The Aer Lingus Cabin Crew Were Like Sherpas Pushing Drink Carts at a 45-Degree Angle – Paul M.

Thank you. Thank you. I don't know what happened and how it is today. Hopefully by about 10, 30, quarter to 11, I should be able to wrap it all up. I know this may come as a shock to some people, but I'm not from the neighborhood here originally. It's about 25 years now since I left my native Cuba. And, yeah. I'm from Ireland originally, and that's probably the reason. Let's put the Irish guy up first. Nobody knows what he's saying anyway, you know. You know, is he speaking Gaelic? Is he speaking in tongues? What's going on here? And I... The first step of Alcoholics Anonymous. I know you can't drink 24 hours a day, seven days a week. I know that. But let me say it this way. If alcohol was a place, I wanted to be in that place all the time. If I wasn't in that place, I wanted to be going to it or talking about it when I was there. Booze consumed me 24-7 all the time. One drink created a thirst that I couldn't quench. If another man had done to me what alcohol had done to me, I'd have killed him with my bare hands. Booze took me to the cleaners. I used to get a lot of mental gymnastics. You know, was that a symptom looking for disease? I don't know. You know, we get into a lot of mental gymnastics in Alcoholics Anonymous. You know, the old egg conundrum. What came first, the chicken or the keg, you know? There's a few alcoholics who got drunk trying to figure that one out, you know? I started drinking on a regular basis when I was 14 or 15. But I had a couple of skirts. I had a couple of skirmishes with alcohol as a younger kid. And maybe I'll just offer them for your perusal. I was about nine years of age and we were on vacation or on holidays with my family in a place called Newcastle County Down, made famous by Percy French, where the mountains of Mourne sweep down to the sea. And as would happen back then, my mother would take my sister down to the shops and my father and his friends took the boys and we went into the bar, me and my sister. And my older brother, he was 10, I was perhaps nine. And we were drinking endless Coca-Cola and eating endless chips. But that wasn't good enough for this guy. I started going around and I was sneaking people's drinks. And the result of this surreptitious drinking, they had a little stage like this because it's some live music. And apparently the story goes, at about nine years of age, I'm drunk, I get up on the stage and I sing Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. And I fall off the stage and have to be carried out of the bar. I could pretty much end my story right there. That's pretty much what happened every time I drank. I drank, I fell down and I had to get carried out. I mean, not the Chitty Chitty Bang part, but who knows in the blackout, they go, oh, there goes that Irish guy. Every time he's drunk, he thinks he's Dick Van Dyke, you know? You know? But alcohol, as I said, took me to the cleaners. I mean, I understand today. If we do enough looking into it, we could perhaps figure out why we took the first drink. Inquisitive, peer pressure, a rite of passage. But why the compulsive drinking? Only God knows that and he's not telling. Why is it five or six people can drink and get away with it and there'll be one who's an alcoholic who can't? Why does one drink? Why does one create a thirst that I can't quench? Why did alcohol, the pursuit of it, take me, not up to, but into the gates of death and insanity? You know, I started drinking as a kid, as I said, on a regular basis at 14 or 15 years of age. And the sort of an alcoholic I was, there was no graduation period. I was right into it from day one. I was the sort of a guy you might see laying in your front garden on a Friday. I don't know how many of you are watching this, but I was a little bit of a fan. I was a little bit of a fan. I was a little bit of a fan. I was a little bit of a fan. I'll give you one synopsis on how drinking affected me. When I grew up in Northern Ireland, I was a soccer fanatic. I lived and breathed soccer. And there was a guy from not too far from where I lived who was a world-famous soccer player. His name was George Best. And every kid in the neighborhood wanted to be the next George Best. I played soccer morning, noon, and night. I played soccer morning, noon, and night. Until something happened in my life. I took a drink. I don't think I kicked a soccer ball five times after that. That tells you the effect that alcohol had on me. When I took alcohol, everything within a short space of time went on the back burner. And that's what alcohol will do if you're out here tonight. It'll take your job. It'll take your car. It'll take your wife. It'll take the shirt off your back. But what it really wants is me, six feet under. I believe of all diseases, this is the most terminal. If I hadn't stopped drinking, drinking would have stopped me. That's not some theory I've come up with. I'm not around alcoholics now almost a long time, but I'm around here long enough to know what happens when this disease gets you in the crosshairs. It will kill me with or without drinking my body. I don't need booze in my body to destroy my life. I almost did it with untreated alcoholism because I wouldn't put it on. I wouldn't put it on. I wouldn't put it on. I wouldn't put it on. I wouldn't put it on. I wouldn't put it on. I wouldn't put it on. I wouldn't put it on. I wouldn't put it on. Because I wouldn't put the rest of these principles in my life. But first things first, the drinking has to stop. Now why is it for a guy like me, if you'd have told me when I was 14 or 15 years of age where I was going to end up 15 years later, I wouldn't have believed you. I know it's at this time of the year. And like Dickens' book, Christmas Charle, if the ghost of my Christmas, if the ghost of my alcoholic future, would have came along and said, come here, I want to show you something, and rubbed the window and said, look in there, you see that guy who's sitting in there drinking around the clock against his own will? You see that guy whose quicksand stretches around all around him? You see that guy who's burnt every bridge? You see that guy who's put everybody out of his life who mattered anything in his life? You see that guy who's drinking against his own will? I wouldn't have believed you. As I said, if another man had done to me what alcohol had done. But that's what we take. We come in here, as our book says, the 12 and 12, under the lash of alcoholism. Beaten down. I mean, my 8-year-old daughter, for me to take a drink at this stage in my life, it was like getting into the ring with a heavyweight champion. My 8-year-old daughter could say, excuse me, don't get in the ring. But don't get in the ring means don't take a drink. And I can't. I kept getting back in the ring. I'll bob, I'll weave, I'll stay off the ropes. And as we know, as it says in our book, it's one more attempt at drinking, followed by one more failure at not drinking, followed by one more attempt at not drinking, ad infinitum. Booze cut me with a collar as a young age. I converted to the starting blocks. You see, I never want to look in. I never wanted to blame. I never wanted to look at the alcohol. I thought the alcohol was doing for me what I couldn't. I thought the alcohol was doing for me what I couldn't do for myself. I can identify so much with Bill Wilson, but he doesn't say it in his story in the big book, but he goes into detail. When he was shipping out to World War I, and he said they had a party up in, it might have been Plattsburgh, or they were shipping out the young officers, and they had a party at one of the finer houses in the town. And he's at the party, and you can see photographs of Bill Wilson there on the, earlier on, 6'3", 6'4", tall, gangly, felt out of place, he's at this party, he feels awkward, he feels socially inept, back against the wall, and then he says the magic happened. Somebody put a drink into his hand. He said before he took the drink, he felt like he was being dragged over and introduced to people. But when he took that drink, it felt like people were being introduced to him. I know that feeling. The closest thing to spiritual awakening, for me, that actually wasn't one, was drinking booze. It was this close. It looked like the real deal. It felt like the real deal. You'd have thought it was the real deal, but it wasn't. It was bogus. It was counterfeit. It was phony. Just like Carl Jung said to Bill Wilson, the same root word, spirit, for the highest human experience and the lowest form of depravity. I backed the wrong horse. I remember I took that drink for the first time. As I said there, for the first time on a regular basis when I was 14 or 15 years of age. It was unbelievable. I don't realize that booze is doing this for me. I don't realize that the stone's coming out of the shoe, the knot's coming out of the stomach. As this drink's going down, all the boxes are being checked. The low self-esteem gone. The awkwardness gone. I could be everything I thought you wanted me to be. And for a chronic people pleaser with low self-esteem, it was a magic elixir. But when I look back on it now, I made a Faustian bargain. I made a deal with the devil. Booze will give you a lift. It'll give me a lift. But when it comes time to pay the freight, watch out. And the merchant of Venice, Shalawak, but just wanted one pound of flesh, not this disease. It wants a whole lot and then some. I've seen people drink again and alcoholics and almost, I thought would never drink again. But you couldn't tell me at our 15, 16 years of age. I'm drinking. I'm getting away with it. Booze is doing for me what I couldn't do for myself. I drank because of a lack of. I didn't know that before I came to AA. You could have said to me at the end of my drinking, I'll give you 20 minutes. Tell us what your problem is. I would have talked above it. I would have talked below it. I would have talked around. I would have came nowhere near it. I can tell you in three words tonight what my problem is. What my problem always was. Lack of power. I sought power in alcohol. I sought power in people and places and things. For whatever reason, I don't know and I've stopped trying to figure it out. I end up with a hole in my soul. And I try to fill it with booze and people and places that talk about that union. That connection. That connection. Wanting to be complete. Wanting to be together. When I took that drink in the early days, it was unbelievable. You'd have thought it was a spiritual awakening. Because I was physically and mentally and spiritually and emotionally in the one place at the one time. And I thought to myself, this is it. I will not be without this stuff. And I hitched my wagon to a star called alcohol and I rode it to the precipice. And where I ended up, 15 years later, it talks about in our book, you'll come to know loneliness like few people will. The thoughts of life with drink terrified me. And the thoughts of life without drink terrified me. As our book calls it, the jumping off place. I admit to my inner, I had to come to Alcoholics Anonymous at 30 years of age. Rock bottom. Ego crushed by alcohol. To finally concede to my innermost self, which most people don't know. Which most people don't know. Which most people don't know. Which most people don't know. Which most people don't know. Which most people don't know. Which most people don't know. Which most people had suspected for years. I'm powerless over alcohol. And what does that mean for a guy like me? I got a body that won't let me drink and a mind that won't let me stop. My life's unmanageable, drunk or sober, if I'm running it. And I had both hands on the wheel in a death grip. Alcohol had been mismanaging my life for years and I couldn't see it. Even close up to the end, I thought alcohol was holding me together when in actual fact, it was drugged me. It was dragging me apart. Alcohol became a common denominator in my life. Every decision I made was divided through drink at least once. At the end up, it would have been going from here to the strip. Is there enough booze to get me there? Enough to get me when I get there and enough to get me back. And when you live your life under those parameters as we do, your life gets smaller and smaller and you just jettison things. You jettison people, places, things. I'm sitting on a hot August morning drinking around the clock against my own will and thank God for Bill Wilson and Dr. Bob Smith that there's a place. This time right now, 78 years ago, Bill Wilson was working on his first step. This time, 78 years ago, Bill Wilson was, on his last drunk. This time, 78 years ago, our futures hung in the balance. It could have went either way. But thank God for us, it went the way it went. And Bill Wilson, booze filled him completely. Invested everything in drink and had that spiritual awakening in Towns Hospital and went looking for another alcoholic. The first word of the first step, the most important. We were in this lifeboat together. I drink, we stay sober. If I'm doing Alcoholics Anonymous alone, I'm not doing Alcoholics Anonymous. And that's what helped me get that first step. People came to me and shared their experience and their strength and their hope. How they drank, how they get sober and how I might get sober. And it's not what we have here tonight. It's not what Alcoholics Anonymous is. It's hope in human form. We'd rather see a sermon than hear one. People get people sober. God works through people. And we can sit at this moment in time and trace right back to that moment in time of Bill Wilson and Dr. Bob Smith. The good news for us is that there's life after booze because of Alcoholics Anonymous. As I said, they're 15 or 16 years of age and my life's falling apart. I grew up in Northern Ireland. It was the height of the troubles over there, the war that was going on. And that just fed my denial. My life's falling apart, but I don't want to look in. I want to look out. I'm into the blame game. I'm a finger pointer. I don't think I'm the problem. You're the problem. I'm blaming Northern Ireland. I'm a Catholic from the wrong side of the tracks. Can't get a break. And I'm always looking. That's the story of my life. That's why I drank alcohol. I was always looking for an outside fix for what's really an inside job. You get to Alcoholics 101, you find out, it starts from within. I was always like, if I can get the right this and the right this and the right that, then my drinking will fall into place. I didn't realize that I headed around the wrong way. Now, it was only when I stopped drinking that things out there started to fall into place. My life's falling apart and I'm drunk. I'm drunk. I'm drunk. I'm drunk. I'm drunk. Drinking now. I started off, I've experienced every form of drinking. I was a weekend drinker as a kid. And I was a daily drinker. Then became a morning drinker. For years, binge drinker. At the end of it, I was a periodic alcoholic. And you know that equation. The drunks get longer and the peer between them gets shorter. So I'm drinking against my own will. But this stage of my life, I'm looking for that outside fix for the inside job. My life's falling apart in Northern Ireland. And I said to my father, I said, Sir Darren, I've got some bad news for you. I says, I'm going to America. And don't try and talk me out of it. He says, talk you out of it will help you pack when you're leaving. On you go, Columbus. Let me give you some fatherly advice. Turn left at Greenland, you know. And for an alcoholic like me, it powers over alcohol. I hopped on the only airline to fly if you're an alcoholic. Aer Lingus, Ireland's national airline, you know. The plane's still going down the runway. And already the cabin crew's getting the drinks carts out, you know. The plane's at like a 45 degree angle. And the cabin crew are like Sherpas, pushing the carts up this incline, you know. And everybody's ringing their bell, looking booze. You think, you know, a pinball machine rather than an airplane, you know. And it's amazing how the alcoholic, and it's so true. Even though I won't admit that I'm an alcoholic, alcohol is making all my decisions for me. It's like this built-in GPS system. I end up in a neighborhood. It's funny how alcoholics are. You could blindfold me or put me in a sack. I ain't going to end up in a neighborhood that drinks as much, if not more, than the one I left. And I end up in a place called Rockaway Beach, New York, you know. And you talk to a lot of old-timers from New York, and they go, oh, Rockaway Beach. It's a big Irish-American neighborhood. They go, oh, Rockaway Beach, the Irish Riviera. It should have been called Cirrhosis by the Sea. They had more alcoholics. And that's what I do. What I do as an alcoholic, the matter, this disease, it's in me. It's intrinsically in me. And what that allows me to do, I got a job as a bartender. I'm talking about, I worked in one of the craziest bars in New York City. In fact, six weeks ago, the bar took on probably about eight feet of water. I guarantee you none of the customers even realized, you know. They're probably like, why is the jukebox floating down by the pool table, you know. But what this working in this bar allowed me to do with this first step of alcoholic synonymous, which is what I always did, it allowed me to move the line of scrimmage. There was people in that bar that were drinking at six o'clock in the morning. That made it okay for me to drink at six o'clock in the morning. And this powerlessness over alcohol and my life just becoming more and more manageable. And it's incredible, the stamina. It's incredible what we will put up with for to defend our drinking. I almost went to the graveyard defending my right to drink. Booze almost killed me. And here I am just to find it. I'm rationalizing it. And the first drink will always come again. As I said, I ran through this weekend drinking, daily drinking, morning drinking. And then I end up there. At that period. Periodic part of my life. And I would stop drinking. Now I'm putting X's on calendars. I'm stopping for this. I'm stopping for that. I know booze is the problem. You see, up until this moment in time, up until I came to alcoholic synonymous, up until this moment in time, right now, tonight, I have never beaten an obsession to drink. By myself. We do together what I can't do alone. That's why an alcoholic. Like me. If I'm going to recover from the first step of alcoholic synonymous, I cannot do this alone. I need something between me and the first drink. Self-knowledge. Even pain. I'm the alcoholic that it talks about in that book. And the classifications and the doctor's opinion. After a period free from alcohol and paraphrasing things so you can drink again without impunity. That's me. For whatever reason. I'd be off booze for a while. And the thought would come to drink. You see, now I have something between me and the first drink. Before I came to alcoholic synonymous, the thought would become an obsession. The obsession would become a reality. And once the clock started ticking on that sequence of events, I had no way of stopping the clock. I have a way today because I'm a part of. We do together what I can't do alone. I need, if you're new here tonight, get something between you and the first. Drink or you'll drink again or go off a bridge because you can't live with yourself. Before I came to alcoholic synonymous, I had nothing between me and the first drink tonight. I have unity. We do together what I can't do alone. In the lifeboat here together. I'm in service in alcoholic synonymous. Freely given what was freely given to me. And I'm in a program of recovery. Before I came to alcoholic synonymous. Yes, I was sitting on the fence and the wind blows the wrong way and I'm drinking again. People say, oh, I'm an arm's length away from a drink. I'm 12 steps away from a drink. I just can't get drunk because I'm in Las Vegas. But I can backtrack through those steps right back to step one and drink again. Self-knowledge will not keep an alcoholic of my variety sober. Thank God for the rest of the program. Because for an alcoholic like me, step one is a death sentence. If this is a one-step program, I'm a dead man. The good news is that I'm powerless over alcohol and my life's unmanageable and I will drink again. The good news for me as an alcoholic, because of Bill Wilson and Dr. Bob Smith, that the governor's on the phone with a pardon. That I'm not going to die. Because of the rest of the program of alcoholic synonymous. And I think about Bill Wilson and the self-knowledge. I love that story. Maybe you're familiar with it. And I can identify so much. He's in the house. He's not drinking. Irritable. Discontent. I'll be like that. I'll try to stop drinking. I'll be walking back in the house. Somebody, Susan referred at one time. She says, you know what you're like? You're like a caged panther. Walking back and forth, back and forth. Trying to stay off drink by myself. Bill Wilson was the same way. And Lois says, why don't you go off and play golf? So, okay. Gets to clubs. Lived in Brooklyn Heights. Heads over to Staten Island to play golf. Maybe you're familiar with the story. He's on the bus. Starts talking to the guy next to him. And he probably is alcoholic. At this stage now, this is when Bill Wilson, before he went on his last drunk. This is November 11th, 1934. He probably steered the conversation. I've done this. Steered the conversation around alcohol. Alcohol. Tells the guy next to him, oh, I don't drink. And I can't drink. And this happened to me. And I've been hospitalized three times for drinking. And this has happened. This happened. The guy is listening intently to Bill Wilson recounting all these escapades that he's had with his alcoholism. The bus breaks down. They have to go in and wait in a bar for the bus, another bus to come along. This is the part I feel a little annoyed about. The bartender's Irish. And the bartender says, oh, Armistice Day, November 11th. Drinks are on the house. And Bill Wilson, I don't know what he was drinking, a glass of milk with a sandwich, pushes it to the one side and has a glass of whiskey. And the guy who was sitting with him on the bus says, you just told me for the last half an hour that you can't drink. And the reasons why you can't drink. And you give me all this evidence. And here you are. And Bill Wilson says, well, I must be crazy. Because without alcoholics synonymous, I have nothing between me and the first drink. Without alcoholics synonymous, a thought becomes an obsession. And I'll drink again. I drank, when I look back on it, the writing was on the wall even as a young guy. I was 18 or 19 years of age. And I was a young man. I'm drinking in a bar in Northern Ireland. And this was a in the bar. And this guy was looking in the mirror. And he could see me. And I ordered a drink. I don't think I turned 20. And I get the drink. And I'm like this. And this guy came down the bar. And I sort of knew him. And he said, you can tell me to mind my own business. But that's some shake in your hand for a young guy your age. And I said, I'm not going to drink. I'm going to be a drinker. And I said, OK. And as Bill Wilson says about reading that gravestone of Winchester Cathedral, ominous warning indeed. Because that guy had my number at 19 years of age where I was going ahead with alcohol. As I said, they're the powerlessness and the unmanageability. And the thing just unravels before you. And things just get worse. And they get progressively worse. The good news in alcoholics synonymous. OK. As far down as you go with drink, I believe you can come back up and even then summon alcoholic tsunamis. I'm not going to stand up here tonight like some snake oil salesman and promise you the moon and the stars. There's things that I lost through drinking. They're not coming back. There's things that you lost through drinking. They're not coming back either. But because of alcoholic tsunamis, I can live with the past. I've come to terms with the past so I can live in the present for the future, which is the rest of today. Left to my own devices, I will drink again. As I said, the way, the unity. I love alcoholic tsunamis because they come here all various. James Joyce has got a great line from one of his books. He's talking about Dublin, but it's so indicative of what happens here in alcoholic tsunamis. He says, here comes everybody. You look around here, gender, color, creed. Most of the people in this room tonight, I don't know, but when you tell me you're an alcoholic, I know enough. I know you've experienced terror, frustration, bewilderment, and despair. I know you put a drink to your lips as the tears roll down your face and you drank it anyway. I know that friends and family and loved ones pleaded with you not to drink, and you drank. Because that's what happened to me. And we had that together. That shared experience. Under the lash of alcoholism, we come in here together. And we're in this lifeboat together, sharing experience and strength and hope. Kindred spirits on that road of happy destiny. Trudging it, one alcoholic helping another. I love that, that wee part of the first step. When Bill Wilson had that vision in a few days time, in 1934, and he had that vision of a chain of drunks, not just around New York, not just around the Northeast, but a chain of drunks around the world. One drunk helping another. And that's what I said to myself, even the first step, how strong is my link in the chain? I'm so sorry. How strong is my link in the chain? Is it strong that people going ahead of me? Is it strong that people coming behind me? I believe that the powerlessness of this alcoholic, I'm more powerless over alcohol, today, than when I first came into Alcoholics Anonymous. When I first came into AA, all I was aware of was the physical pain that I was in. Just get the you know what off my back. But today I realize, through sobriety, just like drinking, give me a full knowledge of my condition while drinking. Being sober, give me a full knowledge of my condition of alcoholism. That alcohol not only cleaned my clock as regards physical, but mentally, and spiritually, and emotionally, I was bankrupt in all areas. I came into Alcoholics Anonymous, and I'm so glad for the wee portion. Because I'm here as a recipient of another alcoholic working his program. And he came, and that was a turning point in my life. I mean, I worked in a crazy bar, as I said, in New York. And I'd heard about Alcoholics Anonymous. We'd always, somebody in the bar, there was always somebody at the farm, drying out. And, in fact, this one guy came into the bar one time, and we hadn't seen him for a while. Just shows you the sort of bar I worked in. His name was Hole in the Head. And he used to call his son, Little Hole in the Head. He's probably in therapy somewhere right now, and, and nobody had seen Hole in the Head for a while. And he comes into the bar one night, and we're all sitting there, and we're all alcoholics. I'm behind the bar, you know. And he says, somebody says, John, where have you been? He says, you want to know where I've been? I've been to Alcoholics Anonymous. And the whole bar felt, felt quiet. Even the, even the jukebox turned itself off, you know. And he says, you want to know what happens at Alcoholics Anonymous? And we're all like, yeah, what happens at Alcoholics Anonymous? He goes, you got to go in there, and you stand up in front of the whole room, you tell them you're an alcoholic, and you never want to drink again. And you could feel all the oxygen being sucked out of the bar, as everybody took a deep breath, you know. But later on, I remember Alcoholics Anonymous, when I was 30 years of age, as I said, I became a periodic alcoholic. And these drunks got worse and worse. I started to have convulsions and seizures. I ended up in restraining sheets, strapped to beds, and I would drink again, and I would drink again. They talk about the alcoholic being the bewildered one. Nobody was any more bewildered than me. Why am I, I would sit there, after coming off these drunks, and I'd think to myself, I wasn't a sociopath. I'd say to myself, why? Why is this happening to me? And this is the best that I could come up with before I came to AA. Lack of morals, I'm a bad seed. Lack of willpower, if I had more willpower, I could have half a dozen drinks like that guy, and go home. Lack of discipline, and then my old ace in the hole, punishment from God. If it wasn't for him, I wouldn't have all this bad luck. I got the Alcoholics Anonymous, and I found out none of those reasons are true. I drink alcoholically for a long time, because alcohol worked. Unfortunately for me, it stopped working, and booze failed me completely. And I was sitting in my apartment, and this is what alcohol does to a guy, like this is where I ended up. And I ended up in hospitals and so forth. And I remember one time, and Susan will tell you this, I collapsed in a bar. I'd been drinking at home, and I must have run out of booze. And I collapsed, I went to a bar, I drank more, collapsed in the bar in an alcoholic seizure. And I woke up in a restraining sheet in the hospital, and eventually they took the restraining cups off. And Susan was at my bedside, and I says to her, I don't know why I can't drink, but it's obvious I can't drink. And that's it, I'm done. I'm finished. I will never, ever, drink again. If you'd have got an oath, I would have signed it in blood. That's it, I'm finished. When we left that hospital, but you see, I didn't have unity. I didn't have service. I didn't have recovery. I didn't know about the doctor's opinion. I didn't know that out of body it wouldn't let me drink, and in mind it wouldn't let me stop. I didn't realize that this physical allergy to alcohol, that creates a thirst I can't quench, when I take the first sip, and I don't realize any of this stuff. So I come out of that hospital, I don't have unity. I don't have service. I don't have recovery. I don't have 12 steps away from a drink. It's just me against alcohol. And here's what happens to me. Even after an event like that, here's what happens to me when I leave. About a week goes by, I get a stone in my shoe. I don't know where it comes from, but it's there all the time. About two weeks go by, I get a stone in my shoe. I don't know where it comes from, but it's there all the time. About two weeks go by, I get a stone in my shoe. I don't know where it comes from, but it's there all the time. I get this knot in my stomach. About three weeks go by, the top button feels tight all the time. About a month goes by, it feels like everybody out there is on my case, eating it or not. Put an X in the calendar. I'm drinking again. Now I haven't had a drink in my body for 30 days. Is that a drinking problem? No, that's a living sober problem. And I found out the hard way that there's a difference between giving up and letting go. I gave up many times, but letting go was different. Letting go was letting you into my life. Letting go was coming to Alcoholics Anonymous and putting my hand up and saying, my name is Paul and I'm an alcoholic. Because that tells me who I am and what I am and where I am and most importantly, what I need to be doing. Walking through the doors of Alcoholics Anonymous is the greatest singular event in my life because unbeknownst to myself, I was moving from the problem to the solution. I came in here and it's not the grace of God. You come in here in the worst night of your life and you're given the grace not to drink. And I'm here as a recipient of a 12-step call through a non-alcoholic, Susan, not me. I didn't make the call. I was out of my mind. At this stage of my drinking, when I drank, I wouldn't eat. So at this stage, I'm drinking. I'm in the apartment for about two weeks. I haven't had solid food in maybe 12 or 13 days. Here's a recipe for unhappiness. Lock yourself in an apartment, drink around the clock and listen to blues music. That's what I used to do. And the sadder the song, the better I felt. Some of my favorites was like, B.B. King, nobody loves me but my mother and she may be jiving me too. I'd be like, yes, B.B. I'm right with you. Or The Great Warren's Yvonne. If you don't leave me, I'll find somebody that will. I'd sit there and it's amazing. At one time in my drinkin', I would watch people goin' to work and comin' home and sittin' there drinkin' and I'll look at them almost like, look at these aunts marchin' off and almost looking down my nose at them. But the end of my drinkin', I'll say, I realized I'm sitting in an apartment and I want to be part of that. But I have separated myself. There is a conscious separation. Because when at the age of my drink, I lost everything. Because I lost me and I lost you and I lost him. And I see these people going. And I wanted to be where they were. I wanted to be part of that. But I realized that I had ostracized myself. That I could not be where they are. Alcoholics and alms, as Bill Wilson says, it's a bridge back to life. And that's what AA did. It built a bridge from where I was sitting in an apartment back to life. Doing life on life's terms. The good, the bad, and the indifferent. And as I said, there was a guy who came out. A guy who was sober a long time. And he came to my house. And for the first time, I thought I was the worst drunk in town. And this guy drank himself. And he was a drunk. In their district jackets. In places like Bellevue Hospital. Rockland State Mental Hospital. And he told me. I worked in a bar. I had seen drinking up close and personal. But I had no idea of what alcoholism was. And he met me. As only one alcoholic can meet another. The doctor treats the physical symptoms. The clergyman looks for the lack of religious conviction. The therapist. And the psychiatrist treats the causes and the effects. And the alcoholic dies drunk. Because nobody can get him sober. Are those things important? Yes. But first things first. And this guy met me where I lived. This wasn't somebody talking. This was somebody looking me eye to eye and saying, Yeah, I was in a straight check in Bellevue Hospital in 1961. And I'm sober today. And you can be too. This is what your problem is. You are an alcoholic. And I bought it. Because before he came to the house. I'm sitting there. And I'm drinking. And this note had been put under my door. With this man's telephone number on it. And I'm sitting there. It was a hot August morning. And I'm drinking. I'm in. As I said, quicksand did stretch all around me. I'm in bad space. And I know it. And I pick up the phone. And I called this guy. And he said something very strange. He says, Paul. He says, do you believe in God? And I was like, oh, man. I got Billy Graham coming over to the house, you know. I was going to ask him to pick up a quart on the way over. I can't do that now, you know. But it was strange that he said that. He says, why don't you get down on your knees and say a prayer. I'm on my way over to your house. And I'm sitting there. I thought about God. See, God and I had parted ways many years. Many years before. Because what is lack of power was my dilemma. Alcoholics and anomalous. There's a solution to your problems. And there's always the next step. If I'm powerless and unmanageable, I needed a power that could manage my life. And I'm sitting there because, you see, I had contempt. As it says in the big book of Alcoholics and Anomalous, contempt prayer to investigation. You're looking at it. See, I grew up in Northern Ireland where people killed each other outside the front door over who had the biggest God. We were burned out of our house at the height of the troubles one night by the opposing power militaries. I said, God, you never come down our street very often, but you can go on ahead. I thought that was real slick and cute. But desperate times cause for desperate measures. When you're out of options, and I was out of options, on August 19th, 1992, I indeed knew my master, and it was John Barley Cohn. Everything was gone, and everybody was gone. Everybody was gone. And it was just me. And it's something when you're sitting there, and everything's gone, and everybody's gone, and you realize that you've backed the wrong horse. And I had. I had invested everything in drink. And pushed away people who loved me for drink. It's amazing. And, I got down on my knees for the first time in probably 15 years. And I said, is there anything out there? Please help me. And I felt like someone walked up behind me and took a weight off my shoulders. I had a serious sense of peace came over me that I've never experienced before since. I started to worry and fret, and this other feeling kept suppressing that I'm sitting on the floor totally at peace. And the door knocked, and Jerry came to the door. He was from the old South Bronx group, and they had a mantra, we don't give up on anybody. And I came in, I told him, what I just told you. He says, Paul, you're the spiritual experience. It will get you sober, but it won't keep you sober. We gotta get you to Alcoholics Anonymous, the unity of the way. I was too sick to go then, but four days later, I went to my first meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous. And I haven't, we haven't taken a drink from that day to now. And the longest I was ever off drink before I came to Alcoholics Anonymous was six weeks. And I wasn't off drink. I was either thinking about a drink, drinking a drink, or coming off a drunk. Booze consumed. It consumed me 24-7. I'm free today. The thing that I always wanted from alcohol, I thought alcohol was liberating. My sponsor called it that two drinks smooth, when you're just sitting there and everything's okay. Being in control and out of control all at the same time, it's amazing, but it wasn't. It was false, bogus, and phony. I finally got liberated in Alcoholics Anonymous. I finally got free from the one guy I couldn't get free from, which is me. I finally started to live in the one place that I'd never lived before, which is today. Because of Alcoholics Anonymous. And I thought I knew about freedom. In Northern Ireland, we fought in the streets for freedom. We talked about freedom. We sang about freedom. I wouldn't have known freedom if it jumped up beside me. But I'm free today because of Alcoholics Anonymous. Because I got unity in service and recovery. I can get on a plane and fly almost 3,000 miles to be here with you. Those are freedoms I didn't have at the end of my drinking. And it's amazing how when you come into Alcoholics Anonymous, how that first step, it made my life smaller and smaller and smaller, with less people in it. And the minute I came into Alcoholics Anonymous, the exact opposite started to happen. It was no I anymore. It was we. And when you think about it, the loneliness of the alcoholic. You sit in a room and you hear someone talking about being in a crowded bar and being totally alone, and their heads will go up and down. And I would think about my drinking. And I would want to say to somebody, I'm living in a place like New York. I'm walking around Manhattan, one of the most populated places on the planet. And I feel so alone, so bereft of spirit. And I want to say to somebody, excuse me, I'm going to go to the bathroom. I'm going to go to the bathroom. I'm going to go to the bathroom. And I want to say to somebody, excuse me, I want to stop drinking so bad. But when I drink, things just go to black and white. And I can't live in a black and white world. I don't want to drink for two weeks around the clock. I just want to have a couple of drinks to take the age off. But the last time I took a drink, I ended up in a hospital. I want to say that to somebody, but I don't know how to put the words and music to that. I don't know how to articulate that. So what do I do? I drink some more and try to push it down some more. And that's why when I come into Alcoholics Anonymous, it's amazing what we do. I'm totally neurotic. Anybody that gets into contact with me is also. I mean, because what separates us? I will say this. I bartended for many years. And I would be, how would you say, mildly inquisitive about the heavy drinker. I worked in a bar where you had alcohol abusers of the first water. But like it says in our book, they can stop if there's sufficient reason for it. A medical reason. A romantic reason. And they can stop. But not us alcoholics. We keep returning to the problem because we don't know what the solution is. I was a guy who used to drink in the bar where I worked. And he was a carpenter in the 608. And he was just sitting there one night. And all the rest of the guys that he'd come up through with were all settled down, bought houses. He was sitting with the next bunch of apprentices. He says, I can't do this anymore. He just pushed the money over. He hasn't taken a drink since. A heavy drinker, absolutely. An alcohol abuser. And that's the thing about Alcoholics Anonymous. It helped me put my life together and the people around me. Because even a heavy drinker, families can deal with that. It mightn't be a leave it to be of existence. But they can deal with that. Yeah, dad goes out, watches the football game on a Sunday, gets drunk. They can live with that. Not the alcoholic. Because they don't know who's going to come home. Is it Jekyll? Mr. Hyde? What's coming home? What personality is going to walk through the door? That's why when I hit Alcoholics Anonymous, I was neurotic. Anybody who was close to me was the same way. But thank God the healing process that takes place in here. But this is the only disease in the world where the patient has to diagnose himself. And I was glad that I found out. Unfortunately, it took me to drink until there was almost nothing left. And booze have failed me completely that I was willing to admit. And why is that with us alcoholics? I don't know. But the good news is that people can come in here and their bottoms can be raised up to meet them. And that's a wonderful thing. Because if you're an alcoholic, there's nothing out there for you but pain, trouble, and misery. I'm here to tell you there's life after booze. And it's in here in Alcoholics Anonymous. This is the last thing I tried and the first thing that ever worked. And I tried many ways of stopping drinking. And not only Alcoholics Anonymous allowed me to. I said I've bridged back to life. I'm able to be consistent. I'm able to show up. I'm able to be a father, a husband, all the things that I couldn't be before I came to AA. I was just saying earlier on at dinner. Came into AA 30 years of age. 32 years of age. Didn't even have a high school diploma. I bartended my way through school. Got a degree. Got a couple of master's degrees. Became a school teacher. You cannot get where I am today from where I came from without Alcoholics Anonymous. You just can't. It's an impossible journey. But I come here because I want to see your journey too. I know how the movie goes but I wouldn't miss it for the world. Seeing people coming in here and putting their lives together. Seeing people beaten down under the lash of alcoholism and crawling in here. And slowly but surely coming back one day at a time. One step at a time. I don't care if you're sitting out there tonight. And we're going to have a lot of people talking this weekend about various steps. But I don't care how deep you are. I don't care how deep you are. You hear people say you go 10 miles into the forest. You got to go 10 miles out. I don't believe it in AA. I don't care how deep and how dark and how painful that forest you're in right now is. As far as I'm concerned, you're just 12 steps away from a brand new life. You hear people saying Alcoholics Anonymous. Oh, I came to AA and I got my life back. I don't want my life back. It sucked. It sucked. I got a whole brand new life here in Alcoholics. Anonymous. And I felt very nervous up here tonight because there's a great amount of great speakers coming up behind me over the weekend. But my wife doesn't buy into this. My wife's a non-alcoholic. I'm telling her about all the different speakers. My wife thinks being a good speaker in Alcoholics Anonymous is like being the tallest of the seven dwarfs, you know? Might have a lot of cachet in here, a lot of panache, but not a whole lot out there. But you're looking at a guy here tonight that's not at the customer service desk wanting to return this gift. And sobriety is a gift. Believe me. You know? I used to say we're the chosen ones, but no, not really. The guy said to me, no, Paul. God's grace. Grace is like the rain. It falls on everybody. But I don't know when that drop of rain fell on my face on August 19th of 1992, I had that moment of clarity and said, I can't live this way anymore. And the guy down the block drank himself to death. And we're here over this weekend to keep those doors open. Because right now, I guarantee if I left this podium, I wouldn't have to knock on two windows. I wouldn't have to knock on any doors. And I'll find somebody just like I was, drinking themselves to death right now. Oblivious to what's going on here in alcoholic tsunamis. And that's why we must be here to keep that door open for the alcoholic who's here and the alcoholic who still has to come here. Because when that wonderful picture of the man on the bed, it just sums it all up. And we've all been that man or woman on the bed, sitting there, the body language, contracted, confused, bewildered. And the two men sitting there are saying, yes, we have a solution and more than that. Because when the families are sitting tonight around that bed, and they say, what should we do and who should we call? I must raise my hand and say, call me. I mightn't get chosen, but I better be willing to go. Because when I was sitting on August 19th, 1992, that guy who... I've been in alcoholic tsunamis since 1961, who knew Bill Wilson personally, wasn't off in some ivory tower, reminiscing her, whatever. He came over to my house and he carried this message. My message mightn't even keep me sober. This message. And that's what happens here in alcoholic tsunamis. It happened to me that morning. When complete deflation through alcohol meets hope in human form, in alcoholic tsunamis, then recovery can begin. And that's what happened to me. I'm so glad that when that gentleman came to my house, that he didn't have a checklist, because I would have checked the box for not drinking. I've been delighted at that. And I would have sure changed myself up so much. Because I've gotten me back, I've gotten you back, and I've gotten him back. Because of alcoholic tsunamis. It's been a privilege to come to you. To come here tonight. It's been an honor. It's a great blessing. And I'm here to tell you that there's life after booze. I'm here to tell you, if you're struggling, and I believe this, and I believe it so much that I bet my life on it on a daily basis. I believe there's a miracle here with your name on it. Nobody can take it from you. Nobody can take it for you. Come up and get the life that God always wanted you to have before that first step. And the inability to take it took you down a different road. I'm here to tell you, you don't even have to come up. We'll give it to you. Because we have to give it to you to stay sober ourselves. I know we throw the miracle around a lot, but I've seen it in my life. August 19th, 1992. What is a miracle? A miracle is a complete reversal or upheaval of the laws of nature. It's in our nature. We used to be drunk right now, and we're not. And that's because we admitted to ourselves that we couldn't take drink in any shape or form, that our lives were unmanageable, and moved through those steps, and got the life that we always meant to have, and stopped going for that synthetic spiritual experience through booze, and got the real deal through the 12 steps of Alcoholics Anonymous. So I wish you well in your journey, and I hope we do bump into each other again on the highway. I'll be a road. Thank you so much. That's all I'll say tonight. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.