Remember Is the Word in How It Works That Keeps Me Sober Forty-Two Years – John L.
About This Speaker Tape
John L. shares his story at the Monday night Blue Chip Speakers' Meeting at the NABBA Club. After a warm introduction from Isla — who recounts John taking her to an Elton John concert and pushing her wheelchair a mile and a half through a parking garage with complete patience after her knee gave out — John takes the podium and tells the room his sobriety date is April 22, 1982. He got sober on Maui in Lahaina, a place he notes is now gone but whose sobriety lives on. He was 43 years old, freshly out of his third marriage, when a girlfriend called the cops on him after a blackout rage in their apartment.
Most of the talk is a long, comic taxonomy of his drinking — the linear blackout, the movable brownout, the time warp, and the retrograde blackout he discovered while tending bar after counting down his till. He spent twenty years as a bartender, including the first eight of his sobriety, which he flatly does not recommend. He tells two stories that pin down his old insanity: a girlfriend named Vera who threw an ashtray and then came at him with an ice pick because she 'thought it was a knife,' and a third wife who drank wine from a glass perched on the toilet tank during her shower — a scene he found completely normal because his own scotch was sitting right next to it.
The spiritual core of the tape is the word 'remember.' He says it is the most important word in How It Works, more important than alcohol, cunning, baffling, or powerful. He remembers because his mind took him places he never wants to go again, and because telling the story is how he stays out of them. He recalls the tall, tan man named Paul who shook his hand at his first meeting on Maui and said 'I'm glad you're here' — a line he has tried to pass on to every newcomer and old-timer for forty-two years.
He closes with two pieces of advice. The first came from an old-timer who wrote it on his first-anniversary card: 'Don't believe your own bullshit.' The second is to take a chair, any chair, and watch the parade — watch the sponsored newcomers go out drunk and the unlikable craphead stay sober year after year, and quit pretending you understand how any of it works. A government worker once helped him see that three years without a drink meant he was no longer handicapped. Don't take a drink today and you have a chance. Take one and he doesn't know if you'll ever get back.
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Timestamps
Full Transcript
Let's have an A.A. meeting.
My name is Isla. I'm an alcoholic.
I am so grateful to be sober to death.
Welcome to the Monday night Blue Chip Speakers' Meeting at the NABBA Club,
where a member of Alcoholics Anonymous with one year or...
My name is Isla. I'm an alcoholic.
I am so grateful to be sober to death.
Welcome to the Monday night Blue Chip Speakers' Meeting at the NABBA Club,
where a member of Alcoholics Anonymous with one year or...
Let's have an A.A. meeting.
My name is Isla. I'm an alcoholic.
I am so grateful to be sober to death.
Welcome to the Monday night Blue Chip Speakers' Meeting at the NABBA Club,
where a member of Alcoholics Anonymous with one year or more of sobriety tells his or her story.
This reading is based on a passage from page 29 of the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous.
Each individual.
Each individual in our personal stories describes in their own language and from their own point of view
the way they establish their relationship with God.
These give a fair cross-section of our membership and clear-cut idea of what has happened in their lives.
We hope no one will consider these self-revealing accounts in bad taste.
Our hope.
Is that many alcoholic men and women in our room tonight and listening later on A.A. BlueChipSpeakers.org
desperately in need will hear our speaker.
And we believe that it is only by fully disclosing ourselves and our problems
that any of us shall be persuaded to say,
Yes, I am one of them too.
I must have this thing.
It was about 18 months ago, I guess,
that I was diagnosed with breast cancer.
And I think, oh Lord, I'm a goner, blah, blah, blah.
So, I didn't tell anybody for a couple of days.
And then, so, we were doing parking lots.
You know, we always have a meeting in the parking lot before and after meetings, right?
So, we were doing that on Zoom.
And one of the gentlemen in the crowd said,
I have...
My wife isn't feeling well,
and I have two tickets that I would like to sell for Elton John.
Well, I love Elton John, right?
And since I'm going to die anyway, money is no object.
But I had one stipulation.
I said, yes, I'll buy them if John LaSalle will be my date.
And John agreed.
And that was awesome.
And we were there, and after the concert,
but we're leaving that Mercedes place, and it's, you know, it's huge.
And I took a step or two, and my knee went out.
And it was the most painful thing in the world.
Long story, I'm getting to it, a point.
I got the first wheelchair that I've ever been in before, or since.
Part of his job was to pick me up, and we went on Mars.
But even though I had...
With wheelchairs, it was still like a mile and a half or something crazy to get to the Mars.
And, man, were we a pair.
But the thing that is so very, very impressive is...
Now, I knew that John had long, long...
Has long, long-term sobriety.
I knew that he was one of the coolest people I've ever known.
What really, really, really was the most impressive thing...
John.
Never once expressed any signal of being agitated, of being irritable, of being put out.
He was just kind and gentle.
And I tell you, John, you are a hero of mine.
And a wonderful friend and mentor.
So, I give you John LaSalle.
That was really cool.
My name is John LaSalle, and I am an alcoholic.
And a really swell guy, as he just turned.
Thank you for that introduction, Isla.
My sobriety...
My sponsor told me that my sobriety date is April 22, 1982.
Do you have a problem with that?
What the hell?
Well, take your own damn answer, Jody.
Anyway, and I put it that way.
My sponsor told me, because I didn't have a clue.
I thought I was really kind of a sick puppy when I came in.
I'm sure none of you can identify with being a sick puppy when you came in.
But I thought I'd come in on a Sunday.
And he said, no, you came in four days earlier.
You came in on a Thursday.
And I said, well, how the hell do you know that?
And it seemed that I had gone to my first meeting, and it was in his apartment.
This was on the island of Maui, where I got sober, in wonderful La Haina.
I've still got friends there, but La Haina is no more.
The place where I got sober is no more.
And that's kind of a sad thing, but sobriety lives.
Maui no ka'oi.
That Maui is the best, let me tell you.
They all got together.
After a while, I got sober.
After that, in the spirit of love and aloha.
But any of that, my first meeting was at his house, and he kept a diary.
And in the diary, he said, new fellow named John came in today.
And it was April 22nd, Thursday.
So that's how I knew I had been sober that long.
And I'll tell you what.
I don't know about anybody else, but when I first came in,
I would hear people.
I would hear people who were talking about how they had a year, a year of sobriety.
And they'd be all grinning and happy, and I'm thinking, what a butthead.
That's over a year?
You're smoking dope.
You're doing bacalolo.
And please, what are you telling me?
There's no way anybody could have a year of sobriety a year away from a drink.
Not if you drank like me, by God.
It's sissy.
And then there'd be somebody who said, I've got five years.
I'd say, yeah, well, you can get a little tipsy on New Year's Eve.
And then there'd be somebody who was my time this amount of time.
And I'd be like, that old fart's got nothing better to do.
He's dealing with the end of life.
So he comes to these stupid meetings, and I'll bet he doesn't even remember what it was like to drink for crying out loud.
Well, I'm going to tell you something.
When we read how it works before every meeting, there's something, there's a lot of important things in there.
You can get a lot of meetings just out of how it works, if we're actually listening.
But there's one sentence there that says, remember that we deal with alcohol.
Cunning, baffling, powerful.
And for me, the most important word is not alcohol.
It's not cunning.
It's not baffling.
It's not alcohol.
Now, for me, and me only, the most important word is remember.
Remember what it was like.
If you drank like I did, and you're probably here for a good reason, my mind took me places that I didn't want to go.
And I don't want to go back there.
So I remember.
And telling my story is one way where I remember where I come from.
I know I heard a lot of people say, well, if I drink,
I'll,
I'll die.
And I said, well, that's not so bad.
What if I lived?
What if I lived the way I was living when I first came in?
I don't want that.
There's a lot of things worse than worse than dying or going to jail.
When we had the, uh, the convention here, international convention, I was there.
I did some volunteer work for it.
And we had a guy speak who was serving a sentence.
I think it was eight years sentence.
Uh, and they let him out.
He was in a heavier security prison, but then they transferred him to minimum security and they allowed him to come out, uh, to give a talk and we all thought, man, this is cool.
This dude has given a talk.
He's in prison and he's give us a talk.
What we forgot was he is what he had to live with.
He killed somebody.
He didn't go to jail just for DUIs.
He killed somebody.
So anybody who's sitting here,
thinking this thing is a bunch of crap, you don't know if you're going to get back, you might live.
How about if you kill somebody, you want to live with that?
I don't want to.
So I remember I'll go through my childhood as quickly as I can.
There's nothing like sitting in a meeting and it gets out to be 10 minutes to nine and a person that still isn't out of third grade yet.
So let me run through my childhood for you.
I had one.
There you go.
I had a child.
No, I was, when I was growing up when I was a teenager, like many people here, I know I always felt that I was missing a gene.
I knew that everybody else, all my friends, they knew how to handle life.
I didn't realize they were doing on the job training like I was too, but I thought they just were all self-assured.
They knew how to handle.
things and I didn't because I was missing that gene and then sometime in
high school I was a late mover I didn't start drinking till I was about 16 and I
was going to parties and I had my first drink and you know we talked about
selfishness and self-centered in our meetings and here's how what my
self-centeredness was like my interest in you was what do you think of me
that's my interest in you hi how are you doing I don't want to hear how you're
doing what do you think I'm doing you know if you're a guy do you think I'm
funny you want to hang out with me if you're a girl you think I'm cute you
wanna go out with me you want to date me you know so I went to that party and I
had my first drink whoosh mama that was bitchin' right through to my
my toes. Now I'm telling you, people say you can't feel in your fingernails. Oh, bet me.
Yes, you can. Back then I had hair. I could feel it in my hair. And you know what? I knew
right away that I knew how to handle life. And I knew the guys like me. And I knew the
girls, but I was hot and they wanted to date me. Unfortunately, I got really drunk, threw
up and passed out before I got close to any of the girls. But I knew they liked me and
they wanted to go out with me. Now to this day, and that's been many, many years ago,
I still don't know if the girls knew that. But I knew it. Who cared if the girls knew
they liked me? I knew they liked me. So that's the way, that's what alcohol did for me at
first. And I was, you know, I didn't drink every night for a while simply because I couldn't
do it.
High school. And this was Southern California. I was unaware if they had bootleggers there.
I know here in the South they talk about it, but in Southern California I didn't know about
it. So I would drink at parties. Every time I went to a party, I got blissed. And I got
drunk right away. And I would pass out right away. I got used to passing out. I got used
to blackouts, all that sort of thing. I'll never forget one time I was sitting around
in my first few weeks of sobriety.
And I had nothing better to do than take my brain out and play with it. You know when
you're new, your mind is going a thousand miles an hour, thinking of all these thoughts,
all of them negative. And I started thinking about the different types of blackouts that
I had. Now, I don't know who in the world wants to sit around and think of the different
blackouts, but I did. I thought I'd categorize them. Hell, I was an intellectual man. I did
crossword puzzles. So, shoot, I'm smarter than you. Don't take my inventory.
So I was thinking about the different kinds of blackouts that I had. And I would have
the linear blackout. That's the one where you start drinking, you drink, drink, drink,
go up to about midnight, two in the morning, boom, that's it. You blacked out. Linear,
straightforward blackout.
Then I had the movable blackout, or the brownouts.
Or whatever. That's where you would be drinking, all of a sudden you black out, and wake up
in conversation with a total stranger, never knowing where the hell you are. And, you know,
the thing about that that's so frightening is, I never knew what the conversation was
about. Apparently other persons were having a great time. And my first thought was, whose
turn is it to talk? Please let it be your turn, because I don't know.
Yeah, I have no clue about what the hell we're talking about. So that was the other type of blackout.
Then I had the time warp. And I think many of you have had that. That's where you blackout,
you wake up, and it's six o'clock. Which six o'clock is it? Is it six a.m.? Last thing
I remember, it was four. And I was mobbed. And I've been doing , and I'm
not.
And nobody said 6 o'clock. Is it time for me to go to work? Is it 6 p.m.? And I missed work. Holy crap. Those were terrible. And then there was one that always used to get me. I used to call it the retrograde blackout.
And that is, I can remember one time when I was tending bar for about 20 years or so. I tended bar as a drinking bartender. In the first eight years of my sobriety, I still tended bar. I don't recommend that. If you haven't done it, don't pick it up. That's a dumb thing to do.
But I did it because that's all I've known for 20 some odd years. So I did it for the first eight years of my sobriety. But this retrograde.
I can remember when I was working a day shift and I'd get up at 6 o'clock. And I wasn't drinking that particular job. On the job. I did it at others, but not that one.
And this time it occurred to me, well, when I get off, after I count my money, I'm going to walk down the street in L.A. And you can walk down the street and there's two more bars right in front of you.
You know, so I'm going to walk down the street.
Go to something.
I have a couple of pops and then go home. Oh, yeah, a couple of pops. Sure. So I went in there. So that's the last thing I remember. I don't remember closing the place. I didn't drink.
And I knew when I came to later on, I knew that I had to have counted my money, dropped it in the safe, walked down the street, ordered a scotch and a rocks, had another one because that tastes.
Good. But I didn't remember any of that. I blacked out. It was like I'd had a concussion. I had blacked out back to the point when I was five in the afternoon. And that's what I call a retrograde blackout. I used to get all those sorts of things. It's kind of neat not having them. A lot of things that are neat that I don't have anymore. At any event, I'll try to get forward as quickly as I can. Go through my drink-a-log and drunk-a-log.
I'll try to get forward as quickly as I can. Go through my drink-a-log and drunk-a-log.
I'll try to get forward as quickly as I can. Go through my drink-a-log and drunk-a-log.
And it makes sense because you're nuts. Because that stuff is nuts. That's the insanity. I hear a lot of people say, I came into Alcoholics Anonymous and I wasn't crazy. Oh, really? What was your attitude about liquor?
More about alcoholism. It says we switched from scotch to brandy. We drank only natural wines. We drank beer only. We drank only at home. We never drank at home.
Who...
You show me any...
I'm not a regular, normal drinker that does any of that. I remember one time when I was in my early 20s, you know, Reader's Digest, I don't even know if Reader's Digest is still around, is it? Okay, cool. Commence books, Mitch. Anyway, Reader's Digest had one of those, I think it came from AA. It was one of those 20 questions. If you answer three or four of them and they're positive, there's a good chance you've got a problem with alcoholism.
Well, I took that in my early 20s and I answered something like 18 or 19 of them. And I took it honestly. I took it in the positive. And I hadn't been to any institutions yet. Hadn't been busted at that point. So there were a couple of them. But the others I answered yes to. And I came to the only true, logical, intelligent idea that an insane person would. That test was flawed.
Mike, everything they put down was normal drinking. What are they talking about? I hung out with people just like me. I was in the bar. So everybody, particularly the bars that I hung out in, people were like me. We used to laugh about stuff about coming home and then going out to see where the car was parked. You know, that bravado. It was a bravado because it was bullshit.
But I would wake up in the morning and go out and I'd look to see, did I park the car?
In the street? Did I park it on the curb? Is it up on the lawn? And then I'd walk around it. That walking around the car when you don't remember driving home. See the dents or blood on it. And then you know what? We'd all laugh. There wasn't any. But that wasn't funny. And I don't miss that at all. I know where my car is now. Well, unless I have to go to some big market or something.
Then I can't remember where the hell I parked my car.
I just figured it's got to be here someplace. I'll just wait until everybody leaves.
But you know, that's the way it was. And one other thing that I'm going to relate. I was murdered three times. Came close on a couple of other occasions.
And interestingly enough, everybody I met, I'm in the bar. That's really, you know, most of them pretty much drank the way I did. Kind of odd.
And you know, when you're hanging out in the bar, who are you going to hang out with? People who drink like you. These are the kind of bars I went to. And you know, you talk about different types of insanity. I've just got to bring this up. I have no idea why. But there was this one girlfriend I had. She was nuts. She was nuts.
Most of the marriages I had were somewhat contentious. This young lady was contentious.
And we were at the bar one time. And she's down, sitting at the, halfway down the bar. And I'm standing in the bar. And this guy comes in with his mother. He's coming in with his mother, right?
So I say, how are you doing? Oh, hi, how are you doing? This is great. And we're talking. And I'm having a good time meeting this guy's mother that he's brought in to meet me. What a nice guy. And all of a sudden, I hear this crash behind me.
And I look back, and my good friend Vera has thrown an ashtray at me. And it missed me, and it broke some glasses. So the guy just moves it. What's that? And I just said, oh, it's Vera. Don't worry about it.
And I cleaned up, and I went down. And I said, what did you do that for? She said, because you're not paying attention to me, and you're talking to that woman. And I said, that's the guy's mother. I just met her. Shut up, Vera. You haven't been eating.
So with that, I picked up everything around her, took her drink away, everything else, no ashes, ashtrays, nothing that she could use. Well, the night went on. She just sat there on her little fanny, simmering and simmering.
So I go to lock up, and people are out. She's still sitting there. She was going to close up with me. So I went, I locked the front door. As I walked back in, she reached over the bar. She grabs an ice pick.
Now, this is the insanity of what it's like to be an alcoholic, particularly in a contentious relationship. She comes at me with this ice pick. So I grabbed her wrist. I was quick enough to grab her wrist. I squeezed, and she dropped the ice pick. Then I turned her around, and I very nicely went to the front door, shoved her out the front door, and I got her little butt, I think, and locked the door real fast. Went around back.
Next day, we're back together. We're laughing. Of course we're back together. We're in a relationship. Come on. So we're back together, and she points at her wrist, and it's got some bruises on it, where I squeeze it. She says, look what you did to my wrist. Look what you did.
And I said, well, you're coming at me with an ice pick. And she said, oh, okay. And then I asked her what I thought was a penetrating question. I said,
what?
Why did you come at me with the ice pick anyway? And the answer she gave was, oh, I thought it was a knife.
Do you think that's fair? I accepted that answer. I thought, okay, yeah, you thought it was a knife. Why not?
Now, there is one thing to be said about contentious relationships. Why do people like me stay in contentious relationships, so long as they're not, so long as you don't get jabbed with the ice pick itself?
Why do you stay in a contentious relationship? You ought to know this, because making up is bitching, man. Making up is smoking.
Oh, yeah. You want to take my inventory out?
So, one last story about the insanity, because I don't want to go into it too much. God, I'm dying to see the clock, because I don't know about you folks,
but my
attention span is about as good as the quality of my butt when I'm sitting out there. When it starts bugging me, then it's time to end. So, I'm standing up here or not, so I'll try and end, so your butts don't hurt you too much.
There was one last, with my third wife, a friend of mine had been, he had been sober for eight years in AA. He was a part-time bartender where I worked.
I was a head bartender. He used to help me out at lunch. And my wife and I went over to his house one time to have dinner with me and his wife. So, we're sitting around, and for some reason, my wife and this guy go off and decide to start talking.
So, I'm sitting there talking to Stu's wife, and we're having a good time. So, the two of them come back, and they're both crying, my wife and this guy. Wow, what are you crying about? What's going on?
And he says,
John, your wife's an alcoholic.
Holy crap! I'm married to a damn wino. She's going to be down at 3rd and Main in downtown LA, sucking on wine from a brown paper bag.
Did I think of her? Think, oh, she's in trouble? I thought about me. I'm going to be married to that.
But then, once again, being brilliant, I had this brilliant thought. I asked him,
well, what makes you think she's an alcoholic? Pretty good question, I think.
And he said, well, did you know that when she takes a shower, she takes a glass of wine and puts it on top of the toilet tank to drink from it while she's showering?
And I said, yeah. Why wouldn't I know? I was married to her. And it seemed like a normal thing to me.
She's taking a glass of wine, taking a shower, got on the toilet tank. In fact, I could be a nice guy.
Yeah.
Some things were weird, but I could be a sympathetic husband. So there were times when I would stick my head in the bathroom and I'd say,
honey, you want to refill on your wife? And she said, yeah, I'd refill it for her. That was nice.
The only difference was, I usually took a glass of scotch and put it on the top of the toilet tank. And that was perfectly normal.
Well, you know what? When you're sober, and you've been sober a while, you think, that's insane.
So if you're wondering if you're insane, and if you identify with it,
any of that, you're in the right place. Stay right here. One piece of advice.
Well, there's a couple that I'm going to give. You can ignore all of them, but one piece of advice I'm going to give.
You know, we're often told, keep coming back. And that's good advice. I think better advice is stay here.
Stay right where you are. Take a chair, any chair. Take that chair and watch the parade.
Watch the parade of people come and people leave.
People go and find out how little you know, and how helpless we are.
Look at people who come in, and it looks like they're doing the steps, and they're doing great.
They got a sponsor, and all of a sudden, one day, they're drunk. And you wonder, how did that happen?
They were great. And then you're still sitting in that chair, and you see somebody else, and the person's a total craphead.
And you don't like them. You don't like anything about them. But you know what? They stay sober.
Year after year, and they're sponsoring people, and getting better. And why? I can't say why.
Who am I to know? I don't know. I don't know how people stay sober. I don't know how they get drunk.
I just know it ain't me. And I've got my chair, and I'm watching that parade.
So at any event, I came in here in 1982.
And the way I came in was...
A girlfriend that I'd gone over to Maui with, I was out of the third marriage already.
And she called cops on me.
See, what happened in the last few years of my drinking, I never knew which John was going to show up.
Several Johns could show up. Was I going to be the funny guy? And I could be.
You know, I knew a lot of jokes. As a bartender, I could stand there for eight hours, tell joke after joke.
Pick a topic. I could have told you a joke.
Joke about it. Be in center of attention.
And that's where I was. Center of attention. I wanted you to like me.
But I didn't know any other way to do it, except to tell jokes.
But anyway, I could be that guy, or I could be John, the pain in the ass,
which is the same guy trying to tell jokes, but I'm nudging.
Hey, what do you think of that? What do you think of that?
I can remember going out to dinner with my third wife, and there was a couple sitting across from us.
Had another...
Another table. I don't even know them.
And I started talking to them, telling jokes, because I knew they wanted to hear my stuff.
No, they didn't.
But I was just being a pain in the ass.
So I could be funny. I could be a pain in the ass.
I could be the modern drunk, where I'm crying, pitying myself.
You know, I grew up... I grew up basically... I went to high school in the 50s.
Oh, my God.
That was back when we had papyrus to write on, and stuff like that.
But...
But then I was a child of the 60s, of course, and I joined every group you could,
because I was going to save the world.
And I'd get into one of those modeling things, where I'd start crying, because...
Oh, I had tried to do everything in the world to save the world, and look, it's still messed up.
Don't you feel sorry for me?
Nobody wants to be around that.
Nobody...
I don't, unless it's me, but I don't want to be around it.
Or I could be a red-out drunk.
And that is...
I don't know if anybody had done this, but I could blow my top over something really small,
and suddenly I'd see red.
And if you've ever done it, that's a dangerous time.
Because look at me, I'm not big.
I'm not John Wayne, and trust me, I'm not Bruce Lee.
But if I'm in a red-out, I don't feel stuff.
And you can be very dangerous, because you do things that nobody even expects you to do.
And apparently what I had done with her...
I don't know what happened, spilled a drink, something like that.
Apparently I started throwing stuff around the apartment.
Thank God I didn't do anything else, didn't touch her or anything, but she called the cops on me.
And that, to me, was a great 12-step, because that was the first thing that I came to.
I came out of my blackout, there's all these big, big Hawaiian dudes at the door, all in blue,
and they're there for me.
And all of a sudden, I thought to myself,
Wow.
I'm 43 years old, and I had never considered that before.
Now I don't mean to tell you that I've been a 25-30 year blackout.
No, I knew when I turned 25, when I turned 30, when I turned 40.
But in the back of my mind, I was still that 16-year-old kid that the Brothers of the Holy Cross said,
You got great potential.
You can do just about anything you want to.
And I was...
I knew that I was
25 and 30 and 40
in the back of my mind, I'm going to straighten out
next week, so I wasn't really
conceding that I was getting
older, I'd say yeah
today's my 42nd birthday, can we take a nap
but no
in the back of my mind, I'm going to straighten out next
week, next week I'll get a different
job, next week I'll go back
to school, next week I'll get rid of
this wife, next week I'll get married
next week, all of a sudden I see
all those cops at the door
that was next week
and I knew inside
I was 43 years old
so then I came to my first meeting
don't remember much about the first meeting
except one thing
obviously I didn't
remember the day, but one thing I remember
this tall dude, he was
6'4", his name was Paul
had that salt and pepper
gray hair that I always thought was
so cool, and this is on Maui
he came up to me
put on his sand shirt and he says
hi I'm Paul, I'm glad you're here
and that was incredible
because I wasn't glad to be there
and I didn't want anybody to come up
to me, because I was
I couldn't stand myself, I was the worst
person in the world
we used to have a saying over there
lower whale shit, and that's how
I felt, I was lower whale shit
son of a gun
he came up, and I figured
he's so good looking like this
and he's tan, and it's Maui
and everything
and I figured he was somebody like Ted Turner
that he had a yacht anchored off in the harbor
or something like that
after I got to know Paul, I found out
no, he spent several years in Honolulu State Prison
he wasn't no Ted Turner
but you know what, I do remember
that he shook my hand
and that has stood with me ever since
you know we have this saying in the year
the responsibility
whenever anyone anywhere
holds out their hand for help
I want the hand of AA to be there
and for that, I am responsible
and that's one thing that I've continued to do
as long as I've been sober
whenever I go to a meeting
I don't care if it's just
if it's a newcomer
but I hold out my hand to anybody
you never know
not just the newcomer will feel welcome
but maybe that old timer
isn't feeling too good
maybe he or she is feeling down
say hi and welcome them
that's all you gotta do
and son of a gun
it works for you
you know there's an awful lot that I can go through
but I'm just gonna tell you
a couple of quick things
so we can get out of here
at ten minutes of
god time flies
when I'm listening to myself
damn
god you're a good job
anyway
anyway
a couple of things that I wanted to talk
to mention to you
is uh...
holding out my hand
for the hand of AA
always to be there
when I was about three years sober
somebody told me
puke
told me that
there was some government program
that if you were a recovering alcoholic
you could go to it
and they'd give you money
for being a recovering alcoholic
cool man
I want something for nothing
I'm sober
gimme
you know it's like I'm old
gimme
I'm sober
gimme
I had not realized
at that point
that being sober
is its own reward
however
so I was
figure out
I'm gonna find out
where you get money
for being a sober alcoholic
so I tried all sorts of
different government agencies
social security
and everything else
finally I decided on
uh
uh
the department of
of human
not the department of
human resources
the department of
uh
human resources
the uh
uh
unemployment
I go down to
unemployment
office
see if they got it
so I go up to the desk
and this lady is there
and uh
I try to explain to her
what I want
she says
gee I don't know
anything like that
let me call you so and so
she's the best
she's been here
a long time
so this lady comes up
she takes me back to her desk
we sit down
she says
how can I help you
so I told her that
you know I'm sober
gimme money
and
and
uh
she said
well I can't help you
and then you know what
I stood
sat there
and we talked for 45 minutes
well she helped me
keep in mind
I have
the mind
that
I know everything about you
when I meet you
I'm always wrong
but by God
I'm never in doubt
and I knew
that she was a
government worker
hated her job
she was lousy at it
didn't know how to
get a job
didn't know how to
work
didn't know how
to work
didn't know how
to do it
and for 45 minutes
I sat there
talking one human being
to a nice human being
talking about
what it was like
to raise kids
what it was like
having a
paycheck to paycheck
and that sort of thing
and I came to find out
that here's this
government worker
that I knew nothing about
she was sweet
she loved her job
she wanted to help people
do the best she
possibly could
and she helped me
for 45 minutes
to open up
the door
to her
house
and
you know
she opened up
my mind
a little bit
and finally she asked me
just one question
she said
how long has it been
since you've had a drink
and I said
how about three years
she got this big smile
the whole room
lit up
at least it was
felt that way
for me
and she said
oh
you're not handicapped
and I just thought
oh
my
god
she's right
I haven't had a drink
and she said
oh
you're not handicapped
and I just thought
oh my
god
I'm not handicapped
and that's the way
we are
we haven't had a drink
today
we're not handicapped
two things I want
to leave with
on my first
anniversary
I mentioned
shared this with
Lee coming over
on my first
anniversary
an old timer
gave me a
birthday card
and then
he wrote
what I think
is some of the best
advice
I've ever heard
don't believe
your own
bullshit
and by god
and by golly
that's what
I've lived by
for almost
42 years
now
and
one thing
so this
is the last
okay so I'm going to
end over
don't
shit
son
so
there used to be
a guy
at Clarkson
when I
first moved here
from Maui
years ago
and he'd come in
and say
hi I'm so and so
I'm an alcoholic
I haven't had a drink
today
and he said
I don't have a chance
to have a chance
so you don't take a drink
you got a chance
take a drink
I don't know
if you'll
ever get back
thanks
on the whole
on the whole
told ya
thank you
Joss
thank you
Joss
thank you
Joss
thank you
you
you
both
thank you
to you
to you
and
to all
of you
Thank you very, very much.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
My name is Isla. I'm an alcoholic.
I am so grateful to be sober to death.
Welcome to the Monday night Blue Chip Speakers' Meeting at the NABBA Club,
where a member of Alcoholics Anonymous with one year or more of sobriety tells his or her story.
This reading is based on a passage from page 29 of the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous.
Each individual.
Each individual in our personal stories describes in their own language and from their own point of view
the way they establish their relationship with God.
These give a fair cross-section of our membership and clear-cut idea of what has happened in their lives.
We hope no one will consider these self-revealing accounts in bad taste.
Our hope.
Is that many alcoholic men and women in our room tonight and listening later on A.A. BlueChipSpeakers.org
desperately in need will hear our speaker.
And we believe that it is only by fully disclosing ourselves and our problems
that any of us shall be persuaded to say,
Yes, I am one of them too.
I must have this thing.
It was about 18 months ago, I guess,
that I was diagnosed with breast cancer.
And I think, oh Lord, I'm a goner, blah, blah, blah.
So, I didn't tell anybody for a couple of days.
And then, so, we were doing parking lots.
You know, we always have a meeting in the parking lot before and after meetings, right?
So, we were doing that on Zoom.
And one of the gentlemen in the crowd said,
I have...
My wife isn't feeling well,
and I have two tickets that I would like to sell for Elton John.
Well, I love Elton John, right?
And since I'm going to die anyway, money is no object.
But I had one stipulation.
I said, yes, I'll buy them if John LaSalle will be my date.
And John agreed.
And that was awesome.
And we were there, and after the concert,
but we're leaving that Mercedes place, and it's, you know, it's huge.
And I took a step or two, and my knee went out.
And it was the most painful thing in the world.
Long story, I'm getting to it, a point.
I got the first wheelchair that I've ever been in before, or since.
Part of his job was to pick me up, and we went on Mars.
But even though I had...
With wheelchairs, it was still like a mile and a half or something crazy to get to the Mars.
And, man, were we a pair.
But the thing that is so very, very impressive is...
Now, I knew that John had long, long...
Has long, long-term sobriety.
I knew that he was one of the coolest people I've ever known.
What really, really, really was the most impressive thing...
John.
Never once expressed any signal of being agitated, of being irritable, of being put out.
He was just kind and gentle.
And I tell you, John, you are a hero of mine.
And a wonderful friend and mentor.
So, I give you John LaSalle.
That was really cool.
My name is John LaSalle, and I am an alcoholic.
And a really swell guy, as he just turned.
Thank you for that introduction, Isla.
My sobriety...
My sponsor told me that my sobriety date is April 22, 1982.
Do you have a problem with that?
What the hell?
Well, take your own damn answer, Jody.
Anyway, and I put it that way.
My sponsor told me, because I didn't have a clue.
I thought I was really kind of a sick puppy when I came in.
I'm sure none of you can identify with being a sick puppy when you came in.
But I thought I'd come in on a Sunday.
And he said, no, you came in four days earlier.
You came in on a Thursday.
And I said, well, how the hell do you know that?
And it seemed that I had gone to my first meeting, and it was in his apartment.
This was on the island of Maui, where I got sober, in wonderful La Haina.
I've still got friends there, but La Haina is no more.
The place where I got sober is no more.
And that's kind of a sad thing, but sobriety lives.
Maui no ka'oi.
That Maui is the best, let me tell you.
They all got together.
After a while, I got sober.
After that, in the spirit of love and aloha.
But any of that, my first meeting was at his house, and he kept a diary.
And in the diary, he said, new fellow named John came in today.
And it was April 22nd, Thursday.
So that's how I knew I had been sober that long.
And I'll tell you what.
I don't know about anybody else, but when I first came in,
I would hear people.
I would hear people who were talking about how they had a year, a year of sobriety.
And they'd be all grinning and happy, and I'm thinking, what a butthead.
That's over a year?
You're smoking dope.
You're doing bacalolo.
And please, what are you telling me?
There's no way anybody could have a year of sobriety a year away from a drink.
Not if you drank like me, by God.
It's sissy.
And then there'd be somebody who said, I've got five years.
I'd say, yeah, well, you can get a little tipsy on New Year's Eve.
And then there'd be somebody who was my time this amount of time.
And I'd be like, that old fart's got nothing better to do.
He's dealing with the end of life.
So he comes to these stupid meetings, and I'll bet he doesn't even remember what it was like to drink for crying out loud.
Well, I'm going to tell you something.
When we read how it works before every meeting, there's something, there's a lot of important things in there.
You can get a lot of meetings just out of how it works, if we're actually listening.
But there's one sentence there that says, remember that we deal with alcohol.
Cunning, baffling, powerful.
And for me, the most important word is not alcohol.
It's not cunning.
It's not baffling.
It's not alcohol.
Now, for me, and me only, the most important word is remember.
Remember what it was like.
If you drank like I did, and you're probably here for a good reason, my mind took me places that I didn't want to go.
And I don't want to go back there.
So I remember.
And telling my story is one way where I remember where I come from.
I know I heard a lot of people say, well, if I drink,
I'll,
I'll die.
And I said, well, that's not so bad.
What if I lived?
What if I lived the way I was living when I first came in?
I don't want that.
There's a lot of things worse than worse than dying or going to jail.
When we had the, uh, the convention here, international convention, I was there.
I did some volunteer work for it.
And we had a guy speak who was serving a sentence.
I think it was eight years sentence.
Uh, and they let him out.
He was in a heavier security prison, but then they transferred him to minimum security and they allowed him to come out, uh, to give a talk and we all thought, man, this is cool.
This dude has given a talk.
He's in prison and he's give us a talk.
What we forgot was he is what he had to live with.
He killed somebody.
He didn't go to jail just for DUIs.
He killed somebody.
So anybody who's sitting here,
thinking this thing is a bunch of crap, you don't know if you're going to get back, you might live.
How about if you kill somebody, you want to live with that?
I don't want to.
So I remember I'll go through my childhood as quickly as I can.
There's nothing like sitting in a meeting and it gets out to be 10 minutes to nine and a person that still isn't out of third grade yet.
So let me run through my childhood for you.
I had one.
There you go.
I had a child.
No, I was, when I was growing up when I was a teenager, like many people here, I know I always felt that I was missing a gene.
I knew that everybody else, all my friends, they knew how to handle life.
I didn't realize they were doing on the job training like I was too, but I thought they just were all self-assured.
They knew how to handle.
things and I didn't because I was missing that gene and then sometime in
high school I was a late mover I didn't start drinking till I was about 16 and I
was going to parties and I had my first drink and you know we talked about
selfishness and self-centered in our meetings and here's how what my
self-centeredness was like my interest in you was what do you think of me
that's my interest in you hi how are you doing I don't want to hear how you're
doing what do you think I'm doing you know if you're a guy do you think I'm
funny you want to hang out with me if you're a girl you think I'm cute you
wanna go out with me you want to date me you know so I went to that party and I
had my first drink whoosh mama that was bitchin' right through to my
my toes. Now I'm telling you, people say you can't feel in your fingernails. Oh, bet me.
Yes, you can. Back then I had hair. I could feel it in my hair. And you know what? I knew
right away that I knew how to handle life. And I knew the guys like me. And I knew the
girls, but I was hot and they wanted to date me. Unfortunately, I got really drunk, threw
up and passed out before I got close to any of the girls. But I knew they liked me and
they wanted to go out with me. Now to this day, and that's been many, many years ago,
I still don't know if the girls knew that. But I knew it. Who cared if the girls knew
they liked me? I knew they liked me. So that's the way, that's what alcohol did for me at
first. And I was, you know, I didn't drink every night for a while simply because I couldn't
do it.
High school. And this was Southern California. I was unaware if they had bootleggers there.
I know here in the South they talk about it, but in Southern California I didn't know about
it. So I would drink at parties. Every time I went to a party, I got blissed. And I got
drunk right away. And I would pass out right away. I got used to passing out. I got used
to blackouts, all that sort of thing. I'll never forget one time I was sitting around
in my first few weeks of sobriety.
And I had nothing better to do than take my brain out and play with it. You know when
you're new, your mind is going a thousand miles an hour, thinking of all these thoughts,
all of them negative. And I started thinking about the different types of blackouts that
I had. Now, I don't know who in the world wants to sit around and think of the different
blackouts, but I did. I thought I'd categorize them. Hell, I was an intellectual man. I did
crossword puzzles. So, shoot, I'm smarter than you. Don't take my inventory.
So I was thinking about the different kinds of blackouts that I had. And I would have
the linear blackout. That's the one where you start drinking, you drink, drink, drink,
go up to about midnight, two in the morning, boom, that's it. You blacked out. Linear,
straightforward blackout.
Then I had the movable blackout, or the brownouts.
Or whatever. That's where you would be drinking, all of a sudden you black out, and wake up
in conversation with a total stranger, never knowing where the hell you are. And, you know,
the thing about that that's so frightening is, I never knew what the conversation was
about. Apparently other persons were having a great time. And my first thought was, whose
turn is it to talk? Please let it be your turn, because I don't know.
Yeah, I have no clue about what the hell we're talking about. So that was the other type of blackout.
Then I had the time warp. And I think many of you have had that. That's where you blackout,
you wake up, and it's six o'clock. Which six o'clock is it? Is it six a.m.? Last thing
I remember, it was four. And I was mobbed. And I've been doing , and I'm
not.
And nobody said 6 o'clock. Is it time for me to go to work? Is it 6 p.m.? And I missed work. Holy crap. Those were terrible. And then there was one that always used to get me. I used to call it the retrograde blackout.
And that is, I can remember one time when I was tending bar for about 20 years or so. I tended bar as a drinking bartender. In the first eight years of my sobriety, I still tended bar. I don't recommend that. If you haven't done it, don't pick it up. That's a dumb thing to do.
But I did it because that's all I've known for 20 some odd years. So I did it for the first eight years of my sobriety. But this retrograde.
I can remember when I was working a day shift and I'd get up at 6 o'clock. And I wasn't drinking that particular job. On the job. I did it at others, but not that one.
And this time it occurred to me, well, when I get off, after I count my money, I'm going to walk down the street in L.A. And you can walk down the street and there's two more bars right in front of you.
You know, so I'm going to walk down the street.
Go to something.
I have a couple of pops and then go home. Oh, yeah, a couple of pops. Sure. So I went in there. So that's the last thing I remember. I don't remember closing the place. I didn't drink.
And I knew when I came to later on, I knew that I had to have counted my money, dropped it in the safe, walked down the street, ordered a scotch and a rocks, had another one because that tastes.
Good. But I didn't remember any of that. I blacked out. It was like I'd had a concussion. I had blacked out back to the point when I was five in the afternoon. And that's what I call a retrograde blackout. I used to get all those sorts of things. It's kind of neat not having them. A lot of things that are neat that I don't have anymore. At any event, I'll try to get forward as quickly as I can. Go through my drink-a-log and drunk-a-log.
I'll try to get forward as quickly as I can. Go through my drink-a-log and drunk-a-log.
I'll try to get forward as quickly as I can. Go through my drink-a-log and drunk-a-log.
And it makes sense because you're nuts. Because that stuff is nuts. That's the insanity. I hear a lot of people say, I came into Alcoholics Anonymous and I wasn't crazy. Oh, really? What was your attitude about liquor?
More about alcoholism. It says we switched from scotch to brandy. We drank only natural wines. We drank beer only. We drank only at home. We never drank at home.
Who...
You show me any...
I'm not a regular, normal drinker that does any of that. I remember one time when I was in my early 20s, you know, Reader's Digest, I don't even know if Reader's Digest is still around, is it? Okay, cool. Commence books, Mitch. Anyway, Reader's Digest had one of those, I think it came from AA. It was one of those 20 questions. If you answer three or four of them and they're positive, there's a good chance you've got a problem with alcoholism.
Well, I took that in my early 20s and I answered something like 18 or 19 of them. And I took it honestly. I took it in the positive. And I hadn't been to any institutions yet. Hadn't been busted at that point. So there were a couple of them. But the others I answered yes to. And I came to the only true, logical, intelligent idea that an insane person would. That test was flawed.
Mike, everything they put down was normal drinking. What are they talking about? I hung out with people just like me. I was in the bar. So everybody, particularly the bars that I hung out in, people were like me. We used to laugh about stuff about coming home and then going out to see where the car was parked. You know, that bravado. It was a bravado because it was bullshit.
But I would wake up in the morning and go out and I'd look to see, did I park the car?
In the street? Did I park it on the curb? Is it up on the lawn? And then I'd walk around it. That walking around the car when you don't remember driving home. See the dents or blood on it. And then you know what? We'd all laugh. There wasn't any. But that wasn't funny. And I don't miss that at all. I know where my car is now. Well, unless I have to go to some big market or something.
Then I can't remember where the hell I parked my car.
I just figured it's got to be here someplace. I'll just wait until everybody leaves.
But you know, that's the way it was. And one other thing that I'm going to relate. I was murdered three times. Came close on a couple of other occasions.
And interestingly enough, everybody I met, I'm in the bar. That's really, you know, most of them pretty much drank the way I did. Kind of odd.
And you know, when you're hanging out in the bar, who are you going to hang out with? People who drink like you. These are the kind of bars I went to. And you know, you talk about different types of insanity. I've just got to bring this up. I have no idea why. But there was this one girlfriend I had. She was nuts. She was nuts.
Most of the marriages I had were somewhat contentious. This young lady was contentious.
And we were at the bar one time. And she's down, sitting at the, halfway down the bar. And I'm standing in the bar. And this guy comes in with his mother. He's coming in with his mother, right?
So I say, how are you doing? Oh, hi, how are you doing? This is great. And we're talking. And I'm having a good time meeting this guy's mother that he's brought in to meet me. What a nice guy. And all of a sudden, I hear this crash behind me.
And I look back, and my good friend Vera has thrown an ashtray at me. And it missed me, and it broke some glasses. So the guy just moves it. What's that? And I just said, oh, it's Vera. Don't worry about it.
And I cleaned up, and I went down. And I said, what did you do that for? She said, because you're not paying attention to me, and you're talking to that woman. And I said, that's the guy's mother. I just met her. Shut up, Vera. You haven't been eating.
So with that, I picked up everything around her, took her drink away, everything else, no ashes, ashtrays, nothing that she could use. Well, the night went on. She just sat there on her little fanny, simmering and simmering.
So I go to lock up, and people are out. She's still sitting there. She was going to close up with me. So I went, I locked the front door. As I walked back in, she reached over the bar. She grabs an ice pick.
Now, this is the insanity of what it's like to be an alcoholic, particularly in a contentious relationship. She comes at me with this ice pick. So I grabbed her wrist. I was quick enough to grab her wrist. I squeezed, and she dropped the ice pick. Then I turned her around, and I very nicely went to the front door, shoved her out the front door, and I got her little butt, I think, and locked the door real fast. Went around back.
Next day, we're back together. We're laughing. Of course we're back together. We're in a relationship. Come on. So we're back together, and she points at her wrist, and it's got some bruises on it, where I squeeze it. She says, look what you did to my wrist. Look what you did.
And I said, well, you're coming at me with an ice pick. And she said, oh, okay. And then I asked her what I thought was a penetrating question. I said,
what?
Why did you come at me with the ice pick anyway? And the answer she gave was, oh, I thought it was a knife.
Do you think that's fair? I accepted that answer. I thought, okay, yeah, you thought it was a knife. Why not?
Now, there is one thing to be said about contentious relationships. Why do people like me stay in contentious relationships, so long as they're not, so long as you don't get jabbed with the ice pick itself?
Why do you stay in a contentious relationship? You ought to know this, because making up is bitching, man. Making up is smoking.
Oh, yeah. You want to take my inventory out?
So, one last story about the insanity, because I don't want to go into it too much. God, I'm dying to see the clock, because I don't know about you folks,
but my
attention span is about as good as the quality of my butt when I'm sitting out there. When it starts bugging me, then it's time to end. So, I'm standing up here or not, so I'll try and end, so your butts don't hurt you too much.
There was one last, with my third wife, a friend of mine had been, he had been sober for eight years in AA. He was a part-time bartender where I worked.
I was a head bartender. He used to help me out at lunch. And my wife and I went over to his house one time to have dinner with me and his wife. So, we're sitting around, and for some reason, my wife and this guy go off and decide to start talking.
So, I'm sitting there talking to Stu's wife, and we're having a good time. So, the two of them come back, and they're both crying, my wife and this guy. Wow, what are you crying about? What's going on?
And he says,
John, your wife's an alcoholic.
Holy crap! I'm married to a damn wino. She's going to be down at 3rd and Main in downtown LA, sucking on wine from a brown paper bag.
Did I think of her? Think, oh, she's in trouble? I thought about me. I'm going to be married to that.
But then, once again, being brilliant, I had this brilliant thought. I asked him,
well, what makes you think she's an alcoholic? Pretty good question, I think.
And he said, well, did you know that when she takes a shower, she takes a glass of wine and puts it on top of the toilet tank to drink from it while she's showering?
And I said, yeah. Why wouldn't I know? I was married to her. And it seemed like a normal thing to me.
She's taking a glass of wine, taking a shower, got on the toilet tank. In fact, I could be a nice guy.
Yeah.
Some things were weird, but I could be a sympathetic husband. So there were times when I would stick my head in the bathroom and I'd say,
honey, you want to refill on your wife? And she said, yeah, I'd refill it for her. That was nice.
The only difference was, I usually took a glass of scotch and put it on the top of the toilet tank. And that was perfectly normal.
Well, you know what? When you're sober, and you've been sober a while, you think, that's insane.
So if you're wondering if you're insane, and if you identify with it,
any of that, you're in the right place. Stay right here. One piece of advice.
Well, there's a couple that I'm going to give. You can ignore all of them, but one piece of advice I'm going to give.
You know, we're often told, keep coming back. And that's good advice. I think better advice is stay here.
Stay right where you are. Take a chair, any chair. Take that chair and watch the parade.
Watch the parade of people come and people leave.
People go and find out how little you know, and how helpless we are.
Look at people who come in, and it looks like they're doing the steps, and they're doing great.
They got a sponsor, and all of a sudden, one day, they're drunk. And you wonder, how did that happen?
They were great. And then you're still sitting in that chair, and you see somebody else, and the person's a total craphead.
And you don't like them. You don't like anything about them. But you know what? They stay sober.
Year after year, and they're sponsoring people, and getting better. And why? I can't say why.
Who am I to know? I don't know. I don't know how people stay sober. I don't know how they get drunk.
I just know it ain't me. And I've got my chair, and I'm watching that parade.
So at any event, I came in here in 1982.
And the way I came in was...
A girlfriend that I'd gone over to Maui with, I was out of the third marriage already.
And she called cops on me.
See, what happened in the last few years of my drinking, I never knew which John was going to show up.
Several Johns could show up. Was I going to be the funny guy? And I could be.
You know, I knew a lot of jokes. As a bartender, I could stand there for eight hours, tell joke after joke.
Pick a topic. I could have told you a joke.
Joke about it. Be in center of attention.
And that's where I was. Center of attention. I wanted you to like me.
But I didn't know any other way to do it, except to tell jokes.
But anyway, I could be that guy, or I could be John, the pain in the ass,
which is the same guy trying to tell jokes, but I'm nudging.
Hey, what do you think of that? What do you think of that?
I can remember going out to dinner with my third wife, and there was a couple sitting across from us.
Had another...
Another table. I don't even know them.
And I started talking to them, telling jokes, because I knew they wanted to hear my stuff.
No, they didn't.
But I was just being a pain in the ass.
So I could be funny. I could be a pain in the ass.
I could be the modern drunk, where I'm crying, pitying myself.
You know, I grew up... I grew up basically... I went to high school in the 50s.
Oh, my God.
That was back when we had papyrus to write on, and stuff like that.
But...
But then I was a child of the 60s, of course, and I joined every group you could,
because I was going to save the world.
And I'd get into one of those modeling things, where I'd start crying, because...
Oh, I had tried to do everything in the world to save the world, and look, it's still messed up.
Don't you feel sorry for me?
Nobody wants to be around that.
Nobody...
I don't, unless it's me, but I don't want to be around it.
Or I could be a red-out drunk.
And that is...
I don't know if anybody had done this, but I could blow my top over something really small,
and suddenly I'd see red.
And if you've ever done it, that's a dangerous time.
Because look at me, I'm not big.
I'm not John Wayne, and trust me, I'm not Bruce Lee.
But if I'm in a red-out, I don't feel stuff.
And you can be very dangerous, because you do things that nobody even expects you to do.
And apparently what I had done with her...
I don't know what happened, spilled a drink, something like that.
Apparently I started throwing stuff around the apartment.
Thank God I didn't do anything else, didn't touch her or anything, but she called the cops on me.
And that, to me, was a great 12-step, because that was the first thing that I came to.
I came out of my blackout, there's all these big, big Hawaiian dudes at the door, all in blue,
and they're there for me.
And all of a sudden, I thought to myself,
Wow.
I'm 43 years old, and I had never considered that before.
Now I don't mean to tell you that I've been a 25-30 year blackout.
No, I knew when I turned 25, when I turned 30, when I turned 40.
But in the back of my mind, I was still that 16-year-old kid that the Brothers of the Holy Cross said,
You got great potential.
You can do just about anything you want to.
And I was...
I knew that I was
25 and 30 and 40
in the back of my mind, I'm going to straighten out
next week, so I wasn't really
conceding that I was getting
older, I'd say yeah
today's my 42nd birthday, can we take a nap
but no
in the back of my mind, I'm going to straighten out next
week, next week I'll get a different
job, next week I'll go back
to school, next week I'll get rid of
this wife, next week I'll get married
next week, all of a sudden I see
all those cops at the door
that was next week
and I knew inside
I was 43 years old
so then I came to my first meeting
don't remember much about the first meeting
except one thing
obviously I didn't
remember the day, but one thing I remember
this tall dude, he was
6'4", his name was Paul
had that salt and pepper
gray hair that I always thought was
so cool, and this is on Maui
he came up to me
put on his sand shirt and he says
hi I'm Paul, I'm glad you're here
and that was incredible
because I wasn't glad to be there
and I didn't want anybody to come up
to me, because I was
I couldn't stand myself, I was the worst
person in the world
we used to have a saying over there
lower whale shit, and that's how
I felt, I was lower whale shit
son of a gun
he came up, and I figured
he's so good looking like this
and he's tan, and it's Maui
and everything
and I figured he was somebody like Ted Turner
that he had a yacht anchored off in the harbor
or something like that
after I got to know Paul, I found out
no, he spent several years in Honolulu State Prison
he wasn't no Ted Turner
but you know what, I do remember
that he shook my hand
and that has stood with me ever since
you know we have this saying in the year
the responsibility
whenever anyone anywhere
holds out their hand for help
I want the hand of AA to be there
and for that, I am responsible
and that's one thing that I've continued to do
as long as I've been sober
whenever I go to a meeting
I don't care if it's just
if it's a newcomer
but I hold out my hand to anybody
you never know
not just the newcomer will feel welcome
but maybe that old timer
isn't feeling too good
maybe he or she is feeling down
say hi and welcome them
that's all you gotta do
and son of a gun
it works for you
you know there's an awful lot that I can go through
but I'm just gonna tell you
a couple of quick things
so we can get out of here
at ten minutes of
god time flies
when I'm listening to myself
damn
god you're a good job
anyway
anyway
a couple of things that I wanted to talk
to mention to you
is uh...
holding out my hand
for the hand of AA
always to be there
when I was about three years sober
somebody told me
puke
told me that
there was some government program
that if you were a recovering alcoholic
you could go to it
and they'd give you money
for being a recovering alcoholic
cool man
I want something for nothing
I'm sober
gimme
you know it's like I'm old
gimme
I'm sober
gimme
I had not realized
at that point
that being sober
is its own reward
however
so I was
figure out
I'm gonna find out
where you get money
for being a sober alcoholic
so I tried all sorts of
different government agencies
social security
and everything else
finally I decided on
uh
uh
the department of
of human
not the department of
human resources
the department of
uh
human resources
the uh
uh
unemployment
I go down to
unemployment
office
see if they got it
so I go up to the desk
and this lady is there
and uh
I try to explain to her
what I want
she says
gee I don't know
anything like that
let me call you so and so
she's the best
she's been here
a long time
so this lady comes up
she takes me back to her desk
we sit down
she says
how can I help you
so I told her that
you know I'm sober
gimme money
and
and
uh
she said
well I can't help you
and then you know what
I stood
sat there
and we talked for 45 minutes
well she helped me
keep in mind
I have
the mind
that
I know everything about you
when I meet you
I'm always wrong
but by God
I'm never in doubt
and I knew
that she was a
government worker
hated her job
she was lousy at it
didn't know how to
get a job
didn't know how to
work
didn't know how
to work
didn't know how
to do it
and for 45 minutes
I sat there
talking one human being
to a nice human being
talking about
what it was like
to raise kids
what it was like
having a
paycheck to paycheck
and that sort of thing
and I came to find out
that here's this
government worker
that I knew nothing about
she was sweet
she loved her job
she wanted to help people
do the best she
possibly could
and she helped me
for 45 minutes
to open up
the door
to her
house
and
you know
she opened up
my mind
a little bit
and finally she asked me
just one question
she said
how long has it been
since you've had a drink
and I said
how about three years
she got this big smile
the whole room
lit up
at least it was
felt that way
for me
and she said
oh
you're not handicapped
and I just thought
oh
my
god
she's right
I haven't had a drink
and she said
oh
you're not handicapped
and I just thought
oh my
god
I'm not handicapped
and that's the way
we are
we haven't had a drink
today
we're not handicapped
two things I want
to leave with
on my first
anniversary
I mentioned
shared this with
Lee coming over
on my first
anniversary
an old timer
gave me a
birthday card
and then
he wrote
what I think
is some of the best
advice
I've ever heard
don't believe
your own
bullshit
and by god
and by golly
that's what
I've lived by
for almost
42 years
now
and
one thing
so this
is the last
okay so I'm going to
end over
don't
shit
son
so
there used to be
a guy
at Clarkson
when I
first moved here
from Maui
years ago
and he'd come in
and say
hi I'm so and so
I'm an alcoholic
I haven't had a drink
today
and he said
I don't have a chance
to have a chance
so you don't take a drink
you got a chance
take a drink
I don't know
if you'll
ever get back
thanks
on the whole
on the whole
told ya
thank you
Joss
thank you
Joss
thank you
Joss
thank you
you
you
both
thank you
to you
to you
and
to all
of you
Thank you very, very much.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
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