The Committee in Your Head and Who Gets the Front Row – Dr. Paul O.

The House of Representatives, Dr. Jim Ford. Thank you. Let's pray. Almighty and most gracious God, may your blessing be upon us and upon every person who seeks to find justice or peace in our lives or in our world. At this special moment in history, we are thankful for your good gifts that have enriched our lives and given meaning to us. With hearts appreciative for the years past, we pray for this new day and the new opportunities of service. We're grateful for the gifts of family, friends, and colleagues, for the gifts of understanding and tolerance, for the gifts of perseverance, commitment, and integrity, for the gifts of faith, hope, and love. O God, may your spirit visit us and abide in our hearts and minds. Teach us not only to see our own place in the world, but to catch your vision of a world created by the grace of God. May we strengthen each other, support our human bonds, help the needy, comfort the afflicted, and protect the oppressed. May we do such good works in our lives that justice will roll down as waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream. Now bless this food to our use and us to your faithful service, we pray. Amen. I welcome you to the 9th Annual Congressional Luncheon. My name is Ed Chandler and I'm an alcoholic. Amen. This is the 9th Luncheon and it started because a couple of us were going to get together and have lunch over in the Capitol and the first thing you knew, I had a room big enough for 45 people and the first thing I knew we had 55 people and so I got a bigger room and we ended up in this room nine years ago with 179 people for lunch and everyone liked it so much that we made it an annual affair and thus was born the Congressional Luncheon. And I'd like to recognize you for your support and I'd like to recognize with us today and has been, I think, for every one of them, the speaker at the first Congressional Luncheon, Ernie the Attorney. Everyone else has been from out of town but we couldn't afford an out-of-town speaker that year. Ernie came highly recommended and very cheap. I'll explain also the luncheon has developed in a fashion that is obviously an open AA meeting where everyone is welcome to come and over the years people have, brought friends and relatives and employees and bosses to this luncheon so that those not in AA might learn something more about it and I appreciate that personally. I appreciate that. And today I know we have people here who are not members of AA who are our guests and I want to welcome you. There are four or five people in the audience I'd like to recognize if I could. Kind of special guests here today. First is the President of the National Council, Alcoholism and now Drug Dependency, Hamilton Beasley. Hamilton. From the EAP program of the D.C. Public School System, Joe Regis. Josephine. The Alcohol and Drug Program for the National Masonic Foundation, Larry Chisholm. Larry. Former trustee, long-time member of AA, former trustee to Alcoholics Anonymous Board in New York, Garrett Taylor. And perhaps a special, special guest, former D.C. City Council and former drug czar, the Honorable Star, Sterling Tucker. Sterling, nice to have you with us. And all of you who wrote in and got tickets back to the luncheon, I want you to take note of how efficient I was. And those things came right back. And in a moment of honesty, I want to tell you, the reason they came right back is Sheila Burgess and Pam Heidrich who are sitting right here. I thank you a lot. They did all the work. Hell, I never saw your checks, to tell you the truth. So, I want to just one quickly, I want to clarify something quickly. For those of you who come on a regular basis, the chaplain today did not mention my name when he got up here. Every year he was just kind of billed and he would say what a wonderful person I was. Year before last, he even went so far as to say that I was God's right hand. A junior minister, so to speak. And that when he had problems, he called me, the chaplain said. Well, what happened is, I didn't get a date all year after that. And I told him about it. And so last year, he toned it down a little. And this year, he didn't say a damn word. So, I assume I'm back in circulation, I guess. Let me call on now for some welcoming remarks the clerk of the House of Representatives, the Honorable Don Andrews. Don. Thank you very much, Ed. Reverend Chaplain, distinguished guests, friends, my co-workers. I'm delighted to extend a very personal and cordial welcome to the premises of the U.S. House of Representatives. I was thinking about all the events that I've attended in this room for the last 25 years since the building was built. Certainly none more worthy than this event. And I'll tell you why in a moment. Thank you. And also, I think this may be unique among the functions that I've attended for 25 years in this room because I note the conspicuous absence of a bar. A non-alcoholic luncheon or reception on Capitol Hill, I must say, is a bit of culture shock. Particularly for those of us who've been here for 31 years. Though, as a smoker, I must say I'm delighted to see what probably is the last great concentration of smokers in the nation's coffee. We really have to have some little voice, I think. As to why I'm so pleased to be here and to extend on behalf of the House of Representatives my welcome to you is because of the great stock that I, as the employer of a major workforce, more than 550 people, place in the effectiveness and the fundamental worthiness of Alcoholics Anonymous. Those of you who may know me or be associated in some way with the House of Representatives know that since I became clerk of the House some three and a half years ago, I've been trying to establish for the House of Representatives an employee assistance program so that we can provide the care, the kindness, the support, the help to our employees, who have dependencies. Almost from the first week I became clerk I had to deal with the misery and the unhappiness and the uncertainty of members of my workforce who had alcohol and drug dependencies who we either found out about because of their performance or who came looking for help. Had the same percentage, if not perhaps a bit more, of alcohol and drug dependent people. Well, it took almost three years. Some of you know and many of you probably do not realize that just a few weeks ago the Committee on House Administration adopted the proposal of the clerk of the House to establish an employee assistance program for the 12,000 men and women who serve the United States House of Representatives both here in Washington and throughout the 50 states and the territories. And I'm careful to say the clerk's proposal because I'm not looking for credit for it. I'm very proud of it. I feel good about it. It's a matter of great comfort to me and it will be a matter of even greater comfort to those who will take advantage of the services and support that it will render. And some years from now when it's my time to go down the road surely each of us must depart. And I look back on what will then hopefully be a much longer period than I've served already. I've reviewed some of the things that I've been associated with. If there is one thing that I can think of that would be the proudest thing that I have been involved in that I may have touched or influenced in some way it will be the employee assistance program for the United States House of Representatives because as all of you know EAPs save lives, they save marriages, they save families. And when we have to make final accounting of ourselves I mean really what could be a lot of things. I mean really what could be a lot of things. Better than to put forward as something that you've been associated with. So it's a matter of great pride and great happiness to me that the House of Representatives has seen fit to do this. It is the appropriate thing to do. It is the humane thing to do. And if you want to look at it as an accountant, which I am in another sense, it's the cost effective thing to do. And let me assure you that Alcoholics Anonymous and the 12 Steps will be a very prominent part of the employee assistance program for the House of Representatives. We here in our community are very big on AA. We know what it does. We know its success rate. And it will be a very large part of the work we do through our Office of Employee Assistance. With that, again, let me bid you welcome. I'm happy to be here. This is a source of education for me in trying to be an appropriate employer, in trying to be a decent human being, in trying to promote the interests of the workforce, and by the way, the membership of the House of Representatives since they're also entitled to attend if they feel they need to. And it's just a very supportive thing for me to get my batteries charged, to come here and see success, living, breathing success, smiles, people restored to health, happiness, productivity. God bless you, give you strength, and say a prayer for REAP that we get off to a good start and maintain a high level that hopefully will make us a role model for the rest of the government. Thank you very much. Thank you, Don. Alcoholics Anonymous, Recovery and Alcoholics Anonymous is based on 12 suggested steps, and I have asked my friend Alma to read the eight. I'm an alcoholic. Hi, Alma. Alcoholics Anonymous is a fellowship of men and women who share their experience, strength, and hope with each other that they may solve their common problem and help others to recover from alcoholism. The only requirement for membership is a desire to stop drinking. There are no dues or fees for AA membership. We are self-supporting through our own contributions. AA is not allied with any sect, denomination, politics, organization, or institution. It does not wish to engage in any controversy, neither endorses nor opposes any causes. Our primary purpose is to stay sober and help other alcoholics to achieve sobriety. Thank you, Alma. I guess that's it. In keeping with another nine-year-old tradition, I will now call on Hal Elm to introduce the speaker. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Hal Marley. I'm a very grateful alcoholic. Hi, Alma. And as some of you know, I try to live an attitude of gratitude because I've got a lot to be grateful for. I've got a long gratitude list. As I look around this room, I see a lot of old friends which, in my opinion, also have a long gratitude list. It's a pleasure of introducing our speaker. I've had the pleasure of knowing Max and his lovely wife, excuse me, Paul, and his lovely wife, Max. But first things first. Max is a stabilizing influence, as you'll know. At any rate, I've had the pleasure of knowing them for many years. They've spoken together and separately all over the world. Max, for your information, is Black Belt Al-Anon, and she does a terrific job. Paul is indeed a dedicated, active, grateful alcoholic. And that's about the nicest thing I think I can say about any member of AA. Back in the 70s, when Paul and Max were living in the Palm Springs area, Paul started the very first 7 a.m. AA meeting there at the Fellowship Home in Palm Desert, right next to Palm Springs. And he called it the Attitude Adjustment Hour. And many of us visitors, such as I, went there, and we were very impressed about it. I didn't start the meeting here, but various people, visitors in Palm Springs, would go to that meeting, and they'd go back to their home, and they, in turn, started 7 a.m. meetings around the country. And today, it's universal. There's 7 a.m. alcoholic meetings all over the world by the grace of God and Paul Oligar. So Paul is indeed a dedicated member of this Fellowship. Those of you who know page 449 of the Big Book, Paul doesn't need an introduction. And for those of you who don't know page 449, you're going to hear, you're going to hear all about it, because here's the gentleman who wrote it. Please join me in giving Paul a big Washington welcome. Paul? Good afternoon. My name is Paul, sometimes known as Max's husband. And I'm an alcoholic. And I thoroughly enjoy being an alcoholic. Seems like you're introducing people. We ought to at least introduce Max after all that talk. Max, would you stand up? That's enough. That's enough. The Al-Anons are quickly addicted to attention. Don't laugh. Don't laugh. You should never laugh at the Al-Anons. I know there's some Al-Anons in the room. I can feel the vibrations. But you shouldn't laugh at Al-Anons. Our book speaks very kindly of the Al-Anons. It says that they're not at fault. They seem to have been born that way. You should never really laugh at the Al-Anons. I can't talk very long without talking about Max. After all, she drove me to drink for years. It really isn't very funny. It was really pitiful, as a matter of fact. It was really pitiful. And Max and I have been together for quite a while. It's hard to talk without talking about Max because last December we celebrated our 50th wedding anniversary. You're applauding. The program works in that sense for us. It has for us. In fact, we've been together for 64 years. We met at the age of four, in case you're wondering how old I am. In fact, that's an interesting story in itself. When I was four years old, my father, without even asking my opinion, he gave up his job as a druggist in Canton, Ohio, and he bought a house-drugstore combination in Alliance, Ohio. And I literally grew up in a drugstore. And the important part of that was, or one of the important parts of that was that next door was where Max's grandmother lived. Max was an orphan being raised by her grandmother and by one aunt. And the grandmother had two alcoholic sons, so she grew up with two alcoholic uncles. And the aunt that raised her, also had an alcoholic husband, so she grew up with an alcoholism. And indeed, as we were growing up, the two of us were playing together and that my family was concerned. And they didn't really like for me to be playing with the against-line girl. They were afraid that I might grow up and marry her and turn out to be an alcoholic. By God, they were right. A lot of people don't know how they got alcoholism. I got mine by marriage. It had to be that way because there was no alcoholism in my family. I wasn't an alcoholic when I married her. And indeed, it never even occurred to me to be an alcoholic. Nobody had ever suggested they might like being an alcoholic. My mother never said, why don't you grow up to be president of A.A.? You know, no school counselor ever says, what about being an alcoholic? They have a lot of fun. You want to be an alcoholic? I don't even look like an alcoholic. Except sometimes when I'm drinking. I haven't always been an alcoholic. I wouldn't want you to think that, for God's sake. I didn't start out as an alcoholic. In fact, I didn't even, I didn't have to come to A.A. I didn't have any drunk driving arrests or I didn't get a nudge from the judge to go to A.A. or any of that stuff. The only reason I ever came to A.A. was that getting a pass to go to an A.A. meeting was the only way I could get off the nut ward. Well, really, it wasn't very funny. I was there by mistake. Really? It wasn't funny. I had a brain tumor and they missed it. There's nothing funny about a brain tumor. People die of that. And that was my plan, as a matter of fact. I was going to die and you'd all be sorry, by God. And it wouldn't have been so bad being on the nut ward except I was on the nut ward of a hospital I was on the staff of. And that's boring to be on the, I didn't know how to act on the nut ward. I didn't know how to act on the nut ward. But not when you're a patient, for God's sake. That's what I went to medical school for. That's what they teach you in medical school. They teach you how to act like a doctor. How to dress, how to wear a stethoscope, and what to do, and how to sit behind a desk, how to be professional, and how to act like a doctor. But in the nut ward, none of that stuff worked. I tried to help all the other patients. Some of them acted like they didn't even want any help. And they had a dumb philosophy. I don't know how it is. I mean, nut wards here, but in that nut ward they had this dumb philosophy that they tried to convince me that the quality of my life would improve if I learned how to make leather belts. I couldn't see that. I couldn't see how my life would be improved in any way for me to know how to make leather belts. I didn't understand the philosophy. And besides, I didn't understand the instructions. And that wasn't my fault. That's the fault of the occupational therapist because I always had a theory. If you don't understand a thing well enough, you can explain it to me so that I understand it and you don't really understand it as well as you ought to. And this stupid woman had explained it three times. And I wasn't going to embarrass her by asking her again how to do it. I didn't even do that. In fact, I remember sitting there in the nut ward thinking of the mistakes and misunderstandings and the things that had gone wrong. This guy, like me, ended up in a place like that. And while I was thinking these thoughts, this dumb psychiatrist, who couldn't see that my problems were marital, walked up behind me and he said, Would I be willing to talk to a man from Alcoholics Anonymous? God almighty, Doc. Don't I have enough problems of my own without trying to help some drunk from AA? I didn't know anything about alcoholism. Didn't want to know anything about alcoholism. Didn't like alcoholics. What the hell? What the hell? What the hell? What the hell? What the hell do I think about alcoholics for? But I could tell by the look on his face it would make him happy. I felt a little embarrassed. I could read him so well. I didn't know what it's like, but on a nut ward, happiness on a nut ward is having a happy psychiatrist. I was willing to make him happy and I said yes, and indeed it did make him happy. And in no time at all, this clown comes galloping into the room yelling, My name is Frank and I'm an alcoholic. And I felt sorry for the guy. The only thing in life he had to brag about was the fact that he was an alcoholic. I was a lot more impressed the next day when I found out he was an attorney. God, he had a loud voice. Real loud voice. That's alcoholics. That's drunks. And Alcoholics Anonymous. And I think, my God, man, why don't you lower your voice? These people all think I'm a nut. Why don't we leave it at that? And his story went on. It was an interminable story. I didn't know. I didn't know what he said, but I knew he ended up saying, Well, that's my story. I'm going to a meeting tonight. Would you like to go along? And I said, Hell no, I won't like it. But I'll go because I figured he'd go back and squeal to that dumb psychiatrist. And he would have, too. Put us in the car and drove us off to a meeting. Talked the whole time. Real embarrassing talk. Real embarrassing. Talking about how he and his wife were separated and he was trying to get back together with her and he gave her guitar lessons for Christmas. And she ran off with the guitar teacher. My God, what kind of people are we getting mixed up with here? And I started going to these meetings and I've been in a lot of meetings since. I find there are two kinds of people in the AA. Those who want the very minimum. The least they can get and still stay reasonably sober or sober. And those who want everything they can get. And I've been both. And now I go to every kind of AA function I can go to. I love all kinds of AA. I go to Al-Anon. Next comes AA. And we're very involved in a lot of stuff. But I've never been to any AA or Al-Anon function where they had a... I haven't seen one here today where they have an occupational therapy booth. So I have no idea why coming to AA I was able to go back to that hospital and I made the most beautiful pair of moccasins you've ever seen. I did. A pair of moccasins and a half a walk. And I love those moccasins. They were really nice. Really, their workmanship was terrific. And they felt good. They wore good. In fact, I wore them every chance I got. The tongs would break. I'd repair them. It took seven years. Seven years it took before those moccasins wore out to the point where I couldn't repair them anymore. And I felt bad. Not bad enough to go back and make another pair. Yeah. But apparently Max was afraid I might. And for my seventh AA birthday my dear Al-Anon wife had my moccasins bronze. And I love my bronze moccasins. I always kept one at home and one at the office figuring as long as I remember where they came from I wouldn't have to go back and make another pair. I wish I'd have brought them but I've been trying to work this thing. I love my bronze moccasins even though they're not nearly as comfortable anymore. Anyway, I went back to the hospital and made these things and I was going to meetings. I found out Max liked the meetings. Once I found out she liked the meetings then I decided I wouldn't go anymore whenever she'd act up. You know, she'd get smart and wouldn't do it. I told her I'd punish her. I wasn't going to go to any AA meetings or not. And she did something she couldn't do. We went to meetings in Laguna Beach where we lived in Anaheim about 45, 50 minutes away. We were going to Laguna Beach so we wouldn't run into anybody. We knew. Now, 22 years later we've run into everybody that goes to Laguna Beach so they won't run into anybody they know. And she got in the car and drove down to the meetings by herself. And she wouldn't even do that. Couldn't even drive freeway but she'd do that. I don't know if you've ever tried that. Sat at home on a Saturday night drinking while your non-alcoholic wife is off laughing it up in an AA meeting. I found it boring. And so I would go back and go to meetings with her. And of course I wasn't an alcoholic at the time. And you hear a lot of dumb things at AA meetings when you're not an alcoholic. They say a lot of real dumb things and embarrassing things even. I remember a big healthy husky guy stood up there and said if I don't drink today I'm a success today. And I thought God almighty what kind of an organization are we into where we've got to brag about not having one mousy beer for heaven's sake. Of course that's the way you'd think when you're still drinking. And they would say it's the first drink that gets you drunk. Now that's a gross exaggeration. In fact they seem so radical in AA. They even they talk about beer and light wine. It's just you're drunk if you're drinking. That's what I drank when I wasn't drinking. They're real fanatics about this thing. I didn't like the things I heard. I thought it was dumb. But I found out I kept going to meetings I started going back to meetings to see what Max was doing I kept going to meetings and I found out that's how you get alcoholism. I thought you got alcoholism by drinking alcohol. And that's not true. You get drunk by drinking alcohol. But you get alcoholism by associating with alcoholics. It's a contagious disease. It's a virus. It goes in through your ears. It affects your brain. That's what happened to me. In fact if you're around it today or any AA function you have to be careful around AA functions because I've always been impressed with the number of alcoholics that you see at AA functions. And they talk and you listen. And you have to be real careful. Don't keep an open mind so that whatever goes in goes right on through because they're not able to say something and you're not able to say oh I did something like that or worse yet oh I felt like that when I did something like that. You suppose I might be an alcoholic? Boom! Just like that you're an alcoholic. You get it in an instant. We're instant alcoholics. And of course once you got it you can't get rid of it. And in fact I thought well I'll get rid of it I'll give it to somebody else. Made it worse. The more you give it away the more you got it. And they keep saying in AA it's the first drink that gets you drunk. It's that last meeting that makes you an alcoholic. I went to one meeting too many and that was it. And then it's a progressive disease whether you drink a lot drink or not. I am much, much, much more alcoholic today 22 years later than I was then. I'm not drunk. I was when I first became a little bit. In fact I was just a kind of alcoholic. I was almost not a real alcoholic. In fact I was an alcoholic of sorts but I wasn't a drunkard. I wasn't a wino. I wasn't a lush. I certainly wasn't a skid row bum. There was a whole lot of things I wasn't. But I was kind of allergic. That's what I was. I was allergic to alcohol. They say that in AA. They say you have an allergy to wine and compulsive to wine. Allergy to wine and compulsive to alcohol. I didn't have any compulsion to the mind. Compulsion meant to follow you around and make you do things you didn't want to do. I didn't have that. They forgot to tell me it was a secret compulsion but I didn't have a compulsion. An allergy to wine. I didn't know. I phoned a drink. I drank it. I mean what would happen if you waited for a compulsion and it didn't show up? But I did have an allergy. I reacted to the drugs. Alcohol. I do weird and peculiar things when I drink alcohol. In fact, alcohol makes me thirsty. Most people when they get thirsty have a drink that's satisfying. In fact, sometimes they don't even finish the drink. Wasted. When I drink it it makes me thirsty. I think I'll have another. Every drink tasted the same. It tasted like one more drink. I reacted peculiarly in other ways with that. In fact, I used to be it acts me mentally and physically. In fact, I used to go to church dinner dances. I hate church dinner dances. I hate church dinner dances. A lot of people have to talk to them. They have to talk chit-chat, chit-chat. I don't like talking chit-chat. I'm not a good chit-chat talker. And you have to dance at church dinner dances. You can't not dance. Every church dinner dance has at least at least one hyperactive woman. You know? They do. They assign one to somebody. And you can't just sit there and they run up to you and say, come on, Paul, let's dance. You say, I don't dance. Oh, sure you do and drag you out on the floor. Drag you out on the floor and prove that you don't dance. You know? So you can't not dance at a church dinner dance. I used to say you can't not go and so I would have a few drinks. You have to be very careful. You can't not drink because if you don't drink they'll know you have a problem. And you have to not drink too much or they'll know you have a problem. So you have to be very careful how much you drink at a church dinner dance. So I would drink. Your drinks go there. Church dinner dance relaxes me mentally and I could talk, talk, chit-chat, chit-chat. Really, chit-chat, chit-chat. Good. I was a chit-chatter among the best chit-chatters there, as a matter of fact. And dance, too. Boy, I danced. It relaxed me physically. I could really dance good. Today I don't drink and I don't dance. But the two would get out of sync as the evening went on and maybe I'd been begun to realize that I didn't relax mentally yet and I'd get too relaxed physically. It might affect my speech, my lip. And I deliver it so nobody would notice. I would reach for something and knock it over. I would trip when there was nothing. I would find myself lying there looking very serene. My mind would say, get up, you fool. People will think you're drunk. And my body would say, what do you mean, get up? We're paralyzed from the ears down. And I'd lie there and think, isn't that strange that we can't move? Isn't that strange? I've had a few little drinks. I've never heard of anybody who had a few drinks and they got paralyzed from the ears down. I must react peculiarly to this drug. I must have an abnormal response to alcohol. I have a... And that's not hard for me to understand because I've been around drugs since I was four years old and I went to pharmacy school and I went to medical school and I went to internal medicine and became pharmacology was my most interesting subject and I made a study of pills and built up with Max's help. Max worked my way through medical school and as a reward I let her work in the office for free for 25 years. And we built up a large medical practice, a very ethical medical practice too as a matter of fact. I had my own version of the Hippocratic Oath in that I never ever gave a patient a pill that I hadn't first tried out on myself. But I never became a pill head. I never became addicted to pills. I never abused the pills. That's the key word in medicine. You ask any doctor how patients get hooked on pills, they'll tell you two things. First, none of their patients ever got hooked on pills. Second, the people who get hooked on pills always abuse the pills. That's how you get hooked on pills. You abuse the pill. I don't know how to abuse the pill. How do you abuse a pill? Well, you throw it out and you throw it out. You throw it up against the wall. You step on it. You talk mean to it. You dirty, rotten little pill. Why don't you do what I told you? I've always treated my pills with great respect. They were very tiny little pills. You could tell they were very weak and mild. I had my own this little pill, this little pocket inside the big pocket. That's the pill pocket. You keep your pills there. You have to be careful where you carry the pills. You can't carry them anywhere. Put them over where you change the pill. People say you've got to change for a dollar and you say, oh yeah, and you go like that. And they say, oh, you're carrying them. It's all around in the daytime. So you switch it over and put it over with your keys. Then you go to get in your car and you take the keys out of your pocket and quaalude runs down the street. And it always runs faster than you can run. And you can't stamp on it or you'll abuse it. So I always treated my pills with respect. And I never, ever took a pill unless I had the symptom. I never took a pill unless I had the specific symptom that that pill was created for. I either had it or I could feel it coming on. So every pill I ever took was medically indicated at the time, taken according to directions and prescribed by a physician and by a pharmacist. And all, you know, I was talking about the medicines and reacting to that be it sugar or lead to alcohol to that drug, that chemical. That medication. All medications like that. All medications are the same. Everybody's named every patient except for the active. You don't find out they're different in this to them. You see a pill you give that patient the hair falls after it turns red and falls off. You're quite allergic to that pill. You say, I don't want you to ever take that pill as if it was their fault. Every medicine is that way. And it's known. It used to be they'd get penicillin by a pen tape drug and take it by a bucket full and to the very same unless you hadn't to be allergic. They used to give somebody a shot of penicillin and turn around and lay his friends down and they'd drop dead. Wow! He sure is allergic to that stuff. Wouldn't you think if he couldn't handle it any better than that he wouldn't just be more careful? And I'm allergic to, in fact, that's what it would be when I'd be laying there and I couldn't move and I was paralyzed. I never think I'm going to have to ask somebody about this. I'm going to I was thinking maybe I was in medical school at the time and I was thinking I'd ask some allergy professor as to why I would get paralyzed from the years down when I drank. Never found anybody to ask. Can't ask just anybody and I would say well I don't know but if they did that to me I just wouldn't drink it anymore. I didn't want to know what to do about it. I just want to know why I did that. There'd be a bad part about what it was an interesting scientific problem it took in fact I would lie there and I'd mentally be leafing through the pages of Goodman and Gilman's textbook of pharmacology looking under alcohol alcohol poisoning looking for paralysis from the years down never found it. But it was an interesting scientific problem and it took my mind off my full bladder. A very impractical combination but they always went together. Every time I had I was paralyzed from the years down from the years down from the years down from the years down from the years down from the years down from the years down I had a full bladder that absolutely refused to remain full as a matter of fact. Impractical combination and I and there are many AA fringe benefits to AA many many fringe benefits to AA but an increase for me at least increased bladder capacity is not one of them. capacity see I have a pitiful story in that I'm not only an alcoholic but I'm also alcoholic but I'm also an alcoholic with a limited bladder capacity and it was not a good combination and an increased bladder capacity has not been a part of sobriety I'm sorry to say but I'm not complaining though because on the other hand my aim has improved tremendously and and and that's nice I like that Max likes that really and I kept going to these meetings turned into a mild alcoholic and gotten much more severe ever since and today I don't have any problem with not drinking to not to drink is not an option no matter I can't possibly have a problem today that's so bad that I couldn't make it worse by having a drink just to have a drink is not an option just like divorcing is not an option and taking a pill to get to sleep is not an option taking a pill for any purpose is not an option those things they don't even occur to me because they're not options my problems today are not I know that drinking is my number one problem you don't have to remind me of that but to not take that drink today it's not a problem because that's the first thing I had to learn when I became even a mild alcoholic I found it seemed to me that the people in AA who were the happy people were the ones that weren't drinking in fact they're really fussy about that in AA they like to admit you're in AA back in California I come from they applaud everybody I'm going to get up Max and I want to applaud back in my home group anybody stands up we applaud you get up to go to the restroom we applaud and they and then when you say you're an alcoholic they think that's wonderful I remember I said my name is Paul and I'm an alcoholic and he said we do an alcoholic I thought God these people are easily amused they like that and so I did it for seven months but then when I accepted the fact that I was an alcoholic I decided I wanted to be one of the winners I wanted to be one of the happy people they're winners and they're losers winners and they're whiners and I wanted to be one of the winners well that meant I had to quit drinking and that was frightening me because I have quit many many times many many times I have quit and every time every time every time I quit drinking I ended up drunk and I thought gee this quitting drinking is really hard on my health here I am I wanted to not drink and I was afraid to quit and afraid to go on drinking and I remembered the stuff that they say to the new people these from Skid Road they don't drink today you won't get drunk today but you don't tell that to a doctor for God's sake but I didn't know what else to do I wasn't going to tell anybody because back in those days you asked anybody a question it proved you were kind of stupid and I thought well I won't tell anybody but I just won't drink today and see what happens nothing happened and so I decided to try it another day and nothing happened that day and that's kind of the way I do it today today's a very important day for me today's the day I don't drink never drink on Fridays I drank many yesterday certainly going to drink tomorrow but I don't drink today but I still don't know if I can keep from drinking today if I didn't know I was going to drink tomorrow and when tomorrow gets here I'll check the time and if it's today I won't drink today and there you and I try to not take a drink because it's gotten more and more easy for me my problems today aren't drinking I don't have a problem with not drinking what I have a problem with is not thinking like my sponsor says Paul don't drink and don't think because all my problems today all my problems every problem any problem I have today is a thinking problem I don't have a problem today unless I think I do I and I never thought I had one and been wrong I think I got a problem I've got a problem no matter what you think in fact I alone determine the size of my problems if I think it's a big problem it's a big problem if I think it's a little problem it's just a little problem no matter what you think don't have very many little problems don't bother with them like resentment I don't bother with any but justifiable ones all my problems are thinking problems in fact I have a little problem my mind puts energy in whatever I think about just like a laser beam right into whatever I'm thinking about I take in a little problem and just watch it go in fact I can start out with a non-problem well hell that's no problem I suppose if you looked at it a certain way it could I think you know pretty sure I think by God you know it's a good thing I'm looking at this everybody everybody else is missing it you know and it really is a problem the more problems I get the more fascinated I get the more I think about it and pretty sure I'm obsessed with this thing people can't even help you much with a problem like that you tell them about it and they say well don't think about it I don't know how to not think about whatever I'm obsessed with you know in fact my sponsor I always felt that I would have done more with my life I had every plan to do more with my life than I had done and I would have done more if it hadn't been for people and circumstances and bad breaks and people people cost me more trouble than anybody and I'm and Max did cost me a lot of trouble they used to call that's what sponsors are for somebody to whine to call up my sponsor and I tell him I thought somebody needed to know why I wasn't doing more with my life than I was and I would call him up and tell him what was going on why I wasn't doing more with my life and then one day I called him up to tell him about what Max had done Max did something really horrendous that I can't recall at the moment and I started telling him what he had done because I thought somebody needed to know how difficult it is for me and I started telling him what Max had done and he interrupted me I hadn't even got started yet and he interrupted me he says why don't you put it out of your mind a couple of days and see what happens I said Jack a couple of days I'll forget all about that you know uh uh uh uh uh uh that's the biggest problem with problems you can't ignore your problems for any length of time at all problems have a very high infant mortality you've got to get right in there and work on them right away and stay with them you can't you can't neglect problems at all I mean they have never had a problem where somebody says you're going to a meeting tonight you say oh no I can't go tonight I've got to stay home and work on this problem you know they drag you off one of those meetings especially if they get you to stay around talk after the meeting or go to a restaurant at the meeting waste your time and by the time you get home that problem is having to be welded down to the point where you can't even bring it back you can't neglect problems you've got to stay right there with them that's why working with others is a lot of trouble I've been working on a really good problem and someone will call up with some real idiotic iffy bitsy dumb little problem and you have to listen to them you have to listen to them I've talked to Don before to me the importance of listening it seems to me that so much of our program of carrying the message is the matter of communicating and communication skills and listening is such an important part of that and I hear people say they don't want to sponsor somebody else because they don't know the program well enough you don't have to know the program real well to sponsor somebody I think one of the most important things you can do is learn to listen and that's easy in fact you only need to know I figured it out one day you only need to know five words in order to be a good listener you know people are saying something to you and they ask you a question they ask you a question and you answer it you say yes or you say no two words yes or no or else they're talking about something and maybe they're calling from cloud nine and they're real happy real enthused about something no matter what they say they're real enthused you say wow they let yes no and wow or else they're talking along and you don't quite know what they said because you really weren't listening or you don't want to keep saying the same thing over again really yes no wow and really the other thing is if you're really not paying attention you don't want to keep saying the same thing all the time and you don't really have any idea what's talking about you use a non-word no matter what they say you say hmm and you can get that into a question with practice you can get all kinds of inflections so you've got yes no really wow hmm you know and so it's really very simple to listen to people sometimes once in a while it doesn't happen very often but once in a while they do want to know what to do about the problem and that's not difficult you just pick a number from one to twelve so work that step yeah any number from one to twelve work that step it's always worked for me I've never had a problem so I haven't found the answer in the steps nobody's ever come to me with a problem such that I haven't found the answer in the steps I have found that it's very comforting to me to know that there's an answer there I didn't have that feeling as I was coming along though in fact coming here I was thinking how I used I don't like to travel Max likes to travel but I don't and I never had quite traveling but I this business of wanting to do more with my life I always had the best of intentions I have this kind of intentions as anybody any two people in the room I think and I always had the feeling that the day would come when I would agree to fly to Norway or Sweden or Denmark or wherever it is to diabetes high blood pressure common cold things like that and what it would be is when he did that it would be like in that movie Amadeus Salieri got a upset because God didn't make him famous he made Mozart famous instead and tried to kill himself I identified with Salieri that's what it was going to be when I got the Nobel Prize I was going to give all the credit to God I was going to make God famous as a matter of fact all he had to do was make me famous first I thought it would be easier because he knows all those things he should have told me a few scientific secrets like the cause of cancer hypotension and comical a few things like that it would be very easy for him to do that make me famous I know it's quite a bargain but he never bought it he never bought it he not only didn't make me famous he made me anonymous so my problems today actually I say mostly my thinking problems in fact I was reading an article the other day and they're trying to make computers have artificial intelligence so it would be as smart as the human brain computers that would think like our minds to my computer could give my brain some ideas I worked on my computer at night I'd be typing something on the keyboard and when I'm through I'll say I want to quit and the computer will say you want to save this yes or no if I say yes it saves it first thing though it goes poof it goes out where all fifth steps go and I say do you want to turn it off I say yeah turn it off I go to bed now I have never had that computer turn itself on again in the middle of the night my mind does it all the time in fact it remembers stuff the way I want it to be remembered my mind doesn't do that my mind remembers what it wants to remember and it puts in stuff that didn't even happen when I'm working on I put a program in a computer that's the program we worked on not my mind it keeps switching problems all the time in fact my mind has a mind of its own in fact it's like coffee I don't know how it is with you but I think by somebody talking they're talking all the time talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk talk in fact even while I'm standing up here talking all these people in my head are telling me what to say and they get to arguing among themselves as to what they say and they get to fighting and they're telling me and fighting with me and I'm trying to listen to me and trying to make up something to say and listen to them at the same time shut up damn it up there and then they all shut up at once and then I can't think of anything to say and then chatter chatter chatter chatter just all the time and I go to bed and I lie down my body wants to sleep and my brain says no let's sleep here and talk about it a while and I'll actually get to sleep and two three three o'clock they'll say hey wake up we have an emergency meeting up here you know that thing that happened today and you thought you handled so well it wasn't like that at all yeah yeah It really ticked off at you you wait till morning you'll find out you know I don't want to listen to that junk and I'll go over and go back to sleep and just as I'm about to lose consciousness I'll think jeez I'm sure glad I'm not thinking about that anymore and then they'll say yeah you know that wasn't the only time you've ever done that six months ago you did it in fact let's spend the rest of the night making lists of dumb things you've done you know and I got all these people in my head and they all talk and whoever I listen to the most moves to the front of the room and they talk the loudest and the less I listen to them the more they move to the back of the room and the less I hear them and there's one up there that no matter what situation hot or cold a lot of people very few people or whatever situation is he says well I'm going to have a drink and trouble is every time he took a drink we all got drunk and he's there he's still there but he's in the back of the room how do you ever hear him now there's one up there that wants to see me sober there's one up there that never has cared that much for Max he's always watching her and making smart remarks you want to marry who or did you hear how she just talked about you you know always making smart remarks about her another one up there thinks she's absolutely terrific says great sense of humor aren't you glad you have her aren't you lucky she's the one that kept on going to AA meetings when you didn't want to go and I have all these personalities and some that like to worry and some that like to live in the answer room I have learned to get along with all those people up there I think it's been an important part of my sobriety to learn to get along with all those people living in my head I have to write letters to each other talk to each other communicate with each other I used to fight them I used to use drugs I think people talk about why they drank and used drugs I think if I had any reason it was to shut them all up so I could get to sleep at night and quiet them down today I don't need to do that I can let them talk doesn't matter what they say who they are I let them talk I said thank you for participating now if you'll sit down we'll call on somebody else in fact it seems to me that in the very center of all that group of people there's a center of calm and that's where God is that's where my higher power is that he's the center of calm that he's there anytime I want to turn to in fact I don't have to go any place to find him in fact he's not there when I get there unless I've taken him with me and that's a really comforting thing I find he's there in every alcoholic that I've met and it's interesting that I try to communicate from the center of calm within me to the center of calm with another alcoholic and I was at a convention the other day and they were saying something about the closing prayer and they said so often in their prayer we look up or we look down look at the floor so I said why don't you during the prayer instead of looking at the floor look in the eyes of other alcoholics and see if you can find God there and I find it a very interesting way to meditate and say a prayer I my relationship with the people in my head keeps getting better and better my relationship with Max keeps getting better and better we're a real program family as I said I go to many of her meetings and on the way to meetings we listen to tapes of meetings and we take our two hour dogs Liz when we go in the car Lily and Sabrina they say to tell you they don't like it when we fly because they can't come along but they can go to all our other meetings in the car and there's a lot of meetings I get some more meetings than a lot of people that are trying to stay sober they have nicer personalities than a lot of people that are trying to stay sober on the way to meetings some time back we were listening to tapes of meetings on the way to meetings we were listening to the tape of Father Tom W who was given a retreat and we were listening to his tape we were telling him it's a true story as far as I know he was reading about Hitler and about the one time that Hitler drank then Hitler said that he and some other young soldiers had gotten some liquor one night and they drank it Hitler got drunk and in the morning Hitler was disheveled and miserable and felt awful made up his mind that that was stupid that he was