Hilarious Story & the Solution Presented Simply – Earl H.

Transcription by CastingWords nice glasses, whoever he's going to. Perfect. I want to thank the committee for asking me to come share. It's always an honor and a privilege to share at an event of this type. I got up at 4 o'clock in the morning, grabbed a bag, jumped in the car, drove to the airport, got on an airplane, which is an absolutely absurd thing for me to do. You'll find out why. It's just a completely unnatural act as far as I'm concerned. Getting a large metal cylinder and go rocketing across the sky. Completely wrong. And I'm about to get on the plane. I look in the line, and a buddy of mine, Jack, who's the Al-Anon speaker tomorrow at 1, you've got to go hang with Jack at 1. He's a great guy. He looks up and he sees me, and I said, Jack, you know, I got an Al-Anon on the airplane? My odds have improved. You know, it's getting better. And Jack knows me, right? He's keeping an eye on me. I mean, Jack made me feel a lot safer. Get here, and i'm the kind of guy that, like, Like, I get asked to speak somewhere. I find out when I'm supposed to be at the airport, you know, on what date. And, you Know, I Get On The Plane, I Fly, I Land. I Have No Idea What's Going To Happen. I'm Completely Unprepared. I'm Just In The Hands Of Alcoholics Anonymous. And I Get Off The Plano Hoping There Will Be Somebody There With Some Kind Of, You Know, Round Up T-Shirt On Or, You know, A Big Book In Their Hand, You Now. Something, You Knows. And I get off the plane and Suzanne Was There Right This Way, In The Car, To The Hotel. Everything's Been Great. I've had a great time since I've been here met a lot of great people and I'm happy to be here so I think I covered all that stuff right so I drank you know well I got to tell you I did not drink until I was 12 I held off as long as I possibly could I had been a restless irritable and discontented for some time prior to that first drink and it was I mean I wasn't like this clairvoyant you know kid you know what I mean? I didn't I wasn t you know just this troubled child realizing you know but I needed the drink you know I had no idea what I needed I just knew that something was wrong something was just wrong and it started when I was four years old how long do I do this how long am I up here as long as I want thank you very much that's how long I want alright, alright, Alright four years old I start sleepwalking talking in my sleep you stand at the foot of my parents bed talking to them in the middle of the night scaring the hell out of my parent and when I remember I talked about what I needed to I'd walk back through the house and get in bed and they'd follow me and they'd ask me questions and I'd answer them and it was all very bizarre. And they took me to, had a bunch of tests run on me and the answer they came up with back in those days was every night before I go to sleep they'd give me a big tablespoon of this liquid and it would just knock me out. Right? No more sleepwalking. No more problems. So I think very early in my life I got the information that if things aren't going the way you want them to take something. That's what I'll file that away for future reference. You know? know, went on into my life. Twelve years old, I, you know, I'm a strange kid, you know. I'm quiet, but if you take your eyes off me, I am gone, you know. And they did a bunch more tests on me and I found that I had this very high IQ. I don't have it anymore so I'm not bragging. That began to plummet around around 16, right? But so my father decided it's time for me to become a man. You know, I'm 12 years old, I'm five feet tall, I am 104 pounds. Yeah, man, right. Good thinking dad. And so I had gotten accepted to this think tank of a boarding school for boys. I mean there were 250 boys ages 13 to 18 in this school. How I found out I was going to to school. My father came into my room and said, get in the car. Get in the car. Drive, drive, drive. Drive. Drive drive drive. We get there. I get out of the car he gets out of the car nobody else gets out the car put the suitcase down next to me shakes my hand says this will make a man out of you got back in the car and they all drove off welcome to higher learning you know I'm like this paralyzed child standing there thinking what the hell just happened you know they knew me better than anybody in the world they just threw me away what What the hell did I do, you know? I mean, emotionally, it was a devastating experience. Intellectually, it Was great. I mean... You know... The education I received was wonderful. It's held me in good stead to this very day. But... You know.. That's the facts. Right? I've never really bothered with the facts a whole lot. You know what I mean? It's all about the feelings. How am I feeling? You know, I felt bad. And they... You know? So, this is bad. If I feel bad, this Is bad. Right? That's me. And... I don't know why this is going on. I mean, I know I don't belong there. There's 250 boys from all over the earth. I mean they've scoured the earth to find 250 of the brightest, most emotionally disturbed young men they can find. And they've thrown us on this campus as like a lord of the flies in this place. You know what I mean? And everybody's 13 to 18. I'm the only non-teenager. I'm youngest and smallest kid in the whole school. I'm 12 years old. I'm 105 pounds. And 12 doesn't mean anything to anybody except a 12 year old because what do you want to be? Teenager. Everybody there was one, not me. I lose. I just got here. I lose, you know? It's over, you know? It's all wrong. I'm calling home for three days saying, please, big mistake, come get me, no harm, no foul. You know, talking to my mother, crying like a 12-year-old, right? My father, you can hear him in the background, right? Hang up! And my mom going, sorry. I did that for three days and it was like something broke inside me and I said, you know what? You don't want me, I don't want you. you. And I turned my back on my family and I pretty much never went back. And I began my path as, you know, like this lone child in the world. And, um, I met tiny, I had no tools for living. You know what I mean? I was a 12 year old, 12 year olds get told what to do from the minute you wake up till you go to bed at night. There's no, you Know, nobody ever asked me, well, what do you feel like doing? They just said, go over there, read that, study for that, clean that up, go to bed, you Now eat that. Nobody ever asked to me anything, right? So now I'm in this school and I'm running around. No tools for living. And I met Tiny. Every high school has got a guy named Tiny, right. He's like 6'4", 240. Plays guard on the football team, right, and he found me. I didn't find him. He found me and he came up to me. He goes, how you doing, punk? And he slapped me in the back of the head and sent me and my books flying, right! I have no tools for this, right?! I've never met anybody this big, you know, that was assaulting me, right!? So I had this like out-of-body experience. I walked up to Tiny and I hit him as hard as I possibly could, you know. Just laid one on Tiny and this had no effect on Tiny whatsoever. So I'm standing there and, you now, the sun's gone, you kno what I mean? It's for Tiny, right? And Tiny looks down at me and goes, you know kid, you got a lot of guts. And he beat the crap out of me. And as I'm taking this beating, I'm thinking, this is going pretty good. You know, because the fact is, is I'm absolutely terrified of this guy, right? I'm in a place of fear I didn't know existed as I'm taking this beating. I know how to take a beating. I've taken those before at home, you know? But Tiny had said, You got a lot of guts. So my violence had masked my fear. The fact that I attacked him, he figured I wasn't afraid of him at all, which could have been further from the truth, but that was the impression he got. My first tool for living was when frightened, attack. attack because it masks the fact that you're afraid. No one will know you're afraid if you're just attacking all the time, which is what I began to do. And I went back to my dorm room and I'm hanging out in my room waiting for the bleeding to stop. You know, I got knots on my head. You know, life's, my world's just caving in, you know? And word spread across this campus in like 30 minutes, watch out for that little Hightower kid. He's a maniac. He attacked tiny, right? Which is making things even worse, you You know, because now I've got this reputation that's got absolutely nothing to do with who I am. Now I'm known as that little maniac. The fact is, I'm just a frightened child, right? So the cool guys come swinging around. Matt swung by in my room. This guy named Matt. Matt swang by and he stuck his head in my arm and he went, hey, you want to smoke a joint? And I said, well, yeah, yeah I do. And I had absolutely no idea what he was talking about. I had no idea What that meant. All I heard was, you won't hook up with us. The answer was, yeah. I mean, he could have said, look, we're going to go kill the Spanish teacher. You want to come? I'm with you, man. Let's go. I'll hold him. You hit him. You know? I was crazy alone, you know? And we swung by and we picked up Steve and Steve had a Tupperware container full of cheap red wine. I mean cheap red wines. You know what I mean? No grapes involved. You know, that fortified stuff. You know What I Mean? in, which I grew to love, by the way. And we went behind the dorm with two 13-year-olds and a 12-year old standing behind a dormitory. Children, three children standing there. No idea what we're doing. Matt fires up the joint. He just did what you do, you know, and he hands it to me, and I did what he did. And that burns, and that's weird. I don't understand that at all, you Know? And then here comes the wine. I took a pull on the wine. Well, that burns in a whole other way. That's completely unpleasant, that thing. And my head's pounding and thumping, you know. I got knots on my head and eyes swelled, you now. And the wine's going and the pot's going. And I mean, just like that, man. That thing that makes me bodily different from my fellows occurred. And this warm feeling kind of just floated up through my feet and up through the top of my head. And the magic happened, man, I was comfortable standing where I was standing, and doing what I was doing with the people I was doing it with. And I'd never felt like that before in my life. It was the most amazing spiritual moment, man. For me, it was just oh! And I didn't know is it the pot? Is it the wine? Is it a drink? Is it that the fact that I'm standing here with my two very close personal friends, Matt and Steve because there's a connection going on here now, you know what I mean? I don't know and I don' t care. I don''t care. I feel better than I've ever felt, and nothing bad's happening. Nothing bad is happening. I've been told, you know what I mean? You smoke that evil weed, man, 30 minutes, you're on your way downtown looking for heroin. Don't go near that stuff, man. I felt no need to go downtown. Not that night it anyway. You know? And, you know, that demon rum, man, you start drinking that, you know what I mean? You blink, you're a hobo. You got a little knapsack on your back and you're riding the rails, man. You're just a shipless homeless fool, right? Felt no need to ride the rail. Felt comfortable standing where I was standing. Doing what I was doing with the people I was dealing with. It was magic. It's magic. Nobody died. Nobody went went to jail. No blood was drawn. Nobody went to the nut house. All those things were going to happen, but that was not my experience right there. You know what I mean? My experience said, feel better than you've ever felt before. No problem. But I'm no fool, man. I'm doing this as often as I possibly can. And I did every day for the next 16 years, no matter what, which is why, and all of this is just my, you know, silly opinion up here about this stuff just that you know something just a drunken maniac rattle on about my experiences right but my neck of the woods they do this thing they tell they say to newcomers just don't drink or use no matter what personally I'm glad nobody said that to me because I'd have said oh got it and not have been out the door that's the deal I think that kills people cuz that's that's like half the sentence if I could not if I can just not drink or use no no matter why I guarantee you wouldn't be here tonight a plane was involved, I'm not doing it. You know? The truth is, I thought I was going to Cincinnati. That's in Ohio, isn't it? I'm in Kentucky, apparently. That's what I've been told. Fact of the matter is, nothing personal. I don't know anybody in Kentucky. You Know What I Mean? The hell am I flying out here for, you know? Work the steps? I don' t think so. Take Make a phone call from a whining, suffering, alcoholic newcomer who has not done one thing all day long to engage in a process of recovery for himself but feels that 3.30 a.m. is an excellent time to call Earl. I would not take that phone call. I would now do that. Work the steps? Absolutely not. No. Why not? Because I'd be home just not drinking or using no matter what because I could do that fact of the matter is I'm the flip side of that coin I drink and use no matter what no matter what given a good reason I don't stop that's the difference between me and the problem drinker prom during it's another drunk driving charge goes for the judge judge says you know I'm sick you sick of you seeing you you're doing a year I see you again you're going to hear we're not gonna talk about it anymore I see again we're doing here in County end of the year we'll get back together and we'll talk about his dad problem drink or hears that and says you you know what, I don't want to go to county for a year. Makes a decision to stop drinking and driving and can actually follow through on that. Me, I mean, I start wondering what it's going to be like in jail because I'm going. And I'll try. I mean I will really try. I understand drinking, driving, bad. I understand. Understand, I'm really going to make the best of all efforts not to do that. And I'll stop on the way home from the court. Knock back, 30. And then when they invite me to leave their fine establishment, I will go get in my car and drive home. Because I forget, you know what I mean? I just forget. Anyway, it's humble beginnings for me, you Know What I Mean? A little pot, a little wine, no big deal, right? perfectly reasonable 13 was pills the only reason i took a pill is i was at a party and this guy said would you like a couple of pills i said well yeah again having no idea what we're talking about i took two pills 20 minutes later i'm laying on the floor i'm very happy there you know what i mean because this is fine i like this what was that two and a half I'm writing that down man I'm asking for that by name two in all second in all Placidale that was you know I got strung out on all that stuff 14 nights I started thinking psychedelics again I was at a party girl actually I was hanging out with this girl it was about 10 hours past this morning school and I was hanging out with this girl named Debbie fond memories of Debbie Debbie was older woman Debbie was 15 and a half she was also a bad girl Man, Debbie's like... Such respect for Debbie, man. I got to have respect for her. Debbie said, you want some acid? I said, okay. And she had a lipstick tube that women carry and opened it up and spun the lipstick up and there was a little pill on the end of it. I went, that's very clever. And I took it and I popped it in my mouth and swallowed it. And she said, did you take that whole thing? Again, me being an idiot, right? I have no idea what's going on. And I said, well, yeah, I did. You know, it was very small. It was very smart. And I used these horse caps, you know. And she says, that was three hits of wild lightning. A woman over here just went, oh. That's not good. good. Well, anyway, the next two days were very interesting. I can't, I remember, you know how you remember like parts of it, but it's just all weird. You don't know what really happened and what didn't. But I remember we were in a market pretending we were married. And I had the card and I looked at her and I said, do we have any children? And she said, yes, we have two. and I said then we're going to need these diapers right here and then I kind of like just phased back out and to this day I mean I go to a market I have a list you know what I mean I don't just idly go into one of those places man they freak me out the lights and the rows and everything's perfect you know and there's so many decisions to be made there you know and these are the things that I think normal people take for granted you know we get it all taken away from us so we had to piece it back together one little bit at a time. Me, I mean... You know, you've been in the market and you see, you go around the corner and there's an abandoned cart, right? I understand that guy. I understand him. You know what I mean? I mean, I see a car like that and I just go... You know? I know. I understand, man. A lot of decisions. Got a little overwhelmed. Gotta do it. Gotta come back later. Fifteen, I started shooting dope. Only reason I did that was I was on a boat in Marina Del Rey, California and a woman came up to me and said would you like me to stick this in your body and I said yes I would you know and she did and it was one of those where you just went it was a good one yeah I knew it was going to be it was that good one just that all I remember thinking on the way down was oh yeah man you know if I'm dying now fine that was great Now, identify as an alcoholic Here I am talking about drugs Gotta show respect Alright I'm a child of the 60s Our parents were the alcoholics We were trying to carve out our own identity here We were not going to drink ourselves to death The way they were We were going to kill ourselves in a whole new way But here's the facts only real information I have about my life as a result of having gotten sober stayed that way awhile done my inventory work and look back on my life with some kind of sane perspective all right and what I know is this my drug of choice is what do you got it's all anti oral medication to me man you know if I can get enough of what you got in my body I can kill the fear and be in the world that's all I drank because I love the effect that was produced by alcohol the same was true for other substances. So, I mean, my favorites down and out, I like heroin. I like barbiturates. I like alcohol. These are a few of my favorite things. My idea of a good night is sitting around just checking my pulse. You know what I mean? That's my idea. But you don't have any of those? I'll take a great big bag of the cocaine, please. I'm sure. Sure, I'll sit around all night listening to the air around my head, you know. Driving down the freeway decoding license plates. You know, just psychotic. Sure. It's a plan. Because for me it's not about going down or going up. It's about I've got to get out of right here right now. Because right here, right now, I'm self-centered and I'm frightened. Right here, write now, I'm comparing my insides to your outsides and I am losing every time. I've gotta get out here. Up or down? Prefer. prefer can't up fine let's go let's just we got to make a move right so the drugs would come and go whatever was on you know what i mean i wasn't a specialist you know i mean it was you know give me some you know and they would come in go on me it was heroin one day barbiturates the next cocaine this day but you know What I mean all this stuff there's only one thing that was on the box on the table every single day that was alcohol alcohol was on a table every Single Day and I believe the reason for that again just my opinion I believe the reason for that is drugs are completely unreliable you know there's no quality control going on out there you know what I mean you don't know what you got until you get it in your body you know because I never went to the dealer and said excuse me I'll take some of that cocaine never once did he say to me you know it's not really that good this week come back next week we'll have something a little better for you they don't say that they say yeah watch out for this man man, you may need to cut that again. Be careful now. Powerful. Very powerful. Get home and it's salt. Right? You go get a fifth of Jack Daniels. You go gets a quarter good gin, you know what you got here. This is reliable stuff. You can count on this stuff. And by the time I was 16 years old, people were referring to me as an alcoholic. And my response was, what's your point? Yeah, I am. I'm an alcoholic and a drug addict at 16 years of age and I know it. It's clear to anybody who comes in contact with me at this early point in my life, right? I've got to have a bottle. I've Got to Have a Bottle. And whatever else happens is whatever else Happens. I do so much cocaine, I can't get my mouth open anymore. You know? And it's 7.30, the party just started, and I've completely overshot the mark one more time. Not a problem. I suck enough gin through my teeth, I'll loosen up, and then I can go on with the party. No problem. Not enough heroin to get you to that cool, quiet, just heart and lungs working place. That's my favorite place ever. right? No, no. Just start sucking on that Jack Daniels bottle, man. He'll get you the rest of the way. He's going to get you where you need to be because booze is reliable. So that's why for me, in the end for me, it was all about drinking. It was three or four grams of cocaine a day only to keep me on my feet so that I could drink the way I needed to drink. It wasn't about getting high. It's about staying up because you need more, right? Get that alcohol in. Get that alcohol and all the rest of it was just a complete waste of my time you know I it was we weren't playing anymore you know what I mean that last six years was nasty 16 I went to my first mental institution dropped out of high school father decided I was insane locked me up for three months of observation a year of rehabilitation which I thought was a little excessive and they had the signs I thought when I was sitting here they got the green exit signs in here and And that's what they had in this nuthouse I was in. And all I thought, that's it. That's all I want to do. One word. They got it down there. One word for me. Exit. That's All I Want to Do. And I'm in there taking three cups of pills a day and shuffling around this joint planning my escape, right? So I'm getting ready to escape and I met this girl named Kilday who was nuts, right. I mean, I ate all my meals with KildAY just to kind of get to know her a little bit and all he had to do to flip her out was look at her and say, Hey, KildY, how you doing? Wow, man! and Kilday just snapped. Every meal was like dinner and a show, you know what I mean? Flip Kildaya out, she ran all around the place and not everybody chased her, right? All attention was on her so I used her as my diversion, you know? So I'm sitting at lunch and I'm going to escape and I got Kildy, got her flipped out and she goes that way and I am sitting in my little chair ready, ready, go! You know what it is? and I'm hauling ass, you know? That's all I got. And you're like, your brain works fine, you know, but first time in weeks you try to make a move and it ain't there. And it's like demoralizing because out of the nurse's station you hear over the intercom, uh, Ed, when you got a minute, do you want to grab Earl? He's making a break for the door. You know? And Ed's eating a sandwich going, yeah, I'll get him in a minute. I didn't know, Harry. And you're over there, and like a normal person would just go, you know, bummer, man, just go sit down. They're going to take you back to your room with no doorknob. It's over, right? Me, I was working. I was workin' until Ed came and got me. Oh, let's just turn it this way, partner. Damn. Right? This is, you know... I mean, what we're getting a glimpse of here is my best thinkin'. You know? This is my best thinkins'. You know, Mr. High IQ, yeah. The next time I got thrown in a nuthouse, I escaped the first day because I'd learned, you know, my tools for living were drugs, alcohol, violence, and run. And now, because I've been thrown in the nuthhouse, I realized my fifth tool for living was if you're going to get thrown in an nuthous, you've got to get out before they get to Thorazine-y. Because if you don't, you're leaving with nothing. So I'm in the intake process of my second insane asylum, you know? And I'm sitting there going, yeah, yeah, it's very, very bad. It's very very bad, I'm really glad we got here. You know what I mean? I really need a lot of help. Hey, look at that. And I'm moving this time. You know, I mean, I'm running. The whistles are going and I got a guy chasing me and I'm out on the back lawn and I am heading for this 12 foot ivy covered chain link fence and at this point in my life I am like 17. I am an alcoholic. I am a drug addict. I am high school dropout. I am in any moment hopefully an escaped mental patient. This is like my resume. You know I mean. This is what I have to say to myself and I think if I make that fence I don't have any problems because I'll be drunk in 20 minutes because I'm the opposite of everybody else. I drink and use no matter what. I've got lots of things that have shown up in my life by age 17 that say it is not working. Your life is just spiraling downward at an alarming rate and it's all clearly, directly attributable to drinking. And my answer to that was, but that's like saying to me, stop breathing. breathing. This is how I get out of bed, this is how I take a shower, this how I dress, this is how go out into the world, this is how listen and talk to other human beings, this is how drive, this is how look at the world I look at it with this filter on because I can't take it when you take the filter away It's too bright, it's too intense it's to emotional, I can deal with it Gotta have my filter on at all times so I hit the streets I did three years out on the street doing what you do to stay loaded on a daily basis I thought it was like me and Jack Kerouac you know on the road and it wasn't like that I had it very romanticized in my head but it was a pretty brutal way of life met this woman we talked at a party for 20 minutes and went well so we were in love through a series of weird circumstances I went on an interview and I got accepted to a good business college in Northern California right my high school dropped I didn't even have a high school diploma I just got accepted to college I go back to my father and I say, I got accepted to business school. Don't ask. Give me a year's tuition and I'll leave town. He said, beautiful. Hit me with a check. Me and this woman piled all our belongings and eight pounds of hash in the back of this truck and drove to Northern California for higher learning, you know? She got a straight job. I became a drug dealer and I had no problems becoming a drug dealer because I had at this point in my life, I'm 19 years old, I've got no sense of family, I've got no sense of community. I've Got No Ethics. I've GOT NO MORALS. I'm just this loose cannon out there, this wounded animal drinking and using from the minute I get up till I pass out every night just trying to find a way to be in the world. And I mean, I'm in business. I mean I'm studying marketing, production, distribution and I'm applying it to my business. Business is booming. I think this is all great. She's got the straight job. The using is getting a little out of hand for her. She's saying stuff like, I'm too high, which is a completely ridiculous thing to say. I mean, if you can say it, it's not true, right? So we're back to L.A., and I got the drink the way I needed to up there, right, and we kept the ball rolling. Twenty-one years old, I get diagnosed to have malignant cancer. Fly back to LA, they do major surgery on my upper back. They tell my family I'm going to die. They prepare me to die, and I just look at them and say to them, you know, you don't even know who you're talking to. You know, the way I'm using it, that comes up like twice a week. You're going to die. Yeah, yeah, I'm going to Die. Ain't we all? And so I did that and I went into the nuclear medicine program. I didn't like the drugs they had, so I went home and got loaded the way I get loaded. I just blew off the nuclear medical program. I was a nuclear medicine thing. And I beat the cancer thing. I've been a long-term cancer survivor. I've done cancer for a long time. And back to school, you know what I mean? That was just kind of like this little side trip. It just didn't mean anything to me. And I go back up north. I mean, I got an early acceptance to USC Law School. I'm editor-in-chief of my college newspaper. I'm writing inflammatory political articles on a weekly basis. They're threatening to expel me every day. And I'm citing my rights and I'm just drunk and loaded and I've got hair out like this. You know what I mean? They're just looking at me like, Jesus, what have we created here? This went sideways years ago. And my mother calls me and says, look, we haven't been anywhere as a family in 10 years. We've got to put this family back together. We'll go anywhere you want to go. Let's just go as a familly. Begging me, crying, using all the mother tricks. And I said, fine. And on my birthday, November 7th, I flew back to L.A., and we took off to a flight of Guadalajara on my birth day, and on the way there, the plane crashed. And my mom, my dad, and my mom were there. My mother, my father, my little sister all died in the crash, and I didn't. and I woke up on this mountain in Mexico and my skull was fractured and my back was broken in three places and my leg was crushed and my arm was crushed. I was paralyzed from the waist down and I was awake and my mother was laying right over there and my little sister Kimberly was right there and my father was right over here and I couldn't move. The only thing I could do was move my right arm. I couldn' t move. I couldn''t help them. I couldn ''t get to them and I watched them all bleed to death right in front of me and I had this conversation with God And I said, you know what? Anybody that would take a kind, loving, gentle, poetic little creature like my little sister Kimberly and leave a lying, cheating, thieving, dope-fiending alcoholic like me on the planet, I have no use for a God of this type. And I renounced God. And then some guys came up on the mountain and they scavenged the plane wreck. And they came up to me and I could get my wallet out and I just wanted them to know my name because I knew I was dying. And they took my wallet, took the money out of it and threw my wallet back on my chest and went on through the wreck and got what they could get and went back down the mountain and left me up there to die. So, you know, I renounced God and I renounce any association with you as well. I had no love of man and I had not love of God and I didn't care what anybody thought from this moment on. I thought, you now, I'm going to get out of this mountain and I'm gonna let y'all know what I think of this thing called life. I mean, you kno, I've been trying to keep a facade going in my life, have things going on, so y'al leave me alone, let me drink and use the way I want it. You know what? I don't need it anymore. I'm gona do what I want. You don't like it? Just step aside because I'm an angry, hostile, terrified human being and it's on. And finally some guys came up and they got me and they put me in the back of this truck with my mother and they took us down to an aid station and they tagged my mother dead, they tagged me dead and they sat there smoking cigarettes waiting for me to die and I just wouldn't die. I was angry. And finally they took me to a hospital and then they found out my name and that meant the Federales had to show up so the Federalese interrogated me through an interpreter for the next three and a half days and wouldn't give me anything for paying. They weren't throwing what I was doing back in Mexico which is a story we don't need to get into here and I it was ugly man it was just ugly and I called a buddy of mine that I was associated with in Northern California who called the family in Mexico City who flew in the plane you know greased a few palms and they plastered me from the neck down and smuggled me out of Mexico back into the States I spent a long time in a hospital in Southern California they told me I probably have a withered left hand I might be blind in my left eye and I may or may not be walking and I remember but again looking at it I'm thinking you don't have any idea who you're talking to man and I maximum dose of the Demerol every three hours around the clock for I don't know how long and eventually I got out of the hospital I had a brace that I had custom made brace I had made and I had my cane and I got up and I walked out of that joint in three hours and 15 minutes after I got there I was so strung out man I was looking to connect and I went on my last run and it lasted for six years I was sober three times in six years. They were for 72 hours each. And that was when I would go to this bootleg sanitarium in Hollywood, California. You'd walk in, you'd give them 150 cash. You'd give him your bottle of Valium. You'd giving him your car keys. You'd given him your wallet. You'd gave him your gun. You know what I mean? You go in and you lay down on the gurney and they strap you down. They shoot you full anti-convulsants and then let you ride. And 72 hours later, they either send you home or the morgue and they didn't care which way you went because they got their 150, right? And I've reintroduced myself to God and say, you know what? You get me through this thing in a life. I'll never drink again. And I'd get up off that table and they'd say, you'd be a good boy or don't drink. You know, you're an alcoholic, don't you? I said, yes, ma'am, I do. He said, you drink, you are going to die. It's getting rough out there for you. I'd say yes, Ma'am. I'm not going to drink no more. And self-knowledge availed me nothing. I'd be drunk that night. Drunk that night, couldn't stop drinking. I remember the last time I went in there, I said madness and insanity in my life was over the top. and I remember I meant it with every fiber of my being I said I cannot drink another day I cannot drink anymore nothing good happened in years Milo I'm so completely totally alone the souls just being sucked right out of me the madness is so severe I got visions of dead people dancing in my head it's just so dark and I can't do it anymore and I left that place I drank for two more years couldn't stop drinking and I don't know why but I mean I came to and last time I came out of a blackout I was 28 years old both my hands were broken I had hair like this and a beard like this I was yellow I'd had two doctors tell me that if I didn't stop drinking this year I was going to die and it was like the fall you know what I mean I was getting close my thyroid was shut down kidneys weren't working couldn't touch the liver heart was swollen they were deciding whether or not to charge me with attempted murder coming out of this last blackout I'd been stabbed twice shot at I'd broken 74 bones. I had over 650 stitches in me. My family was dead I had no friends. I hadn't no place to live I was psychotic and I do not use that term loosely I could not distinguish between the true and the false as the book says I mean my life was burned to the ground It was just burned to ground and I just and I did the what it's just inconceivable what I did I raised up two busted hands and I said help And they took me to by ambulance to a a UCLA emergency. They pumped my stomach and said, get him out of here. He's a pathetic old man. He's drunk. He'll die. He was 28 years old. Took me to another place to get me five more days. It got worse. Then they took me by ambulance to another place. This was a place to get sober, man. This was an old Air Force hangar, Long Beach General Hospital, in the care of this lady named Dr. Vicki Fox. She was a real pioneer. We ever started having AA Saints, her name's going to be in the basket, let me tell you. Helped an incredible number number of people. And it was 42 cots in one room, 21 cots on each side of the bed with sheets drawn between them. And you went in there and if you threw a seizure like me, convulsions, but that's all you got. You kicked like a dog and it was free. And how you earned your cot was you stayed and you faced your kick and you listened to your body tell you what it thought about what you'd been doing to it. And your list went insane. And 42 guys in oneroom doing this, you didn't sleep people wink right because at any moment you know somebody's snapping somebody's losing somebody's pitching up out of that cot you know and flopping around on the floor you know we're all yelling we got another one you know they're all shaking going over there trying to help that guy you know nuts and I left there and they said you don't want to die you better go to Alcoholics Anonymous and I said okay got out of place came back up in LA for that Friday night I went into to the basement of a church on 830. Hair out like that, mad dogging everybody that looked at me. Do not come up to me. Do not. Because if you come up to me, we're going to have a problem. That was the vibe I was throwing out. It's not going to go well. I see you talking to each other. We'll just keep it over there because I'm insane. And us frightened, us terrified people, we're dangerous. You corner us like that. Don't come at me all smiling with your hand out. You know? Because I might get hurt. It's not you're going to get hurt because I'm like glass, man. I'm not glass. None of my tools for living work anymore. You come up and shake my hand and you're gonna ask me a question I can't answer like how are you doing? You know. I don't know. What's going on? Beats me, man I don' t know what's going o I'll shatter I'll just shatter Right? But everybody's got a new guy All that he saw was other new guy You know And he came up He said Hi Vegas I'm an alcoholic And I said So what? you know and exactly the highlight of my life I don't know what you're so happy about get away from me he looked at me said keep coming back I thought oh beautiful keep coming back powerful brother powerful right I'm sure when I'm home patient trying to waiting for to get that hour of sleep I've been getting lately every night right and I'm losing it I'm sure that keep coming-back thing's gonna come in real handy thank you if you're new and they they do that to you? I hope you've got more courage than I do. They come up to you and go, keep coming back. Or one day at a time, man. Or my personal favorite, hey, just turn it over. It's a new guy who's insane, right? Like that's going to meet, right. I hope you've Got More Guts Than I Do. Just step out of the place and say, excuse me, I don't personally understand having been out there for the last 17 years. Don't understand the deep spiritual significance of turn it over? Would you mind expanding on that for me a little bit. In my neck of the woods, if they're honest, about 75% of them would say, you know what? I don't know what that means either. They said it to me when I came in. I'm just saying it to you. There's a guy over there who reads the big book. Let's go ask him. Maybe he knows. Just my opinion. And I sat at my first meeting and a guy got got up, back against the wall, checking where the doors and windows were, working my game. Right? Because that's all I had. That's all I had, and that and the willingness to go to one AA meeting, and this guy got up. He's an old-timer, 65 years old, Skid Row bum, ex-boxer, ex wino, I remember, and he got up at the podium and he shared his experience, his strength, and his hope. I didn't know that's what he was doing. Today, I do know that's what he's doing, but he spoke with this grace and a dignity. He talked about his feelings of the man with dignity. I've never heard anybody do that before. There was this presence about him. He had this light in his eyes and he was like this passionate guy and he wasn't doing that old James Dean shit, you know what I mean? That quiet angst in the back, not willing to participate. It's crap, you Know what I Mean? This guy was stepping right up and going, this is important to me and it matters to me. And I feel very strongly about it, which I thought took a lot of guts. Stepping up, man. He was stepping up front and he He was talking about this stuff. Talked about how his head would be chewing on him and how he'd go through a whole productive day with his head chewing on them, using the tools he found in Alcoholics Anonymous. No wreckage being created, which blew my mind. If I'm awake, we got wreckage, you know? And this guy's like, head doing to him what mine does to me. And he's getting through and he's being a service to people at a meeting. The end of the meeting because he knows what a meeting is for. A meeting is a place that we have meetings so that we can have a place where a newcomer can come and hear a message of hope and a message of recovery. That's the point of a meeting. And he'd been the newcomer and done that and they'd given him the 12 steps of Alcoholics Anonymous as outlined in that book and he had worked those 12 steps and he'd had an awakening as a result of that. And he had been relieved of the obsession to drink as a result of working those steps and had become comfortable sober. The minute that happened to him, he was now going to meetings to give back, to be there for the new wave of insanity that's washing up on our beach every day. And I'm listening to this going, whoa! all in one day. This guy's amazing. But the thing that did it for me was like he looked right at me and he said, you know what? I don't care whether you like what I got to say or not. You don't like it? Go to another meeting. I love this because it made it clear to me this guy wasn't selling me something. He wasn't pitching AA to me. Come on in, you know. He was sharing it with me. I was already in. I was in the room. I was there. I was here. He was in. He was showing this with me if I wanted it, I could have it. It was for free. If I didn't want it, cool. cool, go to another meeting. Maybe you'll hear somebody there you can identify with, but by all means keep coming back until it happens for you. And it happened. And I said, you know what? With a look of disdain on my face, right, like... In my head I went, it's cool, I'm coming back. And I've never left. I've not left. I've left because I've never had any place more powerful to go to to address the problems that I face on a daily basis as an alcoholic. And that was, I've been here since November 6th, 1980. And this November I'll have 21 years and I couldn't stay sober for a day. I couldn'T stay sober FOR A DAY. I quit a thousand times. But that would last like a couple hours. You know? The trick for me is not... This ain't about stopping. This is about how do I not start again? How do I NOT start again ? And for me, I know the only way a guy like me is going to NOT start AGAIN is if I can find a way to be comfortable sober. Because when I got here and you said to me, you know, there's a way for you to be comfortable sober. I looked at you and thought, if only that were true. If only that could be for a guy like me. Because I've been loaded since I was 12 years old. I had absolutely no experience in my life of being sober and comfortable at all. I didn't know that it existed. It was outside my experience. I made a conscious decision to trust you and I began to do the things that you told me to do. And I mean, there's so many things that we say to each other in these rooms. But the thing that does it for me is we got this symbol. I kept thinking, that's got to be like the crux of the deal or something, you know what I mean? Because we got like rings and bracelets and bumper stickers and shirts and hats and I mean, this thing's everywhere, right? You see that symbol, you think, you know, AA or possibly a mason but you're thinking AA, I'm okay. Right? It narrows it right down And I found out it's this ancient spiritual symbol. It stands for mind, body and spirit brought together as a whole human being. And therein lies the balance I had sought my whole life and never had drunk or sober. Never had had it. AA adopted that symbol unity, service and recovery. It's the same stuff. Unity is the body. I must bring it here. This is the Body to me. I must Bring It Here. I couldn't get sober but we seem to be able to. I must be with my fellows. I must look you in the eye. I must see you on a regular basis. I've got to go to regular meetings to see the same people over and over again because I can see you changing. And the change I see in you is the hope for me because I'm too self-centered and afraid as a newcomer in here. I can't see the change that's happening to me, but I can See It In You and we've been here the same amount of time. And if it's happening in you and we're doing the same stuff, it must be happening to Me. Hope. Hope. The greatest gift anybody could ever give somebody like me because I came here hopeless and alone. Completely hopeless and along. It was so dark inside me and I've been alone so long when you said are you lonely? It was like, huh, you know when you've been lonely forever It's not lonely anymore. It's just where you are It's in relation to anything else because that's all it's been you know So the unity is the body I got to bring it here I must be with you recoveries of the mind for me the greater aspect of this disease Right the obsession of drinking the book tells me that the persistence of this illusion this belief in a lie that I can drink like a normal man, that it is in any way the answer to any problem I may ever have, is astonishing that many of us pursue it to the gates of insanity and death. That's my story. I end up in Insanus Islands and tag dead in Mexico. I mean, I'm the gate guy. You know what I mean? You know, it's like two drinks and go to the gate. You know What I Mean? It's like, that's what's going to happen to me. And I know that about me. I don't, I've never been able to manage it. I've Never Been A Controlled Drinker. I Never Have Been. I didn't have a family to hold it together for. I didn'T have children I had to keep it together for or a job or a career or a goal or a hope or a dream to keep IT together for what I had was me and knowing that the breath of life for me was drinking and using and that's what I was going to do till the day I die. That was never controlled ever for me and when I got here I came here destroyed which was a great way to get here and you told me to keep coming back and I found out what that meant and why I needed to be with the body of AA the recovery of the mind had to be there for me because if I never got if I don't get relieved of the obsession to drink if I didn't get relieved of this persistent aching gnawing thing in my head that keeps sneaking up on me at the worst possible time and telling me that the answer to the problem I currently face is a drink or to go to a doctor and get a properly prescribed medication to help me sleep at night it'll say whatever it needs to say my head doesn't say go get some heroin it doesn't say that because it knows I'm gonna say thanks for saying shut up you know I don't know thank you for sharing no what it says to me is boy at back pain you've got that you've lived with for the last 26 years that's a terrible thing we need up when you at the very least we need a muscle relax this very very appropriate muscle relax it equals heroin for me I'm on my way it's like I'm like the guy was talking a guy knows got 30 years sober he was a young successful actor in New York he and another guy they were working on Broadway and they were trying to get sober trying to get sober try to get silver there we eat in a drunk in a a drunk NAA and one day they just had a terrible hard stressful day and they just said screw it we're gonna go drink and they went to their favorite bar us outside that the Broadway theater and there's their you know it's so romantic you know what I mean and there is the beautiful burled wood bar and there Tommy the bartender behind the bar, their favorite bartender. And the guy I know walks up to them when he slaps him on the shoulder and he says, Tommy, two double scotches and call the police. Because he knows, you know? He knows. He can't do anything about it because self-knowledge didn't avail him of anything either. You know? Eventually got sober. He's got 30 years now and he's a remarkable human being. He got what I want. Light beams coming out of his head. You know what I mean? Guys lit up. Want that buzz, right? But to get relieved of the obsession, what do I got to do so I can get comfortable sober? I got 12 steps. That's what they're for. Step one is what's the problem? Lack of power is my dilemma. Maybe able to do other stuff pretty well, but when it comes to the question of drinking, uh-uh. Powerless, man. If lack of power's my problem, what's my solution? Step two, a power greater than me that could restore me to sanity, soundness of mind, relieve me of the obsession question to drink. Cool. I know what my problem and my solution are. Now, what should I do? Well, better make a decision to do something about it. It's a program of action. Okay. Third step. Get out on my knees. Turn the will of my life over to the care of a God I do not understand, in my case. I tried to wrap my head around infinity. It just won't go all the way around. I did a lot of psychedelics, man. I can get way out there. But I just get get as far as I can get scared the hell out of myself and come snapping back in. I'll leave that to God, you know? That was another one for you. That one freaks me out, right? Turn my will and my life. Get back up on the couch and embark upon a media plan of action. What's the action plan? Fourth or nine. Four and five is me, six and seven is God, and eight and nine is you. Nobody else to play with. Four or five, I swallow large chunks of truth about myself and I admit these things before God to another human being. Six and seven, I hook it back up with God and ask God to remove the defects of character because I'll remove the wrong stuff. You know what? I'm really enjoying this defect right here. You can have this one, but I'm keeping this, man. We'll talk in a week, right? No, man, just hear God. You do what you think is best for this. And I'll keep praying for the willingness to allow that to happen, to get me out of the way. Eight and nine, hooking it back up with you. I'm very, very sorry. Here's your money. Back in the house. That's it. No big, oh what a wonderful person I have become. Check out my spiritual vision quest. You're going to be wowed by me. Please. These people don't want my money. They want their money. You're gonna go give them their money back. It's very simple. And to make amends means to change, right? It means to chance, right. So I'm sorry I stole your car. You $100,000 at the time of the fact so here's a check and if this is to your except if you're if this Is acceptable to you? I will make monthly payments to you until that amount is is paid And I will not go steal your car and sell it to pay you for the car. It's all from you You know That thing which is the first thing that comes to mind of a guy like me And I just one more deal and we'll all be fine No 10, 11, and 12 keep me in the game because I made it past that at that first time but I have not come anywhere near dealing with all of it. I've scratched the surface. I've become aware of the work that I need to do. 10, I continue to take personal inventory. Me. And when I'm wrong, promptly admit it. 11, I seek God. I seek a God. I seek Gott through prayer and meditation. I pray for knowledge of His will for me and the power to carry that out. That's it. And I meditate to quiet the mind so that when the answers come I can hear them. having had a spiritual awakening is the result of working the steps having been restored to sanity soundness of mind having been relieved of the obsession to drink it's been made possible for me to be comfortable sober for the first time in my life I can give away something I've got so when that next and that was all the guys that gave that to me I was sponsored for almost 14 years by the late great Donald Madden right up until the day he died I stayed with him until the date he died he saved my life I was with him long and I was with my parents. And he said to me, we'll give you everything we got. We'll give it all to you. And we're going to ask you one thing in return. What's that? He goes, when you catch this buzz, you turn around and you give it away to the next crazy little lunatic like you that comes walking through that door. I said, deal. So I've been doing that ever since. Since I caught the buzz, that's what I call it, I've bee trying to turn other people on to it who come to me. I don't go walking down the street going, hey, come here. You know, some guy walks up to me in a meeting and goes, I want to talk to you. I say, sure. You know? I mean, I had a, you know, what can I tell you, man? I mean it's over 20 years. I've got a life beyond my wildest dreams. I mean way beyond my world. I'm doing all this stuff. I swore on that mountain in Mexico I'd never do again. I swored I'd ever love another human being again as long as I live. And I'd forever tell you who I was. There's no way you're going to love me. I'm out. I'm OUT. And I'm not out. I mean, this thing goes so far past not drinking and using. It's a mind blower. It's designed for living. You get rebuilt in here. Who you get introduced to here is you, the real you, the true you, the truth about yourself. And it's always much more delightful and experienced than we imagine it would be. When I came up that mountain, I suffered from survivor's guilt. I lived, they died, I had no right to be alive. Every morning I would wake up and think to myself, you're worthless. worthless, you're worthless. You have no right to be here. What right do you have to be breathing in and out? So I could have no joy. I could have no peace. I can have nothing. You know, I suffered from such post-traumatic stress. It was unbelievable man. Can I have some water? Oh, that's right there. Thank you. Magic has come and unglued. It's a great place to come ungluing. I mean, I can't fly in airplanes. airplanes. No way. The plane goes bump, my head goes right to core primal stuff, fight or flight. And on an airplane you got nowhere to run and you got nobody to fight. You just have to sit there while your brain throws pictures and images of carnage up in your head to try to get you to do something about this, right? And I get on planes all the time. All the time, I fly about 100,000 miles a year. And And I do it for one thing. I do a five o'clock synonymous. And the good news is that I get to prove to myself on a regular basis I'm willing to go to any lengths to stay sober, you know? It's emotional tonight. It's emotion because right naturally God did it to me again. I'm out there before the thing, right? And I'm just so exhausted I don't even care. I've been up since four o' clock in the morning. It's just like whatever, you know what I mean? We'll all stay sober. We'll also do this and we'll all get drunk, let's see. You know what i mean? You know, I'm just, you know, there. And this guy walks up and we start talking, you know, and he was in a plane crash six years ago and he'd heard my take. And he came here to meet me. Guys like me don't get to have lives like the one I'm having. We don't gets to feel a sense of purpose, of value that we can in some way contribute. I cause problems. I hurt people. I take advantage. I break things and then I die. Not here. how about those Vikings huh I got it look what I am is I'm a grateful alcoholic he's got a life feeling as wildest dreams I'm living them you know what I mean I mean amazing people I get to travel in Alcoholics Anonymous I get the sponsor legion of guys who sponsor an army of guys you know me and they all know that I'm the product of Donald Madden is a product of and Norm A., who's a product of Chuck, who's the product of Bill. That's my lineage. That's where I come from. And they all know about the late great Donald Madden and their babies. The guys they sponsor know. And I know that when the guy I sponsor is out of town and the guy he's sponsoring with 36 Days calls me up and goes, will you take me to a meeting? And I go, yeah, yeah. And I'm going to get him and we go to a meet-up and this guy's going to speak and he's just going to throw down. You know, it's just gonna be the... And I think, thinking, ah, isn't this wonderful that I get to be a part of this, that this guy's going to throw these pearls of wisdom at me every time he talks. And little Michael here is going to get turned on to that in 36 days. It took me like 18 years to figure out what this guy was talking about. Michael's goingto get it in 36 Days. And sure enough, the speaker's talking and it's amazing. And I'm thinking, isn' t this great that Michael's getting this? Guess what? Michael's not getting this. Michael is having a fundamentally different meaning than I'm having. You know, Michael's got 36 days. Give him a chance, you know? He gets his turn. I've got to remember what I was like when I was coming to meetings at Alcoholics Anonymous, brand new. I mean, I was going to this place called Ohio Street and I would pull up to Ohio Street and the inside of my head was just like, okay, okay, we found the building, we found it, we're parking over here and you go into the meeting, you go in the meeting and they put the keys in the seats, keys inthe seat, put your keys intheseat, put yourkeysintheseats. Where are you going to sit? Where areyou going tosit? There's a guy with a red coat. Sit next to the guy with the red coat, spot the guy with the red coat you know where he's sitting right right put the keys down put the keys up within the ring about we're in about what do we know okay we're sitting down we're sitting down with something to me okay good good good i'm here all right what do you got what do you got whatever you got come on what do yeah come on lay it on me i'm ready i'm here come on let's go let's stop right guy gets up guy gets up all right he's reading something he rarely saw something he's really seen something he really failing something he said i didn't i missed a lot of that i don't really know what I don't really know what happened right there. I don' t know. I don''t know. Oh, oh. Twelve things. Twelve things in Alcoholics Anonymous. Twelve things remember that. I got that. That was good. That was a good ABC. Twelve things ABC. Twelve things NBC. He's down. He's done. I didn' t get a lot of that. Twelve things A-B-C. We'll build on that later. We'll do it later. He's up. He drank. He drank! I drank. I did that. I did this is good. I like this. This is good to do. He's out. That one didn't last very long. All right. All right, I gotta remember that guy. Where's that guy? Where's the guy? Get the face. Get the face. Remember the face already. All right, good. Oh, here's another guy. They're passing a basket. They are passing a basket! What the hell is this? Don't take the money. Don't take the money. The baskets don't buy. That's gonna go by. Okay, we're getting up. We're going outside. We're going outside. Why are we going outside? We smoke. I smoke. All right. We'll watch everything. How you doing? Fine. How you doing? Fine. How you doing? Fine! Go ring the bell. Go Go back in, go back in. They're reading 12 things. They're not the same 12 things? 24 things ABC. 24 things ABC. This guy, he's up. He's up, he drank. I did that, I did it. Oh, he felt like that? He felt like... I felt like, I feel like that. I feel that guy. I feel at that guy, he doesn't even know it. He doesn't know it, but he's inside my head. How does he get in... How do they do that? How do get in my head like that?! That is absolutely incredible. That was amazing. This is great. You know what? I think I belong here. I may in fact belong here, here, he's down. That was great. Here's the guy up. He's up. We're up. They got me by the hand. Oh, we're praying. All right. Praying. I know. And I would leave the meeting and somebody would say, what did you think of the meeting? I'd say, it's a great meeting. And I'd go home, you know what I mean? Just this little bit. I mean, I went to a meeting and I won. I won, I was victorious, man. I was going to bed sober. One more day. I win. Didn't matter the wreckage of the bill collectors and, you know, the old warrants and all this, you now. I was sober. the miracle of my life to this day is that I'm sober and who needs to know that as me and I knew it from the day I got here right so when I go walking into the meeting and I got a little mic sitting there with 36 days and it's happening and we walk outside and I looked at a little mic and I go so what do you think of the meeting he looks at me goes great I look at him I go go, all right, little bro, you're right on track, man. You win. Good for you. And the cycle begins again. You know, this human chain that we're in. There's a buzz to be caught here, man, and it's all about right here, right now. Just, you know? I've got to get between those. Somehow, just, I've Got to get in there. That place that I avoided at all costs. Remember when it was all about I've GOT TO GET OUT OF RIGHT HERE, RIGHT NOW? Up, down, don't matter. Let's just get out of here. Now, what I get is right now, and And where else am I going to have a life? But right here, right now. If I'm comfortable doing what I'm doing with the people I'm dealing it with, right here right now, then I've got a life. Where else am i going to find God? But right there, right here now. Where else can I find any kind of peace or dignity as a man? Where am I gonna be able to battle the flaws that are mine? The conflicts within me that carry on because I'm human and flawed and doing the best I can to get better on a daily basis and not hurt anybody else in the process you know where else am I going to do that I got to do it right here right now it can't be in my head in the future it's got to be now gotta be now Alcoholics Anonymous gave me back right now that's what it did and I can think of no greater gift because in there lies the hope for me the strength right that I need to carry through with each day because they don't have to do alone I get to do with you I said before I don't know anybody in here but I know everybody in here we all got two things in common. We're all human beings, we're all alcoholics. That's all I got to know. It's all you got to notice tell you that I love you. I love you and I'm a grateful member of Alcoholics Anonymous. Grateful member. And when I see that woman sitting right over there in that green dress she got her hands up like this he's looking at me and she smiles she's going like this I go, that's it. I'm in. Love in Kentucky. Peace. Have a good weekend. Thank you.