Alcohol Renovates Your Perception of Reality and Then Unrenovated Reality Becomes Unlivable – Clancy I.

My name is Clancy Immersland and I'm an alcoholic.
I assume this is for someone previous to me. I hope it is.
So, in a nice way, let's throw one along.
Yes, we want to go down to the next trophy.
This will be good training for me. We're having the Olympics in Los Angeles next summer and
I thought maybe we'd play the state songs for the winners.
I want to welcome all of you to the Saturday night meeting. A special welcome to all of you folks downstairs in the half-measures room.
We want to get to you first.
I don't want to live in a Pepsi machine.
I'd rather have a sandwich and wonder what that arrogant son of a bishop stare looks like.
I want to thank the committee for inviting me. I've heard many fine stories about this conference.
My sponsors told me about it a number of times. She's been down here several times.
And it really is kind of a staggering thing.
You know, 600 people at this convention.
That's just how many we have at our weekly Wednesday night meeting in Los Angeles.
Only it's a little better organized.
But it is...
We don't have hardly anybody who talks funny there.
And it's...
Am I off on the wrong foot?
I've enjoyed the convention very much.
I'm sorry I missed Frank Thursday...
I missed Hank Thursday night.
I had to be at where I work on Thursday afternoon because one of our guys are dying.
One of our long-term employees.
And so I couldn't get out until Friday morning.
But I've heard Hank talk probably more than anybody else here with the possible exception of his wife.
And I've enjoyed him very often.
I'm sure you all enjoyed him, too.
And on Friday...
I'm sorry I wasn't here for the gin tournament.
I could have used another trophy.
I...
And Friday night I...
It was nice hearing Frank talk, who is America's substitute speaker.
It's just...
Anywhere you go in America, whatever your program says, Frank Milo talks.
It's just...
It's a touching story.
And I want to tell you something, Frank, because I want to make friends with everybody here.
You said that you were disappointed
when you came to Dallas
and you couldn't find any cowboys.
I'll explain that to you.
They're all being indicted on cocaine charges.
The...
Maybe I could make some friends later, aren't I?
We're all very arrogant in Los Angeles.
I see in the paper today that they have allowed the Los Angeles Raiders to stay in Los Angeles,
not have to move back to Oakland.
So we're all feeling good.
And I very much enjoyed Beth's talk this morning.
She doesn't look like someone who's been through a lot of trauma, and she doesn't sound like it.
But, boy, I tell you, her talk sent shivers down my spine.
Anyone who missed that, I would suggest you get a tape of that talk.
It's an excellent talk.
It's showing what Alcoholics Anonymous can do.
And I want to also say one thing.
I see among the committee here is Pat Gee in Al-Anon.
And I heard Pat talk last Saturday in Atlanta, Georgia.
And she gave an excellent talk.
And her husband was not there to defend himself,
and so it was an even better talk than the usual.
Let me tell you...
That son of a bitch did to me.
What a shame he's not here to cuff me around in the room afterward.
So, Shirley, why don't you give her a few raps tonight after the meeting just for drill.
And I'm looking forward tomorrow morning to hearing Bill I. from North Carolina.
I've not heard him talk, but I know that anyone whose last initial is I has got to give a good talk.
Tom I, I mean.
Tom I, right.
Anything except Red Eye.
I was thinking, not very far from here, Amarillo.
Seventeen years ago was the first time I came to Texas to talk.
And I came to Texas to talk, and I was a little apprehensive,
because at that time I was still technically a patient at Big Spring State Hospital.
And all they ever needed when I was in the state of Texas was a phone call from my wife
for me to be returned to the electric shock ward for the rest of my life.
And so I was somewhat apprehensive when I came to Amarillo at the top of Texas.
But as it turned out, I ran into some nice people.
I ran into Francis Newsome from Midland and Joe Clary,
whom some of you know.
And Shelby Parnell.
And they invited me to come down to Midland.
And I went over and talked to that hospital.
I've talked there every year since.
I was trying to get down there one way or another.
And talked to the current student body and pushed them deeper into their apathy.
But I very much enjoyed it.
I remember, I don't know how I happened to think about this.
I remember starting off my talk, I didn't know what to say.
I said,
all week and long people had been talking about how wonderful it is they were alive in Texas and so on.
And I remember saying that it was nice to see so many people living in Texas.
But I thought I might be the only one at the convention who died in Texas.
And I, they didn't know what the hell that meant.
But I had, as I went on to explain to them, and most of you know,
I committed suicide in Texas.
Which, at that time,
today when you commit suicide they give you two aspirants and tell them to call back in the morning.
But in those days they were kind of cold about it.
And they examined me for some time at the psych award.
And I tried to explain to them that there was just a series of misunderstandings.
Because I had just got done directing an opera at the University of Texas at El Paso.
And I was working days at an advertising agency.
I was a sports writer for the El Paso.
El Paso Herald Post.
I was the official statistician for the college football team.
That's when Texas Tech was in our conference.
And I had had some depression but I,
the only thing I couldn't get around
was how the hose in my car happened to be
running from the exhaust pipe into the car
and the garage doors were locked and I was in there dead.
I tried to explain, I couldn't explain that very well.
And so the doctor talked to me for a week or two on a continuing basis,
incisive questioning.
Finally determined I had a badly split personality,
a schizoid personality.
And committed me for an indefinite period
to the Texas State Hospital of Big Spring, Texas.
Now most of you younger folks think that the Texas State Hospital of Big Spring, Texas
and these other state hospitals are primarily designed
you go there and do 30 days for alcoholism and come home.
In my, when I was committed there,
there was no alcoholism commitment in the state of Texas.
But I know.
And I wasn't committed as an alcoholic anyway
because I'd been, I was cold sober when all this happened.
I was committed as a mental patient
and I had to go there and stay there until I got well.
And if I wouldn't have found a way around it,
I might have had a call in my talk tonight.
Because it was a, I'm sometimes not certain
that I would pass their graduation exercise
examination.
But I remember being committed in there
and thinking how dreadful.
And it categorized among my other defects
that I was a severe depressive,
which I had been.
And I, I remember sitting at Big Spring
in that old red brick building there
and thinking, Jesus, I thought I was depressed before.
This is really, you know.
When you get an indefinite commitment
to the Texas State Insane Asylum,
that is almost a basic resume buster.
That is, you really have a bitch
working that in later, I'll tell you.
And then what did you do during the next five years?
Well, I was self-employed.
The only funny thing I ever thought about that
is that I thought back and thought,
later I was going to go back and get that psychiatrist.
I almost was going to prosecute him for malpractice.
Because he misdiagnosed my case intensely.
I was going to go back there and say,
you goof.
You know, if you call yourself a psychiatrist
and call me a split personality,
if I could get my personality down to two,
I could make it from there.
It's this group therapy,
or I'm alone in my car, you know.
And the reason I was in touch with him,
such a severe depression,
was because I had been forced to stop drinking
to hold my job.
And I had to hold my job
because my wife was pregnant again.
And I had just recently come to El Paso
to start over from the last time I busted open.
And I...
The...
It was just...
I was under a lot of pressure.
I was holding three jobs,
trying to pay a rent in a home two states back,
that I...
was behind in trying to do something.
And...
And I drank.
Because drinking provides relaxation for me.
And I was under terrible tension.
I was so very intense.
And the dean of the university called me in.
And he told me that he understood
I'd been acting bizarrely in Juarez.
And I...
I had...
I had a terrible time.
Some of you who have been in the athletics realize
there's something called choking.
And it's...
When the pressure is on,
an invisible hand comes out of your shirt
and goes...
And it makes you miss the third strike
or drop the punt
or do whatever it is.
But it also happens in the real world.
And it happens to me
when I'm under a lot of pressure.
And it may happen to you too.
A hand comes out of my shirt.
And...
My mind thinks.
But...
I can't say it.
And I want to just shriek at this guy.
But I didn't.
I just thought at him.
Yeah.
I'm not acting bizarrely in Juarez.
I'm under a lot of pressure.
I'm trying to make up for lost time.
I have a terrible life.
I...
I'm holding three jobs,
for Christ's sake.
Most of the people I know
can't have trouble holding one.
And I'm holding three.
I've got a bunch of little things
that I've got to do.
I've got to...
I've got to...
I've got to...
I've got to...
I've got to...
I've got to...
I've got to...
I've got to...
I'm holding three.
I've got a bunch of little kids.
They cry all night.
My wife is pregnant again.
Sometimes I just...
My mind goes around.
I can't...
I can't stand it.
I...
I can't sleep.
I just...
And I maybe get up at two in the morning.
Just frantic.
And I may go to Juarez
where I'm known and loved.
And I may go into the Chinese palace
or Las Catacumbas.
And I may go in and stand on the bar.
But I need to...
And I need to...
I need to...
I need to...
I need to...
I need to...
I need to...
I need to...
I need to...
I need to...
I need to...
I need to...
all the tourists have gone home
just the regulars are there
and balance on one leg
to show my cuteness
and order limon
y tequila y sal
and sing my little song
yo soy el maestro
de los locos en Chihuahua
God damn it, that relaxes me
that helps me sleep
but that's what I thought
what I said was
and the condition line in front of me
is I could not drink anymore
and when I can't drink
it makes the pressure intolerable
because as long as I can remember
drinking has been a pressure reliever for me
drinking has been a
something that eases off the pressure
and sometimes
when the pressure is too great
or I'm not watching myself
I lose control and I drink too much
and when I drink too much
sometimes people think that my problem is drinking
really well intentioned
kindly people think my problem is drinking
and I have
I can't even think of an answer to explain to them
my problem really isn't
drinking so much
it is now when you see me drunk
but that really isn't it
there's something about me
I don't think I ever put my finger on the phrase
but if I could assimilate all the ways I felt
if I could have said it
if I could have thought it
if I could have collected it
I might have said
there is something different about me
but I don't know what it is
I either got to find a place where I fit in
or I got to drink
but I do the best I can
and it goes good for a while
but then it dissipates
and I do not know why
but people act differently towards me
as though they have found out something about me
I don't know what they are finding out
and I just feel different
and I get frustrated
and I feel
I feel almost as though there is something on the back of my shirt
that says treat me different
and I can't see it but everybody else can
and I wind up
feeling frustrated
and full of anxiety
and I feel separated
and people who I was chummy with two months ago
somehow they are not chummy anymore
something is different
and I don't know what it is
but there has got to be some place
where there are people like me
who have strange sense of humor
or
when they say things
it isn't always the wrong thing
but they understand what I meant by it
or that I understand
that I meant it
or that I meant it
or that I meant it
or that I'm doing very well
doing the best I can
and I can't find it
and I found it again and again
but it never lasted
it never lasted
I remember a couple of years ago
I was up in Portland
talking at a convention
and sitting around the coffee room
people were sharing their experiences
dealing with
the Mount St. Helens explosion
about how they felt
the people who lived in that area
and how they felt
in the north of Portland
because they didn't really
it doesn't like lava coming
you get that in Hawaii
where the lava comes
and burns you out
but there it was just
they'd hear far away little noises
and they saw no evidence of it
but everything
little by little
the whole town turned gray
just as fine powder came down
and the lawn turned gray
and the house turned gray
and the car turned gray
and the children outside
came down
came in
would come in
and they're looking a little gray
just a fine, fine
dissemination of this volcanic ash
and I got thinking about that
on the way home
I was thinking
that's almost
an exact description
of my life
I go to places
I go out of my way
to find a colorful place
where it's going to be colorful
and keep me interested
and fun
and then there are some far away noises after a while
and things begin to turn gray
the house that looked so nice
is now getting to be gray
and the car is getting gray
and the new job is getting gray
and the neighbors are getting gray
and my chums
my new chums are turning gray
and little by little
it gets grayer
and grayer
and somehow inside of me
there's something that cannot
stand
perpetual grayness
I gotta have color
I want some fun
and excitement
and occasionally
I want to have some pleasure out of life
and I can't get it in a gray world
I
to this day
when I look at
over the
look at
The Wizard of Oz
I
I cannot identify with Dorothy
giving up
the technicality
the color of Oz
to go back to Kansas
where it's not even gray
it's a sepia
it's just a
just
yuck
Auntie M may be a nice old broad
but she ain't that nice
to make everything gray forever
and that's why I drink a little bit
I drink because drinking puts a little color in my life
and uh
I started going to AA
way over 30 years ago
uh
and
AA
is a nice place
but it's another
almost a perfect example
of training
for a gray existence
you step into AA
and you realize
that you are at the beginning
of an endless gray tunnel
just an on and on
and day after day
and sit in those goddamn meetings
and
there's those people give you non-applicable
cliches
oh they're going crazy
well
you keep coming back
there's something not intellectually exciting
about the answers you get here
and you could get up every morning and say
well
another wonderful gray day
and there's no relief
anywhere
and at the end of a year
you watch people get a year
is there some break
no
a little hatch opens
and a scrawny arm drops a 39 cent cake
hmm
is that all there is
hello
and on and on
and there's gotta be more than that
and so I tried a lot of things
I realized that
I went to a lot of places
I worked in a lot of towns
I did a lot of different kind of jobs
and all of them were just the answer
till they turned gray
I had it again and again
and I have new
I'm going to be a wonderful father
when I bring my children out of this town
I was always a town or two ahead of them
it seemed like
I'd bring them in
and get settled
I remember in El Paso
a gentleman here from El Paso
when we
when you come here on the airplane
to Lubbock now
it really is fun coming out of Los Angeles
you see the entire southwest
you go to Phoenix
and stop
we stopped there a long time
because there was a lady got on so fast
the safety belt wouldn't go around her
so they had to go to a different plane
and get another safety
but gosh
it was only 105
and then we went to Albuquerque
and then we went to El Paso
but I liked going to El Paso
because I used to live in El Paso
and I remember
but I brought
I went up north
to get my wife and kids
and I brought them down to
drove them to Texas
drove them to El Paso
we came in from Kansas
last night at midnight
and I took them up
there's a road that goes over the mountain
before I woke them up
and I put them in this mountain
right in the middle of town
and woke them up and said
this is the place
and there are golden
there are lights to all
everything is going to be fine here
and a year and a half later
she had to get on and sign that commitment
to put me in the insane asylum
for as long as I could continue
and it just went on like that
and when you feel like that
a few drinks sometimes are necessary
but the problem is
how in the world
to keep from getting in trouble
I want the relaxation
but I don't want
the things that happen
when you cross that line of
where you start getting reactions
I've often thought
my efforts to control drinking
were very similar to modern man's
attempts to control atomic energy
when it works
nothing works better
but every so often there's a
another three mile island
that you didn't expect to
instead of waking up feeling relaxed
you're leaning against a wall like this
or you got your hands
handcuffed behind you
or three guys just get done
kicking the bejesus out of you
on the back of your head
on the back of a bar
and on and think
I got to avoid that
but I also know
I tried psychoanalysis over 30 years ago
I got into metaphysics
I read Nietzsche and Schopenhauer
I did everything I knew how
I went to A&A
heard these guys
and my perceptions by
were so prejudging
that I never heard any
I'm sure they must have been saying
the same things in A&A 30 years ago
they're saying
but I never heard it once
but it seemed to me
I always heard
I drank
for many years
night and day
around the clock
one day I walked through that door
and the desire to drink
left me like a cloak
fluttering to the floor
I now have
three million dollars
right in that pocket
several different families
have returned to me
and I owe it all to one thing
I put the plug in the jug
and the only alternative to that
was the other guy who said
and I've just never felt
so goddamn good
and I
I didn't know what to do
I fought and fought
I went to AA
and I went to therapeutics
I did different things
I went to jail 30 some times
that's hard when you're trying to keep up an executive career
I've been in hospitals
I've been strapped down
tomorrow night I'm going to visit Albuquerque
I have a bunch of kids
who through a series of bad breaks and misunderstandings
live in Albuquerque
and
it really is kind of funny
my oldest daughter and her husband
were teaching in Kentucky at the university
and they both got a very good
opportunity at the University of New Mexico
so they came down to New Mexico
and one of their sisters visited them
and she was at Long Beach State
and she just loved Albuquerque
so she moved to Albuquerque
she was working on her degree in nursing education
and another sister graduated
she and her husband and little girl
they graduated from the University of Hawaii
they didn't have the master's program they wanted
so they visited Albuquerque
and they loved Albuquerque
and next month my youngest child
my son is enrolling as a freshman at the University of New Mexico
so I sometimes think
my older daughters don't understand
why they have such an empathy towards Albuquerque
because they've never lived in that kind of a climate
but I think I know what it is
because Albuquerque is very similar to El Paso
and I think when they were little
and they loved El Paso
that's what they kind of remember
is that
Albuquerque
but I'm going to get out of my mind
but one of those daughters
was working on her degree in nursing education
I remember when she was born
the day mother went to the hospital
I was already at the hospital
strapped down on the next floor
chained down I think
now a lot of husbands get there with the wife
for a day later
but to be there a day ahead
to anticipate labor
and just get up there
and chain yourself up
and God damn it
I hate that
because they look at you funny
it seemed to me
nurses go by and say
it just makes you crazy
I've always been very sensitive to people
doing things like that to me
my oldest daughter
was a faculty at the university there
when we lived in Dallas
when I finally got out of that Texas
I finally beat the Texas nut house
because they put in an alcoholic program
the first one in the state of Texas
and I manipulated them
into allowing me to become
I believe
the first psychiatric patient
in the state of Texas
to be allowed to go to alcoholism
to the alcoholism unit
because I'd been going to AA
six or seven years by this time
I knew how to act like an alcoholic
and I had this old man
nice man
Les Ross
I manipulated him terribly
and I got
you know
the others just came and went
every 30 days
but I was there until I got well
so I became the best patient
they could have had
old Mr. Ross would give us a talk
for an hour
he'd say
I'm going to tell you about
the 12 steps today boys
and we'd go
ah
but not me
he'd get all done
are there any questions
only one question
is this not cruel
and unhuman punishment
I have a question Mr. Ross
perhaps you could tell us
some more about the fourth step
and how we put this stuff on paper
and reached out
and get the garbage
out of our house
and get the garbage out of our system
and find out a way around it
he'd say
I'll tell you about that right now Clancy
and the whole rest of the room would say
ah shit
but I wasn't trying to impress them
I had to get him
you know
it wasn't really what you call
sincere alcoholic recovery
you'd say to the guy next to you
what are you going to do
to get out of here Fred
I'm going to kill that bitch
but by attrition
I got to be the best person
I got to be secretary of the group
and pretty soon
they start sending me out
to little towns
to give AA talks
you know
a couple of patients
were taken over to Odessa
or Midland
or Big Spring
or San Angelo
or some place
not give little talks
just wonderful
friends
I'm just proud to be here tonight
on behalf of my fellow patients
to thank each and every one of you
for carrying a message of faith and hope
to us at the Big Spring State Hospital
many of us were going across
the vast desert of alcoholism
and I
our legs were weary
when we came to the tall green hills
of sobriety
and they were too steep
for us to climb
but folks such as you
showed us twelve golden stairs
that we could climb
one after another
and they were difficult
and they were hard to climb
but we climbed those steps
and now we stand
nearly up on top
of the hill of sobriety
and we are looking forward
to going back to our homes
throughout the West Texas
to transmit the message
you have given us
to other lost wayfarers
on that desert of alcoholism
and may God bless you
and your wonderful ongoing work
now you can laugh
I got me out of the Texas nut house
and the funny thing is
I've said many times
a lot of people think
that kind of therapy doesn't work
but I never had another drink
until I ran out of Thorazine
but we're living in Dallas
now
some people give me a chance again
and now I was going to make my move
and I'd learned my lesson
and after taking my 48 electric shock treatments
at the big spring state hospital
my head was coming back
I didn't know I had that
many little years later
and Dr. Preston down there told me
if I'd known that
I'd never been able to think
but since I didn't know
I was able to come around
but I was working
in the largest advertising agency
in the South
a firm called Tracy Lock
and I was working on these old ads
for the Borden company
these Elsie and Elmer ads
and I was making my move
and I was making my move
and when things started
graying out again
and I determined
this couldn't happen again
and I
because I was still an outpatient
from that nut house
I signed out to my wife
can you imagine that
she had to file a report
every Saturday
how I was doing
and send it in
and all she ever had
to put on there once
was he's acting funny
and that's the end of that
so that makes a little tension
around the house
how did you get the garbage out
of it?
I wish I'd have thought of that Char
and you just think
if she goes near that phone
I'm going to kill her
and I was determined
to make it up to my children
I had a little daughter Mary
who was nine
and I loved her
and she fell off the porch one day
and it turned out
she'd broken her leg
although I didn't know it
and I rushed up
I just happened to be home
watching a football game
half in the bay
and I picked her up
and I said
honey I'm glad daddy's here
and I rushed up
and I said
honey I'm glad daddy's here
and I rushed up
and I said
honey I'm glad daddy's here
and I rushed up
and I said
honey I'm glad daddy's here
and I rushed in the house
and she was longer
than the door was wide
and I broke her leg again
you know
things like that
you just wonder
what do you have to do
for Christ's sake
when you do act well
it goes bad
and it went on like this
and I went to A.A.
and I went to a lot of things
and nothing ever
was the answer
and it got grayer
and grayer
until one day
I found myself
hearing a guy say
get out
and start working
and I said
I'm sorry
I'm sorry
I'm sorry
I'm sorry
I'm sorry
I'm sorry
I said
stay out
and I looked up
and I had been 86'
out of a
midnight mission
on Skid Row
in Los Angeles
and my family
was still in Texas
my parents had written me off
and I couldn't believe it
I was dying
and I don't
I thought
if I only
would have found that place
it isn't from lack of interest
to lack of desire
remember
many times
I have taken vows
that would, I would no more break that vow
that I would, I'd rather be died
than break the vow.
For example, time after time
I have taken intense vows.
Once, we were talking about a couple of weeks ago.
You know, once upon a time I was in jail
for fighting a cop in my hometown
when I was a young guy.
And my father came to the jail cell
and he says, I hope you had a good time last night
when you were out drunk.
And I said, no, I didn't.
I'm going to do better.
He said, I hope you enjoyed it
because you let your little son die at home.
And I could, I almost went crazy with that, I'll tell you.
And the judge let me out
because he was a friend of our family.
He said, I hope you remember this.
And he said, I hope every time
a guy like you goes by a bar
you see your little dead son's face on that door
and never go in.
You cannot handle it.
And I, we went out to the cemetery
and it was wintertime
and up there in the wintertime
they don't,
buried in the ground
they put him in a holding chamber
until the ground thaws.
And it was just a little casket.
And I remember I felt so bad
and the relatives came in
and looked at me funny again
as though to say, look at that son of a bitch.
And I couldn't stand it.
So I wouldn't let anybody be a pallbearer.
I said, I'll be his pallbearer.
I took him from the,
after the funeral
on the hearse
and over to the little house
and I put him in there.
I was in there alone
and I put my hand in his casket
and I said, John,
John, this will never,
ever, ever happen again.
You will never have to be ashamed of me.
I hope when you're in heaven
you will look down
and know you will never be ashamed of me again.
And 29 days later
sitting in a room where I was working
in a different city
I began to drink.
Because if I hadn't begun to drink
I'd have gone crazy
thinking about my son John.
And now that isn't a problem
with drinking.
Drinking,
putting the cork in the bottle
doesn't change that.
Stopping drinking
and becoming good
doesn't change that.
Yeah, I'll be glad to go to AA
if you can make it 1948 again.
If you can make it 1951 again.
If you can make it just a week before
up in another place where I was working
where this guy and I were,
I'd met him in a market.
He was a clerk
and I was an executive
at Fairbanks Moors.
And he said
I said, is there any cheese?
He said, there's some cheese.
I said, is there any good?
He says, it has a certain authority.
I said, what's a goofy clerk
in a store
docking like that for?
So I got talking to him.
Turned out he had been
just expelled from the medical school
of the University of Wisconsin.
And he'd been caught
in a compromising homosexual situation.
And I got
he and I got to be good friends.
And I said, listen, I'll tell you something.
I don't know much about homosexuality.
It never bothered me.
But let me see if I can help you become straight.
Because I've read theories where homosexuality
is kind of a retarded sexual maturity.
And I was directing a play
a night up there.
And I put him in a place
called My Three Angels.
And I've made a point of getting him together
with a leading lady.
And they came to fruition.
And he was starting to like it.
And his job was to help me
so I wouldn't drink.
I was going to watch him
so he didn't become homosexual.
And he was going to watch me
so I didn't drink.
Well, that was all right.
But one day, as it must,
I didn't know why,
nor does anybody here know why
when it happens to him.
I just wanted to get a drink.
And I got so goddamn tired
of the gray world.
And I drank it.
So somebody said,
shouldn't you get a hold of Bob?
The hell with Bob.
And I drank.
And I got drunker.
And then I got mad at myself.
Maybe some of you have done that.
And I started breaking up things
in the living room.
And my wife didn't know what to do.
She got a hold of Bob
and said, Bob, can you come over?
Maybe you can help Clancy.
I can't.
So he came over.
And he looked at me with that look.
And maybe you've seen that look.
Again, I saw it again and again all my life.
That look of disappointment.
That look of, oh, how could you do this?
Just that, don't even say anything.
Just look at you.
And it makes you feel so bad.
And I shrieked at him.
Get up.
Get that goddamn queer out of my house.
I got children in this house.
I don't want a queer around my children.
And on and on.
And he just turned white and staggered up.
And the next morning his mother called up and said,
what happened to Bob?
I said, I don't know what.
She said, he killed himself last night.
I said, oh, Jesus.
And that day I started hitchhiking.
Gave up my job and wound up hitchhiking west
to play piano in a cheap bar in San Francisco
and left everything I had.
Everything I touched turned bad.
And yet, I can't find a formula for it.
And maybe I'm crazy, but I'm not crazy.
I've got to find a place where I can sustain it.
And I can't sustain it.
I can't believe that I've been singled out
to just feel bad all my life.
And in a sense, it was almost a relief
standing on Skid Row in Los Angeles.
I had a t-shirt, an old pair of pants and some pennies.
I could look down and see the sky.
I was on my wrists where I had my wrist slashing.
I could think back of, at least I can't hurt anybody now.
And I remember thinking, I wish I would have known
what the hell was wrong with me.
And I went over the next morning to sell a pint of blood
at the Skid Row blood bank.
And they took a drop of blood in my ear and said,
you don't have enough iron in your blood
to sell blood anymore.
Couldn't get a $4 for a lousy pint of blood.
And it was raining and it was cold and I felt bad.
Then one, the funny thing, suicide,
the two bottles, always, never wanna commit suicide
when they're really at rock bottom.
You gotta have something to make people sorry about.
It's just, when you're at rock bottom,
you fight to stay alive, it's the damnedest paradox.
And I walked 71 blocks out to the AA club.
And I walked in there, something called the 6300 Club.
And the guy says, you can't come in.
And I said, why not?
I couldn't talk very well either
because I just had my front teeth kicked out
in the Phoenix Drum Tank.
Which cuts into your brain.
It cuts into your ability to do consonants.
I said, why not, for Christ's sake?
He says, you've been banned out of here.
Remember, two weeks ago, you stole the coffee money
at the Friday night discussion group.
I said, oh yeah, remember that?
No, yeah.
I remember thinking, I better tell this guy
that I better pretend to be an alcoholic.
I said, I guess I had a little slip.
He says, you didn't have any slip.
You're just a funny puke.
I said, I guess you're right, Tom.
But I thought, someday I'm going to pull out your fingernails,
you son of a bitch, one by one, and listen to you scream.
But I can't do it today.
He says, why don't you just go in the back room?
Don't anybody know that I let you in?
Because you make me sick.
God bless you, Tom.
But I thought, I'm going to heat up those fingernails
and stick them in your eyeballs.
Just scream.
Scream, mother.
Scream.
And I went in the back room, and I lay down there,
and I thought, what am I going to do?
I remember thinking briefly.
It sounds funny, but it just wasn't at all funny.
I remember thinking, I thought, maybe my suicide in El Paso
had been successful, and that this is
the way it's going to be for eternity.
When you're a Lutheran, you think those sort of things.
And I thought, I better pretend to be an alcoholic for a while,
just to get these people off my back.
Just to get them off my back.
I don't know what the hell went wrong, but by God,
I was better at 15 in the Pacific in World War II
than I am now when I've had success.
I've only wanted to be a good man in a good world,
and there's something inside of me.
Maybe I'm possessed by some kind of devil.
Maybe there's something that every so often just
comes and gets me.
And I don't want it to happen, but it happens.
If I could only find a way to keep the color,
without the result.
And I decided to pretend to be an alcoholic,
until I could get a score and get to Seattle.
And I, it was so bad that I couldn't even get a score.
And I wound up stuck in that damn club for weeks,
for days, and then weeks, and then months.
I lived in the backseat of an abandoned car in the parking lot,
in the tall weeds, and I just lurked out there
and came in in the morning and went out at night.
And I had no idea then, and I didn't after a while.
I remember when I was 30 days sober thinking,
Jesus, I'm 30 days sober.
There must be something wrong.
And I had no idea that that would be my sobriety date.
I didn't intend for it to be,
and sobriety doesn't help cases like mine.
And that's why I'm glad tonight to give my sobriety date,
as you say here, through the grace of God
and the power of Alcoholics Anonymous.
It's not been necessary for me to take a drink
for a sedating or tranquilizing pill.
It's not necessary for me to take a drink for a sedating or tranquilizing pill.
It's not necessary for me to take a drink for a sedating or tranquilizing pill.
I've had a chill since that morning, October 31, 1958,
and for which I am very grateful.
In a couple of months, if I survive,
and I knock on wood that I won't be carried away by gypsies,
I'll have 25 years of sobriety.
And I sometimes have questioned the quality of my sobriety,
because I suppose every alcoholic, sober alcoholic does
who has been sober longer than 20 minutes.
But when I sometimes think about where I came from,
I'll tell you,
I will settle for any quality sobriety.
I hope to make it better because it's more comfortable
and I want to regain my comfort
when I get in a situation that are bad.
But I'll tell you this,
that I sometimes find myself,
as you would expect when I'm reminded of things,
almost tears in my eyes of gratitude
because the best professional people in America
that I knew threw up their hands at my case.
And the best AAs that I knew
threw up their hands at my case.
And nothing really traumatic happened.
Nothing really traumatic happened.
Somehow, someway,
something made me desperate enough
to do something that I would have usually not done.
And that is, for whatever the motive,
I began,
I began to change my actions.
The only reason I changed my actions
was I could hustle these people and make a score.
So I began playing their sick little game.
And their sick little game that I played worked.
And I was in that club all the time,
so I had to act better all the time.
It really got to be a drag.
I had no place to go and let it out.
And those old guys that I got to sponsor,
I had many sponsors.
I had the editor of the El Paso Times
was my sponsor.
And the head of the largest public relations firm.
And a big doctor,
society doctor in Dallas was my sponsor.
And I've had sponsors in every city I've ever been in
that I went to AA because I was like,
get a sponsor, get a sponsor.
So I got a sponsor.
But this sponsor was,
turned out he didn't have
unjudged love.
That's,
if you want to make it easy around here,
look for a sponsor that has unjudgmental love.
Who says, I love you.
I don't want to get into your space.
You got to do what you got to do,
but whatever you got to do, I love you.
I always look for sponsors like that.
They don't bother you.
They don't get in your way.
They don't nag you.
I got a whole,
I tried to get a couple guys like that in that club,
but they didn't want,
they said, we don't believe we're qualified to handle your case, Clancy.
All right.
All right.
All right.
All right.
All right.
All right.
All right.
I got a guy.
And I got the wrong sponsor.
He did not understand love.
He'd say things,
you know,
when you got a sponsor,
I'll tell you what you do.
You try not to talk to him unless you got good news.
Or else you got,
you need money,
one or the other.
But then you call him up.
When you usually talk to your sponsor,
it's two o'clock in the morning,
you call him and say,
hello, Fred.
I'm afraid I've let you and A.A.
down.
And if you've got a loving sponsor,
you say, you haven't let us down.
You're sick.
You've had a relapse.
That's all.
I'm coming right over here.
I'm bringing some of the guys.
We're going to sit with you through the night.
Well, I'll bring you pints
so you won't get DTs.
And if you need money, let me know.
And we'll sit through it
until you get through this.
Now, that's what I call a sponsor.
This old fool
said things to me like,
Dad,
call me whenever you want to.
Whenever you have to.
Up until the time you take a drink.
But after that,
don't call.
Because all you're going to hear
is a click and a dial tone.
That's a crappy way to sponsor people.
I said, Jesus, Bob, look at me.
I'm living in an abandoned car.
I'm an award-winning writer.
I directed one of the most outstanding
university productions
of a grand opera.
I've never ever seen in America.
And here I am living in a car
taking crap from pukes.
I'm cold and I'm hungry.
I'm not used to living like this, Bob.
What do I do?
He says, get a job.
I says, look how terrible I look.
He says, get a terrible job.
I followed that direction to a T,
I'll tell you.
And now I...
The amazing thing is,
the amazing thing to me sometimes
is I look back and think,
you know, 24 years.
Incidentally,
I hope I don't forget tomorrow
to wish someone a birthday.
Someone who's got 30, what,
36 years, 11 months, and 30 days.
I know who it is.
I knew him when you were still
drunk in Los Angeles, you puke.
I guess they don't have
loving sponsors down here
like we have here.
Like we have in L.A.
We don't judge out there.
But I give 24 years
and nine months
or nine and a half months.
And I...
To think that the only therapy
I've had since 1958
is Alcoholics Anonymous.
To think that I have
found something
that has done the one thing
that I thought could not be done
in my life.
Enable me to sustain
and occasionally return
the color to gray life.
I suppose in the last analysis
that is the greatest goal.
Frank was mentioning last night
when he was four years sober.
And all of AA had become gray.
And he didn't want to go anymore.
He ran into some people.
Some people I know.
And they got him taking actions
that restored, or in his case,
almost put the first color in AA
since he was new.
And one of the hardest things
to do around here
is to remember that.
Because if you are like me,
I have a tendency
to fall into the terrible trap
of when everything is good,
I forget, I think,
that's how it should be.
When things are bad,
somehow I'm being screwed.
And that is exactly wrong.
It took me a long time
to understand.
I am not here,
to fight an alcohol problem.
I am here to battle
the disease of alcoholism.
And about 98% of the people
who battle it, lose it.
And some of them win for a while
and take it for granted
and then lose it.
And almost, probably 99%
and some percentage points
of alcoholics die from alcoholism.
The mere fact I'm in this room
and you're in this room
is really an oddity.
Because of one funny phenomenon.
The one thing I never thought of
when I was being screwed in sobriety.
The natural state
of sober alcoholics
is anxiety
and tension
and depression
and frustration.
These are not things
that come and get you.
This is the natural state.
Because that is the natural state
of sobriety
in the disease of alcoholism.
And that is the natural state of sobriety.
And that is the natural state of sobriety.
And that is the natural state of sobriety.
In the disease of alcoholism.
I've talked about this so many, many times
but I still, I need to hear it again
and I hope there's somebody new
who might need to hear it.
Probably most people die.
I'm in a position today
that hardly anybody in this room is.
Maybe a couple of you.
But I see alcoholics dying every day.
I see alcoholics going into
brain damage every day.
Watch them taken away
with brain damage every day.
Sometimes I sit in that job
and I see alcoholics
but I'm tired and down
and I think,
what am I doing here?
I can't stand it.
It happened just a week ago.
I went to work.
I was tired.
I'd just come back from Atlanta.
It was a hot day.
And I watched that other guy
hauled into my office
stabbed to death
and his gut hanging out.
I think,
what am I doing here?
Why would I give up
a good career as I had
sober to do this?
Other days when I'm feeling better
I see it differently.
But I watch these guys die.
And I suppose
most of them are like me.
If the last day
I had my last drink
if a man would have put
a lie detector in my arm
and said,
are you an alcoholic?
I would have said,
no.
Not really.
And that needle
would not have flickered
a sixteenth of an inch.
Because unlike alcoholics
my problem is not really alcohol.
My problems are emotions
and feelings
and something that makes me feel
different once in a while.
And I don't know
what the hell it is.
And I very nearly died
and I watch people die every day
and some of the people
in this room tonight
will die from it.
Because it took me
almost my life to discover
the nature of my problem
is not alcohol
it is something called
alcoholism.
Which again,
you know,
it's the same with
too smart aleck punks
like me
who used to say
well that's just a little
three letter suffix
that's sophistry
but it is not sophistry.
That little three letter suffix
is what makes me
terminally ill
and at the same time
if I can identify it
gives me the only chance
of ever getting better.
And the difference is just this.
If your problem is alcohol
and it sometimes seems
there are speakers
whose problem is alcohol.
I don't know why they're there.
Because they make it sound like it.
They say,
well I was speaking to a man
sober and it was just wonderful
and I drank
and I just went crazy
and I got sober
and it was just wonderful
and I got drunk
and I just went crazy
and I got sober
and it was just wonderful
and I got drunk
and I just
and you feel like saying
why do you drink for Christ's sake?
People like you
really shouldn't drink?
But if you are one of those people
whose problem is alcohol
I've got a solution for you
that's going to revolutionize your life.
Don't drink.
You don't have to sit
in these smoky rooms
for the rest of your life
listening to neurotics
complain about the nature
of their upsets
rather than listening to yours.
If it turns out
that you suffer
from what I suffer from
whatever the degree of intensity
there is no chance for you.
Because people like you
would be never understand
at least I never knew
anybody who did.
The nature of the problem
is not alcohol
it's alcoholism.
And the difference between
an alcohol problem
and alcoholism
is probably best described
by saying
stopping drinking
relieves an alcohol problem.
Stopping drinking
has no effect whatsoever
on alcoholism
except to move you
into a more painful area.
Sobriety is the deadly aspect
of alcoholism.
That's why people drink again.
It doesn't mean that
when you get sober
you suddenly just go to hell.
Sometimes there's a big surge
you take vows
you're going to do better
it's going to be alright.
But eventually
you're back in reality.
And the same things
that made you feel bad before
are still there.
And the tensions come back.
And the intermittent fear
and the paranoid guilts
and the defiance
that you used to cover your guilt.
And the screw you attitude.
I don't care what anybody thinks
which means I care
what everybody thinks.
And on and on
you get to
and you give it all you got.
And you want to do it
for your little child
you want to do it for your mother
you want to do it
so you won't be such a goof
so people won't look at you funny.
But little by little
it comes back.
And one day you look around
and it's starting to
gray out again boy.
And you get to a point
where it's graying out
and the tension
and the tension is there
and the problems are there
and you just can't hardly stand it.
Now
the funny thing is
that doesn't make you an alcoholic.
There are millions of people like that
who are not alcoholics.
They are known medically as
intense or acute neurotics.
They are people who see reality
as it is
but react godly to it.
React emotionally.
React obsessively.
Overreact.
Withdraw.
Then overreact.
These people in fact
unless something happens
to change the pattern
of their growing conflicts
can get to a point
where they snap
and become psychotic.
And to oversimplify that
it just means
the brain
makes you see reality differently
to reduce the conflict.
Now it's a funny thing.
Alcoholics almost never
become psychotic.
Isn't that funny?
Alcoholics almost never
become psychotic.
Now they say
well alcohol is the second
greatest cause of insanity.
What are you talking about?
Not insanity from conflict
and snapping.
Alcoholic insanity
as I mentioned
is brain damage
from continued use of alcohol.
And you think
well I've got a little
alcoholic insanity.
I'm acting funny.
Alcoholic insanity
doesn't make you act funny.
If you ever saw a case
of alcoholic insanity
it sends shivers down your spine.
If you want to see a good case
of alcoholic insanity
you see someone
who is sitting in a ward somewhere
and they come and change his diapers
three times a day
and they feed him
and put him to bed
and get up in the morning
and change his diapers
and feed him
and you never
ever
ever get better.
There is no possible recovery from that.
Through one of the great ironies of life
the two men
and the two major areas of the body
that do not recreate
the damaged cells
are the brain and the liver.
The two things that alcohol hits.
But
what happens to alcoholics?
Why don't they snap?
Because when it gets bad enough
long enough
they'll have a few drinks.
Which begs the question
why don't these goddamn neurotics
have a few drinks and relax?
And the point is they do.
Many of them do.
And there is the other
funny quantity of alcoholism.
It doesn't bring relief for them.
It turns out
that alcohol has a special effect
on my body I never dreamed of.
And I used to try to measure
you hear it all the time in AA
it has a special effect on your body.
What is it?
Well does it make
I guess it makes you stay drunk all the time.
I never stayed drunk all the time.
Now that I look back
I have never known a human being
to stay drunk all the time.
I think it's safe to say
it is physically impossible
for a human body to stay intoxicated
14 straight days and nights.
In a laboratory.
You sure can't do it on the streets.
Is it that you get crazy and weird?
Not really.
Not really.
Some of the worst miserable goddamn
drunks in the world
are people who get drunk on New Year's Eve only.
And they just act
like any self-respecting drunk
that I know.
Wants to stay off the streets
on New Year's Eve.
Because them amateurs are out there
just acting crazy.
They don't know
when they are going to throw up.
Anybody in this room
and you got at least 10 seconds
you'd have
pardon me just a second.
Got a cert?
These people don't see
these feelings every day
and they just
they can be talking right to you.
So I said to Billy Joe
I said
They don't know
when they are going to throw up.
They don't know
when they are going to fall down.
Anybody here just goes
They just fall on you.
One of the great things
I was thinking about recently.
One of the great ways
you could tell
a non-alcoholic
at parties.
I said
Margaret
I'm a little
little fuzzy
would you mind driving
the car home tonight?
If anyone in this room
ever did that
I'd be sick
with remorse.
The answer is
It's my goddamn car!
And I was driving
my goddamn car!
You know
you can rock your ass
on your own.
I'm not going to give up
my keys
when I'm at the top of my game.
That's the first time
I felt secure all day.
It turns out
of all things
how do you measure alcoholics?
By what it does to them?
By what?
How many times
you've been in jail?
It's been estimated
most people who die
from alcoholism
have never been in jail.
Most people who die
from alcoholism
don't have wrong histories
of hospitalizations.
Nobody knows
but that's what's estimated.
What is it
that makes an alcoholic?
What is the difference
in my body?
It turns out something
I never dreamed of
and I never knew anybody
who told me about it.
After I was sober a while.
It turns out
the mark of the alcoholic
is that alcohol
does something special for you.
It does something special
for me
that it doesn't do
for other people.
By the time
it's doing something to me
it's way down the road.
What does it do for me?
It almost instantly
alters my perception
of reality.
It almost instantly
alters my relationship
to my environment.
Wherever that environment is.
It almost instantly
makes me larger
and more self-contained
and them
smaller
and less threatening.
And I don't even know it.
I don't even know
what it does to me.
I don't even know
what it does to me.
I don't even know
what it does
to me.
I don't even know it.
I take it for granted.
Now,
if it does that for me
I am lost.
Because every time
it works for me
it little by little
alters my ability
to deal with reality
without it.
And the curse of alcoholism
is not that you can't get sober.
If getting sober
was the answer
detoxes would work.
Treatment centers
would turn out winners.
Hospitals
would turn out winners.
Toilets
would turn out winners.
You all remember
what it means
to get sober.
What it means
is that
somewhere
in the disease
of alcoholism
alcohol has now
done enough
to renovate
my perception
of reality
so that
unrenovated reality
is untenable.
And that's why
nearly everybody
who has it
dies from it.
Because they keep
knowing
deep in their heart
but I'm not
like them.
My case
is different.
They don't
really
understand.
I suppose
if there ever was
a universal phrase
that every alcoholic
I've ever known
has ever said
is
but you
don't
understand.
Just that.
And knowing
if only
if only
I would have found
the right place
the right person
the right job
whatever your
if only is
every alcoholic
in the world
knows
if only
she hadn't died
if only
I had kept
that job
if only
this hadn't
happened.
And we've all
got our hooks
to if only
and if only
and if only.
Now
so alcoholism
is a deadly
thing.
Makes it
impossible
for me
to live
sober
very long.
And I can't
handle drinking
because by then
the drink is
doing something
to me.
I guess
that's what
is so well described
in the Bible.
The one thing
all of us
have in common
what?
That we all
not that we live
in Texas
or New Mexico
not that we drank
rum
or not that we drank
martinis
or not that we're
lawyers
or not that we're
writers
or not that we're
farmers
or ranchers
or cowboys.
What is it we all
have in common?
We all got so terribly
drunk we wound up
in jail.
A lot of people
in jail.
Some have been
in jail
for years.
The great obsession
of all of us
is that somehow
someday
we will control
and enjoy
our drinking.
The persistence
of this illusion
is astonishing.
Many of us
pursue it
into the gates
of insanity
and death.
And it goes on
to say
that there's
brief recoveries
followed always
by still worse
relapse
until you reach
a point of
pitiful
and incomprehensible
demoralization.
The state
of sober
alcoholics
is anxiety
and depression.
Now,
that makes
it seem
bad.
And that's
why I have
to remember
that the
purpose of
Alcoholics
Anonymous,
its actions,
its involvements,
the reason
to do
these things
is not
some token
thank you
to some
abstractions
of where
for getting
me sober.
I gotta,
this is
only my
own opinion
of course.
Everything I say
is my
opinion.
But Frank was
saying last night,
I used to have
a great deal
of problem
with that too.
Because God is,
if God is just
picking and
choosing people
to stay
sober,
He's not
going to have
any time
for me,
baby.
There's too
many nice
people dying.
What are they
going to do
if they
accept God?
Because if
God existed
I was damned.
And what you do
in that case,
if there's
no God,
become a
parlor intellectual,
parlor atheist.
If God exists
let Him strike
me dead.
You know,
things emotionally
immature people
do to cover
up their own
fear.
One time
we almost
had a deal
in one of
the Texas
newspapers,
because we
were cute
then.
We were in
one company,
a dial-up
prayer for
atheists.
For you dial
this number
and nobody
ever answered.
And we were
so cute,
we thought
we were just
cute.
I had to
come to
believe in
my sponsor.
And he got
me to do
things that
gave me
enough self-worth
to believe
in AA.
And when I
got enough
things done,
one day
my sobriety
is preordained,
or my drunkenness
is preordained.
All of this
is just a big
scam.
This is just
a hollow
mockery.
I believe
God loves
me.
I believe
God loves
you.
I think He loves
me the same
amount He loves
you.
And I think
He's given us
all kind of
tools.
And we're
all,
some of us
aren't very
good with
this,
but I know
that I
am staying
sober,
and I couldn't
stay sober.
And I watch
people in this
room,
in this state,
in this nation,
in this world,
who I know
all over the
world,
staying
sober until
they somehow
get a perception
they no longer
need to do
these things,
and little
by little
what happens?
Their perceptions
begin to
gray out
and people
turn gray
and the
steps turn
gray
and God
turns gray
unless they're
in one of their
exaltations
where they are
now alone
with God
watching everybody
else turn
gray,
which causes
people to get
drunk just as
fast.
And so I
suppose,
if I wanted
to say
anything,
the one thing
I've learned
in all these
years is that
the sad
thing is
I take it
for granted
sometimes
and forget
it.
About a year
ago I found
myself in a
situation
that I would
have sworn
I would never
find myself
in again
because it's
caused me a lot
of pain over
the years.
And I thought,
how can I be
in this
situation?
And the
situation was
very easy
because I
had been
so active
in contact
with God.
I got into
a little situation
where anything
I thought must
be God's
will.
And I had to
start all over
again a year
ago.
Not no big
dramatic thing,
I just had to
start rebuilding
my relationship
with God
so that I
could again
walk in the
sun.
I was thinking
yesterday morning
when I got up,
I was telling
someone here at
the convention,
I had a kind
of intense
moment
that I
can't
help
but
fordi
some of you
know my family
moved out
to California
and they've
lived there
ever since.
We had a little
boy and
he's...
But this
next month
I'd
have terrible
pain.
It'll be the
first time
in 33
years
we haven't
had a
I don't know if he's going to make that tackle
because he's going to let that back run right up
but all these kids
and all these things
and my parents
I probably have never had a better life
as most of you know
about nine and a half years ago
I gave up a marketing career
that had become successful
and I run the same mission
I got 86 out of
I've been doing that for almost 10 years
and it's not an alcoholic treatment center
we feed 43,000 meals a month
and we bed down thousands of dying men
and I could make a little more money
doing something a little more fun than that
and the funny thing is
as I say when I'm feeling bad
I wonder what the hell I'm doing
in this gray world
but when I'm feeling right
I think I got more color in my life
if I could pick one of those poor bastards
off that street
and give them some life
than I did in all of the
coming down elevators in Beverly Hills
snapping my fingers
and saying baby I'm cute
the funny thing is
you never become wonderful here
you always have to maintain some posture
because it isn't that I turn bad
I stay fine
but everybody else grays out
if I don't take care of myself
you all get screwed by life
and the reason I stay active
is to keep you shaped up
I'm sick of sacrificing for you
if you want to know the truth
that those of you who are new tonight
what I would say to you
we ask you to take these actions
you don't need them
but all these pukes around you do
everywhere you are
they got to
and if you don't take care of yourself
they don't look bad again
that's why they say
they'll get too hungry or angry
or lonely or tired
not because they're bad conditions
they are perception distorters
when you're hungry
people act stupidly
have you ever noticed that?
they just know you're hungry
and they act stupidly
when you're angry
It's a perfect, approved, obsessive explosion.
You've got to shut up, bitch!
I'm just saying it for your own good.
When you're lonely, it pushes every self-pity button you've got.
Well, I suppose all the people from the group
probably went to a party tonight after the meeting.
Guess they didn't want to tell me.
Oh, well, I like Johnny Carson.
When you're tired, people act funny.
As I've said many, many times, the best example I know,
driving in the freeway in the morning,
and I'm tired, and I'm going to maintain and make sure
that no one knows I'm tired.
And how do they know? They know.
Total strangers know.
You just see an old lady up there saying,
See the boy in the blue mark?
He's very tired this morning.
I'm going to cut that son of a bitch off.
Sometimes, at least I don't chase him anymore.
I'm not past my exit.
If I haven't caught him by then, the hell is it?
I used to go out to Covina after him, 20 miles.
But the point of all these exercises,
the point of AA, as was said here before,
AA is not...
Now, this is not Alcoholics Anonymous.
This is the pit stop for Alcoholics Anonymous.
Meetings are the pit stop for Alcoholics Anonymous.
The race is out there on those bricks.
Just like it is at Indianapolis on those bricks,
it's on those bricks.
That's why a lot of people have problems,
because they get thinking here, they get thinking so well,
they're going to go out there and be wonderful.
But you're not.
You're going to be mistake-prone,
because you're a human being,
and you're going to be fallible,
and you're going to make errors.
And you're going to...
Sometimes you're going to feel superior,
sometimes inferior to a woman,
sometimes inferior to a woman.
And you need a lot of reinforcements.
That's why Action in Alcoholics Anonymous is so grand.
That's why working with new people is so grand,
because you relearn the stuff through them.
If you ever take a new person to a meeting,
you will notice you listen ten times as good
as when you sit there by yourself.
Because you've got to listen,
in case there's any heresies to explain to the puke,
what he really meant was,
and the purpose of it all
is not to make you wonderful or grand,
but better than that,
to give you some way
to, when your perceptions get gray,
to bring them back to color.
Maybe not the vivid color,
to bring them back to real colors,
to bring them back to living in the world.
I sometimes am so grateful
that I'm sober,
that I'm sober,
that I'm sober,
that I'm sober,
that I'm sober,
that I'm sober,
that I could cry.
Sometimes I forget to be grateful for days on end,
and I'm just concerned about why I don't have,
things aren't going my way
and the board of directors or some goddamn thing.
But somewhere in between there
is what AA and God
and the steps and the sponsors make available to me.
A perception of reality
that's got enough color
so I need never drink to stand it.
A place,
a place to go,
to share that perception,
knees to kneel on,
to ask God to give me a little more courage
to do what I should,
and a little more wisdom to know what it is
that's being carried away with my own BS
and my moments of delusions of grandeur,
and to little by little
be willing to extend myself
for the next man
as someone extended themselves to me.
I am very pleased to be here tonight.
My sponsor, Chuck C.,
I ask that I especially give you his good wishes.
He's not feeling well, but he's coming along.
I am grateful to the committee.
I'm grateful to have seen so many old friends and new friends,
but primarily, the best thing I know,
I must be all right because you all look okay tonight.
Thank you.