37 Years – 114 Days

This post is worthy of repetition. It recently came to the attention of a number of us that a gal in New York with 19 years clean in NA is “back out there.” She is loved by many, and knowing that she’s killing herself is being felt by those she helped. As yet, none of them have followed her, thank God. Please, these stories are real and true. Take them to heart. Alcoholism, addiction, kills people. [Originally posted June 15th, 2007]

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I’m paying attention. To Mary Christine. To dAAve. To a host of others. And I have to re-tell this story. A story I had the absolute pleasure of repeating to an “oldtimer” sitting on his time at a meeting here a few years back.

Many AA groups on Long Island have group anniversaries each year where they combine an eating meeting, a speaker and a dance afterwards. Really festive occasions.

A number of years ago, quite ordinarily as it had become, we began to hear the announcement, as usual, about this particular anniversary meeting and dance being held that month in our area. Not unusually, we were informed of the speaker and the speakers’ sobriety time. In this case the person coming to speak had 37 years sober. Heck, that impresses me!

It felt almost like a slow drumroll as the date closed in and I developed some excited anticipation as did many others. We arrived at the meeting place, did the usual hello’s, saw friends from other groups we hadn’t seen in a while, chit-chatted, and finally ate a fine meal furnished by many volunteers. Eventually the time came when we were asked to find our seats for the meeting and it began. First the readings, the obligatory stories about the group and its history, the announcements about coming events in the area then lastly, the introduction of tonight’s speaker. As I recall it wasn’t too long-winded. Just basically “so and so” from “their home town” who has graciously accepted the invitation to share their 37 years of experience, strength and hope with us this evening. Cool…

A well dressed lady approached the podium. I don’t think I was alone sensing something, something wrong. I’d seen a fair number of speakers approach the podium by now and this just wasn’t right. The suspense did not last long. Once she arrived at the mic, she stated her name like we do and then said something along the lines of “thank you all for inviting me to speak but I’m not sure you’ll want me to stay up here when you hear my first statement.” The feeling began to clear.

Next she offered what amounted to an admission and an apology, saying she knew we expected to hear someone with 37 years sobriety tonight but that she was no longer that person because as of that day she then had 114 days. Wow…

I guess I might say that I’m thankful everyone was too stunned to react poorly because what happened then is one of the most important lessons I’ve learned in recovery. She proceeded to ask permission, receiving it without sound, to tell us exactly how this came about. And then she explained in detail how she worked the program backwards, beginning with cutting back on meetings.

Mary Christine tells us about a man who slowly stopped going to meetings and what he thought as the process grew worse in his head. This sounds soooo similar to what we heard that night years ago and I’ve not forgotten it. I’m not very good at telling jokes, perhaps dAAve has this one in his arsenal – about the alkie who got a flat on a lonely country road, had no jack, saw a farm house a quarter mile away, walked towards the farm house and went through so many negative thoughts that by the time he got to the front door to ask for help with his flat tire he instead cussed the farmer out and told him to keep his f**ing jack!

That ladies’ story about how she worked herself, thought herself, right out of recovery into her next drink is a story I never want to forget. I can’t retell it in its entirety simply because you’d have had to have been there to truly understand. Myself and about 250 others were there.

The deal is to never, ever rest on our laurels because alcohol is a subtle foe! No matter how much sober time I may have I am only one stinking thought (f it) away from that next drink. For me, what has become of paramount importance, is to maintain a conscious contact with the God I understand (the one who loves me unconditionally) and tell that God each and every day that I am thankful for the gift of sobriety and I will do what I can to pass it on. I will continue to make meetings, no matter what. BTW – for those of you who don’t know (and without an explanation except for – this is about to change, thankfully) I make 3-5 meetings a week and haven’t had a drivers license for almost 8 years. Please, don’t go anywhere near telling me or anyone similar to me that you are having trouble making it to meetings. That is just a lame excuse!

I have no idea what has happened to that lady but I certainly owe her a debt of gratitude (and that group for letting her talk) for what she said that night. You never know where what you need will come from…