The bus driver

This morning someone asked me to explain what I was doing at a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous. She said that I looked like a regular guy and couldn't imagine me being anything like her. I gave her the three minute run down on my life and then I went home. I went home with my memories. I went home and remembered. I was very insecure as a child. With two alcoholics raising me it is no wonder that I never learned "normalcy". One of my first memories was of a bus trip with my Mom. She got all dressed up looking so pretty with her special hair do and her red lipstick. We were going to go to North Park shopping. I was three or four years old. It was an exciting day. Mom never drove a car and to take the big giant bus was a real treat. So we waited and soon the bus came and the next thing I know we were under the North Park sign.  We went to several shops and Mom bought some stuff. Then we were back waiting for the bus. Under Mom's big grey coat she hid a quart of Gallo port wine. It was always Gallo Port for her. While we waited I remember her taking some sips from that bottle. Then we were on the bus going home. Mom was stumbling down the aisle. She fell in front of the bus driver spilling her purse. The wine bottle rolled on the decking. Mom was lying on the floor and not able to talk. The driver was suddenly yelling at her. Get off this bus you drunk. I was busy picking up the coins that fell while everything started to go in slow motion. The driver poked Mom and she started to rise dropping her purse. Then she just kind of rolled down the steps of the bus landing in the gutter. I told the mean bus driver to wait, that's my Mom. He said get the hell off of his bus. I grabbed the purse and the coins I could hold stepping off of the bus but trying to not step on Mom. The bus doors closed with the sound of air rushing out. I grabbed my Mom's hand and tried to move her. The big tire was right next to her head and started to move. I panicked because I thought the bus would kill her and there was nothing I could do about it but get out of the way myself. Suddenly the bus was gone. I shook Mom and tried to get her to wake up to no avail. Someone came out and picked my Mom up and asked me where we lived. He carried her home a block away depositing her on the living room couch. I cried. I had torn a part of her coat liner off while trying to get her away from the bus. That piece of silk liner became my la. It was several years later after much cajoling that I was finally able to give up that la and stop sucking my thumb. I don't think anyone in the family ever knew about that day. Mom would never admit that anything happened and I could not express my fear, no my terror until I had been sober for a few years.
That interaction shaped my life in many ways that I could not realize for years to come. Firstly I learned that I could not trust my Mom. Secondly I learned that I could not make things better by yelling at the bus driver, when I got mad at him, things only got worse. I attribute a lot of my attitudes about life from that fateful day. I distrust authority (bus driver), I am not worthy of being listened to (bus driver). I am not worthy of love because if Mommy loved me those things would have never happened. I had no idea of how much power alcohol had on an alcoholic until much later in my life. However I became my Mom. I did what she did and more. I sometimes think today that I was trying to relive that day of the bus ride when I drank and I was trying to make that day come out OK during my whole drinking career. That never happened. Instead I just did the same thing to my family and wives until I finally got sober and began to heal.  I drank for 25 years. Today I have 24 years of sobriety and I can still hear the sound of the bus pulling away narrowly missing crushing my Mom. Today I am still healing. There are many, many more adventures in my history. Thank God I am sober.

I thought this would be fun

I went to the morning meeting today with expectations. I thought I would laugh and tell silly stories. Instead Jan came in crying and I remembered what had been said about her daughter. Her daughter was 26. Jan shared first. Her daughter had been in the rooms with Jan for a while but just could not get the program. Saturday the daughter was arrested and placed in jail. Jan said she was grateful knowing that at least she knew where her daughter was. Jan wished that this time perhaps her daughter would get sober. That was not to be. Someone bailed her daughter out of jail and by the end of the day the daughter was dead. She died of an overdose. Jan shared the story and not a dry eye was in the house. It was not fun, it was not joyful, it was real.
Jan's experience brought back so many memories for me. When I attended my first meeting there was a guy huddled in the corner, sitting on the well worn carpet. He was crying. I paid no attention to him. Instead I was worried all about myself. Fifteen years later that guy was me. Me wife died of brain cancer and I used the power of the group of Alcoholics Anonymous, I used the prayers of those people to support me and help me though my pain. You see Jan was like me and I like Jan and we were both the guy crying on the floor, huddled in the corner. Without AA I don't think the three of us would have remained sober. Without Alcoholics Anonymous we would have returned to our basic selves, drunks unable to meet life on life's terms. Today I have real friends because I told them that I was hurting. They put their arms around me and loved me back to life.

What is wrong with us?

I heard a story at a meeting yesterday that explained everything one needs to know about addiction. The 40 year old guy took his 90 token. A 90 day token is an award for having ninety continuous days of sobriety.  That is a huge thing for a person who has been addicted for years and years. John was a Iraq war veteran. He was a sergeant, a leader of men, a combat hardened warrior.  Then the Army released him. He went home to live with Mom until he got a job. He had continuing nightmares of the time in service, IED's, burned bodies and comrades who were lost while under his leadership. They said he has PTSD. He found a solution in alcohol. Within a year he had switched addictions and was now on Heroin. The Hero was out stealing to pay for the forgetfulness that came with each shot. But it demanded more, more and more. One day he left his door ajar at home and his Mom looked in to see blood everywhere and her son nearly dead. The ambulance came. The doctor said he had 7% of his heart functions left and that he would probably die. He continued to live and he spent one month in intensive care. Four months later he was released to a rehab hospital where he learned to walk and to feed himself again. After one year of therapy he returned to his heart doctor. The doctor told him that his heart had returned to 70% function and John cried. He cried not because he lived, not because his body had been restored or that his heart was basically normal. John cried because he then knew that he could then use heroin again.
An addict will do anything to return to the needle. There is no learning, no recovery and no life if an addict does not seek help. Thank God that today John took 90 days clean time, the most time he has had in years. But John could not have stopped on his own. The doctors warnings were not sufficient to make John stop. His Mothers tears could not convince John that he should not use again. He had to go out and destroy some more relationships and do some more damage before he could start clean time again. John had to find others that had the same problems. John had to get to a 12 step program and start to work the steps for without the steps he would surely use again. John found out that he had a spiritual malady and his only hope was a spiritual solution that can be brought on by working the 12 steps. Tonight John is a hero again. A hero with 90 1/2 days clean time. Congratulations.

Amazing double rainbow

Living a spiritual life or dying drunk is not always an easy alternative for an alcoholic. I had to put my dog down. Chalupa was rescued from certain death from the animal shelter. She was a mean little Chiwawa, German Shepard mix. She used to bite me when my wife first brought her home. Everytime I tried to pet her she would snarl and nip my hand. That lasted a long time. My wife was diagnosed with brain cancer and died four months later. During my wifes' last days they brought a hospital bed into the house and Patti laid down on that bed never to rise again. When Patti laid down Chalupa also laid at Patti's feet on that bed. Patti took her last breath as her family recited the serenity prayer all around her. Then Chalupa got up from Patti's feet walk up to her cheek and licked Patti's face. Then Chalupa jumped down from the  bed and became my dog, for awhile that is. My roommate Ann moved in with me and Chalupa became her dog instantly. Fickel little dog she was. But Ann fed her every day and slept with Chalupa every night. They loved each other and when Ann worked

 Chalupa belonged to me. We went to thousands of AA meetings together. Chalupa made many alcoholics smile and laugh. Then she got old and I had to put her down. It was hard. I had her cremated so her ashes could be scattered in the ocean with Patti's. This morning Ann and I took the ashes to Sunset Cliffs. The sun was not yet up. I had dozens of roses and flowers cut from my garden and we placed the petals under her ashes as we said the serenity prayer overlooking the sea. The sky wept, just a misty light rain that is so unusual for this hot time of the year in San Diego. We tossed her ashes toward the sea but many of them refused to depart, instead falling at our feet and all around the cliffs. We cried. Chalupa was a force in my life, she told me where to go and when to go there. Now she was gone like her rescuer. We left the cliffs tears in our eyes knowing she had gone on to a much better place. Then I noticed a rainbow. Now just a rainbow but a double rainbow seemingly coming from where the ashes were placed with so much love. I know they are both up there celebrating the new life. I can chose to live my life in the raindrops or I can choose to live in the double rainbow knowing that there is something else after this life on earth. I choose rainbows, I choose love, I choose sobriety.

Post Number 1 Obsession

I am just an alcoholic with 24 years of meeting adventures. I go to AA meetings almost every day. Every time I go I hear new "stuff" that really needs documentation. Like yesterday when a friend told of hiding her vodka in plain sight. She loved to wash dishes and was always in the kitchen. So she would fill her glass with vodka then place silverware in the glass as if it was ready to be washed. No one ever bothered her "dirty" glass and she was able to drink to her hearts content. Many of us who are real alcoholics found a need to hide the booze thinking no one would ever find out that we were drinking. Even when we were slurring our words or passing out drunk, we would still think that no one knew. Drinking was our little secret. I think the art of getting away with secret drinking is almost as addicting as the actual act of drinking.  I once heard a story of someone who hide their booze in the kitty litter box because no one would ever think of looking there! I never hid my alcohol. I was proud to be a drinker. I was just like my Dad. Booze bottles everywhere. One time my second wife was trying to show me how sick I was with my drinking. She was yelling about something then suddenly threw open the refrigerator door and said, "Not everyone has three bottles of tequila in the fridge!" My reply was "I guess most people don't know how good tequila is when it is cold." That made perfect sense to me at the time but today with 24 years sobriety, I realize just how sick I was. I was obsessed by alcohol. Worse than that for me, I didn't even know I was obsessed, I thought my actions were normal. Thank God I found my way into Alcoholics Anonymous. The program and the people in AA showed me that there was a better way to live. They told me that if I just did not drink one day at a time, went to meetings and worked the steps that I would never have to drink again. When I heard those words I thought, "I'll never GET to drink again". Today I am so grateful that the obsession to drink has abated. Today I am grateful that I have found a Power Greater than myself that allows me to live alcohol free.