I have a big goose egg on my temple and a scrape on my knee and finger, thanks to Ms. Romy, who "greeted" another dog by running down the street toward her at a dead run, dragging me behind. Her obedience is out of control; I've let her coast for so long it's like she doesn't even hear me. Sound familiar to any of you with teenagers?
My aunt died yesterday just a few weeks before her 90th birthday. My aunt was my father's sister and definitely, when I think of the word 'matriarch,' she comes to mind. She hadn't been ill, in fact, she was still driving herself to the beauty salon. A big party was planned for her on the 27th, so all in all, it's sad, but she went quietly in the early morning hours.
She and my father were so close that it was wonderful to see them interact. My aunt became very ill one year on a trip from Arizona back to her home state of Pennsylvania, and my father packed up a bag and drove straight to Houston to sit at her bedside for a week.
They were raised on a farm in upstate New York and had a tough childhood. My father was forced to become the 'man' of the family at six or so and that was his driving force in life--to be responsible and do what a 'man' did. I think everything he learned about being a man before the service was in the Boy Scouts.
My aunt taught kindergarten, as I recall, until she married a grocery store manager, who would later by their bootstraps form a large grocery store chain. But my aunt was always the benchmark of the family, the one everyone turned to with their heartaches, their cuts and scrapes and their joy. She will be missed terribly.
There are many stories surrounding her famous relationship with her hard-driving husband, but let me share one of the best. Let us suppose her last name was 'Richard'. She had a habit, which spoke louder than words, of rolling her eyes when her husband was not in synch with her thinking, which was about 99 percent of the time, it appeared. Her daughter, my cousin whom I visited in April in South Carolina, has a great eye roll, too, as do her two daughters.
My cousin's husband remarked that he and my aunt's husband and a brother-in-law or so would sit on one side of the table and all the women would be on the other side. My uncle would make some remark and my cousin's husband said he'd immediately watch "The Richard roll," which was four sets of female eyes rolling simultaneously. Can't you just visualize it?
I love to cook, and often, in fact just a few months ago, I called her to ask her how to tweak some recipe or what cut of meat to use for a particular dish, I can't recall which. We've lost that, and much more, but this is life, isn't it?
My mother and aunt were great friends, and I know that she's in the great beyond with my father and my mother, having a few laughs, or, knowing them, a lot of laughs. I will miss her.
Sunday, July 15, 2007
Wednesday, July 11, 2007
Phlox
These phlox just bloomed; aren't they great?
We watched Iron Jawed Angels today in class, a movie about the American suffragettes. These steely women earned us the right to vote, but not without considerable emotional and physical pain.
U.S. women should watch the film. Many of us don't realize how hard women had to fight in this country to achieve the right to vote. Plus, there's some great acting by Hilary Swank and Mr. McDreamy of Grey's Anatomy fame.
Until tomorrow, have a great day.
Monday, July 09, 2007
Bad customer service
As any of you have who have read my blog for long know, lousy customer service sends me over the edge. Today it's a fight with RH Donnelley which prints the yellow pages here locally for Embarq. I decided to take out two lines in their pages for my business. The salesperson was nice and very pleasant, until I decided, well before the deadline, to cancel. Then she was a rude piece of crap and said "fine" and hung up on me. I assumed it was taken care of.
A month later after the pages are out I get a bill for over $200 for the second line which I cancelled. Of course, I called her immediately and she said she "doesn't recall" the cancellation. She gave me a number to call, which was the wrong number, and after 15 minutes they tracked down where to call her supervisor, who never returned my call.
Then, I wrote a letter with the bill. This morning they called and said that any cancellation should have been in writing. I told the woman this morning that I would have canceled in writing if the woman who was my rep told me to instead of hanging up on me. This new player said there's nothing she can do.
I told her to write me a letter so I can take it to the Public Service Commission, which regulates this type deal, I believe. She said she can't, there is no form letter for this. I told her to write one up only after I told her to "bite me."
You, too, can have this much serenity when you have 22 years clean.
After hanging up on her, I immediately took out my daily meditation book, and read these words: "Help and Peace and Joy are here. Your courage will be rewarded." I don't feel courageous, I feel pissed and overwhelmed quite frequently these days.
Last night at my home group we were talking about small changes in our lives as we stay clean which end up bringing big changes. I admitted that this is an area, lousy customer service, that routinely sends me over the edge. I don't know what exactly to do about it. Sometimes I'm unfailingly polite with customer service people realizing that some village lost an idiot, but other times I just get in a frothing fit.
I've learned another lesson--put it in writing. No one, in today's business environment, it seems, owes you the courtesy of explaining anything.
I did find this online, though, and if I knew the email address of the woman I told to bite me, I would avail myself of this free service.
I may have to ask my sponsor: Does this count as an amends?
An update: I found the email canceling and confirming my cancellation. Round Two!
A month later after the pages are out I get a bill for over $200 for the second line which I cancelled. Of course, I called her immediately and she said she "doesn't recall" the cancellation. She gave me a number to call, which was the wrong number, and after 15 minutes they tracked down where to call her supervisor, who never returned my call.
Then, I wrote a letter with the bill. This morning they called and said that any cancellation should have been in writing. I told the woman this morning that I would have canceled in writing if the woman who was my rep told me to instead of hanging up on me. This new player said there's nothing she can do.
I told her to write me a letter so I can take it to the Public Service Commission, which regulates this type deal, I believe. She said she can't, there is no form letter for this. I told her to write one up only after I told her to "bite me."
You, too, can have this much serenity when you have 22 years clean.
After hanging up on her, I immediately took out my daily meditation book, and read these words: "Help and Peace and Joy are here. Your courage will be rewarded." I don't feel courageous, I feel pissed and overwhelmed quite frequently these days.
Last night at my home group we were talking about small changes in our lives as we stay clean which end up bringing big changes. I admitted that this is an area, lousy customer service, that routinely sends me over the edge. I don't know what exactly to do about it. Sometimes I'm unfailingly polite with customer service people realizing that some village lost an idiot, but other times I just get in a frothing fit.
I've learned another lesson--put it in writing. No one, in today's business environment, it seems, owes you the courtesy of explaining anything.
I did find this online, though, and if I knew the email address of the woman I told to bite me, I would avail myself of this free service.
I may have to ask my sponsor: Does this count as an amends?
An update: I found the email canceling and confirming my cancellation. Round Two!
Sunday, July 08, 2007
Control freaks unite!
"Knock knock."
"Who's there?"
"Now YOU say 'control freak'!"
I heard this at my women's meeting today and only two of us got it. I completely roared laughing. The others looked at us like we were crazy and we had to explain it. I guess I qualify.
I went to Alanon last night and the message, although I haven't been in years, is still the same. Let go and work your own program.
Then this morning one of our women who isn't an addict but comes to meetings anyway (boy, has this generated some meetings snapping shut!) talked about her control issues. She said that her husband was putting together some paperwork and she had to resist the urge to stop heading out the door to work to "help" him although he was totally capable, she said.
She said she realized that what he was doing "did not require my assistance." I was thinking that when I get ready to stick my nose into someone's business, the way they're doing things or not doing them, I should remember the acronym (DNRMA), or "does not require my assistance." I'm sure the world and me would both be happier.
Until tomorrow, sleep tight.
"Who's there?"
"Now YOU say 'control freak'!"
I heard this at my women's meeting today and only two of us got it. I completely roared laughing. The others looked at us like we were crazy and we had to explain it. I guess I qualify.
I went to Alanon last night and the message, although I haven't been in years, is still the same. Let go and work your own program.
Then this morning one of our women who isn't an addict but comes to meetings anyway (boy, has this generated some meetings snapping shut!) talked about her control issues. She said that her husband was putting together some paperwork and she had to resist the urge to stop heading out the door to work to "help" him although he was totally capable, she said.
She said she realized that what he was doing "did not require my assistance." I was thinking that when I get ready to stick my nose into someone's business, the way they're doing things or not doing them, I should remember the acronym (DNRMA), or "does not require my assistance." I'm sure the world and me would both be happier.
Until tomorrow, sleep tight.
Saturday, July 07, 2007
Account canceled!
I learned a new technique for surrendering resentments. I was talking to a good friend on the phone today, Oz's original mother. Pat is a woman who walks a straight spiritual path and has been an inspiration to me for many years. I've learned so much from her, both in terms of dogs, but also in terms of how to live a more spiritually based life.
I was talking to her about my epiphany about the "release" that I had about a few days ago about a hurtful situation thatI wrote about in my blog. Because Pat is such a giving and trusting person, over the years, a lot of people have really used her. She explained a technique that has helped her greatly when struggling with emotional hurts and resentments.
She said that the original Greek root of "forgive" is the equivalent of "account canceled." I'm sure there are controversies over this, but the idea at least in the Lord's prayer, originally Anglo-Saxon but changed with Latin phrases, is "Forgive us our debts." So the idea she uses is to think of someone who hurts you as an "account." Briefly review that hurt in your mind when it arises, go in and visualize canceling that debt.
Then, if the thought comes back, that resentment, that anger over the event or circumstances, don't fight the thought. (The Buddhist tradition has taught us much here!) Instead, in your mind, visually check that account tied to that resentment or person or institution and say, "Yes, I canceled that debt; the account is empty."
Pat tells me it's been the most healing affirmation she has used in dealing with resentments over her life. Until we meet again, I hope you have a safe and fun weekend.
I was talking to her about my epiphany about the "release" that I had about a few days ago about a hurtful situation thatI wrote about in my blog. Because Pat is such a giving and trusting person, over the years, a lot of people have really used her. She explained a technique that has helped her greatly when struggling with emotional hurts and resentments.
She said that the original Greek root of "forgive" is the equivalent of "account canceled." I'm sure there are controversies over this, but the idea at least in the Lord's prayer, originally Anglo-Saxon but changed with Latin phrases, is "Forgive us our debts." So the idea she uses is to think of someone who hurts you as an "account." Briefly review that hurt in your mind when it arises, go in and visualize canceling that debt.
Then, if the thought comes back, that resentment, that anger over the event or circumstances, don't fight the thought. (The Buddhist tradition has taught us much here!) Instead, in your mind, visually check that account tied to that resentment or person or institution and say, "Yes, I canceled that debt; the account is empty."
Pat tells me it's been the most healing affirmation she has used in dealing with resentments over her life. Until we meet again, I hope you have a safe and fun weekend.
Friday, July 06, 2007
Tuesday, July 03, 2007
Happy 4th of July
Each year when the 4th of July arrives, I can't help but think of the freedom I have gained from active addiction. It's not so much anything I have done, I believe it's a gift of grace, pure and simple.
I lived in Oakland for many years and there was a man who was a counselor in a drug treatment program who got clean in NA. Ray P. is a great speaker and he would end his pitches with the same words, "Free at last, free at last, thank God almighty, I'm free at last." When I heard him, as even now as I write these words, I get goose bumps.
I thought today would be a wonderful day to print an excerpt of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s mighty speech in the hope that we will ponder, even if just for a moment, what freedom really means.
"I say to you today, my friends, that in spite of the difficulties and frustrations of the moment I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream. I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self evident; that all men are created equal.
I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave-owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.
I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a desert state sweltering with the heat of injustice and oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.
I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character . . .
I thought today would be a wonderful day to print an excerpt of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s mighty speech in the hope that we will ponder, even if just for a moment, what freedom really means.
"I say to you today, my friends, that in spite of the difficulties and frustrations of the moment I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream. I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self evident; that all men are created equal.
I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave-owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.
I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a desert state sweltering with the heat of injustice and oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.
I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character . . .
I have a dream today. I have a dream that one day the state of Alabama ... will be transformed into a situation where little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls and walk together as sisters and brothers.
I have a dream today. I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plains, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.
This is our hope. This is the faith with which I return to the South. With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.
This will be the day when all of God's children will be able to sing with new meaning 'My country 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my fathers died, land of the pilgrim's pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring.'
And if America is to be a great nation this must become true. When we let freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of that old Negro spiritual, "Free at last! Free at last! Thank God almighty, we are free at last!"
So tonight and tomorrow, have a safe and wonderful holiday.
Friday, June 29, 2007
Release
Remember me mentioning a few months ago a women in my home group that I'd gotten cross ways with and hadn't been able to straighten it out? Although I had sat down with her to see what I may have done to offend her, she just wouldn't talk to me except to say that she "didn't understand me." We were at an impasse.
A few weeks ago she broke a bone in her hip and within a few days she learned she had terminal bone cancer. It really hit me hard, partly because I didn't feel like I could support her in her illness like she did for me due to this distance between us. I had mulled about the relationship for months. I had gone to visit her in the hospital, but still felt that distance between us and felt uncomfortable and sensitive to anything she said.
Last night I was reading one of Catherine Ponder's books, The Dynamic Laws of Prosperity. In it she talked about the concept of release, and it hit me squarely. In it, she talked about the power of release and giving things, truly giving them to God by saying "I release this situation to you, God." She also discussed the importance of not talking about negative issues, stewing over them like I had been doing for months with this particular issue.
I had made my amends to her for whatever it was I did, I still don't know, but I hadn't released the situation. I was still talking about it with a few trusted friends, mulling it over, wondering if I had somehow again offended her the last two times I've visited her. I hadn't released the relationship to God's care.
Last night, I did just that. I released her, with love, to my loving Higher Power. My heart changed, and so did my mind. I no longer need to to relive (the root word of resentment) the situation, wondering what I did, how I can make it better, etc. It's over. Like a bright blue balloon, it floated away to God's care.
Sure enough, when I got home tonight there was a message from her on my phone asking me to call her. She loved the home-grown flowers I'd taken to her. She went on in the message about how fragrant they were and how she hadn't had the time to properly thank me. I released her to God and God did the rest.
Tomorrow I'll call her and I know--things between us will be good. I learned something so powerful. It's the power of release. That was the lesson in all this, I believe.
Until tomorrow, have a wonderful day.
A few weeks ago she broke a bone in her hip and within a few days she learned she had terminal bone cancer. It really hit me hard, partly because I didn't feel like I could support her in her illness like she did for me due to this distance between us. I had mulled about the relationship for months. I had gone to visit her in the hospital, but still felt that distance between us and felt uncomfortable and sensitive to anything she said.
Last night I was reading one of Catherine Ponder's books, The Dynamic Laws of Prosperity. In it she talked about the concept of release, and it hit me squarely. In it, she talked about the power of release and giving things, truly giving them to God by saying "I release this situation to you, God." She also discussed the importance of not talking about negative issues, stewing over them like I had been doing for months with this particular issue.
I had made my amends to her for whatever it was I did, I still don't know, but I hadn't released the situation. I was still talking about it with a few trusted friends, mulling it over, wondering if I had somehow again offended her the last two times I've visited her. I hadn't released the relationship to God's care.
Last night, I did just that. I released her, with love, to my loving Higher Power. My heart changed, and so did my mind. I no longer need to to relive (the root word of resentment) the situation, wondering what I did, how I can make it better, etc. It's over. Like a bright blue balloon, it floated away to God's care.
Sure enough, when I got home tonight there was a message from her on my phone asking me to call her. She loved the home-grown flowers I'd taken to her. She went on in the message about how fragrant they were and how she hadn't had the time to properly thank me. I released her to God and God did the rest.
Tomorrow I'll call her and I know--things between us will be good. I learned something so powerful. It's the power of release. That was the lesson in all this, I believe.
Until tomorrow, have a wonderful day.
Thursday, June 28, 2007
Littered among the stuff
Diaries, several, probably five, from my early years of recovery and one from my using years. I can only imagine what they hold. In the next few days, as time permits, I'll be going through them to see what I can glean from my early recovery. Or from my late using. That should be scary.
Until tomorrow, have a great day.
Until tomorrow, have a great day.
Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Yard sale
My neighborhood is having a yard sale Saturday and I am getting rid of a bunch of stuff. Not just any stuff, mind you, but traveling stuff. This is stuff that has been to Missouri from Arizona, back to Arizona, then back to Missouri again. Expensive stuff, that is, in road miles and mini-storage.
Why do I hang on to stuff? Part of it is a connection with the past. Much of what I'm keeping after honing down to as little stuff as I can stand, was my mother's. The rest of the it are things I've picked up over the years in flea markets and antique stores. I have two new pieces of furniture, a mattress and a couch (which I bought from my boyfriend's generous gift of all his saved change). Everything else is second-hand and well-loved. Well, my desk and file cabinets were new 14 or 15 years ago, to be rigorously honest.
So it's time to, as my sponsor suggested, take a physical inventory and part with things. Friday I'm spending the day sorting and pricing. Want to help? How much should a ten year-old black dog cost? Just kidding, Romy! Romy? Come back here! I was . . .
School starts this afternoon; I'm taking a four-week course in organizations. That should be swell. Tuition will rise by 19 percent this fall at my school. I can't believe the college is that badly mismanaged that they have to raise tuition by that great amount. It's going to price a lot of students right out of school.
Until tomorrow, 2 dogs are waiting for their walkies.
Why do I hang on to stuff? Part of it is a connection with the past. Much of what I'm keeping after honing down to as little stuff as I can stand, was my mother's. The rest of the it are things I've picked up over the years in flea markets and antique stores. I have two new pieces of furniture, a mattress and a couch (which I bought from my boyfriend's generous gift of all his saved change). Everything else is second-hand and well-loved. Well, my desk and file cabinets were new 14 or 15 years ago, to be rigorously honest.
So it's time to, as my sponsor suggested, take a physical inventory and part with things. Friday I'm spending the day sorting and pricing. Want to help? How much should a ten year-old black dog cost? Just kidding, Romy! Romy? Come back here! I was . . .
School starts this afternoon; I'm taking a four-week course in organizations. That should be swell. Tuition will rise by 19 percent this fall at my school. I can't believe the college is that badly mismanaged that they have to raise tuition by that great amount. It's going to price a lot of students right out of school.
Until tomorrow, 2 dogs are waiting for their walkies.
Monday, June 25, 2007
Is 75 percent honesty enough?
The women's meeting was interesting the other morning. We got on the topic of honesty and two of our newer members made the statement that they were working on honesty and that they felt that their "75 percent honesty" was enough. I scanned the meeting hall for a dictionary to no avail (every meeting hall should keep a dictionary on hand, the older the better, because some words, when the Big Book or Basic Text were written, had slightly different meanings. Meanings for words can change over time.)
So I rushed (well, I looked it up this morning, honestly) home and picked up my Webster's 2001. "Rigorous" is defined as 1) "Characterised by rigor; rigidly severe or harsh, as people, rules or discipline: rigorous laws. 2) severely exact or accurate; precise: rigorous research."
"Rigor," the root word, is best defined in this context as "scrupulous or inflexible accuracy or adherence." The synonym (opposite)? "Inflexibility, stringency." So, I guess 95 percent honesty is not enough.
Okay, I know, these were relative newcomers. But as we stay clean, the more we evade the truth, whether it's about ourselves or about others, the more it pinches. The longer we stay clean, it's said, the narrower the path. Honesty is a habit, in many respects, I think. When I came into the rooms I'd lied for so long that I had to monitor every word that came out of my mouth, practically. I didn't know the truth. My friends in the program helped me learn how to be more honest.
I recall early in recovery I was resisting returning to work because I resisted the low pay and felt that I didn't know anything but the "fast life," as we called it. I wasn't just addicted to drugs, boys and girls, I was addicted to the drugging lifestyle. Running in the bars and speaks until all hours of the morning, hanging around with low-lifes, always wanting to know what the buzz was on the streets; addiction to the lifestyle was part of my addiction that had to be broken.
I remarked to a friend who suggested maybe I'd better stay out of the clubs if I wanted to stay clean that "I don't know anything else." He said, in a word, "Bullshit. You've held a normal job, you came from a normal home; it's time to make some changes." Honesty, for me, was very slow in coming. Rigorous honesty took years, and still sometimes I fail.
I started with small things. "Cash-register honesty," as it's called; giving back change if given too much, telling the truth even if it's not what I want to say at that moment. I stopped telling tall tales just to get attention. Those little things set the stage for the ability to be more honest in all my affairs. But still, after all this time, it can be a result of habit. Yes, I can take that extra $20 the cashier gave me or I can give it back. I once went through a bank drive-through and the women was very nasty to me. She gave me an extra $100 back. I kept it because I rationalized she owed it me for her behavior. All that had to change when I got clean. My honesty muscle is now in good working order now because I've exercised it for so long.
I have two major pet peeves in the program. It's people on disability coming into the rooms talking about how much they're making under the table and the ones who are experts tax cheats, proud of how little they pay the government (that's us, you and me, you know) because they earn a lot of cash. Somewhere along the line, they didn't learn the "practice these principles in all our affairs" part of the program. When anyone steals, it costs us all; one way or the other, we all pay for others' dishonesty.
I don't like the current tax system, but I still chose to live in this country so I'm stuck with it. Unless I'm willing to go all out to change the system, then I cannot live here and pretend the system doesn't apply to me. That's my opinion, anyway.
I was on a user group the other day littered with doctors and Ph.Ds. The moderator of the group went on a hateful rant about alcoholics; they are "manipulative," etc., she said. I did talk to her on the phone later and told her I had been in recovery for over two decades. I was met with an uncomfortable silence. I hoped that she was talking about those not in recovery, but my guess is, somewhere along the line, she's seen something that shades her perception of even those of us in recovery.
The old saying goes "You may be the only Basic Text that someone ever sees." Does my behavior match our spiritual principles? Is 75 percent, or 95 percent, or 80 percent honesty enough? I honestly don't know. I only know I strive for 100 percent honesty. I'm not always successful, but I'm pretty close.
Well, enough wanderings for one day. Until tomorrow, have a great, honest day. I always feel much better when I do.
So I rushed (well, I looked it up this morning, honestly) home and picked up my Webster's 2001. "Rigorous" is defined as 1) "Characterised by rigor; rigidly severe or harsh, as people, rules or discipline: rigorous laws. 2) severely exact or accurate; precise: rigorous research."
"Rigor," the root word, is best defined in this context as "scrupulous or inflexible accuracy or adherence." The synonym (opposite)? "Inflexibility, stringency." So, I guess 95 percent honesty is not enough.
Okay, I know, these were relative newcomers. But as we stay clean, the more we evade the truth, whether it's about ourselves or about others, the more it pinches. The longer we stay clean, it's said, the narrower the path. Honesty is a habit, in many respects, I think. When I came into the rooms I'd lied for so long that I had to monitor every word that came out of my mouth, practically. I didn't know the truth. My friends in the program helped me learn how to be more honest.
I recall early in recovery I was resisting returning to work because I resisted the low pay and felt that I didn't know anything but the "fast life," as we called it. I wasn't just addicted to drugs, boys and girls, I was addicted to the drugging lifestyle. Running in the bars and speaks until all hours of the morning, hanging around with low-lifes, always wanting to know what the buzz was on the streets; addiction to the lifestyle was part of my addiction that had to be broken.
I remarked to a friend who suggested maybe I'd better stay out of the clubs if I wanted to stay clean that "I don't know anything else." He said, in a word, "Bullshit. You've held a normal job, you came from a normal home; it's time to make some changes." Honesty, for me, was very slow in coming. Rigorous honesty took years, and still sometimes I fail.
I started with small things. "Cash-register honesty," as it's called; giving back change if given too much, telling the truth even if it's not what I want to say at that moment. I stopped telling tall tales just to get attention. Those little things set the stage for the ability to be more honest in all my affairs. But still, after all this time, it can be a result of habit. Yes, I can take that extra $20 the cashier gave me or I can give it back. I once went through a bank drive-through and the women was very nasty to me. She gave me an extra $100 back. I kept it because I rationalized she owed it me for her behavior. All that had to change when I got clean. My honesty muscle is now in good working order now because I've exercised it for so long.
I have two major pet peeves in the program. It's people on disability coming into the rooms talking about how much they're making under the table and the ones who are experts tax cheats, proud of how little they pay the government (that's us, you and me, you know) because they earn a lot of cash. Somewhere along the line, they didn't learn the "practice these principles in all our affairs" part of the program. When anyone steals, it costs us all; one way or the other, we all pay for others' dishonesty.
I don't like the current tax system, but I still chose to live in this country so I'm stuck with it. Unless I'm willing to go all out to change the system, then I cannot live here and pretend the system doesn't apply to me. That's my opinion, anyway.
I was on a user group the other day littered with doctors and Ph.Ds. The moderator of the group went on a hateful rant about alcoholics; they are "manipulative," etc., she said. I did talk to her on the phone later and told her I had been in recovery for over two decades. I was met with an uncomfortable silence. I hoped that she was talking about those not in recovery, but my guess is, somewhere along the line, she's seen something that shades her perception of even those of us in recovery.
The old saying goes "You may be the only Basic Text that someone ever sees." Does my behavior match our spiritual principles? Is 75 percent, or 95 percent, or 80 percent honesty enough? I honestly don't know. I only know I strive for 100 percent honesty. I'm not always successful, but I'm pretty close.
Well, enough wanderings for one day. Until tomorrow, have a great, honest day. I always feel much better when I do.
Sunday, June 24, 2007
Did you hear the one
Did you hear about the dyslexic agnostic with insomnia? She sat up all night wondering if there was a Dog.
.
.
I asked my boyfriend to put up a"Beware of Dog" sign at my basement entrance. I don't know about you, but I'm scared, but not of my dogs.
Thursday, June 21, 2007
Oh my gosh . . .
I am wiped. I'm sitting in the Phoenix airport waiting for my flight, which would only be delayed if a plane couldn't take off in 115 degree weather. I forgot how HOT it is here.
Barbara met me at the NA meeting Tuesday night. We went and got some Thai food then headed out to my friends' house to spend the night. We had a great visit and she looks wonderful. She's on her way to Oregon. Last I saw her she was heading north on Highway 60; Pete was riding high in the back of her car. She has her camera, so I'm sure she'll post some great pics along her route.
I accomplished a lot during my three days here. Business is definitely picking up. Remember six months ago when I was literally in a panic, wondering what God wanted me to do? "Trust God, work with others." It doesn't say "trust others, work with God."
Until tomorrow when I plan to post a bit more coherently, have a blessed day.
Barbara met me at the NA meeting Tuesday night. We went and got some Thai food then headed out to my friends' house to spend the night. We had a great visit and she looks wonderful. She's on her way to Oregon. Last I saw her she was heading north on Highway 60; Pete was riding high in the back of her car. She has her camera, so I'm sure she'll post some great pics along her route.
I accomplished a lot during my three days here. Business is definitely picking up. Remember six months ago when I was literally in a panic, wondering what God wanted me to do? "Trust God, work with others." It doesn't say "trust others, work with God."
Until tomorrow when I plan to post a bit more coherently, have a blessed day.
Monday, June 18, 2007
Stuck in the airport
I'm sitting in the KC airport; my flight is rain-stalled. I was hoping to make my connection in Albuquerque, but it doesn't look likely. Oh well. Life on life's terms, as one of my friends said last night when we visited her in the hospital where she was just diagnosed with incurable bone cancer.
I decided to while away the time that I would write about another great couples fight I just heard about. My girlfriend, who I'm going to stay with in Phoenix, called me to see if I needed a ride from the airport. She mentioned that she had a little set-to with her boyfriend that day. I've known him for about a decade now and I know that having a "little" set-to with him isn't really possible; it's usually a loud and long fight, but I gave her the benefit of the doubt.
They import German shepherds, so their house is like going to visit a kennel. She told me she was running around for two hours cleaning up and moving dogs while her boyfriend took a nap. She ate lunch and when he woke up, he asked her if she'd made him any lunch. She had just laid down to read a book and she was rather annoyed that he was asking her to make him lunch. So she said something to effect of "I already ate lunch while you napped; you can make your own lunch."
That was all it took. I think he woke up on the wrong side of the bed, and they were off to the verbal races. He yelled at her that she was inconsiderate or something to that effect. So she stomped into the kitchen finally and made him a salad then went back to read her book. A minute later she heard the toilet flush. "That's what I think of your salad," he yelled as he flushed it down the toilet.
I almost cried I laughed so hard when she told me. It was a very visual fight; I could just picture him stomping into the john and putting the salad in the toilet.
It's just another indication that relationships are hard. Until tomorrow, don't get in a stupid fight; let me do it for you.
I decided to while away the time that I would write about another great couples fight I just heard about. My girlfriend, who I'm going to stay with in Phoenix, called me to see if I needed a ride from the airport. She mentioned that she had a little set-to with her boyfriend that day. I've known him for about a decade now and I know that having a "little" set-to with him isn't really possible; it's usually a loud and long fight, but I gave her the benefit of the doubt.
They import German shepherds, so their house is like going to visit a kennel. She told me she was running around for two hours cleaning up and moving dogs while her boyfriend took a nap. She ate lunch and when he woke up, he asked her if she'd made him any lunch. She had just laid down to read a book and she was rather annoyed that he was asking her to make him lunch. So she said something to effect of "I already ate lunch while you napped; you can make your own lunch."
That was all it took. I think he woke up on the wrong side of the bed, and they were off to the verbal races. He yelled at her that she was inconsiderate or something to that effect. So she stomped into the kitchen finally and made him a salad then went back to read her book. A minute later she heard the toilet flush. "That's what I think of your salad," he yelled as he flushed it down the toilet.
I almost cried I laughed so hard when she told me. It was a very visual fight; I could just picture him stomping into the john and putting the salad in the toilet.
It's just another indication that relationships are hard. Until tomorrow, don't get in a stupid fight; let me do it for you.
Monday travel day
Well, I'm off, but then we knew that didn't we? I'm heading to Arizona for a few days. I'm meeting BaWA Tuesday night at the VA then we're having a slumber party at my friend Debbie's house. Whoopee! Then she's off for a vacation. Pete is accompanying her; unfortunately, 2dogs have to go to the kennel.
Have a wonderful day. Say a safe travel prayer for both Barbara and me. Until tomorrow, when I'll be baking in 110 degrees, ciao.
Have a wonderful day. Say a safe travel prayer for both Barbara and me. Until tomorrow, when I'll be baking in 110 degrees, ciao.
Sunday, June 17, 2007
Saturday, June 16, 2007
He's got a lot of explaining to do . . .
Here's a sickening article to start your day, or end it. This is how disposable prostitutes are in our society. I'm heading to Arizona today for a few days. Barb, meet me at the Tuesday night meeting at the VA!
Friday, June 15, 2007
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
I love plants
The Draculus Vulgaris
Check out this bad boy! I have no idea what it is, so if anyone knows, I'd love to know so that I can plant one. My neighbor is growing it. I guess I could ask her but that would require some effort. [P.S. I did ask her, the name is in purple above. I'll say.]
I went to a good meeting last night and I had a realization. No one does relationships very well. The topic was "right relationships" and there was a guy there last night who said he'd been married to his wife for 52 years. He went into a long story about how he'd met her when, drunk, he spun out on a gravel road and drove through her father's goat pen. While he left the scene that night before the sheriff could arrive, he caught up with her father the next day at church to admit he'd done it because he knew her father wouldn't cuss much at church.
Sure enough, he went over to fix the goat pen and there he met his future bride. "She was just a little bitty thing with pigtails," he said. Needless to say, we (at least the women in the meeting) were just charmed, imagining this scene. Then he went on to say that sometimes when things are rough, the silence between them might go on for a week or more. That made me laugh because that's my modus operandi; when I'm mad, I don't want to talk about it, sometimes for a long time.
.
Another guy who is about 60 or so told another long story about how he was making lunch for his wife that morning and he mispronounced her sister's name for about the 1,000th time. She had to correct him, he said, and her tone of voice apparently sent him over the edge. He said they ended up in a physical altercation with her pulling his beard and him wielding a kitchen knife. We were laughing thinking of these two sexagenarians duking it out in the kitchen over a bag lunch. It just goes to show you, you never know what goes on in someone's home even if they do tell you their side of it. My mother always said "You never know 'til you marry them." I don't know how she knew that; she was only married once. I guess that was enough to figure it out.
I left the meeting thinking maybe I'm not so dysfunctional after all. I'm heading out to Phoenix next week to work for a few days, so I'll get to hit some meetings and see a few friends. Until tomorrow, take it easy. I plan to.
Sunday, June 10, 2007
Codependency: Who doesn't qualify?
Every week when I can, I update my readers about what happened at our women's meeting. Yesterday was a great meeting. A women with 16 years came in and talked about her fiancee going back out after about two shaky years in the program. She said it didn't surprise her that he'd relapsed; he wasn't working a program.
It must be in the wind. Relapse, that is. But of course it's not in the wind just today; people we know and love and are family either by blood or ties as deep as blood are relapsing.
My wonderful sponsor, who has 25 years clean and works the strongest program of about anyone I've ever met in the rooms, had her husband relapse a few weeks ago two months before his 20th birthday.
My own husband, whom I finally divorced at five years clean, relapsed for the entire time after we were married until our divorce, and remains on the fringes today.
No, relapse isn't in the air, it's something that we deal with almost daily. So how do we react when those we love make bad choices?
First, we keep going to meetings. Often people relapse because they stop going to meetings. They aren't around to find out what happens to people who don't go to meetings any longer, as the old saying goes.
Next, we find others who've been through what we are going through and ask for help. I found tremendous strength in Naranon, which was very strong in the Bay Area where I lived at the time. "Detach with love," members kept telling me. So I tried.
But when one we love relapses, anger is often the first emotion that flares. As my acquaintance John Carter who wrote God, Get Me Out of This One, a book about his addiction (but unfortunately not about his recovery, which is a treasure), anger is often the last emotion "left standing." Anger is safe. It allows us to postpone the heartbreaking grief that follows. But the grief does follow. It is inevitable, unavoidable and threatens to overwhelm us.
Inflicting our anger on our loved one, who is sick, and on others in our path, isn't the way to deal with this emotion. Writing, talking to others about our feelings, screaming at the top of our lungs when we're alone, beating the crap out of a pillow, those are legitimate channels for our anger. One day I decided that I was going to take all the dishes out into the brick courtyard of our apartment and smash them one by one. It made perfect sense until I realized they'd probably cart me away.
I didn't get really angry until after the divorce when my wasband got clean and he started dating someone else. Then, I was furious! "You mean I put up with that SOB for five years then he gets clean and loves someone else?" I thought. I was on fire. Thank God, I had moved to LA by that time so I didn't have to see him in meetings and I was able to process my feelings with my sponsor there, act out in some pretty sad ways and get support from women at the WSO, where I worked at the time.
But while still in the relationship, one thing I learned was that He would tell me of some crisis he's created, problems with his instructor at school or having no money until payday, and I couldn't fix his problems.I would simply say "I'm sure you'll work it out." I stopped offering advice, offering to smooth things over, suggesting he go to a meeting, calling his male friends and asking them to talk with him. I worked my own program and tried to keep my mouth shut, which you can imagine is hard for me.
I don't mean I was a saint. I said some really mean things to him a time or two, at least. Once when he told me before the divorce was final that I could keep his last name (I used both mine and his), I blasted him with my opinion of his dysfunctional family.
Another thing I did was stop listening to people who wanted to update me on his whereabouts. There was one woman in particular who loved to make judgments about how I could stay with a practicing addict. She and her husband had a lot of years clean and I knew her concern wasn't concern, it was judgment. She didn't want to know what was happening out of love; she wanted information, I'm sure so that she could feel superior. About ten years later she O.D.ed on pain pills, my husband's drug of choice ironically, in a hotel room in Santa Cruz. We need to work our own programs and not worry about how other people are working theirs.
People would approach me at meetings with a look on their face I came to know. The look said: "I'm going to fill you in on what he's really up to." Once someone said "I saw your husband in the projects today with a VCR." Imagine how helpful that piece of information was, since he was a Texas white boy in the middle of an East or a West Oakland project. So when I saw them coming with that look, I would wave my hands in front of me and say "I don't want to hear it." Soon, the updates stopped. (That, incidentally, is a 'boundary'.)
My sponsor at the time, Tery, was tremendously helpful. She would tell me "Stay in Step Eleven," and "Act in haste, repent in leisure." So I stayed busy, finishing college, providing service and going to meetings. And I prayed constantly about the marriage and what God wanted from me.
How did I know when to leave? One day, after I'd given up a teaching fellowship at Fordham University to take a job and put him through treatment, we were driving to marriage counseling. I looked over and he was nodding out. He was loaded again.
We got to therapy and the therapist, very wise about addiction, asked him if he had anything to say to me. Of course, he didn't. She asked me if I had anything to say to him. "Yes," I said. "I want to know how long. One month, six months, six years; what's the time frame here?" I asked, referring to his using.
"I don't know," he said. I had a mini-epiphany. I realized that this was probably the most honest thing he'd ever said to me. I realized he didn't want to get clean; I wanted him to get clean.
I said, "Well, I do know." I told him it was over. I left therapy, went to a speaker meeting at Alta Bates Hospital in Berkeley, stood at the podium during burning desires and sobbed. It was finally clear--it was done.
It took several years to get over the grief of that failed relationship. I don't care what anyone says, for me, taking sacred vows to love, honor and stay through sickness and in health changes a relationship in some spiritual way. He's remarried for the second time to his second wife. I hear from him occasionally, we laugh about the old days, talk about mutual friends, he talks about work, but we don't talk about the Program. That itself speaks volumes.
Codependency, for me, was my core problem. I grew up in a family that had no clear boundaries except anger. Over the years, and mainly thanks to Naranon, I have learned a great deal about what I can do and what I can't do in another's life. I've learned in NA that I can walk through fire and not get loaded, even when those I love choose different options.
As my beautiful friend Susan Lydon used to say, "If you feel your feelings, you never have to get loaded again." For those who come in and out of these rooms, I am convinced no one ever told them that.
Until tomorrow, may you walk in sunlight.
It must be in the wind. Relapse, that is. But of course it's not in the wind just today; people we know and love and are family either by blood or ties as deep as blood are relapsing.
My wonderful sponsor, who has 25 years clean and works the strongest program of about anyone I've ever met in the rooms, had her husband relapse a few weeks ago two months before his 20th birthday.
My own husband, whom I finally divorced at five years clean, relapsed for the entire time after we were married until our divorce, and remains on the fringes today.
No, relapse isn't in the air, it's something that we deal with almost daily. So how do we react when those we love make bad choices?
First, we keep going to meetings. Often people relapse because they stop going to meetings. They aren't around to find out what happens to people who don't go to meetings any longer, as the old saying goes.
Next, we find others who've been through what we are going through and ask for help. I found tremendous strength in Naranon, which was very strong in the Bay Area where I lived at the time. "Detach with love," members kept telling me. So I tried.
But when one we love relapses, anger is often the first emotion that flares. As my acquaintance John Carter who wrote God, Get Me Out of This One, a book about his addiction (but unfortunately not about his recovery, which is a treasure), anger is often the last emotion "left standing." Anger is safe. It allows us to postpone the heartbreaking grief that follows. But the grief does follow. It is inevitable, unavoidable and threatens to overwhelm us.
Inflicting our anger on our loved one, who is sick, and on others in our path, isn't the way to deal with this emotion. Writing, talking to others about our feelings, screaming at the top of our lungs when we're alone, beating the crap out of a pillow, those are legitimate channels for our anger. One day I decided that I was going to take all the dishes out into the brick courtyard of our apartment and smash them one by one. It made perfect sense until I realized they'd probably cart me away.
I didn't get really angry until after the divorce when my wasband got clean and he started dating someone else. Then, I was furious! "You mean I put up with that SOB for five years then he gets clean and loves someone else?" I thought. I was on fire. Thank God, I had moved to LA by that time so I didn't have to see him in meetings and I was able to process my feelings with my sponsor there, act out in some pretty sad ways and get support from women at the WSO, where I worked at the time.
But while still in the relationship, one thing I learned was that He would tell me of some crisis he's created, problems with his instructor at school or having no money until payday, and I couldn't fix his problems.I would simply say "I'm sure you'll work it out." I stopped offering advice, offering to smooth things over, suggesting he go to a meeting, calling his male friends and asking them to talk with him. I worked my own program and tried to keep my mouth shut, which you can imagine is hard for me.
I don't mean I was a saint. I said some really mean things to him a time or two, at least. Once when he told me before the divorce was final that I could keep his last name (I used both mine and his), I blasted him with my opinion of his dysfunctional family.
Another thing I did was stop listening to people who wanted to update me on his whereabouts. There was one woman in particular who loved to make judgments about how I could stay with a practicing addict. She and her husband had a lot of years clean and I knew her concern wasn't concern, it was judgment. She didn't want to know what was happening out of love; she wanted information, I'm sure so that she could feel superior. About ten years later she O.D.ed on pain pills, my husband's drug of choice ironically, in a hotel room in Santa Cruz. We need to work our own programs and not worry about how other people are working theirs.
People would approach me at meetings with a look on their face I came to know. The look said: "I'm going to fill you in on what he's really up to." Once someone said "I saw your husband in the projects today with a VCR." Imagine how helpful that piece of information was, since he was a Texas white boy in the middle of an East or a West Oakland project. So when I saw them coming with that look, I would wave my hands in front of me and say "I don't want to hear it." Soon, the updates stopped. (That, incidentally, is a 'boundary'.)
My sponsor at the time, Tery, was tremendously helpful. She would tell me "Stay in Step Eleven," and "Act in haste, repent in leisure." So I stayed busy, finishing college, providing service and going to meetings. And I prayed constantly about the marriage and what God wanted from me.
How did I know when to leave? One day, after I'd given up a teaching fellowship at Fordham University to take a job and put him through treatment, we were driving to marriage counseling. I looked over and he was nodding out. He was loaded again.
We got to therapy and the therapist, very wise about addiction, asked him if he had anything to say to me. Of course, he didn't. She asked me if I had anything to say to him. "Yes," I said. "I want to know how long. One month, six months, six years; what's the time frame here?" I asked, referring to his using.
"I don't know," he said. I had a mini-epiphany. I realized that this was probably the most honest thing he'd ever said to me. I realized he didn't want to get clean; I wanted him to get clean.
I said, "Well, I do know." I told him it was over. I left therapy, went to a speaker meeting at Alta Bates Hospital in Berkeley, stood at the podium during burning desires and sobbed. It was finally clear--it was done.
It took several years to get over the grief of that failed relationship. I don't care what anyone says, for me, taking sacred vows to love, honor and stay through sickness and in health changes a relationship in some spiritual way. He's remarried for the second time to his second wife. I hear from him occasionally, we laugh about the old days, talk about mutual friends, he talks about work, but we don't talk about the Program. That itself speaks volumes.
Codependency, for me, was my core problem. I grew up in a family that had no clear boundaries except anger. Over the years, and mainly thanks to Naranon, I have learned a great deal about what I can do and what I can't do in another's life. I've learned in NA that I can walk through fire and not get loaded, even when those I love choose different options.
As my beautiful friend Susan Lydon used to say, "If you feel your feelings, you never have to get loaded again." For those who come in and out of these rooms, I am convinced no one ever told them that.
Until tomorrow, may you walk in sunlight.
Thursday, June 07, 2007
Welcome to my messy life
Why is it we get into relationships and suddenly the things we love about another person send us over the edge? Admittedly, I am a little overly obsessive about my dogs. But I've been that way for about 30 years, so it should come as no surprise to those who love me that:
- There is often dog hair lying about, despite my best efforts at sweeping every day. I don't think everyone would want to live this way, but I am okay with it.
- I don't go on spontaneous vacations anymore because I have to consider where I park the dogs, and believe me, not just anywhere will do.
- If I'm gone all day, I want to hang out with my dogs. Sometimes they want some attention, too.
These are three weird things about me I guess, the latest craze sweeping the blogosphere. Why is it that we don't so much get into relationships as take hostages? "Become like me!" seems to be the mantra.
Yes, my house might appear, at times, a zoo. It has been that way for a long while. My childhood was a zoo: You made allowances if the dogs got sick; the dogs ate the fence; my brothers brought the colt into the living room (as they did one Christmas eve); the dogs left hair all over the place; the cat ate the fish; the horse got colic and you had to stay up all night to walk it; or the dogs hung out on the couch. This is how I was raised and I'm completely comfortable with it. You know the old saying? "If nothing changes, nothing changes." If you don't want it to change, well, then, it definitely won't change.
This is my messy life.
Every day I'm above ground and sucking air, as my sponsor says, I am grateful. I plan to go through it one day at a time, usually with a lot of dog hair on my clothes. How about you?
Wednesday, June 06, 2007
The 1st Tradition
I went to a meeting tonight; in fact, I've been to meetings every night since Sunday. I've been in a difficult place; a lot of personal things going on. Tonight's topic was the 1st Tradition, each group should be autonomous . . . .
It got me thinking about what kinds of meetings I like to attend. The town where I live has one meeting per night, so there isn't much choice. I hit most of them from time to time, Sunday night is my home group. There is one meeting in town, though, that I don't attend. It's an "everything has to go exactly like what is on the format" or the poobahs that started the meeting will have apoplexy. I call it a control issue, but what do I know?
I know as an addict, I don't like authority, never did, and despite many inventories and a new Fourth Step in progress, probably never will. I didn't come to NA to have someone else's ideas of how to behave or what direction the sharing in a meeting "must" go, right or left, pushed down my throat. If that attitude will cause me to rebel, imagine what it will do to newcomers.
Tonight I shared about the type meetings I support. To my taste, the best meetings are relaxed; yes, there are some ground rules, but there is a good deal of bantering that could be construed, in those oh-so-rigid meetings, as crosstalk.
I like meetings where we don't read everything NA has ever written, nor take up the entire hour reading from literature at a literature study. Even with my years clean, I can't pay attention that long.
I also like meetings where people don't share to correct members who spoke before them, no matter how much clean time the "correctors" have. The program I work may get someone else loaded. There are a few things I've learned that I think are musts, but that's my path and I don't have to correct everyone who differs with the way I think the Program works.
My favorite meetings are those that make a big fuss over newcomers, greet new people to the meeting they may not know, and that start on time and end, reasonably on time. I don't like candlelight meetings because, as I learned from my old friend Red, newcomers needs to look you in the eye so they know you aren't bullshitting them about staying clean.
One local meeting just had a group conscience and decided to outlaw text messaging in the meeting. I don't like meetings that change their format to address one problem rather than talking to the "problem" and straightening it out, or not. Personally, if someone wants to sit in meetings and text message, who is it hurting but him?
If there is scandal revolving around a meeting as we've had here for a few months, I refuse to listen to the gossip. I simply tell people that "I don't want to hear it." A meeting that is spiritually unfit will die; it is that simple. If I don't like the things that I believe are going on in a meeting, I can either attend it and hope to steer it back toward center (not my center, an atmosphere of recovery that our literature describes), or not support the meeting and simply say, if asked, that "I don't go to that meeting." It's not my duty to run around town spreading more gossip about the meeting to try to stir up support and "save" the meeting.
Our First Tradition is a strong tie that can bind us together if we remember that it's all about our "common" welfare, not my group's welfare at the expense of another group's.
And here's another opinion. If your sponsor, after taking you through the Steps, doesn't then take you through the Traditions, offer to go through them together with him or her. They may never have done so.
The Traditions are just as important in our recovery, if we want to keep what we have, as are the Steps, in my opinion, anyway.
Well, I am exiting my soapbox for an early bedtime. Tomorrow is another day.
It got me thinking about what kinds of meetings I like to attend. The town where I live has one meeting per night, so there isn't much choice. I hit most of them from time to time, Sunday night is my home group. There is one meeting in town, though, that I don't attend. It's an "everything has to go exactly like what is on the format" or the poobahs that started the meeting will have apoplexy. I call it a control issue, but what do I know?
I know as an addict, I don't like authority, never did, and despite many inventories and a new Fourth Step in progress, probably never will. I didn't come to NA to have someone else's ideas of how to behave or what direction the sharing in a meeting "must" go, right or left, pushed down my throat. If that attitude will cause me to rebel, imagine what it will do to newcomers.
Tonight I shared about the type meetings I support. To my taste, the best meetings are relaxed; yes, there are some ground rules, but there is a good deal of bantering that could be construed, in those oh-so-rigid meetings, as crosstalk.
I like meetings where we don't read everything NA has ever written, nor take up the entire hour reading from literature at a literature study. Even with my years clean, I can't pay attention that long.
I also like meetings where people don't share to correct members who spoke before them, no matter how much clean time the "correctors" have. The program I work may get someone else loaded. There are a few things I've learned that I think are musts, but that's my path and I don't have to correct everyone who differs with the way I think the Program works.
My favorite meetings are those that make a big fuss over newcomers, greet new people to the meeting they may not know, and that start on time and end, reasonably on time. I don't like candlelight meetings because, as I learned from my old friend Red, newcomers needs to look you in the eye so they know you aren't bullshitting them about staying clean.
One local meeting just had a group conscience and decided to outlaw text messaging in the meeting. I don't like meetings that change their format to address one problem rather than talking to the "problem" and straightening it out, or not. Personally, if someone wants to sit in meetings and text message, who is it hurting but him?
If there is scandal revolving around a meeting as we've had here for a few months, I refuse to listen to the gossip. I simply tell people that "I don't want to hear it." A meeting that is spiritually unfit will die; it is that simple. If I don't like the things that I believe are going on in a meeting, I can either attend it and hope to steer it back toward center (not my center, an atmosphere of recovery that our literature describes), or not support the meeting and simply say, if asked, that "I don't go to that meeting." It's not my duty to run around town spreading more gossip about the meeting to try to stir up support and "save" the meeting.
Our First Tradition is a strong tie that can bind us together if we remember that it's all about our "common" welfare, not my group's welfare at the expense of another group's.
And here's another opinion. If your sponsor, after taking you through the Steps, doesn't then take you through the Traditions, offer to go through them together with him or her. They may never have done so.
The Traditions are just as important in our recovery, if we want to keep what we have, as are the Steps, in my opinion, anyway.
Well, I am exiting my soapbox for an early bedtime. Tomorrow is another day.
Monday, June 04, 2007
Friday, June 01, 2007
Another good meeting
I had kind of a rough day trying to figure out some health insurance stuff and dealing with life on life's terms. So I headed to a meeting tonight, right after I cooked up a batch of chicken with rigatoni. It was good if I do say so myself.
Anyway, one of the kids at the meeting (this meeting gets all the drug court people) was saying that he though people who had NA stickers on their cars were narcs. When was the last time you used the work "narc"? Anyway, it reminded me of a story, I'm not sure why but lately at that meeting I'm surrounded by all the teenagers and young adults, and I remember a lot of stories from my early recovery.
I was married at the time and we were at the Northern California Regional NA convention in Sacramento, probably in about 1989. Anyhoo, we ate dinner, my wasband and me and about five of my girlfriends, Susan Lydon, who I've blogged about before, and several other women. After we all threw our money in, my wasband stayed inside to pay the bill and we went out on the sidewalk to wait for him to head to the convention center.
Standing outside by about ten brand new pickups were a bunch of Hells Angels in their colors. We gals stood there waiting for my wasband and they sort of sidled over to us and starting making conversation. I was not in the mood to chat because I steer clear of bikers of that ilk, but a few of the gals started chatting with one in particular.
He asked us where we were from and we told him Oakland, the home of Sonny Barger, who of course started the whole mess. He asked what we were doing in Sacramento. There was a weird silence. My friend Marilyn piped up and said, "We're here for a Narcotics Anonymous meeting."
The biker kind of hiked his leather vest around him and said, "Well, I prefer to keep my narcotics anonymous, too."
But that wasn't the funniest part. My wasband about that time came out of the restaurant and saw us standing there surrounded by Hells Angels. He walked by us like he didn't even know us. Later I asked him why and he said, "What do I look, stupid?" He was a survivor, that's for sure.
Anyway, it was getting dark as we all piled in the car and drove to the convention center for the speaker meeting. We drove across the Sacramento River bridge and we saw this one headlight coming toward us. We couldn't figure out what it was until we were right up on it. A street person pushing a grocery cart had rigged up a headlight on his cart. It was too bizarre.
I used to love to go to NA conventions. Last weekend was Arizona Regional Convention which is an awesome convention and which I unfortunately could not attend. Until tomorrow, 2 dogs say "Hey."
Anyway, one of the kids at the meeting (this meeting gets all the drug court people) was saying that he though people who had NA stickers on their cars were narcs. When was the last time you used the work "narc"? Anyway, it reminded me of a story, I'm not sure why but lately at that meeting I'm surrounded by all the teenagers and young adults, and I remember a lot of stories from my early recovery.
I was married at the time and we were at the Northern California Regional NA convention in Sacramento, probably in about 1989. Anyhoo, we ate dinner, my wasband and me and about five of my girlfriends, Susan Lydon, who I've blogged about before, and several other women. After we all threw our money in, my wasband stayed inside to pay the bill and we went out on the sidewalk to wait for him to head to the convention center.
Standing outside by about ten brand new pickups were a bunch of Hells Angels in their colors. We gals stood there waiting for my wasband and they sort of sidled over to us and starting making conversation. I was not in the mood to chat because I steer clear of bikers of that ilk, but a few of the gals started chatting with one in particular.
He asked us where we were from and we told him Oakland, the home of Sonny Barger, who of course started the whole mess. He asked what we were doing in Sacramento. There was a weird silence. My friend Marilyn piped up and said, "We're here for a Narcotics Anonymous meeting."
The biker kind of hiked his leather vest around him and said, "Well, I prefer to keep my narcotics anonymous, too."
But that wasn't the funniest part. My wasband about that time came out of the restaurant and saw us standing there surrounded by Hells Angels. He walked by us like he didn't even know us. Later I asked him why and he said, "What do I look, stupid?" He was a survivor, that's for sure.
Anyway, it was getting dark as we all piled in the car and drove to the convention center for the speaker meeting. We drove across the Sacramento River bridge and we saw this one headlight coming toward us. We couldn't figure out what it was until we were right up on it. A street person pushing a grocery cart had rigged up a headlight on his cart. It was too bizarre.
I used to love to go to NA conventions. Last weekend was Arizona Regional Convention which is an awesome convention and which I unfortunately could not attend. Until tomorrow, 2 dogs say "Hey."
Thursday, May 31, 2007
Wednesday, May 30, 2007
A new AA joke
A drunk went into a bar for the first time and ordered three shots of whiskey. Each day thereafter, he'd come in and order three shots and drink them down. One day, the bartender asked him why he ordered the three shots. "It's for my two brothers in Ireland," he said. "When I drink the shots, it's like having them here with me."
This went on for years. The drunk would come in and ask for three shots before he got down to his serious drinking. One day, he came in and asked the bartender for just two shots.
"What happened?" the bartender gasped. "Did something happen to one of your brothers?"
"Oh, no," the drunk assured him. "I quit drinking."
Until tomorrow, have a great night.
This went on for years. The drunk would come in and ask for three shots before he got down to his serious drinking. One day, he came in and asked the bartender for just two shots.
"What happened?" the bartender gasped. "Did something happen to one of your brothers?"
"Oh, no," the drunk assured him. "I quit drinking."
****
Until tomorrow, have a great night.
Tuesday, May 29, 2007
I can, I can, I think I can
I looked out the window at dusk last night and this critter was sitting in the bird's nest. Then he made his way over to the screen and was winding his way up the feeder. He finally made it, just staring at me when I took his photo. None of them turned out too well. Tomorrow's another day; I'm sure they all be back.
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There's a dog in a kennel run near my house, a beautiful golden retriever named Maggie. She's about a year old and as sweet as, well, a Goldie. The owners pay absolutely no attention to her, besides feeding her once a day and about every three days cleaning up after her. She just lies in the sun, the rain, whatever, on cement. She's depressed, I can tell.
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Romy and Oz and I visit her regularly. We offered to buy her but the owners said that their son would miss her too much. In the six or seven months she's been there, I've seen him play with her once.
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What people don't understand is that sometimes we have to do the unselfish best for the animal, even if it means placing it in another home. We've talked about "disappearing" her; it would really be in her best interest because she could live with at my boyfriend's house with his Goldie, Bailey dog. However, I'm not prepared to pay the karma.
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So Maggie sits, day after day, and watches the world go by, chews her dog house or just sleeps. Mostly, she sleeps. I am thinking maybe I should write a letter to the owners and tell them how I feel about that beautiful dog, which I know will pine away if she doesn't get a home with humans who interact with her.
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I know you can't save them all, but I'd like to save Maggie. Until tomorrow, say a little prayer that Maggie's owners will see the light and place Maggie in a home with people who want a dog.
Sunday, May 27, 2007
God always provides
As early as I can recall, I've had a negative attitude; I'm not sure why. Maybe I was just born with a dour outlook on life. I know, however, first hand the power of positive thinking. When I applied for college at an incredibly expensive school in California (Yeah, Mills!), everyone doubted I'd get in and encouraged me, like all my pals, to go to ASU. But I made up my mind it was Mills or bust, so I "acted as if" and did the footwork.
I was accepted, but I didn't get scholarship money, so that meant I really couldn't afford to go. But did I give up? Nope, I moved there, kept working and took one night class. I reapplied for a scholarship for the fall semester and won it. I was then on a ride until I graduated.
I don't know why I was able to be so positive in that case; no one else was. But I set a goal and stuck to it. So applying that same principle to my business, I've been doggedly doing the marketing and finishing work on time for new clients. I've even been giving them more than they paid for. But I went one step further.
I started reading about the power of God, in Marianne Williamson's books, in the Bible, wherever I can find it. And I posted the income I wanted to earn on my refrigerator so that I see it every day. I'm starting to turn off that negative brain chatter that says "You'll always be a loser."
Now that might not seem like much, and maybe there's more that I can do. But I will tell you that just as I finish up one project, it seems like the phone rings and something new comes in. So something is working. Maybe it's God?
I was accepted, but I didn't get scholarship money, so that meant I really couldn't afford to go. But did I give up? Nope, I moved there, kept working and took one night class. I reapplied for a scholarship for the fall semester and won it. I was then on a ride until I graduated.
I don't know why I was able to be so positive in that case; no one else was. But I set a goal and stuck to it. So applying that same principle to my business, I've been doggedly doing the marketing and finishing work on time for new clients. I've even been giving them more than they paid for. But I went one step further.
I started reading about the power of God, in Marianne Williamson's books, in the Bible, wherever I can find it. And I posted the income I wanted to earn on my refrigerator so that I see it every day. I'm starting to turn off that negative brain chatter that says "You'll always be a loser."
Now that might not seem like much, and maybe there's more that I can do. But I will tell you that just as I finish up one project, it seems like the phone rings and something new comes in. So something is working. Maybe it's God?
Bye Bye Birdie
My last pic; they're gone. I had no idea they grew up so quickly. The next fat robin you see, say "Hey" from 2dogs.
Saturday, May 26, 2007
Friday, May 25, 2007
Thursday, May 24, 2007
Wednesday, May 23, 2007
Phoenix airport
I'm sitting in the Phoenix airport listening to some guy with a small guitar belt out a version of Brown-Eyed Girl complete with people singing the chorus. I guess it's the chorus, anyway. Americans may sing a lot in the shower, but rarely do we sing in public venues like airports or on trains or while waiting for a bus. What's up with that?
America is a funny place. Going from Missouri to California, you might as well go to a parallel universe, whatever that is. I drove today in my rented HHR (they upgraded me because I asked) from La Habra to the Burbank airport and it was the most tense I've been in months. I noticed I was gripping the wheel like I was somebody's grandmother. [My God, it's a Southwest employee singing. What marketing ploy will they think of next?]
I am totally exhausted and fighting a dangerous depression today. I think I'm just overly tired, and although I had a wonderful time with my wonderful goofy friends, I have never realized how alienating it can be to be in a city of that size again that moves so fast, fast, fast.
My big project we've been working on has a pretty serious error in it and I'm having to explain why, which is embarrassing. We caught it in time, but it's my fault since I was editing it. But I learned something valuable and next time, we'll make a different mistake, not that one. One nice thing about being in recovery, I don't always have to keep hitting the same speed bumps in the road of life again and again. I can choose to learn from my errors and take a different route.
I just received a nice piece of business, for which I'm very grateful. This should keep me busy for the next few weeks. So all in all, things are great. I'm just too long since my last meeting and tired. It's time to HALT and go eat, so until later, mis amigos, have a great day and thanks for your check-ins the past few days.
America is a funny place. Going from Missouri to California, you might as well go to a parallel universe, whatever that is. I drove today in my rented HHR (they upgraded me because I asked) from La Habra to the Burbank airport and it was the most tense I've been in months. I noticed I was gripping the wheel like I was somebody's grandmother. [My God, it's a Southwest employee singing. What marketing ploy will they think of next?]
I am totally exhausted and fighting a dangerous depression today. I think I'm just overly tired, and although I had a wonderful time with my wonderful goofy friends, I have never realized how alienating it can be to be in a city of that size again that moves so fast, fast, fast.
My big project we've been working on has a pretty serious error in it and I'm having to explain why, which is embarrassing. We caught it in time, but it's my fault since I was editing it. But I learned something valuable and next time, we'll make a different mistake, not that one. One nice thing about being in recovery, I don't always have to keep hitting the same speed bumps in the road of life again and again. I can choose to learn from my errors and take a different route.
I just received a nice piece of business, for which I'm very grateful. This should keep me busy for the next few weeks. So all in all, things are great. I'm just too long since my last meeting and tired. It's time to HALT and go eat, so until later, mis amigos, have a great day and thanks for your check-ins the past few days.
Monday, May 21, 2007
Walk in downtown Disney
The past two days have been exciting for me listening to journalists and some of the nation's top experts in business talk about the economy, including the CEO of Disney. We covered topics from how to write a column; the housing bubble (hang on to your hats!); the prospect for universal health care; journalism ethics; venture capitol and more.
It's been really exciting and I know that I can hang in there with the best of them. But when I remember this trip in a year or two years, what I'll remember is the dinner I had with Meg. (Check out her blogs for incriminating photos.)
Isn't it funny that you can sit down with another person in recovery that you barely know and talk like you've known each other for years?
Tomorrow I go to a former coworker's house and three other former coworkers are joining us for dinner. They are some of the funniest women I've ever known.
When I was in school administration in the 90s I worked with them here in LA. One of them, Barb, is a distinguished looking, grey haired women (a former professor, in fact) with a raucous sense of humor. She drove a bright maroon four-door Buick with plush velour interior she called "The Pimpmobile." Now in LA, lunch is an event and you'd have to imagine four or five of us, dressed to the L.A. nines, piling into the Pimpmobile to cruise to whatever restaurant we fancied that day.
We worked for this guy who was really a jerk. A nice guy, actually, but always put his foot in his mouth. One day he was going on and on about his golf game. She remarked to him, in front of all of us, "You know I've always told my husband that golf is just an excuse for old white men to dress up like pimps."
You could have heard a pin drop until all the women fell out laughing. Barb is a hoot. So I'm looking forward to tomorrow. Until then, have a great day.
It's been really exciting and I know that I can hang in there with the best of them. But when I remember this trip in a year or two years, what I'll remember is the dinner I had with Meg. (Check out her blogs for incriminating photos.)
Isn't it funny that you can sit down with another person in recovery that you barely know and talk like you've known each other for years?
Tomorrow I go to a former coworker's house and three other former coworkers are joining us for dinner. They are some of the funniest women I've ever known.
When I was in school administration in the 90s I worked with them here in LA. One of them, Barb, is a distinguished looking, grey haired women (a former professor, in fact) with a raucous sense of humor. She drove a bright maroon four-door Buick with plush velour interior she called "The Pimpmobile." Now in LA, lunch is an event and you'd have to imagine four or five of us, dressed to the L.A. nines, piling into the Pimpmobile to cruise to whatever restaurant we fancied that day.
We worked for this guy who was really a jerk. A nice guy, actually, but always put his foot in his mouth. One day he was going on and on about his golf game. She remarked to him, in front of all of us, "You know I've always told my husband that golf is just an excuse for old white men to dress up like pimps."
You could have heard a pin drop until all the women fell out laughing. Barb is a hoot. So I'm looking forward to tomorrow. Until then, have a great day.
Sunday, May 20, 2007
Nothing but the dog in her!
Just can't keep Meg off a fire hydrant!
I'm in Anaheim for a convention, and fellow blogger Meg picked me up and took me to dinner at the Lazy Dog Cafe in Orange. We had a great time; however, when we left the restaurant, I was quite chagrined to have to pull Meg off the fire hydrant.
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I'm telling you, you can't take us addicts anywhere in public.
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Meg, you are a doll. Thanks for checking in with me this year. Your steady insight helps keep me on track.
Friday, May 18, 2007
One egg unhatched
I head out tomorrow for a few days in California for a journalism conference. Things here have been busy with a few projects. I keep putting one foot in front of the other and someday, things will make more sense than they do now.
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The parents are out gathering worms for the babies, so I may have another post of little heads later today. It's a constant delight.
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I am grateful to be above ground and sucking air, to steal a phrase from my sponsor. Until I blog again, have a blessed day.
Wednesday, May 16, 2007
I'm not the only one who hates Dell
New York's attorney general has filed a deceptive business practices lawsuit against Dell, for, among other things, "failing to provide their customers with adequate customer service." See what an influencer my blog is?
To read the press release, click here.
To read the press release, click here.
Tuesday, May 15, 2007
Monday, May 14, 2007
My newest friend
I put a window birdfeeder up near the mother bird. Bad idea. Mr. Squirrel moved right in. He was fearless when I stood up to the window to get his snap.
Sunday, May 13, 2007
Saturday, May 12, 2007
Dad, there's a crazy woman bothering us!
Every time I stand in the window to take a snap, this mad mother calls for reinforcement. In the upper picture, note the little blue egg peaking out. I'm still not sure how many are in there.
Out of the mouth of babes
As those who read my blog know, from time to time I get my undies in a big angry bunch and a few days ago was no exception. I truly believed after the liver transplant I wouldn't have problems with anger, but as my dear friend Louisa J. in Oakland (Happy 60th, girlfriend, I love you!) says, "It's like peeling the layers off an onion." Complete, I might add, with tears.
Anyhoo, I went to the Thursday night NA meeting where each week about a dozen new addicts arrive from drug court. Most of them are none too happy to be there, but each week as we learn their names and give them a "hey, welcome back" when they arrive, some of them start to warm to us, laugh at our lame humor, and even share in the meetings.
Most of us who shared Thursday had been around the camps awhile. The daily reading was about self-acceptance which led me to talk about my issues with anger and how it's "come around again," as I think I phrased it.
I shared a few of the things I felt had been a trigger, one of them the customer support from ACT Database (Boo) and the other thing the old guy who got in my face a few weeks ago and then Monday got really nasty with another of my friends complete with invading her body space, which sent me in another rip.
Like I said, just when you think you've dealt with the issue, ha! It isn't the "issue" it's the causes and conditions, isn't it?
Well, after the meeting this old guy there with a nudge from the judge pattered up to me and said, "When I was in before, my sponsor used to say to me when I got angry, "Who put you in charge of that?"
My eyes must have shot open, because boy, there was a moment of clarity! No one put me in charge of anything. All I need to do is watch my own emotions and keep them in check. God takes care of everything else.
Out of the mouth of babes sometimes comes the strongest reminder--God, not me, is in charge and I have to get out of my own way.
I missed the women's meeting this morning because Ms. Romy didn't wake me up. She needed her beauty rest, apparently. Have a wonderful weekend.
Anyhoo, I went to the Thursday night NA meeting where each week about a dozen new addicts arrive from drug court. Most of them are none too happy to be there, but each week as we learn their names and give them a "hey, welcome back" when they arrive, some of them start to warm to us, laugh at our lame humor, and even share in the meetings.
Most of us who shared Thursday had been around the camps awhile. The daily reading was about self-acceptance which led me to talk about my issues with anger and how it's "come around again," as I think I phrased it.
I shared a few of the things I felt had been a trigger, one of them the customer support from ACT Database (Boo) and the other thing the old guy who got in my face a few weeks ago and then Monday got really nasty with another of my friends complete with invading her body space, which sent me in another rip.
Like I said, just when you think you've dealt with the issue, ha! It isn't the "issue" it's the causes and conditions, isn't it?
Well, after the meeting this old guy there with a nudge from the judge pattered up to me and said, "When I was in before, my sponsor used to say to me when I got angry, "Who put you in charge of that?"
My eyes must have shot open, because boy, there was a moment of clarity! No one put me in charge of anything. All I need to do is watch my own emotions and keep them in check. God takes care of everything else.
Out of the mouth of babes sometimes comes the strongest reminder--God, not me, is in charge and I have to get out of my own way.
I missed the women's meeting this morning because Ms. Romy didn't wake me up. She needed her beauty rest, apparently. Have a wonderful weekend.
Friday, May 11, 2007
Here's an egg!
Robins lay blue eggs. This pair of robins are fiercely protective of their little treasures.
Wednesday, May 09, 2007
Another day clean
but angry. I'm not sure, maybe it's because I spent about four hours in the past two days on software support with techs in India who wouldn't know their butt from their madras shirt. I found myself, late today, in a rage, terribly upset because I couldn't find the place I was supposed to get my hair done, then upset because she did a poor job.
Tonight was the last night of class and one of our classmates presented a PowerPoint presentation on aborted fetuses. Jeez, give me a break. If this is graduate level work, I must be dreaming. Even in college our instructors didn't let us present on abortion. It's too controversial and what can you say? You're either pro-choice or not and feathers always fly.
I went to my home group, but after I found myself right back in a snit. I'm feeling a lot of pressure. I'm sure it's about being back in the workforce and the magic word, fear. Will I be able to support myself? Will more jobs come in? It's probably all 3rd step stuff, but then, maybe it's time that I dive into that 4th my sponsor suggested.
I'm feeling like everything and everyone lets me down. I don't know what all this is about, just frustration and expectations, I guess. I read page (now) 419 on acceptance. I know that I can't change anything; that all is how it's supposed to be. But as I told a friend of mine who's going through similar feelings and getting advice from others that her faith is lacking, it's one thing to talk theoretically about fear when you're not the one in the barrel; it's another to walk through the fear to the other side.
I guess God hasn't brought me this far to abort me. I think, reflecting on this, that most of all, I have let myself down. Maybe that's the real one to forgive.
Tonight was the last night of class and one of our classmates presented a PowerPoint presentation on aborted fetuses. Jeez, give me a break. If this is graduate level work, I must be dreaming. Even in college our instructors didn't let us present on abortion. It's too controversial and what can you say? You're either pro-choice or not and feathers always fly.
I went to my home group, but after I found myself right back in a snit. I'm feeling a lot of pressure. I'm sure it's about being back in the workforce and the magic word, fear. Will I be able to support myself? Will more jobs come in? It's probably all 3rd step stuff, but then, maybe it's time that I dive into that 4th my sponsor suggested.
I'm feeling like everything and everyone lets me down. I don't know what all this is about, just frustration and expectations, I guess. I read page (now) 419 on acceptance. I know that I can't change anything; that all is how it's supposed to be. But as I told a friend of mine who's going through similar feelings and getting advice from others that her faith is lacking, it's one thing to talk theoretically about fear when you're not the one in the barrel; it's another to walk through the fear to the other side.
I guess God hasn't brought me this far to abort me. I think, reflecting on this, that most of all, I have let myself down. Maybe that's the real one to forgive.
Sunday, May 06, 2007
Another day unpacking
I spent a few hours today unpacking. I've collected pottery for years, Frankoma, Hull, and a few other styles, and each piece I took out of the box had a bit of memory attached to it.
I unpacked my mother's dishes yesterday, washed them and put them in her old maple hutch. I couldn't help but recall how many family dinners we ate on those plates; how many Thanksgivings we ate as Bolero blared in the background; how many times she and I stood in the kitchen drying that china after all the hustle of the meal was over and my brothers and Dad sat in the family room watching football or baseball or arguing about something.
Sometimes, not often because I try not to allow myself regrets, I wonder how, despite how hard my parents tried to raise me well, I got so screwed up. I am so grateful that I got clean while they were alive so that they could see how much I'd changed. I'd finally, my mother said to me, become the daughter she'd wanted all along. I wonder why I couldn't see her love for me when I was young?
I guess I'm in the mood to reminisce because tonight at my home group I talked a lot about how I got clean in Phoenix. I don't know that I would have gotten clean anywhere else. People took me under their wing and loved me when I felt completely unlovable. They saw something in me that I couldn't even fathom in myself: That I was a worthwhile human being who had so terribly lost her way. Thank God for the Fellowship we had at the time.
We were at church today and sang Amazing Grace. Every time I hear that song I cry, I'm not sure why. Maybe it's because that's exactly what I was, a wretch, a pitiful, self-hating wretch. Yet God chose me to get clean.
Tonight at my home group there were three of us there with over twenty years. When I spoke about watching, as Red in Phoenix used to call it, the "passing parade," I saw them nodding, because we can't figure out why some people make it and some people don't. I often wonder why I am so lucky to have found the rooms and stuck.
Yes, I did the footwork, but it's grace, pure and simple, that brought me to the Fellowship and it is grace that has kept me there. And grace will lead me home.
I unpacked my mother's dishes yesterday, washed them and put them in her old maple hutch. I couldn't help but recall how many family dinners we ate on those plates; how many Thanksgivings we ate as Bolero blared in the background; how many times she and I stood in the kitchen drying that china after all the hustle of the meal was over and my brothers and Dad sat in the family room watching football or baseball or arguing about something.
Sometimes, not often because I try not to allow myself regrets, I wonder how, despite how hard my parents tried to raise me well, I got so screwed up. I am so grateful that I got clean while they were alive so that they could see how much I'd changed. I'd finally, my mother said to me, become the daughter she'd wanted all along. I wonder why I couldn't see her love for me when I was young?
I guess I'm in the mood to reminisce because tonight at my home group I talked a lot about how I got clean in Phoenix. I don't know that I would have gotten clean anywhere else. People took me under their wing and loved me when I felt completely unlovable. They saw something in me that I couldn't even fathom in myself: That I was a worthwhile human being who had so terribly lost her way. Thank God for the Fellowship we had at the time.
We were at church today and sang Amazing Grace. Every time I hear that song I cry, I'm not sure why. Maybe it's because that's exactly what I was, a wretch, a pitiful, self-hating wretch. Yet God chose me to get clean.
Tonight at my home group there were three of us there with over twenty years. When I spoke about watching, as Red in Phoenix used to call it, the "passing parade," I saw them nodding, because we can't figure out why some people make it and some people don't. I often wonder why I am so lucky to have found the rooms and stuck.
Yes, I did the footwork, but it's grace, pure and simple, that brought me to the Fellowship and it is grace that has kept me there. And grace will lead me home.
Thursday, May 03, 2007
Bring it forth
"What you bring forth out of yourself from the inside will save you. What you do not bring forth out of yourself from the inside will destroy you." -- Gospel of Thomas
Wednesday, May 02, 2007
Tuesday, May 01, 2007
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