Step 11 and the Compass Within – Earl H.

Would all of you please give an enthusiastic welcome to Earl! Hi everybody, my name is Earl. I'm an alcoholic. Thank you all for asking me to come share here. It's always an honor and a privilege to do this sort of thing. And thanks to all the fellas. Paul and all the fellows from North Dakota came down to visit. Appreciate that very much. Thanks. And whoever cooked the tacos, thank you. Good. Very good. What else? Just glad to be here. It's been quite a journey getting here. I got here via New York City, Buffalo, New York, Chicago Illinois, Sioux Falls and here it's kind of the circuit and I'll go from here to Colorado and then Colorado home tomorrow and meeting people everywhere, I was looking at the pamphlets that you have here I'm a long way from home and I went over and I was look at the pamphlet you have over there and they are it's shocking but they're identical to the ones we have in Los Angeles it's exactly the same stuff can I sit this on that? i don't want to get in trouble right out of the gate right anyway so uh alcoholism right i uh i started drinking when i was 12 years old um and it was a really good idea um i had been uh shipped off to boarding school by my father um how i found that i was going to boarding school was my father came into my room one day and said get in the car all right got in the car and with a bunch of other relatives and another car and it kind of caravaned off to this joint and uh i got out of the car my father got out Of the car nobody else got out the cars they just kind of idled you know and uh he put a suitcase down next to me and said this will make a man out of you and shook my hand got in the Car and everybody drove off and the fact was was that I was being given an opportunity for a wonderful education it's helped me in good stead to this very day the feeling was was that I had just been thrown away by the people who knew me best in the world and I didn't know what I'd done to be thrown away so emotionally it was a devastating experience for me I was terrified I was 12 years old five feet tall 104 pounds scared of my own shadow I didn't have any tools for living I mean who knows who needs tools for a living when you're 12 years old you know what i mean you just do what they tell you when youre 12 get up all right go to school right come home from school okay eat fine do your homework of course go to bed and that's pretty much the day right there getting direction all the way if at any point you say no i don't want to it goes bad immediately so it's a very simple life and uh now i'm in this school of 250 boys they'd scoured the earth to find 250 of the brightest most disturbed young men they could find It was like Lord of the Flies in this joint. It was not a friendly place. There were no electives. It was a school where you went to school five and a half days a week. You went to class, you went home, you went school half a day on Saturdays. You were informed what courses you were taking. I had four and a halve years of Latin. Used that a lot. That's come in handy. and you know Ubi est ubi sabubi that's Latin means where oh where is my underwear that's all I got that's it thousands of dollars to learn that and I mean I was just going to classes scared to death didn't know what I was doing there calling home every day crying telling my mother you know you gotta come get me this is crazy you know I don't belong here it's very clear I don' t belong here and you can hear my father in the background going hang up gotta go after about 3 or 4 days of this it was like something inside me broke and I just went you know what you don' T want me I don'T want you and I turned my back on my family and pretty much never went back and when there'd be about every 7 weeks you'd get to go home for the weekend and I'd usually go I'd either stay there or go to some other kid's house you know go home with another family. Very seldom did I go home and when I would I really didn't have anything to do with my parents because I had one of the few jobs in the school you could work in the kitchen and I got a job working in the kitchen making 75 cents a meal and I would have them keep my money till I got a weekend pass and I'd have a pretty good little chunk of money when I leave that just 7-10 weeks of that and I go home and I'd have a date with my little girlfriend, you know, and I get a cab. My mom would say, would you want me to drive anything? No, no, I'll get a cap. I'd get a cabin, go get my girlfriend, go to the movies, take her to the movie, take your cab ride home, go home. I didn't want anything from my family. I just didn't wanna do it. They threw me away. That's it. Um, and uh, there was every school has got a guy named tiny. My high school, you know, had tiny six, four, two 40 played guard on the football team. Right. And actually he found me. I didn' find him. I was just moving around trying not to make eye contact with anybody. Tiny found me, he said how you doing punk? And he slapped me in the back of the head and sent me and my books flying and I had this like out of body experience where I was like watching myself moving towards Tiny and instead of my head was saying this is a really bad idea as I went up and hit Tiny as hard as I possibly could and Tiny looked at me and said you got a lot of guts kid and he just beat the crap out of me on the spot And as I was taking the beating, I was thinking, this is going pretty good. This is going, you know, it's going well because I was terrified of him. But he had just said, you've got a lot of guts. My violence had masked my fear. And that's what my whole life was about. I mean, my whole Life was about the illusion that I could create for you. It was never about what was really going on. You never got a straight answer out of me because I Was a self-centered, frightened individual. I could never tell you the truth because I had been trained very early in my life by my father and my uncles and my father's father, right? That you play close to the vest. You don't tell anybody anything about what's going on with you. You just don't. You don'T talk about your feelings. You play it close. You keep it tight. And that's just what I did. So when I would be, you know, dying of loneliness, if you asked me how I was, I'd just say, I'm fine. I'm Fine. So there was no real legitimate communication on any kind of human level going on at all in me. So, I mean, word spread across this campus like wildfire. Watch out for this little Hightower kid. He attacked Tiny. He's a lunatic, right? So now I've got this rep that's got absolutely nothing to do with who I am. I mean I'm a 12-year-old child. I'm an affrighted kid, right, but now I'm the lunatic. So the cool guys came around. A guy named Matt swung by my dorm and he said, hey, listen, you want to smoke a joint? and I said yes I do so yeah and I didn't even know what he was talking about I didn't know what that meant I didn' understand what that was but what I heard was do you want to come with us and the answer was yeah man I'm like I'm not liking this alone in the universe feeling I'm having no log well let's go right so we went and we picked up Steve and Steve had a Tupperware container wrapped in aluminum foil I can see it to this day man this Tupper a container. And I'm thinking, and it was wrapped in aluminum foil. I'm going, I wonder what that is? And we went behind the dorm by this tree, two 13-year-olds and a 12-year old, three children. I look at them today and I see them all kind of go, how old are you? 12. And they go, really? That's how old I was when I started this? That's absurd. You know? You know, now they're coming in. Now getting, I mean, I started drinking when I was 12. It's kind of late these days. You know what I mean? You know. When did you start drinking? Well, I was around seven. Got a job in a liquor store packing boxes in the back. Jesus. Unbelievable. Yeah, Iwas robbing cabs. Eight. I was eight years old. Anyway, Iwas 12 and went behind the dorm and Matt fired up the joint and he took a hit and he gave it to me and I just did what he did and it burned my lungs and I thought, I don't like that. That's ridiculous. And then the wine came around took a big pull on the wine and this is the fortified stuff this is cheap no grapes involved red wine this is nasty all right something I can't it's an acquired taste let's put it that way and I did acquire it I did acquire the taste but I took a pull on that and it burned my stomach and I thought man I don't get it I got knots on my head from the thumping I took from tiny I got My stomach's burning. My lungs are burning. I don't even know these two guys. You know what I mean? Tiny's lurking around out there somewhere, and it's like my life sucks. Two weeks ago, I was fine, right? And now through no fault of my own, it looks like by next Wednesday, I'll be dead at the pace we're going here, right. And, you know, just it happened. That thing that makes me bodily and mentally different from my fellows occurred. And suddenly, the pot and the wine kicked in, and suddenly I'm comfortable standing where I'm standing, doing what I'm doing with the people I'm dealing with. I never felt like that before in my life. It's like the big book says, that ease and contentment that came with the first couple of drinks. That's exactly what happened to me. It was just this feeling came over me, and it was a new day. It was a New Day. And I was going in a new direction, and I knew it. I knew right there. I thought, I mean, the knots went away. You know? I don't know, is it the pot? Is it the wine? Is it that I'm standing here with my two very close personal friends, Matt and Steve? All right, boys, I'm feeling that connection, right? Tiny's out there. I'll give it another shot. Bring it on, man. I got that courage that comes in a bottle, right. I mean it was just, you know, family doesn't want me. I don' t want them to hell with them. I'm okay. Just like I'm going to be all right. there was hope in the beginning for me and i got to remember you know it's it's nice to say you know alcohol did this to me and you know you know those other things did those things to me but the fact is i gotta remember the reason i got into this jackpot in the first place was that it worked perfectly in the begining it did precisely what i wanted it to do it took all the little compartments of me and it just put them all together and i was in the world and talking to people. Life on this planet became possible. It was no longer something that I couldn't figure out. I was going to be all right, and I thought nobody died. Nobody went to prison. Nobody went to the nuthouse. No blood was drawn. All those things were going to happen, but they didn't happen that night, so my experience when my head hit the pillow was drink a little red wine, smoke a little weed, feel better than you've ever felt before, no harm, no foul. Move on with your business. I thought, I'm in. I'm doing this as often as I possibly can, which was every single day for the next 16 years, no matter what. And I was given many good reasons to stop along the way, but I think that's the difference between me and the problem drinker. The problem drinkers get drunk just like me. We look the same drinking. We get drunk, look just the same. We both get drunk driving charges, just the same.We both go before the judge, and the judge says, you know what? I'm sick of you. I'll see you one more time. you're going to do a year in county, and then we're going to talk. Me and the problem drinker here get that same information. Both of us immediately think well I don't want to go to jail. And both of us immediately make the commitment to stop drinking and driving. Now here's where we part company. The problem drinkers having made that pledge, given that solemn oath actually doesn't drink and drive after that. I go home and immediately think, well, you know, I didn't say I wasn't going to drink. I just said I was not going to drink and ride. So I go back home and I have a couple of drinks, perfectly reasonable, but something happens to me when I have the couple of drinks and that psychic change occurs and suddenly I just feel the need to go somewhere. And I've somehow truly forgotten about this deep commitment I had made not an hour before. I mean, I was the guy that if the judge said, you get drunk again, we're going to have a problem. And I would say, Your Honor, I hear you. I'm with you. We're good. Trust me. We'RE good. I leave the courtroom and the judge could say, just follow him home. this isn't going to take but a couple hours just follow him home he will reappear hammered and be moving towards his vehicle just get him right there and bring him back he could he could they can say that about me because i can't i can' t do it i can''t do it i didn't know that and i got to tell you something else when i was and i'll get to 16 but when i were 16 years old 16 and a half years old a guy said to me you know you're an alcoholic And there was nothing in me that was offended by that. I just, all right. I'm an alcoholic. If this is what you call an alcoholic, okay. But if you think for a moment, that's going to make me stop drinking, you're nuts. Call it what you want, but this is What I Do. I'm An Alcoholic? Great. Next time somebody says, Earl, what the hell are you doing? I'll be able to say well apparently I'm an alcoholic and see if that satisfies them I mean it's just I'm going to stop it knowing you're an alcoholic and being able or willing to do something about it is two entirely different things the difference between those two things for me was 12 years from 16 to 28 so humble beginnings a little pot and a little red wine 13 was pills, the only reason I took a pill was the guy said would you like a pill and I said yeah again having no idea what we're really talking about couple of two and all's 20 minutes later laying on the floor very happy down there don't see any problem with laying onthe floor see people do it all the time so I got strung out on placidil, second all, two and al all that stuff I don't even think they make that anymore I don't know. Do they? You're the wrong crowd to ask, clearly. Just go down to the bar and ask them. Can you make two and all? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Here's two right here. Are you going to have two or three? Fourteen was psychedelics. Dropped the acid with a lovely girl, Debbie. Debbie. Bad girl. Loved her. she said would you like to drop some acid and I said well of course I would Debbie the next two days were very interesting I'm going to speed this up at 15 I started shooting dope the only reason I shot dope was because another girl, Cammie very nice girl CammIE said would you like me to stick this in your body and I said well yes I would and she did it it was one of those shots where you just kind of go and on the way down I was just thinking if I'm not dead, I am doing this again that was fantastic it was one of those moments where you're having a really troubled day and then just no I'm NOT I'm Not Having A Troubled Day I can't even remember what I was upset about and again I'm mentioning drugs but I identify as an alcoholic I'm a child of the 60s we were very focused on the drugs because our parents were the alcoholics and we were trying to carve out our own identity here we weren't going to kill ourselves, drink ourselves to death the way our parents were, we were going to kill ourselves in an entirely new way we were getting our own identity but the fact of the matter is this, for me the drugs would come and go but there was only one thing that was on the table every single day and that was alcohol and I believe that alcohol was on the table every single day for one simple reason drugs are completely unreliable they are there's no quality control going on out there you don't know what you've got until you get it in your body this is when you know if we're going to be all right or not so you always got to have a fifth of jack daniels or a quart of good gin sitting there because if you've Got that it really ultimately doesn't matter how the little drug exchange goes you got what you need you're going to get where you need to get because jack is present right you do so much cocaine you can't get your mouth open anymore just and it's only seven o'clock and the party's just started you've completely overshot the mark one more time doesn't make any difference it doesn't make any different you suck a little gin through your teeth you loosen your eye up you can go on with the party you'll be fine the heroine's lousy doesn't matter Jack Daniels will get you where you gotta get, man to that cool, quiet heart and lungs working place where there's just nothing else going on Jack will get your ass away and in the end for me it was all about the alcohol all about alcohol for me I didn't have time to mess with trying to be cool it was business had to happen I was one of those guys that drank if I was awake I was drinking I woke up, I drank in the end. So 16, I went to my first nut house. They put me in for three months of observation and a year of rehabilitation, which I thought was a little excessive. And I got very compliant though when they started doing the signing, you know, bringing out the forms to sign you up for the shock therapy. Like, ugh. You know, I'd seen the guys come sliding back from the shock, and I mean sliding back from the shocked therapy. I thought, nope, nope don't want the little rubber triangle in my mouth what was that question again i'll be happy to answer that for you and so i finally talked my way out of there that first time second time they locked me in the nut house i escaped uh first time i tried to escape i found out um they give you these three cups of pills a day and if you act up at all you get a shot and you're just shuffling around inside this joint with everybody else you know what i mean so when you go to make your move and it's not there when you when you're ready to go ready ready go you know and that's it that's all an ass that's all you got that's when you know it's the cups of pills man you got to get out before they get the thorazine in you because they get that thorazin in you you're leaving when they say you got you don't have a fast move um so the second time i escaped the first day just shot out of there like a cannon and hit the streets. I spent three years out on the street doing what we do to stay loaded on a daily basis, you know? Just a common street drunk. That's what I was. I mean, it was not... I thought it was going to be, you know, great. Me and Jack Kerouac, man, on the road, you know what I mean? This was goingto be the stuff legends are made of. Couldn't have been further from the truth, man. It was just me being a pathetic, drunken, loaded guy out doing what he was doing and doing what we do, you know, just my... And slowly but surely my alcoholism progressed, so that it was no longer something over there. It was something in here. And it had taken over my life. It had become the central core element to how I spent every waking moment. Had to do with getting ready to get high, being high, recovering from being high. Figuring out how I'm going to get out of the trouble I got into when I was high not liking the feelings I was feeling when that was going on so needing to get high again and doing what was necessary to make that possible and that was my loop that was just where I lived and it just got and the world got smaller and smaller and small when I was 20 years old I got diagnosed with malignant cancer and I was living up in northern California to become a drug dealer and the only reason I was a drug dealer is I had no morals I had No ethics I had no sense of family I hadno sense of community I didn't have any of those things I didn'y know anything about anything. I was just, this is just what I did. I was loose. I hadn't been parented since I was 12 years old. I didn't have any idea how to engage in anything that had anything to do with the kind of things that I had learned as a child, in terms of what was right or what was wrong. So I ended up just loosing out there. Got diagnosed with malignant cancer, flew back to L.A. I remember they were sitting with me and my mother, and the doctor was sitting with me and my mother, and the guy said, listen, this isn't good. I went, yeah, I got that. Cancer bad. I get it. You know, but I mean, still, just, you know, not a reality-based individual. I mean there was no real moment in any of this where I was sitting there thinking, wow, I'm really in trouble, or wow, you knows, this could kill me. None of that was sinking in for me. I could see my mother was upset, and they were saying, you need to get your affairs in order. And I just was like, that was funny to me. Okay, affairs. I'm like 20 years old. I've been a drug addict since I'm 12. I make a couple of phone calls. We're good to go. You know what I mean? I don't have a lot happening. You Know What I Mean? I Don't Have Any Affairs To Get Together. So I called my little sister in Northern California, flew up, saw her, let her know what was going on, came back to LA. They did major surgery on my upper back and they prepared me to die, prepared my family to die. put me in chemo but they called it nuclear medicine back then so I was in the nuclear medicine program and I didn't like that I wasn't getting a buzz off of their stuff at all so I just left and uh I beat it I've been a long-term cancer survivor it's been like 30 35 years and that has something don't don't if you're you know there'd be nice applause if there was if I had done anything to support that process you know what I mean but I didn t I mean I was completely a part of the problem and it was that was a great example of pretty much every other area of my life you know there were there was within me i think a desire to try to have some value but i could never manifest that at all in any way shape or form i was just spiraling downward um when i was 21 um my mother called me and just said listen you know we haven't done anything as a family in almost 10 years. For your 22nd birthday, let's just get together as a family and go somewhere. We'll do anything you want. Let's just do it as a family. And I said, fine. And I flew back to LA and we took off to fly to Guadalajara, Mexico. And on the way there, the plane crashed. And my mother, my father, my little sister all died in the crash. And I didn't. And I woke up on this mountain, not a mountain, it's like Noel in Mexico. And I was sitting in the plane crash and my seat had been thrown out of the plane and I was sitting in my seat. I don't know why I'm talking about this, I never talk about this but I'm sitting in my sheet and I remember thinking oh and I looked and my mother was laying over there and my little sister Kimberly was laying right over there and my father was laying right over here and I thought I have to help them and I unbuckled my seat belt and I just fell out into the mud because my back was broken and I couldn't move and I mean my arm was messed up in my leg and my back and my skull was fractured. And the only thing I moved was my right arm, but I was awake and I watched them all bleed to death. And I swore I'd never love another human being again as long as I lived. And there was, and I renounced God. I had no love of God. It broke. It just kind of broke my heart. It just shut me down as a human being and some uh some guys came up to the plane site and i remember i took my wallet out and i had my my driver's license in my hand because i knew i was dying i just wanted to know who i was and they they took my wall took my money and moved through the wreck and took what they could find then split they scavenged the planes the wreck site and left me up there to die and i'm ever thinking i got no love for you either man i'm out so i was just one crazy, angry, little alcoholic drug addict. And some other guys came up and they took me in a flatbed truck with my mother down to a Mexican aid station and tagged us all dead, and I didn't die. So finally they took us to the hospital Fatima in Los Mochos, Mexico. And I stayed there for quite a while, and the federales came in and they interrogated me through an interpreter for three and a half days, wanted to know what I was doing back in Mexico because of a little issue with the Mexican government that we don't need to get into right now. But let's just say they were not thrilled to see me. And I called some buddies of mine in Northern California who flew a plane down and paid some guys off, and they plastered me from the neck down, put me in a body cast, and flew me out of Mexico into Southern California, and I was in a hospital for quite a while there. Came out of there nuts, nuts getting maximum shots of Demerol every three hours around the clock. It was crazy, just crazy. It was great. Crazy. and I got out of there and I went on my last run and it lasted for six years and it's the kind of run where you don't have any anchors left you don' t have a family you don''t have a wife or kids or a career or any kind of real goals there was nothing there for me to kind of hold it together for and I just went nuts and about four years into this I would go every once in a while I'd get so sick I couldn't use anymore and I'd go to this little bootleg sanitarium in Hollywood where you give them 150 cash, and they take you in straight out of your little gurney, shoot you full of anticonvulsants, let you kick for 72 hours, and then they'd sit you up and say, behave yourself. All right, yeah, all right. And then you'd run off into the night, right? And I had done this. This was like the third or fourth time I'd done this, and, I mean, 72 hours in, I'm still kicking like a dog, man. I mean I'm not done detoxing at all, right, but they'd set me up, and I remember this nurse. She seemed like, and it's, you know, when you're in a joint like that and they seem particularly upset about you that's not good you know and the nurse comes up to me she goes earl don't you know that you're an alcoholic and a drug addict i said yes ma'am i know i know i mean no hesitation nothing inside me going yeah just you know appease her no i yeah i'm an alcoholic i guess she goes you know for you to drink or use it's just nuts boy you just you know you haven't been having any fun you have not been partying you have not been getting high you need to look at your words because those words don't fit what you're doing you just feed the beast boy that's all you do is just feed the beast you just try to get it back to zero because you're in pain all the time i can see it in your eyes you're like a little old man and you're dying and if you don't want to die you better better not drink or use anymore and i just said no ma'am i'm not an idiot and i meant it man it was almost like I mean, she was that close to quoting the book. Now, Earl, armed with this self-knowledge, you're not going to drink anymore, are you? No, ma'am. Walk right out to the parking lot, take 40, 50 milligrams of Valium because I'm shaking real bad and that's clearly what's medically indicated. You know, and I get behind the car and four days later I come to a different city and I don't even know how I got there. I mean it was over. It was over and I went and drank for two more years. you know there was not at that point there was nothing in my life you could look to and say well that's going pretty good i mean there wasn't anything like that and i still another two years of just banging it out out there and i came out of my last blackout and i was the day before i was 28 years old um my hands were busted they were deciding whether or not to charge me with attempted murder and i'm a i'm the most peaceful guy you'll ever meet in your life man but drink You know, how we get. We take exception to things. The imagined insult is the worst. To quote a friend of mine. And I had the moment of clarity that they talk about in recovery. And the moment for me was I wasn't connected to another human being on the face of the earth. And that was the direct result of my actions, my behavior. you don't know if somebody said to me you're lonely i would have just gone what are you talking about you know because when you've been alone when you haven't been connected to anybody for a long long time and you've Been Alone on with What's Inside You for a Long Long Time and You Haven't Had A Legitimate Conversation With Another Human Being That Had Any Measure Of Truth or personal exposure in it at all for a long, long time. You don't know that you're lonely anymore. Lonely is compared to something else. It's like you're around a bunch of people, you've got friends, and suddenly you don't. Wow, I feel real lonely because I missed the human contact. I didn't miss human contact, I hadn't had it for so long. I didn' t even know that I was lonely. I didn''t know that's what it was. So I mean, it's really... I think a lot of people when they say to newcomers, you know, you've gotta learn to identify your feelings. I think a lot of people, normal people think well that's the stupidest thing I've ever heard but you know what, it's the truth we come in, we need to identify our feelings when somebody says how are you feeling right now I don't know how I feel well, you seem really angry oh alright so what's behind the anger what do you mean what's behind the angry, if I'm angry, I'm angry you know, well for me it's always fear self-centered fear is the chief It's like you read the 12 and 12 on step 7, about second to last page, step 7 in the 12th and 12th, halfway down the page. It talks about self-centered fear is the chief activator of all my defects of character. I'm paraphrasing. It says I'm either afraid of losing what I have or not getting what I want, rejection or abandonment. And that's me in a nutshell right there. If you just walk up a little early on, man, it was funny. It must have been funny to watch me in an event. somebody coming up on me just a little too quick what are you doing that's all you had to do to end up on my inventory was just approach a little too quickly because you're scaring me and you're going to come up you look all happy and you are going to ask those questions that you people ask how are you what's up i have no idea how you doing don't know got nothing to compare it to hate talking to you does that count i hate talking TO YOU! get away from me there was a woman that remember her name is raj she saw over a long time she saw me in my first few meetings and people ask her, what was he like? And she doesn't even use words. She just goes, oh, shakes her head. And I'm like, come on. And she goes, you were so angry. And now I look back and I go, wow, really? I looked angry because man, I was just scared. I was so scared. I was scared that you were going to find out the things that I had done. And if you found out the thing that I have done, you're going to ask me to leave. Because that's what reasonable people would do when you look like reasonable people. So I came in here knowing right out of the gate, I can't tell these people the truth. I can' t tell you either. I got no place else left to go. So I can''t get thrown out of here. I got to stay here. So I'll just be sitting in the back. And I mean, I came with my alcoholism in full effect. I mean that moment of clarity hit, and you know what I mean? And 47 days later, I was on a free cot in a hospital. 42 cots in one room. That's where I went. That was my treatment program, right? 42 cotes, 21 cotes on each side of the room with sheets drawn between it, right. the guy laying next to you on this cot hasn't been outside more than six months since 1958 and he's looking at you like how are you doing kid oh don't talk to me and you sleep facing him God man my life sucks end up in the basin of a church on a Friday night AA meeting back wall arms folded hair out like this beard like this psychotic right i'm not using the term loosely this was testimony to the human skull that that much pressure can be going on in there and you're not just sitting we should be sitting around in meetings and just every once in a while some newcomers head just blow up this head just explodes slump over now have a special cleanup crew just rushes right in cleans that all up and that's why they put the newcomers in the front so you know if one of them blows in the back you don't see it's like me he's up front don't just don't pay attention to that what happened to him new guy sitting in the bag just oh god you know knowing where the doors and windows are you know trying to scan the room find the guy who's got the juice in the room seems to have the power in the room slide up on him burglarize the conversation find out what they got going on in here and get out that was my plan that was mine going to a a plan find out how they don't drink and then split looked up on the wall 12 steps hmm got it all right what else you got all right traditions for the group i'm not a group don't need that you know just banging around inside my head you know what i mean and people And every meeting he's got the guy who's just caught fire with A&A, and he's going to give it away tonight. My guy's name was Vegas N. And Vegas was a blonde guy, a real Nordic-looking guy. Everything on him was light. That's the story I remember seeing when he came powering down the aisle at me. The old guys saw like woof when I walked in. They were just like, get a cup of coffee, get yourself a seat, good luck with all that going on over there. they didn't get near me, right? Because they knew that guy's too scared. Don't move on him too quick. Let's just give him a little room. They knew, which was exactly the way to treat me. Just let him be here, right, because they knew if you just come up, because they'd been me. That was nothing special about me. They'd all been me, but Vegas had just caught fire with AA, and he saw me. All he saw was new guy, and here he came, and I'm just like mad dogging him, man, just like he's trying to get him to veer off before he got to me you know i mean nothing had any effect on this guy whatsoever and he walked up he said hi i'm vegas i'm an alcoholic and i just said great me too it ain't exactly the highlight of my life don't know what you're so happy about go away and he looked at me and he said keep coming back and i remember thinking oh great keep saw that little slogan on the wall earlier great keep coming back apparently there's some deep spiritual significance of that i have no idea what it is those three guys standing over the left over there those guys are all going oh did you see vegas told a new guy to keep coming back right and i'm thinking okay i don't know everybody else clearly knows what the deep meaning of that is i don t i lose again i hate this love an aa so far man just thanks a lot for swinging by to point out the fact that I'm the idiot in the room, Vegas. Thank you. And off they all went. If you're new and we do that to you hit you with the slogans. Keep coming back one day at a time. My favorite. Hey! Just turn it over. Just turn It over. Have more guts than I did. Just step up to us, man. Just step up and say, excuse me. I don't understand the deep spiritual significance of just turn it over. Would you mind expanding on that for me a little bit? Well, if it's my neck of the woods, if they tell the truth, what they'd say is, well, you know, about 75% of them would say, well you know I don't know what it means either. They said it to me when I came in, I'm just saying it to you. I have no idea what any of this means, my friend. There's a guy over there that reads the big book, maybe he knows. Let's go ask him. Just so you know that little turn it over thing. Right over there. It's right over there so i sat in the back just thinking i hate this luckily for me i didn't have any place else to go i didn'y have anyplace else to g, I'd have gone. Sat there and a guy got up and he shared his experience strength and hope shared openly and honestly about his feelings as a man never heard anybody do that before in my life. Not like that. I had never heard anybody talk that way about those things, and the room was just like going, mm-hmm. I mean, they were with that guy. They were with him, and they went on what was, I didn't know it at the time, but so was I. So was I, I was with that guy. There was nothing that guy said that I could think, well, that couldn't possibly be true, you know, because I'll tell you one thing about drug addicts and alcoholics, man. We may not like it, but when you tell us the truth, we hear it. We know the truth when we hear it. We may not like it. We may not admit to it, but we know. We know. And I knew. I knew that guy was telling the truth. Talking about how he'd get up in the morning with his head chewing on him. I got that head. You know what I mean? It's like, oh, it's like the guy reading my mail, man. He would wake up in the morning and his head would go, listen, we've all been up for several hours talking this over. We're glad you're up. We've got a few things we want to cover with you. First of all, you're a completely useless human being and there's no hope for you whatsoever. And he would just go, whoa, thanks for sharing, fellas. And he'd get up, he'd go shower, get dressed, go to work, give him an honest day's work for an honest pay, go get something to eat, go to an A&A meeting. Not to go there to take from the meeting because he'd worked the 12 steps as outlined in the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous and he had a spiritual experience as a direct result of doing that. He'd been relieved of the greater aspect of his illness. Been relieved of the obsession of the mind. And he's walking on the earth a free man for the first time. So he went to that meeting to give to that meeting, not to take from it. To be of service to that meaning. Head chewing on him the whole way. Go home, go to bed, no wreckage. That was astounding to me. Because I wake up, we're going to have some wreckage because I wake up and that committee happens in my head and I get scared by the things that are going on in my own head. I don't even need you to get frightened. I can do it to myself. And when I get frightened, my defects of character just start flying around the room. And I'm going to have to make it about you or make it about you. Or get into something else. Get something else going. So that the attention is over there and it's off of me as far as I can tell. And that's what happens to me. This guy saying he's hung out with A&A, did the things they did. He could go through a whole day with no records. I thought that was absolutely remarkable. And then it was like he looked right at me and 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. And I went, I love this because it made it clear to me he's not selling me something. He's sharing it with me. This ain't a hustle. They don't have a big recruitment campaign going on. They're just here. And if you want to try to find a way to live, here's the thing that's amazing. You want to trying to find the way to be comfortable sober, they got a plan I thought wow you know I've been sober and I've been comfortable but I never been both at the same time and that's what they're professing and what I've come to understand is this is not about stopping drinking that is not what this is about not about dropping drinking done that thousands of times this is how do I stay stopped and the only way a guy like me is going to stay stopped if it's as if I can get comfortable clean and sober and there's only one way to do that got to be relieved of the obsession of the mind got to get the beast off of me can't have that beast whispering in my ear day in and day out because sooner or later the planets are going to line up and you know world life on life's terms is going to happen world's going to lay it on me and that beast going to whisper and i'm going to go you know what you're right i'm gonna get drunk not for the rest of my life i'm just gonna get drunk for right now which turns into the rest OF MY LIFE it's just a way it works so I've got to do the whole deal I can't just go to meetings I know lots of people that do that Personally, don't get it I didn't go for any little bitty baby buzz out there I sure as hell ain't going for one in here If I'm coming, I want the buzz And people tell me the buzz is this triangle with a circle around it This ancient spiritual symbol stands for mind, body and spirit Brought together as a whole human being they realize the balance i've sought my whole life and never had drunk or sober alcoholics anonymous adopted that symbol same stuff they just say unity service and recovery but it's the same thing unity is the body of bring it here i couldn't get sober but we seem to be able to first step word in the steps is we we admitted we were powerless over alcohol that our lot our lives had become unmanageable that there's something happens when i stick with you i watch people go out all the time i've been around a while now and i watch people go out. Some of them get back, some of them. And I go, what happened? Well, first they stop going to meetings. Go to meetings! It's pretty simple stuff. It's not easy, but it's simple. Go meetings. Another great suggestion is go to regular meetings regularly on the meeting idea. In my town, we got like 3,000 meetings a week. You can go to a different meeting every day for like nine years and, you know, never hit the same meeting twice. And you also remain anonymous within an anonymous program. Not good. So when you go get drunk, nobody's going to go, where'd Bobby go? Nobody got to know Bobby. So nobody notices that he's gone. So I get a home group where I go all the time. And whether I like it or not, people start to get to know me. And I start to discover that I like it. I like that. I like somebody calling. It's an astonishing moment for a lonely human being when somebody goes, hey man, where were you last week at the meeting? We missed you. What? Really? Really? You noticed I wasn't there? Huh. Whole new thought process starts spinning in there. That must have something to do with you know, other people being in your life. I remember the day I called up my sponsor. I called Up Late Great Donald Mann and he always answered the phone in his very calm, normally Oh, hello to you. Donald, it's Earl. Yes, I know that. Donald, something terrible has happened. What is it? I love you. And he said, Oh, I don't know. Oh, no. Click. and i went he does he knows he understands that for me to love somebody i'd sworn i'd never love another human being yet as long as i live all of a sudden i got a sponsor that i love i love this guy i love the way he's there for me i love the information that he gives me i love the way i'm being included i love what's happening here and i have to admit it i have to say it out loud or i'm going to reject it i have to say it so i said it and he understood that this was a real problem for me now what matters to me if he goes or not if he gets mad at me i find this upsetting This is all new for me. I mean, every woman I ever was with, if she'd said to me, she'd call me up one day and just said, I'm marrying Ed tomorrow. I'd say, that's fantastic. You know, are you registered? What do we get you? I don't care. Never cared. I've been at the altar thinking, this is just paperwork. I couldn't connect. Couldn't connect to other people. I'm married now. I'm marriage to somebody I actually know. It's amazing. it's a whole new experience for me my fourth marriage and i'm i think i'm actually married for the first time in my life it's really great didn't tell you i'm a slow learner man i'm a really slow learner but unity service recovery unity is the body i bring it here recoveries of the mind i work the steps to be relieved to the greater aspect of my disease i go out and detox and go to meetings i've kicked but i've dealt with the physical phenomenon on a craving. The obsession of the mind is the greater aspect of my disease. How I get rid of that is to work the 12 steps. Step one is, what's the problem? Lack of power. Step two is the solution to that problem. What's the solution? Power. Greater than me that can restore me to sanity and soundness of mind, relieve me of the obsession of drink and use. Step three, I better make a decision to do something about this or it's just another conversation I'm having. I need to get this into my life somehow. So I get on my knees and I turn my will and my life over to the care of a God I may or may not understand. I pray to a God I don't understand. I don' t understand God. I find anybody who tells me they do highly suspicious. I see evidence of God though on a daily basis. You know? Trees. Drove by a whole bunch of trees. Come driving here down here from Sioux Falls. Is that where it was? Sioux Fall? Yeah. I probably should remember that because I got to get back there tonight. but i'm looking i'm look at all these trees and i'm not a tree guy per se but i mean anybody else you're driving through here it's all snow there's not a leaf to be found in south dakota just bark everywhere right you're looking at this as far as i can tell all this stuff is dead this looks dead to me a few weeks here spring is going to hit what's going to happen boom these things are coming back to life may not have even been dead in the first place just faking it right and I'm looking at all of it going you know and I have absolutely no idea how to make any of this from scratch I have no idea how to do that from scratch I can take a cutting off one and make another yeah but from scratch over my head consciousness beyond my own going on all around me everywhere I go every day so is there a power greater than myself happening easy for me that's easy for me yeah right four and fives about me six and sevens about god eight nines about you that's the whole team nobody else to play with there it is me god and you swallow large chunks look at the order of these things first thing i'm going to do is i'm gonna do this inventory i'm gonna read it before god another human being gonna swallow large chunks truth about myself right because you can't come you gotta a problem and you're going to get a solution going for that problem, you best find out where you're starting from. Because if you don't know where you're started from, how are you going to get where you are going? If you're on your way to Aunt Maggie's house and you are lost, when you call up Aunt Maggie and say, Aunt Maggie, I'm lost. What is the first thing she asks you? Where are you now? Because she could just start firing off directions but they may not have anything to do with where you are. First thing, where are you now. Well, I am here. Okay. Based on that information we can give you some directions on how to get to Maggie's house. Or in my case, a place where I could possibly sustain life. So get squared away over here. Once that's established, what's happening over here? The inventory shows great examples in resentment and fear of sex of me leaving the playing field. Me not getting it right. Powerlessness in my life. My effectiveness as a human being. Six and seven, I hook it back up with God asking God to remove the defects of character because I'll remove the wrong stuff. I'll cut deals. Really loving this defect. You can have these. Maybe we'll talk in a week, see what's happening. Not a good plan. I'm involved in the decision making. It's not good. Eight and nine, everybody else. Pretty simple. Very, very sorry. Here's your money. Back in the house. Oh, and to make amends means to change so I'm very sorry I stole your car I estimate the value of the car at $20,000 at the time of the theft. That's acceptable to you. You get this much money every month. Same check every month plus whatever interest you think is appropriate and I will not go steal your car and sell it to pay you for the car I stole from you. I'm going to stop stealing cars. I am out of that. I will stop. 10, 11, and 12 keep the ball rolling. 10 me, 11 God 12 you. Same order, same idea keep checking my side of the street right? Step 11 one of the most powerful steps available to us one of those the least used steps I seek God oh you mean I don't just wait for God to reveal himself to me no turn my will and my life over to God, I can't commit suicide anymore it's not my life to take 11. I seek God through prayer and meditation what do I pray for? It says right there The power of his will for me and the power to carry that out. God, you know, just very simple. Right? Conscious contentment has been understood in praying only for knowledge of his Will for us and the Power to carry That out. That's all I pray for. What do I meditate for? Quiet the mind so that when the answers come, I can hear them. God doesn't talk to me through the radio anymore. Used to get very, very clear, loud messages from God. Now, none of them were applicable. now it's just that there is that moral psychology, that compass within all of us. And if I'm quiet, I know the difference between actions that are beneficial to self and others and actions that are harmful to self and others. I know what, I know how to do that. I know that I know the difference. I do. If I just quiet down and stop trying to, you know, justify behavior, I know what the right thing to do is and then I can take action based on that. Twelve starts out of the triangle. Unity is the body and bring it here. Recovery is the mind and work those steps. Having had a spiritual awakening is the result of that. the whole point of it, to be restored to sanity, relieved of the obsession of drink and use. I can practice these principles and carry the message. I walk the earth a free man, no longer a slave to alcohol and drugs. And the beauty of that is, is it works. You can say whatever else you want about it, but it works If I do that there's nobody, I've never met anybody that can do all of that earnestly as it is outlined in the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous and not be changed by the experience It's impossible it's impossible not to have it change your life and how it changes your life is it doesn't take anything from you that makes you, you away from you a lot of you's in there but you get what I'm saying your identity is your identity what makes you creative and unique and special remains intact what that will take from you is the obsession of the mind the beast your alcoholism it will address it you'll still be an alcoholic i'm still an alcoholic the beast lies dormant within me and based on a daily reprieve i'm free i stay free it's an amazing thing it's absolutely amazing thing to me and if you just told me they said i'm sure they told me these things when i was new but you know i mean all my phaser shields were up like god it's talking to me you know they want me to do something i'm gonna you can't just do something you know holding on to my you know really great life of pacing in my little one-room apartment to get my hour of sleep so i can get up and just be nuts for another 23 hours. Right? So I did that and it happened. And it worked. Now, I've been here 27 years. I've Been Here. Last November 6th, I turned 27 years sober. And I couldn't stay sober for a day. Uh-oh. He was going to clap again. Again, not me. Them. You guys. There's no as Earl sees it in there. Well, there is. There's some as Earl sees it in their. But it slowed me down. It didn't speed me up. It didn' t help. right what's in there is the program is outlined in the big book of alcoholics anonymous i mean it's an amazing thing to me how few people read the bigbook people talk about controversy in aa we were talking some guys over here earlier we were talked about earlier when we're eating tacos and talking controversy oh yeah controversy you know i can't tell you how many controversies there have been since i've been sober i mean at one point there was people were uh i forget what it was about oh the inner child big thing everybody was checking out their inner child going to groups to talk about their inner childhood i went to some meetings and i walked out of them thinking oh man i'm glad i didn't i'm not new i'd come out of here thinking all i need to get sober it's a teddy bear and a hug it's like you know and it was a big controversy big controversy but the thing is if you ever called central office about it tell what are we going to do about these inner children people? They would have just said, well, we have no opinion on that. Click. Huh? You know, now, I mean, in my neck of the woods now it's antidepressants. Ooh, antideressants. Going to ruin Alcoholics Anonymous. Can't you see that? Ruin them. People walking around saying they're sober. God damn it, they're not sober and you got your medical degree where well i don't have a medical degree do we have a pamphlet on that yes we do got a question about that read it outside issue it's got nothing to do with controversy we were talking about there was controversy in aa when there's three guys in aa well right there was a guy in aa who swore he started aa not not bill and bob swore that till of day died. Clarence, I think. Clarece S., right? Hot under the collar for three decades about that. It's always something. And you know what I do is I think, well, you know, and people say, we got to do something about this. We've got to DO something about THIS. I think I'll tell you what I'm going to do. If there's a controversy in AA, I'll you what I think it is. It's remarkable to me. How many people come into AA and nobody ever gives them a big book? It's amazing to me how many people have never worked at 12 Steps. That's pertinent, I think, to this, it being a 12-step program and all, right? That we got one book. I mean, I swear to God, I think if you told alcoholics, which is also dramatic, right, I mean I am, when I got through, If they'd have said to me, listen, you can't tell anyone. But there's an AA library. It's huge. Tomes on alcoholism. Deep in the Yucatan Peninsula. It's in the jungle. Big jungle south of here. You go to the Mayan ruin, you know? You've seen the big Mayan temple, right? It's not a Mayan Temple. It's a secret It's an AA library underneath Hundreds of thousands Of books We have secret buses They leave at night We go to the library You're going to love it It's fantastic I would have thought This is the greatest thing I've ever heard of in my life Where do I get on the bus? We got to leave now This is fantastic I have a lot of reading to do Because it's very dramatic I would love that That's the greatest, like a big mystery Right? What do they say? Listen, if you don't stay sober You're probably going to die And we got this book It's a blue book We call it the blue book And you don' t even have to read the whole thing Just read the doctor's opinion The first 164 pages You'll be fine Here you go God, that was kind of like a Big Letdown big books used as coasters all over the world I went over to a guy's house I'd sponsored him for like two three months he'd been sponsored for years by another guy he came to me and I said well come on go over here have some little talk you know we'll talk about what we do and he goes great he loved it because he didn't have to do anything just stay at home and I would come to him came to him and he go you got your big book he goes yeah I got it right here he brought it I took the big book, and I opened it up, and it went snap. It had never been opened. It cracked when I opened it for the first time. He said, how long have you had this? He said seven years. I think we stumbled onto the problem. It's pretty simple. It's so simple. It's not easy, but it's simple. I read the doctor's opinion, and I find out what alcoholism is. I read the 164 pages, I get definition of alcoholism. The 164 page takes me through the 12 steps, tells me precisely what to do. As a result of that, I become free of the beast. I get out of the prison of my own mind and I have actually something I can give to another human being that isn't going to hurt them. So when a new guy comes up to me and says, do you know how to stay sober? I go, yes I do and none of it's going to come out of my head here. We're going to follow this guide, this text and we're goingto be cool. I was about six years sober me and a buddy of mine got together and we got six other people eight of us we got together and we said we're going to go through the steps as outlined in the big book together and me and this buddy of mind we've been listening to these tapes Joe and Charlie's The Big Book Comes Alive the original Joe and Charley if you never heard that get that unbelievable unbelievable and we take these guys and eight of them we go through and this was a diverse troubled group of eight and that was so um 21 years ago and guess how many of those eight people are still sober all of them all still sober because whatever other statistics you may hear what other other mythology may be out there there's this line that got read tonight it was the first line that she read rarely have we seen a person fail who has thoroughly followed our path and what i'm trying to talk about is what's thoroughly following the path the unity the service and the recovery the mind the body and the spirit when i was five years sober i went to this con i found out that they had just been in a meeting a day minimum seven to nine meetings a week just going to meetings going to work going to readings hanging out of coffee and i found out that there was this convention this thing called the south bay roundup happening about 20 miles south of me in la and i thought wow that sounds fun it's like like a big you know big bunch of us. And I called up my sponsor and said, can I go? And he said, of course you can go. So I drove down there, paid a little tuition. And the guy says, listen, the big meeting's going on. Just go in the back of the room and be quiet. I said, I can do that. I've been doing that. Go in the bank and listen. So when I snuck in the back of this room and looked up and there's 2,500 alcoholics sitting in a room being quiet, listening to one guy talk. And first of all, I was struck by the amazing amount of energy 2,500 of us put off just sitting still because you could just you know the energy in there you know it's a room full of people look like they're going like 60 miles an hour just sitting there just and this one guy talking and I thought who the hell is that guy 2, 500 people to pick from and they picked that guy the guy's name was Franklin W. from Olive Branch Mississippi right and Franklin W. said I'll sum up Alcoholics Anonymous us in six words those six words being trust god clean house and help others i had a spiritual experience when i heard that blew the top of my head off six words trust god clear house and help others and i thought that's all these little things i've been hearing in aa where i've quietly thought to myself well that makes sense well that sounds good and that sounds reasonable all of it just kind of went together and it all fit it all made sense for me and of course i went home, you know, blubbering like an idiot, calling my sponsor up going, we've got to go to the clean house and all that. And he's like, yeah, yeah. I know, I know. My great sponsor. He was great, man. He saved my life, Donald, man, and 16 years later, I got asked to be the Saturday night speaker of the Texas State Conference of AA. I'm 21 years sober, scared to death. Thousands of people showing up. Put on my little suit and ties, you know, wandering around the convention center, and there's a guy sitting in front of his name is searcy searcey at the time was 91 years old he'd been sober for 58 years been married to the same woman for 59 years and sharp as a tack this guy hadn't lost a beat 91 years ago and he's telling a story he says come here i'm telling a storyline sit down he goes listen so i'm sitting i'm talking to uh bill and franklin and i said you mean bill wilson co-founder of aa and franklyn like franklin w franklin williams olive branch mississippi and he said yep said we were talking and franklin w asked bill wilson bill what is the heart and soul of this program that we must protect for the generations that have yet to come us and without hesitation bill wilSON told franklin that's easy franklin trust god clean house and help others and that it hit me like a ton of bricks man it made me realize bill wilсон told franklyn w and countless others to trust god Clean House and help Others franklin told me in countless others trust god clean house and help others. I'm telling you, trust God, clean house, and help others. There's only four generations of us. You're the fifth. That's a short list, man. That's not a lot of guys. I understand that you're listening to that thinking, yeah, and kind of like the power of that list really drops off there at the end. But that doesn't matter, right? It's the information, not the guys, you know. Bill Wilson, Franklin W., Earl. Don't worry about that. Because it ain't about that, it's about the information. The information is what's powerful around here. Not those jokers that get up here. Don't you don't worry about who the speaker boy is. You know what I mean? Look, the truth is this, you know what i mean? And this, well speakers, we need to remind ourselves of this. We ain't the most important guy in the room. And frankly, it ain't the newcomer either. Tell you this, if the coffee guy hadn't showed up, you'd all be so pissed off you wouldn't care about a thing I had to say. Where's my coffee? Or, I thought we were having tacos. If you're new, congratulations. I know that there's some new folks in here. If you knew, congratulations, you've stepped into something. This goes way past drinking and using. It's a design for living. There's a foundation here that we can stand upon, free men and women. It's an remarkable organization. And the beauty of it is, is that once you become free of the beast, once you stand a free man or a free woman, you get to go then manifest your life any way you want to. There's no dogmen here. We don't tell you how to live. We just try to help you find a way to do that. That's what I found here, is they gave me a wayto live. They didn't say to me, now Earl, here's what you need to do with your life. I didn't say that. The only thing that my sponsor ever asked of me was, he said, listen, I'll help you with everything that I got. I'll give you everything I got all you got to do. All you got To do is when you catch the buzz, when you get free of that beast, man, when You get the buzz for life going, I want you to freely give to another individual what's been given to you. And I've been honoring that commitment to him since the day he died and I will till the day I die because it's what works. It's what gives me meaning. It's what gives me value. I mean, and I gotta have some value beyond my own miserable ass. You know what I mean? My life just can't be about me. That's the most boring, ineffective, useless life I can imagine. It's gotta be about something beyond me. And what you find in here is the fellowship that makes a life beyond yourself possible. This is an amazing thing. I mean I'm just amazed by Alcoholics Anonymous. I'm amazed by the opportunity to be a member of this thing. And I'm as grateful as you can possibly imagine. Somebody said, when I was at home, I mean, a guy that I sponsor is not, he doesn't get the service thing. He just doesn't give it. I make him do it and he'll get it eventually. You know, I won't sponsor him unless he'll do it. And I told him, yeah, I'm going to fly from L.A. to New York. And he knows I'm terrified to fly. L. A. to New York, New York to Buffalo, Buffalo to Sioux Falls, going to drive 400 miles in one day. Going to go talk to some people. Going back and fly to Colorado and fly home. He goes, why do you do that? It's ridiculous. They ask you to speak a lot in L. You don't have to go out of town. I go, you know what? When you get it, you'll get it why we do what we do because this is what works for me. I'm not going to start changing what I do. This is what worked. I am doing what my sponsor said. This is you should do. This is what's being asked of you. You do it in that level. Twice I stopped speaking. I didn't speak for over a year one time and then 15 months another time I didn�t speak and I didn �t miss speaking at all. I don't miss this. As long as I know that I get to be a member in good standing of Alcoholics Anonymous, that I gets to do what's asked of me, that i get to participate as much as possible because I have an amazing life as a result of it. I got a great life. I mean I got great wife. I've got a place to live. I had a job turn into a career. I get to travel all over the place. I have a lot of great stuff. The miracle of my life is that I'm sober and And I've known that since March 5th of 1983. That's when I knew that. I've been sober since November 6, 1980. I've know that since march 5th, 1983. Because that's the day my sponsor, Donald Madden, the late great Donald Maddon, first time he asked me to give him a cake was on March 5, 1983 we went to the Wednesday night wrist slashers meeting and it was an appropriately named meeting this was an interesting bunch And we went there, and I gave him his cake. And he got up, and he said, my name is Donald Madden, and I'm an alcoholic. And the miracle of my life is that I'm sober, and who needs to know that as me? And he sat down. And it was like he branded it in my head. And that November 6th, when I turned three in 1983, I asked him to give me a cake at the Wednesday night wrist slashers meeting. And I got up. He gave me the cake. And I said, I'm Donald Madnen, and I got back up, I got out, and I said my name's Earl Hightower, and I'm a alcoholic. And the miracle of my life is that I'm sober, and who needs to know that as me. And I sat down. And I said to him next to me, he looked at me and he went that was wonderful. I said yeah you said it here last March. Oh well yes of course I did. And that's the way it works around here man. That's the truth for me. I hope you find what you need here and that you stay with us. It's a great ride man. I help you stick with it. Thanks a lot. Thank you.