The Disease of Alcoholism as an Elevator – Marie L.

Well she could have gone on and told the rest of it. I'm Marie Lucas and I'm an alcoholic, and it's really great to be here in Orlando. I'd like to thank the committee for the lovely fruit basket that we received in our room this afternoon and for inviting me here to share with you this weekend. And I'm really looking forward to it. And it's fun being the first speaker because all the rest is gravy. And I know quite a few of you here, and it's been a pleasant surprise to have you come up to me and let me know you're here, especially Dot and George and a few others of you that I haven't seen in quite a while. So welcome to all of you. I'm going to get some medical problems out of the way before I start, in case I forget to tell you later. If you weren't at the committee meeting for this conference last night, you might not know that I slipped and fell and broke my collarbone about three days ago. But there's nothing wrong with my mouth. And that was announced at the committee meeting last night. Now, if you want to hug me after the meeting, it's okay, but only hug me on the right side because I've got all this apparatus on over my shoulders and down my back. And I'd like all the women to raise their hands for just a minute, and all the rest of you men or whomevers, put your fingers in your here because I want to talk to all the ladies. When is the last time you had your husband hook your bra or help you put your pantyhose on? It has been a while. Come to think of that he used to take them off of me drunk. Enough of the medical. My name is Marie Lucas, and the reason I give you my last name is if you come to Columbia, South Carolina, and you look in the phone book, You can find my name along with my husband's name, Hollis, H-O-L-L I-S. And I want you to know that and you can call collect. It's okay. I'm sober by the grace of God and meetings and conventions and living rooms and kitchens since January 1st of 1963. And for that, I'm very grateful. Now I can introduce you to my other half. And the reason I drank, and we can just say the Lord's Prayer and all go home. but he really is my best friend and my confidant and my bedmate and whatever else you want to call him for the last 48 years Hollis will you stand up I came to A.A. all those years ago because I didn't know about alcoholism and I didn' t know about Alcoholics Anonymous. And you've taught me so many things about myself. I really didn' T know myself when I came to you. You taught me many definitions of alcoholism. We talked about them at the dinner table. a man had been the president of his company had gone all the way down to absolutely nothing and practically into the gutter. And that's what alcoholism is in one sense. But you taught me that alcoholism is a progressive disease and that's why I'm here today. That's what it did in my life to me. It progressed all the Way Down. Just like an elevator goes and you young people can come in in your 20s and 30s and join Alcoholics Anonymous and have a wonderful life with us and we can walk with you and share with you and help you stay sober or you can continue down and come into AA in your 30s or in your 40s and isn't it sad when you meet that man or that woman that's in his 70s or 80s just coming into the program and I met such a woman in Gastonia, North Carolina not long ago and I felt how sad. But you know, there are many other definitions. I fit right into the category of not being able to guarantee my behavior after I took the first drink. But Mert and I were saying it was never the first drinking that caused me the problem, but that first drink causes a compulsion within the alcoholic that we cannot control the second, the third, the fourth. And for those of you that are not alcoholics, can you take one peanut out of a can and put the lid on and leave the rest alone? Or a cashew or a potato chip? Or how about one of those chocolates out of A Box of Whitman's Sampler? You know, the second one always is a little better. That strawberry cream will be just a little bit better. And it's obvious that's what I do with The Whitman Sampler. My disease will never be arrested. It will only be arrested by staying away from the first drink and attending AA meetings. This is the medicine for my disease. This is where I come to stay well. And with as much sobriety as I have, I still attend three, four, five meetings a week. It's necessary for my diseases in order for me to stay sober. The definition that suits me the best is the definition in the big book, a self-will run riot. And I did it my way or no way, and my life was one hell of a riot. It was just devastating what the disease did to me and my family. i have to share with you a story and it's a geographical story and i'll take you on a little trip around the world or halfway around the world anyway but it's my story and if you quote me anywhere outside of this room please quote maria marie lucas the alcoholic don't quote alcoholics anonymous this is how I see life and how I've looked back on my life and how I understand Alcoholics Anonymous and the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. The reason I don't have a southern accent, Kathy, is I was born and raised in New York City. That's right. Florida is made up of a lot of New Yorkers. I've heard that. I was raised in a strict, structured, scheduled home by a New York Central Railroad engineer and my mother had been born in Vienna, Austria and she was a very passive woman My father was German and I was the oldest of three girls and dad was very strict If there had been a letter before A You know, he'd have invented it because A, wasn't good enough and you should have done better. Couldn't you do better? Home was a normal home for those days coming through the Depression and into the early 30s. I did not abide by the rules. And that was my choice and my doing. and therefore I was punished accordingly. Mother would stick up for me a lot of the times and mother would cover for me a lot at the time but then that got old with her too. After high school when I was 18 years old war had been declared and I worked down near Wall Street in New York City and I took the government test down in the government building to become a cloak typist for the U.S. government, and I flunked the first test that I took because I was so nervous and I hadn't told my folks that I had sneaked my portable typewriter out of the house. So I took the test twice and finally passed, and I now had a job in Washington, D.C. All I had to do was go home and tell my dad and mom, and oh, golly, I was scared. So I finally got up the nerve, and Dad gave me $100, and I rode the bus from New York to Washington with my suitcase and got there early 1942 and started my job. Now, up till now, I didn't have any problem with drinking, or I don't think I had very many drinks to speak of as such. But when I got to Washington, D.C., I moved into a boarding house with other young women and there was always going to be a party somewhere, you know, Naval Anacostia Air Station or Quantico or the air base or we were always going someplace to meet the boys and the phone would ring and I'd have my hand in the air. I was ready to go and I had no problem and we would drink And I enjoyed what drinking did for me, to me, with me, whatever. I could drink. I could sing better. I could dance better. I just kind of fit in better after I had a few drinks. And I had no problem getting up the next morning and going to work. And that was the procedure for a few years there in Washington, D.C. now new year's eve of 42 43 i met this fly boy that i just introduced you to and um i had already been taught how to drink by a marine he took me out one sunday and he was going to teach me how to drank beer well all you do is pick up the glass and put it in your mouth. And that's how you drink beer. So New Year's Eve of 42, 43, my blind date and another couple, we went to this fine restaurant and I chased squab all over the table trying to cut that up. And we had a few drinks and it got to be midnight and we were on the dance floor and everybody else is kissing whoever they were with And I looked at him, and I said, aren't you going to kiss me? So he kissed me on the cheek like he kissed your mother. And that was the beginning of a fine romance. In 43, he gave me his wings. In 44, he give me a diamond. And in September 45, we were married. We have had nine children. we have had two sons and we have seven daughters no, we're not Catholic I'm just a prolific Episcopalian and our last daughter was born just two months after I sobered up and I haven't had any since I found out where they were coming from. We had a baby every two years from 1947 to 1963. We were married in 1945, and those were the canasta days when we carried a pint bottle and went over to the neighbor's house and the babies all slept on the floor for a couple hours, and we played cards. There were no wild parties, but drinking was just a weekend kind of a thing. It was not an everyday occurrence. Hollis elected to stay in the service after the war was over, and we stayed right there in Washington, D.C., and things rolled on just about the same. in 1951 with three children he was transferred to paris france he was general eisenhower's flight engineer in the service and we got to fly over on the general's plane and we spent two years there in paris now this is where my drinking changed i had a full-time maid i had no responsibility i had someone to care for the children and cook and clean and do the wash so i was free to go with the other American women, and we did a lot of sightseeing. We did a little bit of bowling. We did a lot of traveling. We did a lot of partying. We got the Rosenthal, and we got the crystal, and we got the silver, and we'd have big parties, and we would go to big parties, and they delivered the cognac and the two board to the door, rest of the hard liquor we would get in the class six store, and the money was flowing in and everything was going great. I had no responsibilities so I had no problems and I did drink heavily. Those are the years when we learned how to drink the red wine with the beef and the white wine with the pork and the fish and the liqueurs you know in those different colors and those special glasses and so forth and so on. It was a good time, it was a good time. No problems. In 53, we were transferred to Frankfurt, Germany, and it was just one more year of the same thing. Another full-time maid and a lot of parties. That's the year we won the first prize for the Halloween dance. I dressed up in one of his suits and pulled my hair up under a fedora, and I put him in a flannel nightgown with a big picture hat and a mop and a little kid's peapot and a candle, and we won first prize. We were both so drunk neither one of us remember it, but we were there. We came back to the United States, and we had requested East Coast duty because our families were on the East Coast, but typically Air Force in those days, we were transferred to Seattle, Washington. We just stayed there three months and went on to our new base in Sacramento, California. We had brought four children back from overseas. I had had a baby in Paris. And things were quite a bit different now. Money wasn't rolling in like it had been. I didn't have a full-time maid. And I was expected to have his uniforms, you know, starched and ready to go, a clean one every day and take care of four children, be pregnant with the fifth and have dinner on the table. And we had bought our first home in this period. And it was just a little bit difficult to drink in the manner that I was used to drinking. So I'd beg him to bring home a pint or can't we go out to that piano bar or can't we do something you know just a little bit different but sometimes he'd oblige and sometimes he wouldn't and things were not easy through that period another little girl in 55 and in July of 1956 our son that was born in Paris was three and a half years old and he was killed right in front of the house by a drunken driver and this was devastating it just really broke up our home totally things were totally different after that for a long period of time I would have to say until we both come into the program of Alcoholics Anonymous I started drinking for different reasons And I have to say now that death is a process. If you experience the death of a loved one, it's a process You have to go through the process of grief And we neither one in our late 30s had any idea of what this was We didn't go to the minister even though we took the children to church every Sunday We didn' t know who to ask for help Nobody volunteered to help friends stepped in of course and did all that they could do and we were very close to a lot of the military friends at that time but it was a devastating time it was it was not easy and after it was all over and things the things quieted down i would have to say that hollis kind of went his way drinking and i kind of went my way i drank for different reasons i don't know whether you've ever had the knot in your gut here that you just couldn't get rid of, but a couple drinks would get rid of it. And that's the way it was for me. It just soothed the pain just a little bit for me and the more I drank, the more it soothED the pain and the easier it felt. I left Sacramento, California and I've made amends many times because I left Hollis there to clean up all the dirty paperwork and get rid of the household goods and have them shipped to the east. And I left at the doctor's recommendation because I was seven months pregnant at the time and I brought the children to the East, to New York, just a day or two after the funeral. And as I say, I drank for different reasons. Our new base was on Cape Cod, Massachusetts. and I worked in a motel that served liquor for an older woman and it was an easy going place and I was allowed to drink on the job and if she was drinking a little too much I kind of curbed my drinking and vice versa and it wasn't a good time And in 1959, Hollis decided to get out of the service and I had a lot of resentments and there were a lot problems that revolved around that situation and that's his story. When he got out, we just moved into the community and he found a job and I continued to drink. This was when I started sneaking my drinks. It was his bottle and my bottle and our bottle, and this was when we started marking the bottle in the kitchen. And then when the mark, you know, when I couldn't mark it down anymore, I'd water it down so that he couldn't tell I had taken a drink out of it. And this was cuando empezamos a marcar los botellos en la cocina. And it was just not good. We were never coordinated with the utility companies. We either had gas and electric or we didn't have any water, and that's before pampers. You know, we were still using those regular diapers and flushing them in the toilet. And all of the problems settled in in this period of time. Valentine's Day of 1961 instead of flowers and candy Hollis took the only car we had and a little bit of money we had and decided to seek his fortune in the West and I was just about a week from having our seventh child so instead of staying home and kind of getting things in order I walked with my oldest daughter who was 12 at the time to the nearest bar up to my girlfriend's in the nearest bar to make the big announcement. You know, my husband's left me what am I going to do? And by now I was drinking wine because I was anemic and I'm still anemic and the doctor recommended a glass a day you're ahead of me I didn't settle for one glass, as you well know. So I had my few glasses of wine and I went back home and a week later I had another baby girl and I had an eviction notice and I didn't have any electric and the minister from the church brought some food for us and he helped me make arrangements I needed to move. Well, where would I move? The insanity of alcoholism to his family homestead down in Virginia, and his sister took us in. And I moved in with seven children, and she had four. No running water, no inside plumbing. I have to say, I just visited with three of her children about two or three weeks ago, and they were kidding about how chaotic it was. Bath time out on the back porch. But when there was a bottle to be bought, I would go to the state store in her car and I'd get one for me and one for us. And if I mixed the drinks, you know, it was a double shot for me and maybe a half a shot for her. She and I would Go out and have a couple beers now and then so it really wasn't too bad. Just about two months later, Hollis came back and he thought that maybe he was the problem and his drinking was the problema and I agreed with him and would I take him back. And I said yes. And this is when we moved to Columbus, Ohio. He had some cousins up there and he found a job with them and we set up housekeeping, and there wasn't any drinking for six weeks. And I had gotten a job, and the kids were enrolled in school, and we had our furniture, and everything was going along great. But Friday night was payday, and we decided that one six-pack wouldn't hurt. And the next week it was a couple six-packs and a fifth, and I don't need to tell you the rest of the story. It was all of that same old thing, you know, the fears, the unknown fears and the known fears, you know and the bill collectors and the utilities they're just so inconsiderate in sending those postcards you know and they just want their money. All of the blank outs what I call a blank out is those periods of time that go by, you know, two or three hours and I can't account for myself. By now I was drinking at the bar because my older children had confronted me with my drinking and I drank more than the neighbors. So I would drink at a bar in the neighborhood shopping center and I would go on any pretense, you know milk, a couple pencils or anything and I would proceed to the bar and of course I'm only going to have one or two and then somebody sets up the bar and I can't leave a full drink and then I have to reciprocate and somebody tells a story and remember what I told you about the progression after a five or six, you know, really made no difference and thenI couldn't remember whether I took the pencils home or the milk for the baby's bottle or whatever And there I would be. But all of the running, you know, it's difficult to explain to a non-alcoholic, but I think we've all had that gut feeling if we admit to the problem of alcoholism. The fights that we would have at home, I was a good one at pointing the finger. You know, if he wouldn't, I wouldn't. But when we point the finger, there's three pointing back at the problem. And I don't think there's anything worse than a drunken woman. And that is Marie talking. That's the way I feel about it now. But on and on, the blackouts, you know, where I promised to take the Girl Scouts to the circus next Tuesday. and Tuesday would roll around Linda'd say well today's the day you're going to take the troop to the circus and I'd say who told you that she said you told me last week you would take us well when was last week? You know I couldn't remember one day from the next all I was concerned with was the next drink and by now I wasn't drinking Manhattan's and martinis out of those pretty glasses. I was drinking a shot and a beer at the bar, just like most of the men were all around me. I was telling a story at dinner tonight that I hadn't thought of in a long time, and it bears telling. It was through this last stage of my alcoholism that I was so bad that I would come home and bring whatever was necessary. And I'd try to go to bed, and I would wake up thinking I had been asleep a long time, and then I'd get up and I'd have a drink. And if I didn't have a drink in the house, I'd go back out to the bar, and maybe two or three, and my husband would beg me, you know, come on now, settle down. Everything's just fine. And I'd wake up 15 minutes later and I'd need a drink and I'd get up and I get dressed and I go out again. And that's how bad my alcoholism got. My birthday of that year, he begged me not to drive my car home. And I knew that I could make it self will run riot. No problem. And I made a couple turns that were the right turns, but then that last left turn, I made a couple hundred feet short of the intersection into this man's backyard and we knew the man and he took me home like you'd take a little kid home. And he knocked on the door and Hollis answered the door and said, here's your wife. Your car is in my backyard. You You know, this was what it got to. Well, in 1962, I was working for the federal government as an accounting clerk. 1962 was the year before computers in the banks. So I was writing checks, and on Friday, I'll deposit the money, and I'll write the check on Wednesday, and I'm going to get the money. And I'll get there in time. Well, I didn't make it in time a lot of times, and I was placed on probation for checks insufficient funds. I signed my own name. I only wrote them to supermarkets, and I'd go and I would report, and I reported all that year, 12 months in that year up to December of 1962. Now the latter part of 1962, I realized I was pregnant again, and I really didn't want to be pregnant. I really didn't want another child, but that was it. And if possible, I drank more and so forth and so on. But it was a bad year. My drinking was worse, if possible. Hollis was drinking too, and one funny part of his story is he got so bad. He was much worse. He got so bad that he wrote himself notes about where his bottle was before he went to bed. You're ahead of me. And he put the note in his wallet, so he'd go in, he'd pass out, and I'd go find the note. You guessed it. And the next morning, he'd be walking around with this piece of paper in his hand. And he'd say, I swear I put that bottle under the third cushion of the green couch. And I said, well, let me see the note. He'd show me the note, and I said... Well, you must have got up in the middle of the night and drank it or drank it last night. I let him think he was going crazy. He's really a great guy. but the children always knew where to reach me at the bar, and on December 27th, 1962, it was a Friday night. It was payday night, and where else do you cash your check? I was sitting at the Bar, and Linda called me, and she said, Mom, there's two women and a man here, and they want you to come home right away, and i just took a deep breath and i said linda i'm not coming home because i knew what it was there were seven children at home and again i was seven months pregnant and i don't know if you've ever had to run from the authorities but it sure isn't fun and i only had to running for five days five six days whatever it was But I ran for those days, and I tried to slow down my drinking. And on January 1st of 1963, I had my last drink and a whole lot of mushroom soup, and it's still my favorite soup. And on the 2nd of January, I went by the house, and I knew all the kids needed socks so I left socks and I left the car and I took the bus downtown and I turned myself in and I was sentenced to a year at the Ohio Reformatory for Women in Marysville for checks insufficient funds they were all written to supermarkets and I would say for not more than a couple hundred dollars not more then five hundred dollars I did a year i got there and when i'm pregnant i have nine pound babies so i'm pregnant all over so i didn't have to scrub floors and do all those things they just told me go sit in the corner in the rocker and there was no literature in that first thirty days kind of a holding area and i came off of heavy drinking cold turkey with a couple aspirin in a room and I saw all those bugs and I saw all those animals that we all see in those first few days coming off of the booze it was not a picnic but it had to be for me that way for me to be the person I am today at the end of 30 days Mrs. Jones interviewed everyone or she interviewed me and And what she tried to do was try to figure out why you did what you did. So, of course, I'm pointing the finger and he's the problem. And at the end of the interview, she said, Marie, I think you might have a drinking problem and I would suggest that you join Alcoholics Anonymous. What do you think of that? And I said, yes, if you think it'll help me to understand Hollis' drinking problem. I brought to Alcoholics Anonymous a shell of a person, just like a hollowed-out egg. And as I told you what the disease of alcoholism is, it had affected me physically, mentally, spiritually, and also financially. I couldn't have been any more bankrupt in every area of my life. And I came to Alcoholics Anonymous, and you gave me life. You gave me Life Itself. You breathed the very breath into me that I have to this day. A woman came to speak in that first month or two that just about told my story. and I thought, I honestly thought they had released my records to her so that she could read them before she came to talk to AA. And I talked to her afterwards and she gave me the hope that's necessary. So you see, I had no problem with step one in admitting to the disease of alcoholism. My life was unmanageable to the point that I was told when to stand up, when to sit down, when to eat, when to do absolutely everything in that first year. And I came and I came to after my introduction to Alcoholics Anonymous and I cam to believe in a power greater than myself that self-will run riot I was willing to let it down. It's kind of like a concrete block you know one of those sewer pipes and you kind of let a little crack in it and I was willing to let you people in. And I certainly needed help in being restored to sanity. I had done many insane things that I can't mention to you from the podium because Bob's going to tape them and I don't know where the tape is going to go. Many, many things that I don' t care to mention. But I needed somebody's help. I went to Lutheran Bible classes. I went into Catholic catechism classes. Was God ever going to forgive me for what I had done to these children? In March, Teresa was born, March 19th, and the minister from our church that we attended in Columbus, the Episcopal Church, he brought my two oldest children and we christened the baby before she was to go to her foster home. And I, of course, was full of guilt. And I asked Father Moody, would God ever forgive me for what I had done to my children? And he said, yes, Marie, but you have to forgive yourself. And that's very difficult, and I can only speak for women. I've talked to a lot of women, and it's hard for us to forgive ourselves. But God forgives 70 times 7 times, so we have to forget about it. We have to give ourselves. and even if we have to break it down to one day at a time I forgive myself today for what I did under the influence of alcohol so I went on I became active in AA there at the institution and I did what they call easy time and I worked for the school principal and the children came to see me just once and of course their hair wasn't brushed the way I brush it and their shoelaces weren't tied and some of them didn't even have shoelaces. And the serenity prayer helped to accept the things I can't change. I could not accept, could not change the situation. I had to accept it. But God was giving me the courage to learn how to change. And I, oh, I tore that serenety prayer apart so many times. I came home to absolutely nothing, to that same sister-in-law's house in Columbus, Ohio. And my two oldest children were living with her. And it was just before Christmas of 1963. And I went to my first meeting. My sister-In-Law took me to my fist meeting there in Columbus to the Linden Group on Cleveland Avenue. And that was my first meeting. And just to share with you, Christmas was a very sad day that year. All the children came to visit, but then they had to go back to their respective homes again. And as I say, the serenity prayer, I knew that it wouldn't be too long and I couldn't tell them that, but I knew within my heart that with the help of AA that I would have them back shortly so I went to my first meeting and I joined a group and I became a part of and I had made the decision to turn my will and my life over to the care of God as I understand him I had taken an inventory in the institution and I don't suggest if you're a newcomer that you do it this way but I folded an 8 1⁄2 by 11 piece of paper into four parts and I figured after being married almost 20 years it should include Hollis's so it was Hollis is good and bad and Marie's good and bed now you know which side of the paper was full my good and his bad but seriously not long after I came home I went to see that same Episcopalian priest and I took a fifth step and I spent three hours with him and it had nothing to do with that piece of paper I just shared and of course he had known me for years and known the family for years and he made it easy for me and at the end of the three hours we prayed together and he prayed the prayer of absolution that we have in the Episcopal Church. And I did truly feel that I had taken a fifth step, and I felt relieved at that time. Now, I don't know how you work the steps, but in the Linden Group I had about three men sponsors because women were scarce 30 years ago in the program. And they suggested that I work a step a month. So on January 1st I start with step one, and each year since then I run through the steps, some years more, some years less, but each month I'm on a step. And yes, this is August, and yes, I'm on the eighth step. So I suggest that if you don't have a system, as I said, I am strict, structured, and scheduled, and I live my life that way. There's no gray area in Alcoholics Anonymous as far as I'm concerned. It's black and white. Either you want it or you don't want it. Half measures avail us nothing. It's kind of like baking a cake. If you only put half of the ingredients in, you're not going to get much of a cake, and the big book tells us that. It tells us just exactly how to work it. So I got active in AA in 1964. I taught Sunday school, and, of course, I had a troop of Girl Scouts because we had seven daughters at home, And I was just proud to be out amongst people, you know, and to have my freedom. Of course, I couldn't drive and I couldn'T work because I had a year of parole after I came home. In 1965, I was with two years of sobriety. I was voted in as the GSR for the lending group, and that became a whole new service experience for me. i can say now that uh that was in 65 and 67 i became secretary of central and southeastern ohio and in 1969 i was elected delegate to new york and i was panel 19 and wherever tom is i'm not going to speak to him anymore because tom said panel 19 that's like forever ago but It was a priceless experience, and Bill Wilson attended. I was at the conference, the last conference that Bill Wilson attended, and it was just like God was in the room. It was just so special, and he was so special. A man of just a few minutes, his word carried in that room. It really was a privilege. The defects of character is The result of my fourth step were glaring and very easy to ask God's forgiveness and God's help working through them. And the same way with shortcomings. I feel that shortcomings are the everyday things that I run up against, my selfishness, my quick tongue, and carrying on through. making amends I made amends to my folks to the best of my ability they never really understood alcoholism my father thought it was so great for me why can't you get your sister to quit drinking she had a gallon jug in her closet most of the time but little did they know when they'd come to visit for ten days or two weeks they'd wonder why I still had to go to those meetings and little did they know I needed a meeting worse when they came to visit than I did ordinarily. The old-timers told me that I might have some rejection from some of the children and we did from one daughter. She just never did get close again. I think she just didn't trust the fact that, well, Mom won't come home from the store this time when she goes, you know, or something like that. But they told me that by the power of example, if you become dependable as a mother, as a wife, and as a member of the community, your power of sample will show through and they'll come to depend upon you again. um 19 uh i don't know what year it is hollis went back to drinking and i had a very hard time with that and yes i had taken the third step but for a period of time i decided that god didn't understand what i was trying to do with eight children and that i just couldn't hack this so i filed for divorce. One of the Al-Anons got a hold of me, and she said, Marie, you need to go see Father LeBlanc, and he was an alcoholic in the community, and tell him what you're planning to do. So I went to see him, and we passed the time of day, and in 1967 is when public information was first starting in AA, and I would go to the west side of town, and my friends would come to the east side of town where my kids were in school and he had me repeat the vows for better or worse and i said well it's a whole lot worse he doesn't come home for three weeks and uh for richer or poorer and i says yeah he doesn' t send a check every week either you know it's a whole a lot poorer and that's when he asked me if i was still active in public information and did I recognize alcoholism as a disease? And I said, oh, certainly. And he said, the other vows you said in sickness and in health. And I recognized, you know, that Hollis was sick and I was not a bit happy. Father LeBlanc said, I don't know what the hell you want me to tell you. You know, I took him in sickness and in his health. So it was not long after that that Hollist went to treatment for the last time and has been sober ever since, and I think that was January or June of 1967. So we come on down, and you know, where do you find your niche in Alcoholics Anonymous? We all have certain talents. I know that Mert and Kathy thrive on conferences, and I thrive on conference. This is my niche. Bob is familiar with the Hilton Head Midwinter Conference on Hilton Head, Hollis and I and three other couples started that conference 13 years ago and Bob's been taping it for us. You know, what's your niche? If it's nothing else but picking up ashtrays or going to an institution and taking a meeting or going into a hospital and visiting a drunk. And you know, I think we're at the turning point in an era with the disease of alcoholism where hospitals are not going to pay so much money for treatment anymore, and we're going to see more outpatient care. And I think maybe we'll be getting more 12-step calls again where we sit with the drunk and we pull them out of convulsions, as I did with one lady with the phone in one hand and the doctor telling me what to do and her laying on the kitchen floor in her house and me trying to do it and getting her teenage son to go get the medication. So I think we might be making more 12-step calls. We'll be able to check that out. But I challenge all of you to learn about the disease that you have. Make sure there's a big book in all of the libraries, a complete set of books in every school that you come in contact with. Let people know. It's like in Columbia, I was sitting in the central office a week or so ago and a call came in from the university from a psychology class and they wanted somebody to come and talk about Alcoholics Anonymous if that's not your forte get into the background items and do something there there's something for every single one of us how do we show our gratitude I can never be grateful enough for you giving me life itself and that's why I'm everywhere wherever you want to go If it's AA, I have suitcase, we'll travel. I fall down sometimes, but I get up again. You know, what do you do? What do you doing? What do we do for Alcoholics Anonymous to keep it alive? We have an obligation. You know the, in 1935 we had two members and now we have over 2 million and no matter where we go in the phone door even in podunk kansas or wherever you're going there's alcoholics anonymous look them up there's a little book that they put out for a buck and a half called the world directory it comes eastern and western and we drive with that on the front seat and that's our that's our big book as we travel across country and we've done that many times and we'd been to meetings many places. Well, to tell you about what happened, we put a house together in February of 1964 and by July we had all of the children back and there were ten around the table. And we got furniture from Salvation Army and AAs cleaned out their attic and gave us bunk beds and bedroom sets, and we got dishes and dish towels and toys and just about everything we needed. And one man used to come to see me, George Reeder, and he'd say, I'm coming over, and I'd say okay. He'd say put the coffee pot on, and she'd come and he bring a big box of something and he would stay a while and have coffee with me. But AAs really put their hands out to us and it was great. Those early years were a struggle but we made it through. Hollis became a carpenter and then in 1968 he became a home builder and built many homes there in suburban Columbus, Ohio. And we were able to After having filed bankruptcy, we were able to assume a mortgage and have a four-level split and a beautiful home. And we replaced all of that Salvation Army furniture one room at a time as we could pay for the furniture. And we did it all with the help of AA. in 1969 and 70 as i said i was delegate that was the year that our oldest son was wounded in vietnam and i went to new york to for the delegates meeting and the whole convention parade for hollis jr and that was a very special time in my life in 1972 we moved from ohio to Hilton Head Island, South Carolina and Hollis built more houses and we were able to educate the children and buy little Toyotas and Datsuns and pay for the insurance and do what we needed to do. We've had a lot of happiness with our children and we've done a lot of traveling with our children, and now we do it with the grandchildren. We just took two of our grandchildren back home to Fort Myers. I understand death differently now. My mom and dad have died, and we've lost numerous family and friends, and I've read a lot of books, and no matter what you are stuttering and stammering or having problems within your life, there's a book. And I've read a lot of them, a lot of them on death, and I have gone through the process. I've worked in a treatment center. I've been active on the local committees on alcohol and drug abuse. I've done a lot on the boards for treatment centers. I've just been very active in the program of Alcoholics synonymous. We've made a lot of material gains in our sobriety, and if you don't make material gains, gentlemen out of Cleveland, Ohio, Henry Wilmer told me that there's something wrong with your program. I had thrown one diamond away in the snow, and Luke has replaced them and replaced many other things that I threw away. When you're having problems and when I'm having problems, You know, I take the Lord's Prayer and I tear it apart. Give us this day our daily bread. God gives me the sustenance for just today. When I hurt my collarbone the other night, my kids right away said, Oh, Mom, you're not going to speak. I said, Well, sure I'm going to talk. I'm not going speak. I have an obligation. One day at a time, I'll look at it on Wednesday and I'll make the decision on Wednesday. And that's the way I live my life. I can't make my plans for Friday or any other time. I can only make my plan for today. Give us this day. We just don't drink one day at a time. And pretty soon the days kind of pile up. And God gives us the sustenance. And we have to forgive our trespasses as we forgive others that trespass against us. And we need to take a careful look at these prayers that we pray. The absolutes are in the big book, honesty, love, purity, and unselfishness. This is what it's all about. And my morning prayer is, God, please make me patient, kind, loving, and understanding today. And it's just that simple. If I can be patient, Kind, Loving, and Understanding. At the end of the night, I have to tell you about the eighth step. a couple things about the eighth step. A couple of weeks ago, I was up with that same sister-in-law that I've been mentioning to you and we were visiting with her and she put on a big party because the family had all come from everywhere and she and I were in the kitchen for hours and hours and hours cooking and getting ready and she said, Marie, I feel so bad making you work so hard. So at one point, we were both sweating bullets. I went over to her and I got down on my knees and I took her hands and I said, Louise, I can never repay you for all the kindnesses that you have bestowed upon me and my family. So I said don't mention it again. It's payback time. You know, I'm just giving back what you've given me. And that's how it works. That's how we make amends. I've made amends through the years, two that I'll mention that were very significant to me as I look back. And that is when Ken was killed, this one military family just took over the rest of the family and the children and helped us with the burial and everything and all the arrangements. And I sent them the usual, you know, funeral home thank you afterwards. But as we were traveling across country one trip, I said, gee, we need to look up the Gladstones. And to make a long story short, I wrote the Air Force and we found Joe and Kitty and I wrote to them. And they said, when she wrote back, she said, we'd love to have you come through. She said, but if you're coming through, please don't bring a bottle. Joe's in AA and I'm in Al-Anon. So we went to visit, and again I just put my hand over on her arm and I said, Kitty, I can never thank you for all you did when Kim was killed. And she said, Oh, she said we'd have done more if we could. But it was just the recognition of the fact and her being in Al-Anon, she understood what I was doing. And another amends that I made was we were traveling across country again, and I said, you know, someday I need to find Veronica. And she was the daughter of the uncle that we were going to see, the granddaughter of the ankle that we Were on our way to go see because he was sick. So when we got to California, she happened to be living in that house. And she was on a breathing machine and oxygen and all hooked up. And she's a young woman. She was a youngwoman. She died since. And I went to her and I asked her if we could go in her room and be alone. And I took her hands and I said, Veronica, I really appreciate you're taking five of my children, and, you know, the year that I was away in 1963. And she started to cry, and she said, Marie, she said I did the very best I could. I was only 19 at that time, and I said you did wonderful. And just the recognition of the fact, it's not that I did her any wrong, but it was the admission of the act that, hey, thanks for what you did for me as a result of my disease of alcoholism. And that's how it works for me. At the end of Step 9, we get all of the Twelve Promises, and I'm not going to read them off to you. You can find them at the bottom of page 83 in my big book. I don't know where they are in yours. But I strongly urge you to take a look at them, and they all do come true. They've come true for me. I have a meaningful life with some goals now, and I know where I'm going. I know Where I Was Yesterday and Last Night, And I know, too, where I'm going for the rest of tonight. And that's important to me now. Yes, I did chair the Women's Conference, and there will be some pink flyers out front, if the chairman will allow me. I just read the program for the International Alcoholics Anonymous Women's conference. It will be in New York in February on Valentine's Day weekend. And when you get 1,800 to 2,000 women together, let me tell you. Some of the most gutsy, tearful feelings meetings without the men around. I'll tell you, we get down to the gutsy stuff and some of the Most Wonderful speakers. And you'll hear one of them on Saturday night right here. So be sure to come. I strongly urge you to attend the women's conference if you haven't had that experience you women that haven't Mert and Kathy and all of her committee did a wonderful job here in 91 in Orlando well about five years ago we ran away from the kids and moved to Reno, Nevada and we played out there in more ways than one Northern California and all around that Southern California and went to see the prices right and went LA and you know did all those fun things that you do when you live out west and we stayed there for four years and it was wonderful and the scenery is gorgeous and if you haven't been out that way be sure to go but we moved back here a year ago a little over a year ago to North Carolina, but it was a little too country for us. So we moved to Columbia, South Carolina, and I think we'll be there for a while. That's the plan as it stands today, one day at a time. But come and see us. We'd love to have you. About probably ten years ago, A man that I had met in AA was an attorney in the Whitehall group at Columbus, and he's now a Supreme Court judge in Ohio. And we had dinner with him, as we always did, because we had kept our friendship up. And we Had Dinner at the Country Club. Yes, on Hilton Head, we did belong to the country club. And he said, Marie, you need to do something about your record in Ohio, He said, we've passed a new law, and your record can be completely expunged. And I said, it really isn't necessary. You know, my children are all grown, and I don't think anything like that's necessary. He said yes, it is. He said if one of your grandchildren want to get into West Point or the Naval Academy or do something along those lines or get into politics, it's necessary that they research. so he told me who to contact and I contacted a man by the name of Dennis and he wrote back a letter and told me what I had to do and on the bottom he put easy does it so I sent the $200 and about, I don't know a couple months later I got this 8.5x14 certification that I no longer have a prison record No record of my jail time or anything will appear anywhere in the United States. So for that, I'm very grateful. It wasn't important to me before I did it, but it's important to be now. The priest of our church, as I told you, had been very close to us. And I asked him one time, how come you have to go out and counsel in the middle of the night? And he said, Marie, you and Hollis have experienced something that very few people do, and that is that you haveと die to be born again. And I truly have been born again into the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. I feel that we live by step 10, 11, and 12. we continue to take a personal inventory. I hate like the devil to admit when I'm wrong and I'll wait until he's almost asleep some nights and I will poke him. And then some nights he pokes me. But like I said, he has his program, I have my program, we have our program. It is kind of like our bottles used to be. But step 11, sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God. As I understand them, I have a constant conscious contact with God It's not just morning prayer and thank you at night. It's God does six lanes of traffic. Make him take it all for cruise. And he goes cruising through these big cities, you know, on cruise. or God, you know, give me the message to give to this alcoholic on the phone. You know, it's, God's right there. You know I used to have a Sunday school God but my God is within me right here now not out there someplace. My God and I have a wonderful relationship. I understand him and he understands me. Sometimes prayers are answered yes sometimes they're answered no and sometimes they are answered maybe and sometimes they'll wait and then the latest one is sometimes God says you gotta be kidding but I listened for God's answer there were so many times that God would say to me when I was drinking don't do that it's not becoming of a woman a wife or a mother and I'd go hell bend for election now I listen for the answer You can call it ESP. You can called it your conscience. You can calling whatever you want to. I call a God my higher power within me. And I pray and I listen. And that's what meditation is all about, is being still and knowing that I am God. You know, so many times I would pray the prayer and then I'd go help them for election and wonder why am I not getting my answer to a prayer? You know, I just never would sit down and be still and get the answer. And then sometimes God would wake me up before in the morning and give me the answer or I'd go to a meeting tomorrow night and the answer would come out of your mouth and that's how God answers prayer. God is everywhere. God is every where and I thank God for all of you people. It's just wonderful. I'd like to close with a prayer that they closed our Episcopal Church service with and tell you thank you for allowing me to share my life with you. Before I close with the prayer, I'll ask you to pray for Karen. Karen is the middle kid, never smoked, has over five years of sobriety, and she's our middle daughter and she has cancer and it's not good she's had it for over four years it started with breast cancer and she had both breasts removed and now it's in the bone and her health is deteriorating so I ask for your prayers for Karen she's in Reno and God is with her I'd like to close with the prayer our priest closes our service with. Go forth into the world in peace. Be strong and of good courage. Hold fast to that which is good. Give to no person evil for evil. Strengthen the faint-hearted. Support the weak. Help the afflicted. Honor all people rejoicing in the power of God. Thank you. Thank you.