Long Day Ends...

We are experiencing a cold rain tonight.  It so evokes memories of winter in the South. 

"It even smells like winter," I told my father standing out at his car a moment ago. 

Today started out interesting.  I needed twenty dollars to pay for my and Wanda's lunch.  I headed over to find mom still in the bed.

"Can I get twenty dollars?" I pleaded. 

"No!" my mother said point blankly.  

I put on my best whiny teenager persona and voice.

"Please? Please? I want to take Wanda out to eat."

Mom usually gives in if I pester her enough.  She rolled over, pulled the covers over her head, and told me to get it out of her purse. 

It was a standard AA meeting.  Wanda I both talked of how AA in the Valley has just about died due to one very overbearing and patriarchal man who thinks he runs the program.  They used to have meetings every night,  Now, it is down to two times a week.

Wanda, as I had expected, was tired and didn't eat much.  I pigged out with two quarter pounders w/cheese and a large fries. 

"You remind me of my son in Germany," Wanda told me. "Now, he was a bottomless pit and still is."

I took Wanda home and then had to come home and get ready for work.  We've bought a new building next door to the pharmacy that is going to be for our home healthcare operations.   It is my job to get my office moved and set up.  That is what I did today.

Have I told you how glad I am to be home with my Maggins, my tobacco pipe, and mugs of sweet, milky coffee?  I hear raindrops pitter pattering on my window sill.  Gonna sleep nice tonight.  

Frantic and Harried...

My special AA friend, Wanda, called me tonight.

"Where have you been?  You haven't been going to AA!"

I have spurts of activity as far as AA goes.  I will get really interested for awhile then they start that higher power stuff and totally lose me.  I've been using the AA group as a whole as my higher power.

"You only have to stay sober today!" Wanda exclaimed and then hung up.  She sounded so frantic and harried.  I then got to worrying about her so I called her back.

"Go with me tomorrow to the lunch meeting, please?" I asked her.  "I will drive and then we will get lunch at McDonalds."

"It's a date," Wanda then said and we hung up our phones.   

Wanda sounded like my mother tonight when she was on one of her manic highs.  I'm worried about her.  She has to work all night and will be tired tomorrow for a meeting.  I look forward to seeing her, though. 

Centered...

I went to an early morning AA meeting today.  I thought I wasn't going to make it.  I have trouble with day to day tasks that most people take for granted.  I shed a few tears in the shower trying to will myself through it.  Shaving was laborious and cringe inducing. 

Wanda was there this morning.  She had just gotten off her nightly shift at the hospital.  She regaled me in tales of the various patients that came through last night.

"You wouldn't believe some of the characters we see," she told me. "Drunks all night doing stupid stuff."

"Kinda makes you glad you are sober.  Doesn't it?" I asked her.

She agreed and did something completely to my surprise.  She gave me a hug out of nowhere. 

"Thanks," I said blushing.

"You looked like you needed it," Wanda replied.

I wanted the hug to last forever, but it was just a short embrace.   I've always been a very touchy feely person despite my social anxieties.  I love to shake hands and grasp shoulders.  I realize some people are uncomfortable with that.  But Wanda's hug was the best thing that happened to me today.  There was a spring in my step and a feeling of bravado in my voice for the rest of the day.   

Dinner for One...

"Come on!  You can go!" Wanda pleaded with me over the phone.  "We will have a great time!"

My hands were shaking.  I was furiously smoking a Doral Light. 

"Sorry, I can't," I told her. "I just feel unwell today."

Unwell meant suffering from social anxiety and the assorted phobias.

"Well, I will quit bugging you, but I wish you would come," Wanda said at one feeble last attempt to get me to go and then we hung up our phones.

I slumped deep down in my sofa's cushions and sighed a sigh of relief.  The last thing I could take today was being social at an AA cookout.   The meetings are hard enough on me. 

Many hours have passed and I have what my grandmother always called, "ants in your pants."  That on-edge antsy feeling associated with boredom.   Now, I am wishing I would have least gone in my car and tried the cookout.  That way, I could have left if I felt uncomfortable.  

Addictionologist...

There has been this character going around the local AA meetings claiming to be an "addictionologist."  I chuckled when I overheard two AA members talking about it today.  Sadly, there is no easy cure for addiction.  It is a complete change of lifestyle.  At least, that is the only thing I have found that works and that's what AA does -- it reprograms you. 

Wanda and I were talking about it today after our meeting.

"Some people have all the gall," she said after pulling on her cigarette.

"Sadly, people will believe them," I replied, worried somebody would be duped into buying whatever they were peddling.

"He'll get run out of town soon," Wanda replied to my worries. 

This morning we took Maggie to the Veterinarian for her annual checkup.  It is not too often Maggie goes for a road trip and she was blissfully unaware of where we were going as I drove us to the edge of town.  She did good, though, and just shook she was so frightened.  Maggie has settled comfortably back into her usual routines and is no worse for wear.   

Coy Little Pills...

"Alcoholics can't take any addictive substances," Wanda told me on the phone a moment go. "You're playin' with fire son."

"I don't know what to do," I replied, lost. "The quality of my life was at it's lowest point.  I couldn't go any lower."

"Are you going to take it?" she asked.

"I already have," I replied. "I've taken one today."

"It will only lead to you drinking again," she replied tersely.

Sigh!  I told her goodbye after she told me to keep in touch.  I stammered into my den to pick up my other pill and took it.  I am at the point where I will gamble with this pill to feel better.  I felt so badly.  Maybe it is just the alcoholic in me talking, but I feel so much better.  How can something that makes you feel so well again be so bad?  These pills are scary and coy.  

The Pall of Sobriety...

"You look like a different man these days,"  Wanda told me at a lunch time AA meeting today. "Your color.  You demeanor.  Your confidence.  You just seem so full of life."

"Thank you," I modestly replied as I shyly looked at my shoes.  I never was much one for compliments. 

Wanda works third shift at the hospital and was so very tired.  She told me she couldn't wait to get home to snuggle with her many dogs and to climb into bed.  "Prime drinking time!" she said with a laugh of her mornings.  "I had to give up my long love affair with my old boyfriend, Jose Cuervo." 

I have found myself enamored with her lately -- often going to familiarly haunted AA meetings just so I can see her.  I am walking down the wrong beaten and trod path, though.  She is old enough to be my mother.   She is a very complex woman -- full of mystery.  I guess that is why she is so alluring.   I always did love a challenge.

There is always an awkward moment between us as she always wants to go get lunch.  I always make up some lame excuse cause I don't have any money and would hate for her to have to pay.  I think she takes it personally as if I don't want to spend time with her.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  I would love to lavish her with meals from firm bars like Applebee's or Chili's.   I had the grand total of four dollars in my wallet today, though.  Enough for a Happy Meal for one minus the toy they give you. 

Today's meeting we discussed the steps to sobriety -- the much vaunted twelve steps.   "Let go and let God," one member told me when I talked of my own struggles following the steps.  That concept seemed so foreign to me, though.  Let go and let God.   As if I had no control over my own destiny.  I have often struggled with AA for the fact that it seems mystical higher powers take away the urge to drink and not through the own volition of the alcoholic.  There seems to be a lack of accountability, but the twelve steps are all about accountability and growth in stark contrast.  I guess I will just have to let go and let God.  God help me!  I feel like a duck out of water!  I feel just about as awkward as I would if I told the AA group I was an atheist.  Imagine the cold, hard stares!

Of Pancakes and Chicken Plates...

I had two tickets to a local church's Memorial Day barbeque chicken dinner.  I brought the plates home and me and Maggie devoured them.   They were so delicious!

This morning was a pancake breakfast at the AA meeting hall.  I wasn't going to go, but Wanda enticed me into going with her.

"Quit being so anti-social," she said. "You will have a good time!"

There was a speaker's meeting after breakfast and we both stayed and listened to a wonderful speaker. 

"I was always drunk on planes," the businessman said.  "There were times I don't even remember flying and getting to another city.  How's that for scary?"

We all do crazy things when drinking irresponsibly.  I broke my shoulder and arm on a drunken motorcycle ride to go argue with my ex-wife.  I don't remember the ride all the way from home to up by that old cotton mill. I was in a blackout.   I came to laying in the grass with my helmet still on.  It was sleeting and a policeman was standing over me.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

"I'm drunk!" I blurted out.

He took me on to county jail to spend the next two days in pain.  It took a lot of physical therapy to get my arm and shoulder back in shape.  I still have little strength in it and can't even clip my fingernails with that hand.  I have to get Dad or Mom to do it.  

Noontime AA...

I went to another noontime AA meeting.  It was so great seeing familiar faces and hearing familiar sayings.   I should have been going to these meetings all along. 

Wanda was there again.  I find myself drawn to her like a familiar old blanket to soothe and comfort.  We talked a long time after the meeting about our lives and where we want to go.   She is a nurse and stays busy these days.  I, on the other hand, have far too much time on my hands.  I jokingly told her I would trade with her any day.  She hugged my neck and said, "hang in there, kiddo." 

AA Goings On...

My old AA friend, Wanda, invited me to an AA meeting with her today.  I was overjoyed at her call being very lonesome today.   They say to practice H.A.L.T in AA.  Never let yourself get too hungry, angry, lonely, and tired.  I certainly was lonely and tired, and possibly hungry when she rang.

"I've got a half a year sober," I told her as she drove her old Ford Crown Victoria towards Lagrange.

"You're amazing," she said. "I can remember when you first started going to AA and I would have never guessed you would have stayed sober for so long."

A lot of miracles happen in AA.  You see them all the time and today's meeting reminded me of why I need to go more often.  It is my only chance at socializing besides work these days.   I am so hungry for human contact of any kind.  So lonesome it is painful.

Mom bought my groceries yesterday.  There was never a more sweeter sight than when she pulled up in front of my house.  I was stir crazy I was so lonely.  Maggie was overjoyed as well. 

"I love you," I told her. "And thank you for staying awhile.  I get so tired of being alone."

She held my hand and everything was okay in my world for about an hour.  

Big Blessings...

Wanda was telling me this morning on the drive back about her deepest regrets. 

"My children," she told me. "I put them through hell with my drinking."

She said her son was in the Army and stationed in Germany.  He will not talk to her.  Her daughter is also in AA and trying to stay sober with several young children of her own.

"I was like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde," Wanda told me. "You put some tequila in me and I turned into an abusive bitch of a mother.  I was mean, too, and would fight and abuse my family."

"It is a sickness," I replied. "I reckon it is very similar to insanity.  Believe me.  I know."

My ex-wife couldn't have children and I think that was a blessing in disguise.  I never put children of mine through the hell that can be mental illness and addiction. 

Will I ever have kids?  Hopefully, not until I have many years of sobriety and recovery from schizophrenia.  I am not heeding the alarm of my biological clock.  Maggie shall be my furkid.   Now, if I can just keep her from digging out of the fence.  It is like a teenage daughter sneaking out a window late at night to be with a boyfriend. 

Dysfunctional Souls...

Went to another morning AA meeting.  Wanda had called me and asked me to go with her.  It was in a town with meetings I had never attended.  The Episcopal Church loomed large in my windshield as we pulled into the parking lot.  I had to ask a few passersby what room the meeting was in.

Inside the church smelled of burning candles and floral arrangements.  I grabbed Wanda's hand as we found the room and sat down.  Soon "Everybody ready for a meeting?" rang out in the fellowship hall. 

Wanda was excited and giddy today.  She kept telling me how good it was to be sober.  I responded by telling her my excitement as well.  To take joy out of life and to not have to have a drink to do it is amazing. 

We left and I drove Wanda back to her dilapidated single-wide trailer home.  Wanda's three big dogs jubilantly wagging their tails at her arrival. I realized how a lot alike me and Wanda are -- two dysfunctional souls whose lives hung on their dogs lives as we try to stay sober.   Two souls taking it one day at a time if only by the grace of God.       

Just Like Defaming Christ...

Lunchtime found me in Lagrange at an AA meeting.  My friend Wanda was there and was so anxious for us to talk afterwards.  The thoroughly routine meeting ended and we left.  

"You've got a sponsor, right?" she asked me as we were walking to our cars.

"No," I replied sheepishly. "I have never managed to keep one."

"Wasn't Philip your temporary sponsor?" Wanda then asked.

"Yeah, but Philip is an AA asshole!" I quipped.

You should've seen the look on Wanda's face.  It looked almost as if I had defamed the name of Christ.

"He was just a little too AA for me," I said backpeddling with kinder words.

Wanda left and I got in my car to drive home.  I kept thinking why I had never gotten a sponsor.  I won't call them for one thing.  My social anxieties get in the way.  It would take a very forceful and forward sponsor to bring me out of my shell.    

Reunion

It was a quiet drive to AA -- the road ahead bereft of cars and laid out in front of me like a dark and winding snake in the waning light of dusk.  I was content to listen to the radio -- pop music out of Columbus.  All popular music now has that R & B influence I dislike and find so distasteful, but I listened anyway.  I pulled up in the parking lot of Self Help Harbor to find no other cars.  "Were they having a meeting?" I wondered.  It seems as if in a matter of minutes cars poured into the parking lot.  I saw a familiar old Ford Crown Victoria I hadn't seen in ages.  It was unmistakable.  It was my old AA friend Wanda.  Fate and AA had brought us together again.  

"How are you?" she asked as she gave me a hug after walking to my car.

"Fine," I replied. "It is so good to see you. I haven't seen you in ages."

"I've been back out," Wanda said which was AA-speak for drinking again.  "I've come back though.  I'm a week sober."

"Today is my 75th day sober," I told her proudly.

"I will be honest with you," she said as she laughed. "I never thought you would ever get sober for so long.  You were pretty messed up for awhile there."

It was a routine AA meeting.  We started the meeting with "How It Works" and "The Twelve Steps and Traditions."  We all talked meanderingly about having an attitude of gratitude which was so relevant to my recent train of thinking.  Being thankful for what I have for the first time in my life has been such an important step in my recovery.

"Rarely have we seen a person fail who has thoroughly followed our path. Those who do not recover are people who will not completely give themselves to this simple program, usually men and women who are constitutionally incapable of being honest with themselves. There are such unfortunates. They are not at fault; they seem to have been born that way. They are naturally incapable of grasping and developing a manner of living which demands rigorous honesty. Their chances are less than average. There are those too, who suffer from grave emotional and mental disorders, but many of them do recover if they have the capacity to be honest." 

Those words from "How it Works" rang in my head far after the meeting had ended.  "There are those too, who suffer from grave emotional and mental disorders."  That magic combination of psych meds, AA meetings, sobriety, and honesty has served to so change my life drastically these past few months. 

"You know I had a crush on you," Wanda told me after the meeting as we walked to our cars. "I am old enough to be your mother.  I so wanted you to do well."

"I am doing well," I replied. "I am doing better these days than I have for my whole life."

"And you give me hope that I, too, can stay sober," Wanda said.

"Attitude of gratitude," I said echoing tonight's meeting as I warmly smiled and gave Wanda a heartfelt hug.  "I am so very glad to see you again."

We both agreed to do lunch soon.  I got in my car and pointed it down the long and dark street away from Self Help Harbor.  I had the biggest smile on my face and was just brimming to the rim with hope.  This program truly is magical and can change lives.  They say once you go to AA then you will never be able to drink the same way again.  I believe it.  Attitude of gratitude.  May I always have it.  Good night.  

Breakfast with Alcoholics Anonymous

Went to a breakfast A.A. meeting. It was Rosa's idea having talked to one of my A.A. friends on the phone last night. Rosa cooked a delicious sour cream, cheddar, and hash brown casserole to carry with us. It was an open meeting so she could go even though she is not an alcoholic. It was a pleasant meal with plenty of homemade biscuits, scrambled eggs, bacon, and sausage. Rosa's casserole was a hit and there was only a small amount left to carry home. I felt comforted by seeing my old A.A. friends and even my friend, Wanda, was there, having a day off from working at the hospital. She has been having struggles with drinking as well and that is why I haven't seen her lately. When A.A. members tend to just disappear then you know that are "back out" as they say in the groups.

"I've heard you've been struggling a lot lately," Wanda told me after the meeting. "Your girlfriend just said something to me about it."

"The only time I feel well or okay is after drinking a six pack of beer," I told her. "I feel like a hopeless drunk."

"Just don't drink today, okay?" She said. "One day at a time. Let's do this together. Read the stories in the Big Book about the hopeless drunks that got sober. They were so much worse off than you and they got sober for years until they died."

I agreed to not drink just for today and promised my friend that I would try and stay sober to be there for her. Wanda told me she had a slip up as well and got drunk and said terrible things to her daughter.

"I destroyed years of built up trust in just one night," she told me forlornly. "All for a bottle of Cuervo Gold. I don't think my daughter will ever forgive me. Tequila always did make me mean. It seems I have to constantly remind myself why I can't drink."

I gave her a big hug and told her to hang in there. I am so glad I don't have children as I would have put them through hell over the years with my drinking and crazy ways. God works in mysterious ways and I think he worked wonders when he made me a very asexual creature -- no rug rat's lives to destroy in the process. I was never much one to sleep around.

After the meeting, was my shot for my schizophrenia. I have been afraid of driving lately and Rosa drove us down to my father's pharmacy to pick up my injection and to go to the doctor's office. I got my digital camera ordered while I was down there with my father's American Express card and it will be here next week. I can't wait to take pictures again and videos. It was a $380 dollar camera so it should take awesome pictures. I had to borrow the money from my father to be able to afford it much to my chagrin.

Canon 650 IS digital camera

Tonight is our usual Thursday night hotdog supper I host for my mother and Rosa. Rosa went by the grocery store a moment ago and got some delicious looking Hebrew National 1/4 pound hot dog wieners. Even after a big breakfast, my stomach is already grumbling and it is going to be a long wait until tonight. One of my favorite foods is a dog with mustard on a toasted bun piled high with kraut.

Felt so frustrated by the whole drinking, alcoholic thing and told Rosa about it after she had arrived back home.

"Why can't I just have two or three beers like a normal person?" I decreed. "I just want to be normal and average."

"You're not a normal person," Rosa said, plainly. "You're an alcoholic."

I get so tired of labels. Alcoholic. Mentally ill. Bulimic. Schizophrenic. Food addict. Bi-polar. The list could go on and on. I wanted to lash out and it is a shame you tend to lash out at those you most love when this happens.

"You can't drink for the same reason I can't smoke rock," Rosa finally told me after my little temper tantrum. "We get carried away. We can't stop once we get started."

I sat sulking on the couch as Rosa held me, frustrated. It doesn't help that I have a $269 dollar check coming in the next few days that I consider frivolous "play money" -- the money from last month's Google Adsense revenue. All my bills are paid. The car has a full tank of gas. I have plenty of food in my pantry and fridge. Two cartons of cigarettes. And I could just get rip roaring drunk for a few weeks with the only repercussions being the damage to the relationships I have by neglect. I sometimes wish I worked, as I would think that would help moderate these urges. I tend to have far too much freedom and free time. I would be too tired after working all day to even think of drinking and would just watch t.v. and go to bed.

The deep inner struggle is the hardest part -- that "stinkin' thinkin'" as they say in A.A. I put up this big charade that everything is okay for my family and Rosa when I am two steps from just saying, "to hell with it all," and walking away in a drunken stupor. Somehow, amazingly, I manage to keep it together everyday. For my loved ones. For Rosa. For Maggie. I've been pretending all my life really, since I was that young teenager hiding in that crawlspace in my bedroom drinking a bottle of wine as I smoked cigarettes. I've been hiding and struggling ever since -- putting on a brave face for a world the completely exhausts and exasperates me. For a daily mental grind I sometimes wonder if I can keep up.

Large in Girth and Heart

She's a large woman in both girth and heart. I have come to love her dearly these many months I have been attending Alcoholics Anonymous. Brown locks of hair cascade down her face framing her green eyes. Rosy cheeks bounce when she laughs. Her green nurse scrubs make her look professional and caring. She has a sensuously alluring and smoky voice from years of cigarettes that reminds me of Audrey Hepburn. We are having a quiet lunch at a local seafood restaurant. She is enjoying the seafood buffet, while I begrudgingly try to enjoy a bowl of chowder with a side salad. Being on a diet sucks sometimes.

"You sure you're not drinking?" she asks over plates of food and glasses of sweet iced tea with little lemons perched on the rims.

I assure her that no, I am not. I was so worried when I quit going to A.A. that my friends from our local group would abandon me. I have a hard time making friends, but did manage to make a few these last few months of attending. I have been so relieved that Wanda and me are situation normal – nothing has changed.

"What made you decide to stop?" she then asks.

"Stop is such a finite word," I reply, avoiding gory details. "I am still going on occasion when the need arises."

Not being a Christian. Group politics. Old timers. Cultish atmosphere. There are many reasons I wanted to shy away from Alcoholics Anonymous. I struggled with the idea of me using the group as just another addiction and caught myself doing just that. Going to meetings every night religiously. Reading copious amounts of A.A. books and pamphlets. My group of friends slowly diminishing to only include members of the local chapter of our group. I had to step back and reevaluate the situation and take a breather, or break, if you will.

"Well, every time I've seen a member do what you're doing, they end up drunk and drinking again," Wanda said.

I very well could drink again, but it won't be the end of the world. I hope I have the good sense to know when I need to stay on the wagon, or get up off the wagon-trail and try again. I have so many things now that can and do help me that I didn't have when I was homeless and a drunkard. A supportive family. A mental illness under check. A stable living arrangement. A decent and steady income. Self confidence and esteem. I explained some of this to Wanda and she replied that I had her, too, as well. It is interesting to me how us people who have struggled so in life can come together and give each other a helping hand. It gives me hope for the human race as a whole when my hope will often falter. There needs to be more Wandas in this world.