Elderly Recovery Wisdom and the New Generation in AA – Polly P.

Hi, everybody. My name is Polly Pistol and I'm an alcoholic by God's grace in a program called Alcoholics Anonymous. I haven't had a drink since April the 11th of 1977. And for that, I am eternally grateful. I have a home group and that's the West Connect Group in Jacksonville, Florida. We meet at seven o'clock on Monday night. and I'm going to be jumping off from here when I get done running to my home group and Al told me I could do that. So I am going to be doing that and I have a sponsor her name is Rena Kay, she lives in South Florida, she is an amazing woman, she has what I want so I just do what she does I sponsor and the women I sponsor sponsor and the women they sponsor, sponsor. And I'll talk to me about doing a workshop to do a talk on sponsorship. And you know, I just I thought, what I'm going to do is I'm just going to talk to you about my sponsorship, and how I sponsor. But I all want you to know that there is a book that is a pamphlet that's on sponsorship. And I also, a non-approved AA book is a books called The Soul of Sponsorship, which is about Bill W. and Ed Downing. And that is a beautiful book about the relationship that Bill had with Father Downing. And that's a beautiful one, because by and large, Father Downings was his sponsor. Because even though he never got another sponsor, but Ebby, Ebby did have, you know, relapses in his sobriety. So I don't know if that's true or not, but that's the way it's told as far as the people passing down the history. So what this pamphlet is, is questions and answers on sponsorship. And I'd encourage you to, if nothing else, just get it and read it. Maybe it's something that that you can use. And I use some of it and some of it doesn't really apply to me at all because I do a lot of things with sponsorship, I'll tell you, which I don't think anybody's writing about. So but I'm going to share it anyway and to just tell you that it's worked for me. And that's that's just the way we do it. So what I kind of like to do is just give you a little history of my sponsorship, and how I kind OF learned to sponsor and how i sponsor today. And one of the things that I'd like to say is, one time, I was with Clancy. And we were doing a conference together, and there was a question and answer period after we got through. And someone asked Clancy, how many people do you sponsor? And Clancy did not answer that question. He said, he did not say how many. He said I'm one short, which meant no matter what, he always said yes to sponsorship. Now, I don't know how he did it. I don'T KNOW HOW HE BECAUSE I sponsor a lot of women. And I DON'T KNOW how he DID IT. But he sponsored lots and lots of people, I think like, you know, somewhere around 300. I DONT KNOW. But and I know so many people who had him for a sponsor, and they felt like that he gave them plenty of time and a lot of direction. And so what happens is I want to say I sponsor very different way with newcomers than I do with people who have been sober a while. That is, I am a pretty much with a newcomer, a hand-holding sponsor. I really do, I take them through the book. I take them through The Steps, such as that. I'm taking a woman through The Book right now and what she loves is she keeps saying, I just love for you to read out of that dictionary. I have a 1935 dictionary and as we're reading The Book, we go through the, you know, if there's a, she'll say to me, what does that mean? I said, well, let's just look it up and find out what it means. And so what happens is, is one of the things I'd like to say about sponsorship is I don't know what I do without being sponsored or sponsoring. And one of the things that I think is very important, I don'T believe I can sponsor if I'm not sponsored And I mean, sometimes things happen as far as deaths of a sponsor. And there might be a period of time when there's no sponsor. Fortunately, I have never had that. I have ever been without a sponsor, so I'm going to tell you a little bit about that. uh i went to d i was in detox twice and then i ended up being court committed to treatment and in the detox i was at a detox center and part of my uh racy story is i've got i i had uh i came into the rooms of aa so naive that it was sickening but i tell you it did not take me but about five days and detox to get really changed. And then I ended up having a racy story. And now I'm back to being a prude again. So I don't know, a lot of my girl, the women I sponsor, I you know, we talk about we get we we get our virginity back after we stopped being what we were when we first got sober. But I had a husband who was sick for a lot years and I got sober and I would have never dreamed I would do this. But when I got sober, my libido came back too. And I ended up in detox, running off with a guy in detox and ended up at a very dangerous situation in a hotel room in Euless, Texas. and my first sponsor was the director of the detox center he got word of it and he rescued me out of that detox center I mean that motel brought me back into that detox Center now I was raised Southern Baptist let me put that there too and being raised Southern Baptists when I was raised Southern baptist 80 years ago when it was very fundamental to the bone uh it was this thing you were going to burn in hell and thou, you know, thou shalt not drink. And, you know, whatever your sins were, you were gonna burn in hell. And I really was very hopeless when I got sober. And so anyway, long story short, I ended up trying to commit suicide because I was so hopeless. Why should I even try to get sober? I'm going to burn in hell anyway. God's going to punish me. I've abused my children. I'm done these things. My husband's 100% disabled. He's been sick for four years and I can't take care of him anymore. And I mean, and the beat goes on and I just, I just felt so hopeless. So what I, I tried to commit suicide and I got court committed to treatment. And in that treatment center, I fell in love with the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous. That treatment center was the kind that had let people come into the treatment center. They let people and read the big book to you that to let people take us out of that treatment center and take us to meetings. And we had a lot of AA involvement and the treatment Center said, get a sponsor. First of all, the person I chose for my first sponsor was the man that had saved me out of that motel room and was the director of that detox center. And I asked him to be my sponsor and he said he would, but he told me not to call him while I was in treatment, but to be at his house the day I got out of treatment. Now, that was my first sponsorship direction, was to be at his house the day I got out of treatment. I got on a treatment and I was at his House. I announced to him that I was on my sixth step, that I had done my fifth step in treatment. And he announced to me that that was treatment center or cycle babble and that I Was on my first step. And we were doing it out of the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous. And that's what I began to do and what he did with me and how he took me through the steps and how he listened to my fifth step and went, how we laid it out is by and large exactly how I do it today with the women I work with, because we did it exactly as it was out of the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous. The only thing that he said to me is that he said, Holly, before I hear your story, I want you to tell me your parents' story. And I have found that to be one of the most powerful things that I did. And it has also been that way for the women I sponsor, because what happened is, is by doing that, I learned so much about my parents that I don't think I would have have learned. And that was that I'm an only child. My parents were desperate to have kids and they only had me and they gave, they were not wealthy at all. In fact, by today's standards, they would be probably considered poor. and what they did is my mother worked and I will assure you when I was a little girl mothers didn't work and what happened was as I was very embarrassed by that I was really ashamed of that but my mother works so she could give me things so my parents could giveme things that other little girls have so what I was able to see is how my parents had sacrificed for me And then what I learned about my parents, telling Frank my parents' story, is I learned that both my parents mothers had died at birth. For my mother, her mother had been taken away and put in a sanitarium is what they called it at that time. And I don't know, and she didn't know. Because back then people didn't talk and tell you things. She didn't know either what happened. My assumption is, is that her mother probably had what we call today postpartum depression. And she was put in a sanitarium. And he had, she would later have a stepmother who really never accepted her. My dad, on the other hand, mother had died at childbirth and she had died, they said, of the flu. With having this pandemic, I have been able to connect some dots there because they have compared the COVID-19 with the Spanish flu, which was in 1918, which is when my parents were born. So I have a feeling that that's what happened to my dad's mom and he too was raised by a mother who never accepted him, a stepmother never accepted Him. So here was two people who found each other, who desperately wanted kids and they had this one child. And all I want to say is with me, is whatever is inside of us or inside of me, I should say, that makes me mentally and bodily different from my fellows has always been there. And my parents were sacrificing for me. They were doing everything they could do to give me what any little girl would want. My mother was making my clothes, making dancing costumes, and I didn't care if she made the dancing costumes. But I wanted store-bought clothes like my girlfriend's. And there's another big book that talks about me. And that big book says, there's nothing worse than an ungrateful child. And that's what I was. And I didn't see that. And one of the things by doing that is Frank brought me in contact with what amazing parents I had and how loved I was and how much they sacrificed for me. And they did nothing but try to love me and give me whatever any little girl would want. And today, I understand that. And what happened is, even though I didn't realize it, with me working with as many women as I work with, I see the damage that child abuse does to children. And what happens is, is I'm the one you need the hang on just here it is they're getting on the other what I have learned is that that has lasting effects because you see folks I'm a child abuser alcohol took me to a place that I will forever. One of the things we have in the promises, and I'm going to give you a little story about that. One OF the things that it says in the promises and for a long time, and my story, I would say the pro all of the promises has not have not come true for me. And the promise of, of not regretting the past has not come true for me. It hasn't come true for me today, and I'm 43 years sober. It's a lot better than it used to be, but it hasn't come true für mich. And when I was at a meeting one time – and this has been about five or six years ago, it hasn' t been that long ago – I said that, and this woman came up to me and she said, well, that is because that was written by a man. And then what happened was I said that at a meeting when I was speaking one time from the podium and this man came up for me and he says, that's not true. The reason that was written that way is because that man was not a parent. So what happens is, is that men feel that way too. And that's what I've learned, that regret the past with, if some of them do, with what we did with our children. And I can assure you I did because I was a very physically abusive mother. I was an emotionally abusive mother because I screamed and said terrible things to my children. I was physically abusive in that I hit them. I was even guilty of throwing my youngest son into the wall. But the worst thing I did, even though those things were so bad, is I was a parent of blatant neglect because I was passed out and drunk. So what happened is that I believe when we come to sponsorship, I don't know how it works, but somehow or another, for the most part, We picked the right sponsor, even if it's wrong at first. It's still the right sponsor because we're going to learn something from that person. Well, I got Frank and Frank was so amazing. And I had Frank for five years, the first five years. And he laid out a solid, as the 12 and 12, he laid out a solid foundation. He laid out a solid foundation of the steps and he laid out a solid foundation of a thorough and complete inventory and I'm sure that had a lot to do with it because Frank was a priest and he had retired from the priesthood and he well he had left the priest hood to marry an Asian woman. And he had, that's why he was in this detox center, running this detox center because he was no longer practicing as a priest. But he said to me, when I was trying to find God and I had this punishing God that I was going to burn in hell, as Frank used to tell me, Polly, you just believe that I believe. Because believe me, Polly. I did not find God in the church, in the Catholic Church, and I'm a priest. I found God in The Rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous. And I want you to believe that I believe. And Frank, as a sponsor, also gave me his God. And I use that a lot now today with some of the women I sponsor, especially the ones that are so damaged and they come to me and they hate God. God wouldn't let things like what happened to me. God, if there really was a God, God would never let things like that happen to me. And I try to say, God didn't do that. And what happens is, as hard as it is for me to live with being a child abuser, and has been my greatest gift to give a lot of the women that I sponsor. Because what I get to do is I get to share who and what I am with them. And then, and I can remember my second sponsor, and I'm going to tell you about her. My second sponsor saying, Polly, your dark past is your most precious position. And I'll tell you, my being a child abuser is the darkest of my past. And in my opinion, it gets no darker than that. Then to harm a child gets no dark. Darker than that? And that's my story. And what has happened is, is today, I've had a lot of other things that my experiences have been very useful and sponsorship. That one has probably been the most useful. So what happens is, is whatever has happened to us in the past, it appears that what we get to do as we are somehow like magnets to people who have those experiences and we get to share those experiences with the people we sponsor. So I think there is a huge spiritual aspect to sponsorship because a lot of times people will feel really badly and think, well, I asked them to sponsor me. I have to stay with them. And I will give my experience that people have asked me to sponsor them. And somewhere along the road, it just wasn't a connection. It just didn't work. And I says, you know, that's okay. Because what will happen is somebody else will take your place as somebody else has taken the place when that has happened to me. Now, that is personally not my story, but I will tell you, I am very, very familiar with that. And what I try to tell the women I sponsor when it happens to them and they think there's something wrong with them is why a woman will leave them. I will say sponsorship is not a popularity contest. That is not what sponsorship is. Sponsorship is being able to connect with someone that, especially in the beginning, we will listen to and follow that direction. And I am so grateful that I have been taught that way, that I was able to have that kind of sponsorship when I came here. So Frank is the one who gave me a solid foundation. When I was three years old, three years sober, I lived in Texas and I went to a conference in Austin, Texas, and I heard a woman talk. And I absolutely, she touched my heart. Oh my God. And I even said, the people I was with, I said, if I'm ever anywhere where that woman is, I'll get a woman to be my sponsor. Because Frank had, after he had taken me through the steps and all, wanted me to get awoman. And I just didn't, I just kept saying, there's not a woman that I want to sponsor me. And I know I was really new. And he kept saying that you're really new if you tried somebody, I said, just hang with me. And he was perfect for me. He was perfect for me when Dave and I got together. And we got together when I was three and a half years sober and Dave was four and a Half year sober. And I see some people on this meeting and I think I've been at this meeting before. So I'm going to say Dave and celebrated 40 years of marriage in October. And I think that's pretty darn good with two elkies hooked up together. So, and anyway, what ended up happening is Dave took a job in Southern California and I knew that this woman that I was crazy about lived in Southern California because she said she did. And so when I got, we got in, we pulled into Santa Monica, California, and I called the intergroup office. And I said, do you have the phone number of a woman named Dottie Harris? And they told me that they did. And what I did, she said, you meet me Monday night at the Bellflower Big Book at 830. And i did that. And when i was there, i told, she gave me a few minutes of her time. I told her she had touched my heart. Two years ago, I heard her talk in Austin, Texas. And I just knew that if I ever was anywhere where I could have her for a sponsor, that I would want her. And she said that she would sponsor me. And Dottie sponsored me until she died five years ago. And she sponsored me for 33 years. And I can tell you that Dottie was so different than Frank. DottIE was the most, the sweetest, most spiritual woman I have ever known. Dottlie had a really, um, really severe blood disease that kept her feeling debilitated all the time. She had to push through everything she did. And she had other illnesses that continued to take her and she finally ended up dying of cancer. But Donnie had, and she had a very high profile divorce and Alcoholics Anonymous where there was a lot of gossip, a lot of stuff like that and you know we're a small community and that's what we do and um you know so she became a really good advocate to you know it's not about what people say it's just about what people do and so we we all of her girls we learned to walk through all of that but Dottie had the sweetest God, her God was so sweet. And she began to bring me through and introduce me to the God of my understanding today. And that is a God that loves me, a God that is sweet, and a God has no, I know does not want to punish me. But if I want to do things that are unpleasing to God, that he will let me. It doesn't mean he doesn't love me, but he will left me because one of the things good, bad or indifferent that I have is free will. And I have exercised that in very destructive ways up until I was 36 years old, Because that's how old I was when I got sober. So she introduced me to this amazing God. And she told me, she said, God lets us repeat for correction. She says, Holly, God let's us have do-overs. And that's the way she would sponsor. She wasn't a really, she was very much in the steps, but she had the most gentleness of anyone I have ever known. And I'm not sure that, I think from her, I took most of everything that I do as a sponsor. I did what Frank did as far as taking me through the book and doing the steps exactly as it's laid out in the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous. I still do that with the women I sponsor. And a lot of times we're on big book studies together and things like that. But if a person is new, I take them through the big books. I get a lot of women that have been sober for a long time. I have reached the age, and I don't know if there's some of you in here that have also reached that age, but I reached the edge that I am the sponsor to women whose sponsors die. So I have, I am there. That's where I am now. I'm that, i am that sponsor today i i get a lot of women whose sponsors have already died who have died they have uh a lot so already so they've done the steps they sponsor a lot of people and they have their own way of doing things so that in that case i'm not taking someone from the beginning. However, I believe and you have if I sponsor you, I need to have contact with you. I needと talk with you,I need to find out what you're doing. And one of the things that has happened is that I have a lot of people that call me sponsor. But I don't I'm not their sponsor, because they don't use me. And if you don't use me, then I'm not your sponsor. You need to be able you need to talking to me, we need to be making contact from time to time. That's what we need to do. I'm not the firing kind. I don't fire people. I just assume what happens is if you're not making contact with me, that we're not I'm not your sponsor. And so what happens is, is sometimes somebody will call me and I'll say, oh my goodness, I didn't know I was your sponsor, I haven't heard from you in such a long time, and that is an amazing thing because all of a sudden we reconnect and I start getting to hear from these people. It's amazing how that works sometimes. But I believe I spend most of my time sponsoring. And I always have. That's what I spend most of my time doing in the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous. And, I like to say that that pulls in the 12-step as well. Because one of the things that I believe, and what happened was when I went to Frank's house that day, he looked at me I started 12 stepping when I was six weeks sober because I had just gotten out of treatment that day I got I started to do I started twelve stepping the first day I got out of treatment because he looked and he said you have a car so you're going to go get the women a detox and take them to meetings so I was I was busy from the very first day I got sober. That's what I do. I am, be it detox, be at halfway houses, be a treatment centers. And the reason I feel so strongly about that is because somebody did it for me and by doing it for me, I started out being in the book of Alcoholics Anonymous, reading the book. And I started working with people immediately. I believe, I totally believe that what Bill says in the big book, when all else fails, work with another alcoholic, work with another alcohol. My phone rings all day and sometimes I'll get very, you know, overwhelmed. I can get very overwhelmed especially of late because I'm also dealing with my husband who is ill but what happens is I'll sit down I'll take a breath I'll talk to God for a minute and I'll realize I don't know what I do for them but I can tell you right now I would not be sitting here sober, happy, joyous and love with God if it were not for the women I sponsor. And that is absolutely the thing that keeps me going. And I have been, I have Zoom and sponsorship have carried me totally this year because I have not been to a live meeting. It will be one year in March, almost one year. I have never been to an online meeting, but I have been in meetings. on saturday i was in a meeting from 10 until 10 the conference i was on ended and then i ended up having a speaking engagement on the west coast and i'm on the east coast which is a three-hour difference so what happens is as i'm busy and the and the rooms of alcoholics anonymous But I haven't been in a room. I have been on Zoom. I have Been on Zoom rooms and I have Been busy when what happened is Is two years before Dottie died I had the privilege of speaking At a big book workshop in Columbus Ohio and I met a woman who was not From Columbus, Ohio at the time she was from Chattanooga Tennessee but she was at had lived in Columbus and was at that workshop and it was just again God working in my life you know you just can't make this stuff up her and I ended up sitting on a sofa we just ended up it happened sitting side by side and we started chatting and we chatted and a few hours went by and we were chatting and I got to know this woman and I fell in love with her and I caught up from that day and Dottie had been sick and I said when DottIE dies and we knew that was going to happen we didn't know when but then it was inevitable I said I will ask Rina to be my sponsor now I didn't make that I didn' tell Rena that I didn''t say anything to Rena but I certainly said something to Donnie and I told Donnie I said you know and we all knew that it was what was happening and I said I have somebody and she was so happy and I says but nothing will be said because I have you and I have used till the very end and I had Dottie and as soon as Dottrie passed one week later I asked Rina and Rina has been my sponsor almost six years and Rina is amazing Rina is Frank and Dottlie all in one because she's got the book down, she's a researcher she's uh she's she just is thirsty for information and that's the way frank was that's what he did he just studied history and he studied all this and that'rena but yet she is the spiritual beam just like dotty was she's just she has this spirituality in her and she's a teacher. I just want to talk about what we do with a sponsor. I know that a lot of people, let's just talk about the steps. I bring the women I sponsor through the steps for me. And as I think very necessary, I knowthat the book says you can give your fifth step to whoever is very important to me. The women I sponsor give their fifth step to me, I need to know who they are because a lot of times and I have no problem doing this, I believe as a sponsor, I can do this. I am not a therapist. I do not try to be a therapist and I know I truly believe the book where Bill talks about of good you know god has given us a lot of good professionals let's use them and the family afterwards because i have some women that have had a lot of horrific trauma and i can assure you that is not my experience i am the child that was spoiled brad loved to pieces that's my story And I have women that that's not their story. And I do believe with all my heart that you should go get all the help you can. It is available to you. We live in 2021 where there's so many people that can help us. And I believe in that. I believe and getting the help unique because I've had some women that have been so traumatized. And I'll also get to have that from my own husband because it's not just women, it's men as well. And my own husband was abused as a child. And he still has effects of that and he just turned 85 on Saturday. So believe me, these are serious things. And I don't play psychologist. I do what's in the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous. I do what's in pamphlets that are written for us. And these pamphets are very clear that we are not professionals. I am an AA sponsor. Now, I sponsor some women who are professionals and they are professionals and sponsors. But what they are when they sponsor is an AA sponsoring. That's what they are. And that's how they take people through the book. I am big on sponsorship lineage. I like sponsorship lines. I love it. I Love to Get Together on Zoom, or I Love to Get together at a conference. And I love to have a whole bunch of lines and sponsorship. I absolutely love it. So, I love sponsoring. I love being sponsored and I love watching the women I sponsor, sponsor. So these are the things that I believe in. So if you are sponsored by me and you start whining to me after we've done the steps, after we uh and we have got and we're on step 12 and if you haven't already got a sponsee which i feel like you already should have a sponcee because i'm one of these sponsors somebody says when we i did a sponsorship workshop when can i sponsor my answer is stay a step ahead. That's all you have to do is just stay a step ahead. You're never too young to sponsor. And if they find somebody they think is better than you, you'll get it, you will get them. And then somebody will come back to you. It's just what we do. And it's okay. And I would, you know, a lot of people have the sponsor they started out with. And that's even sweeter, but not everybody does. And either way is great. Either way is great. What we're looking for, it's not a popularity contest. What we're working for is to find somebody, most of all, that you can tell the truth to. Please find somebody that you can tell the truth to if you cannot tell the truth it's the wrong person you have to be able to tell the truth and that is what I feel so grateful I had an experience and I my sponsor was the most amazing and that was about two years ago in fact I only resolved this in March, the end of March. And I'd had this resentment for almost two years. And I felt like this person had wronged me and hurt me and had taken something away from me that was I was so passionate about. And then I had put my heart and soul into. And what I did is I liked it too much. And I wonder how many times I put it before I put my husband or my children or the women I sponsor. I wonder How many times i did that? Because an inventory, I definitely did. But what happened was, in that period of time, although I had had Rena for three years, I became closer to her than ever. Because I'm telling you, I must have done five inventories on that because I could not get rid of it. I would inventory it and I would inventory it. And then I would feel okay. I Would feel okay and the next thing I do and think about it again, and I was all back in it again. And then I'd inventory it again and inventory it again. What happened was, what I did is I was thinking about my little boys and my sons, my sons today. My sons today are 58 and 60 years old. Today, I have an amazing relationship with them. And I'm going to tell you a little miracle at the end of my story. And what I did is I thought about how my sons had forgiven me and I knew in the book, I am an Emmett Fox lover. I've been reading Emmett Box since I got sober. I still read it. I use his name because he was a great contributor to Alcoholics Anonymous. And in February, which will be next month, we're doing the Lord's prayer yesterday. So we're doing the Lord'S prayer. And so I knew that the forgiveness section where he's got about five or six pages was in February. And I started reading that on his forgiveness. AndI just sat there and I just had a moment of meditation and I thought of how much my children have forgiven me and I did a thousand times worse to them than this person ever did to me. And I was able to let that go. And i'm so grateful that I was. A huge, a huge uh uh today I am a caregiver for my husband. A lot of you know that that he's been sick and I'm a caregiver and my first husband I could never take care of so I'm so grateful for sponsorship I'm så grateful that I have a woman who's directing me, I'm só grateful that I love and respect her and will listen to her so that's important that I will listen to her that she directs me because many times I need that because I get very tired and I get selfish and I'm so grateful that she's there to lovingly tell me the truth. And one of the things that Frank said to me that I'll never forget, he says, Polly, you can tell anybody the truth, but sometimes you can take the truth and beat them to death with it. So if you have anything to say, if you can't say it with love, please don't say It. So what I try to do is I try to do that because that's what Frank did for me. That's what Dottie has done for me and that's What Rena does for me and if it's not from love don't say it just wait don't say it. Don't do any sideways remarks they just hurt that's all they do is they just heard and that's just me. Now, maybe you have, maybe that's exactly what you want, but it's not what I want and it's not what i like to do. I don't even feel good about it. So what happens is, I'll tell you a beautiful story because I am 43 years sober and I have a son who's two years sober and he's 60 years old. He got sober when he was 58 and a half years old and my heart broke for 41 years because of my son and how I watched his struggle in life and I just want you to know that God's timing is perfect and it's absolutely perfect and today I have an amazing relationship with them that I haven't had in all these years. And Alcoholics Anonymous works. It sometimes just doesn't work on my time schedule, and that is the way sponsorship is. Sometimes you're going to get somebody, and I call them blue ribbon babies. It's just a blue ribbon baby. They're going get in there and they're going to get those steps and they are going to be sponsoring people and they will be doing things and I mean they are just doing it and the next one is going to just wear the crap out of you and that's just the way it goes and that is what sponsorship is about take a deep breath and learn to be a good listener and just hang on because you are in for the ride of your life. Thank you.