unique, individual, one of a kind, different than all
the other kids, only me, the exception, I’m an alcoholic.
(42:27 – 42:55)
And for the first time, I was in a group where I actually felt I belong. I had a home group.
And so I stayed, stayed around and I started reading the book and discovered the steps,
started working the steps.
(42:57 – 43:10)
And I got to step three and I thought, well, I’m good. I’m good. And my sponsor said,
nope.
(43:13 – 43:29)
Step three, sobriety is nice, but you do them all. And I managed over a period of time to
do the steps. I did.
(43:31 – 44:28)
And what happened to me is what it says in the book. I had a profound spiritual
awakening. And that is, that thing, that godless, hateful thing that I had become wasn’t
me.
That was vodka. I was this little scared kid that had given all his power away for all those
years. And vodka had been my higher power.
(44:29 – 45:12)
And whatever vodka said we were doing, that’s what we were doing. And it’s amazing
what can be a good idea when you’ve been up for three days. But I did it.
I took my power back and I asked God for help. I said, I’m going to go for it. Maybe you
really are.
Maybe you really are. I’m not mad at you anymore. Things are okay.
(45:15 – 47:11)
And I took my power back. Now, right away, I’m that scared little kid. I’m afraid to go out
on stage.
So one day at a time, I had to learn how to do that. And eventually, I started being funny
again. Everything I had to learn one day at a time, all of it.
And consecutive days of sobriety allows you to get that kind of stuff done. And gradually,
one day at a time, God gave me my life back. So, I’ve been sober 24 years.
Thank you. And this much I know, okay? Step 11 is through prayer and meditation, we
try to improve our conscious contact with our higher power. And I have a higher power
now.
And I met some Buddhist monks along the way, and they helped me with the meditation
part. And if you stay here right now, and that’s conscious contact, you’re here right now.
And God is here with us.
(47:19 – 47:47)
You can go back into the past when you’re driving in this traffic, and you can dig around
in a pile of wreckage with a shovel. And you can come up with something that you’ll
revisit, make yourself the victim of. Just get a copper little attitude, and have a think on
it.
(47:51 – 47:58)
That son of a bitch. And he’s probably dead. They don’t care.
(48:00 – 48:26)
What are you doing? You’re not conscious. You spent all that time in the past, which
doesn’t exist. You’re not conscious.
And you’re enabling your alcoholic mind. You’re giving your alcoholic mind the green
light to take some of your power. And you end up mad.
(48:28 – 49:00)
And five minutes before, you were here now. Or you can go into the future. And the day
after tomorrow, I got this.
Oh, my God. It’s going to be horrible. And you can think of the worst case scenario,
which I do, and make yourself the victim, and write a whole screenplay about the day
after tomorrow.
(49:01 – 49:05)
So you’re just, that’s all you are. Oh, my God, the day after tomorrow. Oh, my God.
(49:06 – 49:28)
What’s going to happen? Oh, what could happen? What could be worse? Oh, I know.
You’re unconscious. The future doesn’t exist.
You’re unconscious. You’re sitting there like a car in the park with the motor running.
You’re not here now.
(49:30 – 50:20)
Because here now, we’re all okay. And God is here with us. And that is the key to
consecutive days of good sobriety.
Staying close to the program, helping another alcoholic, calling your sponsor, doing it.
When yesterday happened, it happened now. When tomorrow happens, it will happen
now.
(50:21 – 50:31)
It will never be not now. Stay here. You’re okay.
(50:39 – 50:51)
Thank you for listening. I’m grateful to God, the program, and the Fellowship of
Alcoholics Anonymous for my life in sobriety today.
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