The Madness Inside and the Music of AA – Angie D.

I'm Angie and I am an alcoholic. And yes, I am Norma's mother. Everybody's asking me, you sound just like Norma. I said, no, excuse me? She sounds like me. I want to thank Angie and the committee and I want thank you for that black tote full of chocolates. much. I'm really great with chocolates, as you can see. The speaker last night, Norberto, said he was Jewish from Italy. And just in case you didn't know, I'm a Mexican, but not from Mexico. And I live in Blythe and I'm married to a cowboy. You all know where Blyth is? Huh? It's over where God sends you for asking for stuff. That's where it is. What I'm doing in Blythe is there's a man in Bleythe. I mean, this is the greatest guy that's ever been. I've got him convinced he never had it so good. And we're both dedicated to making me happy. And that he'd never had it so good and a woman's place is in the mall. That's what I'm doing in Blythe. If he croaks tomorrow, I'm out of there tomorrow night. I wasn't always from Blythe. I'm from Orange County. Yeah, in a little barrio. You all know what a barrio is? It's a little Mexican community. And the days that I was raised there, we didn't let any Anglos in and they weren't too anxious to come in there either. I was born a long time ago. I'm really a young person in an old container. I was born when they kept the mothers in the hospital a whole week, and when they came home with this baby, they didn't have a name for me, and the reason for that is because my daddy wanted to name me after his girlfriend, and my mother's narrow-minded. My mother was of the little purple lip variety. is she don't have blue lips because she's a Mexican. And I had an older sister that was perfect. You know what I'm talking about. They always told her what to do, and she always did it. And she always didn't write, and then she screwed it up for me. Because I never knew how to be good until after I was bad. And then it's too late, and they're always whipping on me. I don't know I'm a better child. I think that's what I have coming from not knowing how to be good if I'd have known I was a better child and I held it against them guys. I held everything else against them. I had a younger brother and I took it out on him. I think I learned to beat up men with him. They were divorced when I was seven and my mother would say things to me, you're just like your father. And I knew what her opinion was of him. She didn't like him too well. So she'd send me to the nuns so they could teach me to be a lady when the nuns thought was a lady wasn't appealing to me then and it isn't appealing to be now. In fact, it was rather boring. And not only did I not know how to be good but as soon as somebody said thou shalt not, I may not have thought of doing it before but as they said thou shalt now, I couldn't get out of my mind. It was just there all the time and And it wasn't until I did it and then I was happy. And somebody dared me, and I raised the nun's skirt to see what she wore under all them clothes, and they 86'ed me from catechism. And I got home and got my whipping. I was always an embarrassment to them guys. And the next day when I got to school, all the kids thought I was terrific. Man, I had always felt so invisible. And when everybody was talking and laughing and carrying on, I loved all that attention. Because it seems that me, I was born with an emptiness in my soul. There was a yearning, a longing, a hunger to be loved, to be wanted, to be accepted, and to fit in somewhere. And it just seemed that I was never enough. As a little child, I used to worship my mother. I loved her so much. And it seemed that i was never enough. So when I got all that attention, it filled up some of them empty places. Me, I believed that I always had that pilot lit. All I ever needed was a fuel. I was so hungry for love that I'd given my heart to anybody that would take it. All of my life, long into sobriety, I used to think if somebody would only love me, I felt so alone and empty inside. things were happening in our home my mother remarried a man that was getting funny with me and I knew it was my fault that I had done something to provoke this and when I went to my mother with this she said I was a liar and that it wasn't true and I don't know but I felt like a feather in the wind that nobody cares for but I had to do something to resolve this unbelonging and this loneliness. So I used to think, I'm going to go with my daddy because I know everything's going to be better over there. And when I went over to the San Fernando, which is about 60 miles from where I live, I stole money from my mother. I always stole. I mean, that's what you do is steal. When you don't have it, you steal. I believe in share. so i ran out to be with my daddy and he taken up light housekeeping with a lady with eight kids and all he wants is one more and he'll come struggle the good news is my daddy used to take people up north to pick grapes and prunes and we were fruit pickers and god made two kinds of mexicans that's fruit picker's and non-fruit pickers i'm not a fruit pickER they they try to make a fruit picker out of me and uh i'll tell you i've been close to a lot of things but work ain't one of them and richard knows that and he's he says that he ever feels like he's gonna croak he's going to run to the freeway and need a truck so i can get double indemnity on his insurance that's what i'm doing in blithe girls i mean he's the only toad i ever kissed to turn into a prince usually I kiss them as princes and turn them into toads well anyway we went to a place called Livingstone I think it's out of the twilight zone you know we stayed beyond the season with the Gallo brothers and they gave my dad a case of sherry wine and somebody must have said thou shalt not I had a big water glass of that sherry wine, and when it went down, it went boom! Just like I put my finger in the life socket. I'm telling you what, I loved it. I loved that feeling, and I'd have stayed there forever if I could have. Man, where's this been all my life? It's just too bad something that good has to be wasted on social drinkers that don't appreciate it. Man. I love it. And I know that the next one is going to be better. I mean, I'm a chuggalugger. And I chugga-lugged it and I want mine and yours and everybody else's. And I get that down and I don't know what happened. I overshot the goal trying to stay there, you know? And I come to the next day, my clothes all torn, where I throw up all over myself so I'm a puking drunk too and I'm from the Pachuco days you know the days when we used to wear them big hairdos and I'd come to the next day and all my hair I don't know what happened I know it was terrible I didn't know it happened it seems to me that I came through with something else I had a sense of shame of being dirty that went all the way through me. And I knew I had done something terrible, I just couldn't know what it was. And it seemed to me that I started a lifetime looking at people's faces and reading what they were thinking about me and I was never kind, you see. And so I started feeling dirty and shameful at that time. But I don't know how to express those emotions. I just know I can't tell anybody how I feel. It wasn't long after that, I was like 12. It wasn't long after that that I went back to my mother's and I was not wanted at home. She said they'd been free of me over a year and they didn't want me home. I had a knot the size of my fist on my throat where all I wanted was for her to put her arms around me and tell me that she loved me. But you see, I don't know how to ask those things. I just said, I do not care. I do give a damn. You see, I had to put out that exterior of not caring because the inside was hurt so bad. And I started running the streets. I really wasn't doing much different than the kids are doing today, except I was born 50 years before my time. I lived here and there and everywhere. Anybody that would take me in for a little while, and people would takeme in fora little while because they felt sorry for me. But you see, I'm an alcoholic, week. And I love the booze and the boys and the cha-cha-cha, that's what I love to do. And we Mexicans, we like to have them parties all weekend. You know them parties if the cops don't come? If we're there in shootings and knifing, we ain't had no fun! I don't know how to be good but I sure know how to be bad. I mean that came easy. I always had to be something just to feel enough. I also don't know how to work, so I take up burglary. It seemed like a good idea at the time. Your things were much more interesting than mine. If anybody lived over in Lemon Heights in Orange County in the late 40s or early 50s, I'd like to make my amends tonight. I was sure surprised when the state of California discovered me and they took me before a judge and there sat my mother and all them other purple-lipped relatives looking at you looking at me with that I told you so smug look and the judge looks at me Now, you know I'm sleek, hip, and cool. In those days we used to wear them army shirts with the collars up and the fatigue pants always been a little white around the beam so you know I look really sexy and the judge asked me, well young lady what do you think we ought to do with you? Well, I scooched down on my chair and I said you're the judge man, you ought to know that was a wrong, wrong person to have that kind of an attitude with me and my attitude to do a little bit of time for the state of California they didn't understand that my case was different I'm supposed to do nine months because I just turned 18 but I do 13 months because I don't know how to be good there either, I'm a walking bust, everything I ever did I always got caught in and when they finally let me out I thought I'd be the only gray haired little old lady in the girls' reformatory. When they let me out, I'm always one that wants to live in the answer instead of the problem. So I took my first inventory. I don't have a job. I do not have an education. I dont have a home. I have no money. And I'm thinking what an order I can go through with it. I better go out and find me a husband because God knows I need somebody to take care of me. And then I went out looking for a husband in places that husbands are not to be looked for. And unfortunately for him, I found one. There was usually the same kind of guy always caught my attention. You know there's this kind of guys that they walk with a little slouch and they wear tight t-shirts and have tattoos usually it says mother or born to lose and uh they they wear the they wear them hair all slicked back lots of grease you know then they got shine in the eyes they're all smiles and they say, what's happening baby? It still gives me chills. I used to think that look was charisma. Today I know it to be psychosis. My sponsor says you can't make chicken salad out of chicken shit, but we tried. He was a mainline heroin user, and you just don't live happily ever after with one of those. Very exciting, but not very happy. Three months later, we were pregnant, and I was married. He decides I'm going to be a good Mexican wife, but I thought he was going to be a Good Mexican Husband. Our relationship was like the cat that jumped on the skunk. He didn't get all he wanted just all he could stand. Been apologizing to my kids ever since passing on them kind of dreams. By the time I had my baby, I knew this man didn't want to be married. And I knew it because it was me. He had promised me he would change and he would do all this stuff. And I believed him, and when he didn't, I blamed myself. It was always because there was something wrong with me that I couldn't see. So when I had My Baby, and they put that baby in my arms, I felt like finally, finally, somebody belongs to me. When I loved my baby, I knew that nobody could ever take her away from me. That she was my baby. And I promised my baby I would never beat her, abandon her, and discard her as I had been. And I meant it with every fiber of my being. But I'm an alcoholic. And I am a woman alcoholic. And when I drink, I have absolutely no choices and no rights. When I do, I'm going to do what's in front of me to do because it's there to do. I never know or think about tomorrow and the prices. I just know that I've got to have the immediate answer to that madness inside of me, to that emptiness inside ofme. And I took that baby and her sister to places that children should not be taken because I'm an alcoholic. And that's not what I wanted from life. All I wanted was somebody to love me and cherish me. Some little house in some corner of some barrio with the tortilla smells and enchilada smells, that dolphin and I could not do it. I know that today. After the second one was born, I left him because I looked in the mirror and I looked so old and I knew that nobody would want me so I had one other checked out and then threw him out. I always believed in Plan B, and I fell in love. And when I fall in love, I fall all over my body. Every inch of me falls in love. I can't remember the names of some of the men I've fallen in love with forever. This time is going to be different. The guy I fell in love with at that time his name was Danny but they called him CB and that stood for crazy bastard so you know and I became a bar drinking unprotected drunk an unprotecting woman that drinks in bars and is a blackout drinker I know the feeling of degradation and self-loathing that a woman alcoholic goes through when she's treated the way that people like me were treated in bars and have to put a smile and a laugh because you see the clown was the face that I put for the world to hide the pain inside of me. Five years, because this man didn't the first husband didn't let me drink he introduced me to little white pills with crosses on them. I didn't know what they were but I sure knew what they did to me. I had one eyeball over there and one over there, and I make baby clothes all night long. Couldn't remember whether it was time to put them together or time to tear them apart. And during the time that I was alone, I didn't ever remember whether we were going someplace or coming back from someplace, who I was with. Sometimes I knew where I'm at about it. That was more embarrassing. And one day at a time for 12 years, I was not to know what it was to have a sober day. And one night at a day, I went into literal hell. And that's not what I wanted from life. During the time that I was in these five years of madness, there was many a time when I would come home where there was not enough chemicals to kill what I had in that cold water shack that the romance of being a mother had long since died, and the responsibility for those girls choked me. And they were children that fought in whispers. They were afraid to make any noise because a monster would come to, and they didn't know if I would come to, I would start screaming and yelling, and then I would stop hitting, and it was like I was watching somebody else, and I'd start hitting and hitting, and I wouldn't stop, andI couldn't stop until there were screams and blood and tears and prayers, you see. And when a semblance of sanity would return and I would see what I had done to those little girls, I died inside. And I've heard many women come into the program and say that they've taken away their children and they're very sad and I know that you are. But in those days I used to think, would somebody please take these little girls and give them a normal life? Because I got a madness inside of me. There is an evilness inside of me and I don't know what to do about it. So with this type, I had to run and I had to drink and I have to do a lot of things to survive that took all the humanity out of me. After five years of this, my dope fiend husband was someplace in Texas getting the cure and he wrote back pictures and there's nothing like a dope fient when they clean up, don't you? I mean they eat good, lift weights, vitamins, get pure, read the Bible, that need stuff that happens. And so he said, this time is going to be different. And so we, he came back and didn't want me to drink and I'm laughing at him, so he knifes me and I carry a gun and I am going to shoot him and four days later he calls up and apologizes to me and so we take off to Las Vegas and get remarried. And then, I mean, he wouldn't treat me like this if he didn't love me. and we made the Mexican geographical remember to buy half an hour from mama never good stand mama and mama never could stand me but you couldn't go very far away just in case they'd forget who I was we bought a little ranch an acre of ground and the chickens are horses and we're gonna be farmers is doping and And Blythe has been called the armpit of California, but there's a place called Mira Loma over by Riverside that is another part of the anatomy not worth mentioning. At least that was my experience, you see. Something happened there. I mean, I joined the PTA and he became Santa Claus that first Christmas if them folks had only known on whose laps the little darlings were sitting on. But this was 1962, so it is a long time ago. And but after a while that life gets to be too tight. I'm a firm believer you can place me in the best of circumstances and sooner or later I have to create whatever is inside of me because it's inside of the madness leaves don't you know? When he and my neighbor make a pass I go beat up the neighbor and I find out you're not supposed to beat up the Anglo women, they call the cops on you. And my drinking changed where before I had been a party girl and a bar drinker, I became a bedroom drinker. The best thing about Mira Loma I can say is that it's in the middle of four wineries and very close to Cucamonga which is the wine country south. However, the wine that I drank I don't think ever saw the grape. I mean, but it got the job done. I'll tell you what, I'd get up from my bed and go make the run and buy five gallons and come back and go to bed and get up and go make the running. I did this over and over and again. I got to the place in my drinking where my body was drunk, my mind was in agony. No matter what I put inside of me, I could not kill that madness anymore. And I started looking for answers. I went to different churches. I've been to so many churches.I've been sprinkled, I've been thrown flowers at, I'd been dipped and dunked. I mean, I even had went to places where some guy stands up here and says who wants to be saved? And I'm the first one down the aisle. I'm getting mine. I always got save and got home and got unsaved. I don't know what happened. And I did this over and over again, and I got so weary, and got so tired because nothing was working. Nothing. And so I saved my sleeping pills because I just wanted out. And waited until this man was home because I couldn't stand to kill myself and have those little girls find me. And one day he come home, and he was out someplace wherever he went for his connection. And he was watching television, and I said, I'm going to kill myself. He said, okay, and went back to watching. We had a slight communication problem. So I went and took a bath because, you know, I am not taking very many baths this time. And I cleaned my house and threw out all that dirty clothes, underwear, you now. Just in case I die, they won't know how I lived. And I don't know why I would be so concerned. I pushed away everybody near and dear to me. Everybody was scared of me because I'd beat them up or yell at them or tell them something about their grandparents or lack of. And this guy, he used to tell me, shut up or I'll hit you. And I'd jump him first so that I made sure he did. And I just got tired. And I went to bed and took enough sleeping pills to kill a horse. and all I did was sleep for two nights and two days. And when I came to, I was not glad to be alive. I was enraged and came to on what has to be the loneliest day of my life when I couldn't drink and I couldn' t be sober and I could' n live and I cou' n't even die. And I had no place to go. And I knew this man had been in bed with me both nights while I was in that coma and never once did he consider taking me to a doctor or to a hospital. The last person that I thought cared didn't want me there. And I don't have no place to go. And I sink into a pit of self-pity. When I look upon that day, I realize my higher power has always had his hand upon my life, even upon that date. You see, there was a knock on the door. It's a lady from the PTA. If there's somebody I didn't wanna see, it's a Lady from the PT. And there stood Mrs. Clean. Say, hi. I must have been downwind from her because she said, what is wrong? And I tell her how what is wrong about this SOB. I didn't call him SOB, you know what I called him. And how he done me wrong because I trusted him one more time. And like all men, sooner or later they let you down. And so, that was a, I can't say it because I'm a Mexican, but it's cheap shot. Isn't that something? Anyway, guys, I always loved you anyway. You just were unfixable by me anyway. And she came into my house and she stayed with me and I'm telling her all this story. I don't know how you are, but me, I know when I talk too long because they get a certain zeal in their eyes, don't they? And I thought, uh-oh. I don' t know what I said, but she asked me if I ever heard of Al-Anon. I'd never heard of al-Anan, but I got the idea that if I went there, he would straighten up. So she cleaned me up and took me to al-Alanan and I don't know how you felt if you were like me went to Al-Anon I felt a little bit like a whore would in a nunnery there was absolutely no identification between me and them square broads but they hugged me and I gave them that smile you know the smile that goes the lights are on but there's nobody home I had heard somewhere I had a beautiful smile I think it was from some guy that wanted other than my smile but he didn't have to say much and I just smiled at them women so they could leave me alone and I found out years later they used to laugh at me I thought I had them fooled I mean every so often this lady comes and gets me and takes me I don't hear nothing one day I heard the word release so I went home and told him in detail how I was going to release him so he used to sleep in the front room in a rollaway bed with his clothes on and a knife under the pillow and I'd sit in the corner with a big black coat on and watch him. As he'd be dozing off, I'd go take a little peek at him and he'd go, whoa! I mean, that felt so good it was almost sexual. And he would say unkind things to me. He'd say, baby you may I may have a monkey on my back but you got an orangutan how dare he he was so bad made me look good and one day I came home and he was gone he took everything with him he wasn't planning on coming back and that's the way it had to be though that life was unbearable it was familiar and I just stayed there till I killed him or forced him to kill me because you see I I had a feeling way down inside of me that said, do anything you want to me, just don't leave me. Just don't leave me, I'm so terrified of abandonment. And you know bad luck comes in bunches? They also kicked me out of Al-Anon, they did. and they designated this poor soul that had inflicted me upon them to take me to an AA meeting to their husbands who they didn't like either if there's anybody here from Al-Anon you know that the Al-Anan saved my life until I came to you They knew who I was and what I was And they kept me and held me close You see, if they did anything It was where I wouldn't know They didn't say anything about kicking me out I just thought that And they designated this poor soul That had inflicted me upon them To take me to the AA meeting in Pomona which is about 30 miles from from Mira Loma and she got came dressed me and got me there I always went where red green and purple and she gets me dressed I don't know how anyway she takes me to this old dilapidated old house you know the Skid Row part of town which is familiar to me and takes me around through the back because I'm a Mexican they take me around through the back and there's all these Eleanors in the kitchen doing whatever Eleanor is doing the kitchen and she walks me through them ladies now I ain't looking at them ladies in that in the eye I am not giving them the satisfaction of me seeing the contempt and disgust and triumph that I know is there I just looked down at my feet, at my feet and walked through them. And I walked through to a room where I listened to the music of Alcoholics Anonymous. I listened that belly laughter, that smile that reaches the soul that shine in the eyes, and that happy talk. And those are the sounds of Alcoholic Anonymous." The very first thing that attracted me to you was the music of Alcoholix Anonymous! If you knew like I was, there's words and there's music and I don't know the words, but I hear something I hadn't heard in so long. You see, I was a dead person for so long that just my body was too young to die, but my soul was dead. And my sponsor says, and I say it to that my soul has been spoon-fed by Alcoholics Anonymous. And newcomer, you be lucky like me, I let it wash over my soul and I hungered for it. I've often wondered what is it and where does it come from? And it came to me one day that these are just empty rooms. That which happens in here, we bring it with us. Every one of us. And it intermingles and becomes a group conscience, the higher power. You call it whatever you want, but you know there's something that happens in these rooms that never happened any place that I'd ever been before. And I wanted what you had. And And I thought, it's too bad I'm not an alcoholic. If there's another name for the disease that you and I have, it's called, I ain't got it. I know I'm weird, and I know I'm different and three steps ahead of the man with a butterfly nest, but I ain' an alcoholic! You see, alcohol was my answer. And then when I added other things to enhance that. It was like, this is how I wanted to live and that was the answer. But you know if you take alcohol and other drugs along with it, you get busy. You have to get busy because pretty soon this don't work so you got to keep changing the combination anymore. And I'm thinking I just haven't found the next combination, that's all. And so I looked around at all them sober, single, good looking young guys and I said, I'm going to get me one of those and I did it was the sickest one there it had to be I got radar but it takes what it takes and that's what it took for me for ten months I was a visitor in Alcoholics Anonymous in Pomona in those days they used to go around the room everybody gave their name when he came to me I'd say I'm Angie and I'm a visitor now I'm not an alcoholic and they kicked me out of Al-Anon, so I'm just a visitor. Nobody ever said, you don't belong here. Somehow you understood I've been kicked in the teeth by life and rejected by everybody I come in contact with, and I couldn't have stood any more rejection. You put your arm around me and you said, keep coming back. Do you know what that feels like when you're used to people saying, keep on going, weirdo? It was really a disappointment to me when I found out you were telling that to everybody. I thought it was just me. I felt a little funny along the way, so I stopped drinking and doubled up on the Miltowns and Benzedrine, which was what I was taking, and got weirder. And this guy wants to get rid of me now. I'm not easy to get out of because I didn't have a backup. So I moved to Pomona. I moved to Pomola to be closer to the action. And I walked into our room one day and there was this cute little guy sitting there with big blue eyes and blonde hair, and I have an affinity for blue eyes and blonde hairs. Today it's blue eyes and gray hair because time marches on. And this guy is talking, he just got out of jail at the boys' reformatory and he's talking and he says he don't have a girlfriend, he don'T have a surfboard, he DON'T have a car. And I think to myself, come here little boy, I'll take care of you. and I did and I educated him on sick broads I mean he thought a truck hit him I tell you what but after that relationship was over he decided to become a minister and I'd like to think that somehow in my small way I helped her sin over the guy I don't like women and I don' trust men, and that don't leave you much. And I didn't know what I was going through is called withdrawals. I thought that was sobriety, no wonder I never wanted it. Where you walk them streets where you can't sit, you can stand, you can't remember who you're talking to, you have blackout sober, with the anxiety and the panics were so bad, and the charley horses that the only relief there is, is to walk them streets, the depressions were way down and the highs were way up and I thought the highs way up is what I wanted life to be like. And I didn't know about the pits, you see, where I want to kill myself for you. And sometimes a madness would be so great that I'd tear my clothes and I'd beat up on them children and that guy and anybody that was around me. And he was the first man that ever had been kind to me. He was the first man who had ever been gentle with me. Everywhere that he went he wanted to take me with him. Me that had always been abused and misused by every man I'd ever had. And I would have stayed there forever if I could have, you see. I held on with a death grip. I truly believe that you and I do not come together by accident. I really believe we come together by divine appointment. And yet every relationship has its beginning and its parting. The only relationship is the relationship that I hold with my higher power that keeps on growing and fills up all them empty places. He who brought the power that brought this person into my life will not leave me an orphan when that person goes on their life. It's just that when you go on your way, you take a little bit of you with me. I'm with you. And when you leave a littlebit of you behind, and we're never the same because our lives have touched. But I didn't know that then. You see, I didn't trust God. I believed there was a God.I just didn't trust that I would have a loving father. I just trusted this man little by little. And when he got drunk, so did I. He was not my worst drunk. He just seemed to be my most hopeless one. I could not come back to you. I was so embarrassed. And a man named Carson went and brought me back on a rainy Wednesday night in December. And the miracle that happened to me is that last December, the 22nd, I celebrated my 30th birthday. That is my miracle. And the victory is not mine. It belongs to us, you see. i used to think i am a miracle but i am not a miracle the program of alcoholics anonymous is the miracle as long as i stay connected and fulfill the conditions and it is laid out in that book then i am part of the miracle because you see if we are all part of to those of us that forget the miracle and turn away from the sunlight of the spirit and drink again you see So I know that I am here because my higher power has reached down and brought me here for a reason. And it isn't through self-centered gimme, gimme gimmies. You see, I am the messenger. I am not the message. I am The Messenger of what I used to be like and what happened. What happened is that I came back. I mean, I don't know. It helps to be desperate and have no place else to go. That's all I have to say. That's the only thing that'll make me teachable is to be desperate as I came in when I was new. In the beginning, it was a step up for me to be called an alcoholic from some of the things I've been called. I don't know if I wanted what you had. I just couldn't stand what I had, you see, and that kept me coming back. I've got all years, and you know, we have our heroes in Alcoholics Anonymous, and my hero is Johnny Harris. Johnny Harris inspired the love of all colleagues anonymous inside of me. You see, he taught me about the love of one drunk for another, that there are conditions to fulfill here, that we have to go to meetings and have sponsors for reality checks, that we have to read the book in order to get informed of the life that we need to live in sobriety. And he taught me that the steps are not to be read or studied, they are to be taken. That it isn't necessary to believe that they work. All I have to do is to take those steps. And that it is the only program that you can look back and see that it works, you see? The rest of the time is taken on faith. And I don't know what you are, but I never had faith or trust in nothing and nobody. But I told you it helps to be desperate. It's like I heard a speaker once, God if you ain't here, I don't want to repeat the rest because it's four letter words. I am a Mexican that speaks English bilingual but my primary language is profanity. In the beginning, they all know more than me. Then I can stand some of them and then I hate a member of Alcoholics Anonymous. I know there's nobody here that crassly gets resentments against other alcoholics. I mean, this guy didn't know nothing. The reason I know he didn't knows nothing is because I'm a newcomer. I'm supposed to go to a meeting every night and he goes to a meet-in every night. He's sober 12 1⁄2 years. When I'm sober 121⁄3 years, I don't have to go meetings every night and he was there every time and I know he was there all the time because I looked for him. Oh, there he is. I don't have a sponsor. The group is my sponsor. I don' t like women anymore just because I'm sober. The women got a lot of time to look at you. I don''t know what they're seeing but whatever they're seen I don'T want them to see it. And I got this young guy. He's 11 years younger than me and I'm like a monkey with a smunklet so I don ''t like them young women. Let's go this way honey protecting from them young girls. The guys are always much more friendly when you're 32 and cutesy cute. Anyway, they used to, today I know that I could have retroactive sexual harassment. They pat you on the head, bump you in the boob, pat you in your rear, and you just laugh. You think, well you've been taught. They were the same guys that were doing that to me the bars. They're just sober now. Anyway, I went to some of the old-timer men that knew what they were talking about because I'd heard Johnny say, Resentments are the number one offender for the alcoholic. They are fatal and that would scare me. So I'd go to some of them and I'd ask him, How do you get over resentments? I make sure I put my smile. And they'd say, Turn it over as he does it. This too shall pass one day at a time. Go home with the book and come back and don't drink. So, I came back the next time and looked I think it was still cooking. There's a phase of resentment when it just hurts so good, you'll just love that egg until it turns on you and then you go oomph. So I'd go to somebody else and again they'd say, oh turn it over easy does it, these two shall pass one day at a time, go home with the book and come back and don't drink. After a while I got the message they don't know the answer either. Either that or they're going to find out there's a fraud among them. So one day this guy, they told me just pray for him. So I would say the serenity prayer about five million times for him while he's talking. And one day he was talking and then he started to cry and I came to him. He was crying for God's sake. How embarrassing. He's crying. Has anyone ever heard of John Wayne Iwo Jima? Pancho Villa? Emiliano Zapata? Somebody for God sakes. See, only women and sisters cried Jesus. After the meeting, they all went and put their arms around him. Oh, shit. So I went to go put my arm around him, I gave him one of those stiff-arm hugs, you know, just in case what he had was contagious, but I had no better. He don't have no class. He just comes right in and puts his head on my shoulder and starts to sob. I'm startled. And something happened to me. You see, the pain in him reached out and touched the pain in me. What can I tell you? That's the first time that I ever felt somebody else's pain besides my own. And the love that you had been showering upon me, that I never knew how to shower back on you. I'm a taker and I'm a loser. You see? I'm a takers and I am a loser and so I don't know how to give it back. But you see, it inspired something within me. And I hugged him. And all that anger and all that resentment and all that bitterness melted away as it had never been. You see, I took those steps, not because I thought they would work. Those steps don't care who work them. But they are who change me. I used to think that if you try to work on things head on, you can get rid of and they used to say, we work on our resentments. Do you know that I have worked on all my resentments? And the more I work on them, the more they stick. It's amazing how that happens. And one day I turn my head and do something else and then I look back and it's gone. How did that happen? Between every two surrenders, I forget how I did it the last time. A lady volunteered to be my sponsor and she said I had to give him up and I had stay home and be a mother and I never had been able to live without a man I'm not talking about sex I'm talking about somebody to hold me close and make that lonely horrible something go away for a little while and she says stay home and learn to be a mom my kids and I didn't like each other sober drinking or sober so I did the most reasonable thing for me is I got rid of the sponsor she made me feel guilty so i married that young guy thinking that lady had cursed me and the day came when my higher power said it's time you see i did my apprenticeship and it was time i was sober five years and everything that i ever thought i wanted i had it went between my fingers it was never enough nothing was ever enough and that young man i went i had my children started drinking and taking drugs for god's sakes didn't they learn from their father-in-law but you know and they're just like me they like to go out and party and have a fight and um nobody got that one huh one day i came home or on convention i was before i spoke and and they were so loaded i hit them they hit me and they ran off i had one run up to ohio i didn't even like my mother only went half a mile i never knew mexicans went to ohIO and i i had that when my first one that i held in my arm so many years ago was in our living in a commune and came home one day with a burn the size of a silver dollar where people had been putting cigarettes out on her chest and i died inside i died in sight i went into a horrible depression. Today I know the depression is just anger that's turned inward. It's imploded anger. I went into a depression and again I contemplated an attempted suicide. The young man went and took me to the psycho ward, went home, packed his clothes and left me. And everything that I ever feared came about me. I was the best me that I had ever been. I was not enough. And it is the people in Alcoholics Anonymous that came around me at that time and held me up yeah i got i got sober in toast burner country and them toast burners that never got out of their kitchen and their bedroom were the ones that came and taught me about women it is from the women that i've learned to be a woman there's nothing like devastating pain there's something like devastating paint to make all them walls and all them secrets come down where I didn't care who knew me and I was able to share the secrets of my heart with you and yes, you shared the secrets of your heart with me and I realized that we were not so different. Maybe I drank in bars and maybe you drank in your kitchen but we felt the same about ourselves. Actually, it was easier for me because nobody expected anything but the gutter from me and they expected so much from them other ladies that drank in their kitchen and it is from the men that treated me like a lady that I learned to be a lady. Johnny told me that every woman that comes into the program of Alcoholics Anonymous automatically becomes a lady and deserves to be treated that way. And you see, I love to hear those words because I always wanted to be like them people. As a little child, I used to run away from home and peek in through windows where there was lace curtains and dark furniture and clean houses, you see. And I always want it that for me. But I said to my higher power, I went to one guy named Dave and I said, Dave, what is wrong with me? What kind of a person am I that I cannot seem to form a one-to-one relationship with a man on an ongoing basis? I can attract him, but pretty soon they just can't stand me and leave. He said, you are a beautiful, warm, loving lady and one day you will know the reason. And I said... To my higher powers, okay God, I know the reasons. I believed this guy when he said I was warm and giving and loving. I said, okay God, I know the reason, bring him back. And he didn't come back and I said screw him, I'll let him do what the goddamn please, I'm so tired, I'm such a little girl I'm tired. I don't know about you guys but for me that means surrender in the only language I understand. And I made peace with God. I said okay God I'm never going to be happy again. All you ever want me to do is work with a sick woman drunk to let them puke on me. Alright, alright. I will move back to Orange County because I didn't know where else to go and every time they asked for something I held up my hand. They all thought I was new because I was so angry and bitter but you see and I was, you see. I had almost six years of sobriety or dryness unmarred by a day of growth. I threw myself completely and absolutely into this program without any reservation whatsoever. When I got to the other side, you know there's another side to be got. The side where I wanted to shoot him with a shotgun about two inches from his belly and just let all the gore wash over me. Or running down in the freeway back and forth flat like a tortilla. My sponsor assures me they don't lock you up for being crazy, only for acting crazy and she said when i asked god to remove my defects of character god said what an order i can go through with that when i got to the other side i touched a power and a strength that was way down inside of me and i knew that nothing and nobody could ever own me again after all that's said and done. There's only you and me, God, anyway. Sooner or later, all relationships come to an end. You see, I knew that what I wanted from these people, they never had it to give. My need was so great that nobody could have any fulfillment but only my higher power. I threw myself into this program of being of service. I knew the service was the only way, the only thing that I had been sober for. I don't know about your higher power, but mine has a strange sense of humor. When I want something so bad, oh God, if you give me this, I'll go to confession and mass every weekend, and three or ten Our Fathers and Hail Marys all the time, please, please, please. It don't come. As soon as you say, ah, screw it, here it comes. My children came back. I didn't even want them back. Why are they coming back? They went to work. I went to school and became self-supporting through my own contributions. I worked with the women drunks. I used to go to the recovery houses and capture them and take them to meetings and bring them to my house. They thought I cared. I didn't care. They told me, you remember when I stayed in your house? I said, no, I don't remember. There were so many cavemen. Do you remember the money? No, I do not remember. You see, I didn' care. But something happens. I din' care. But I do it like you. I act as if I care. And God throws in a joker. One day I start caring. Where did that come from? And when you love me, it feels great. But when I love you, it fills up like I thought you loving me would feel. I told you I was always so hungry for love that I'd give my heart to anybody that would take it. It's in me loving you feels that way. Why does it happen that way? I thought you lovingme would take care of it. No. My caring what What happens to you feels filled up, all them empty places. I am one of those ladies that had to learn to live alone to find out the difference between being alone and having loneliness, you see. I got so I could live alone and say, man this is wonderful! I knew that because I'm an alcoholic one day at a time I don't drink. because I'm a thief one day at a time, I don't steal because my sponsor won't let me. And there isn't life after marriage. In fact, I can get married any weekend I want and I don' t have to bother with all that other stuff. I don''t know, I kissed them and they turned into toads. So I settled in for old age and menopause and started saving money for my old age. Nine years I lived alone and the day came when I fell in love again. oh jesus here we go again yeah i'm too old and too tired for this i mean this guy was so different he was a cowboy farmer and i'm a pachuco mexican the only mexicans he knew was a nice guy and he came over from mexico and worked for them and all that stuff me i'm the one who beats up men you know and it didn't frighten him it interested him i was really we were just comparing notes it was like we were from different planets, and I don't know. He was a newcomer. I 13-stepped him. If it offends any spiritual giants, it offended me. I took him to a convention once. I was his counselor in the hospital. Well, at least he left home before he started calling, and I took him to a convention once and I was speaking and there came my friend Frank Sloan over here and I said, oh Jesus. You know, nobody worse than your friends. They don't even mind their business. And he looks at him and he says, is he one of us? But he sees he's got the, you know those little dogs that are in the back of Mexican cars ago. And he says, how long has she been sober? And he sees that she's got a red nose like Rudolph. And I said, five minutes. He says, Jesus Christ, and you give that poor guy a break. Let him sober up first. So I go to my sponsor. My sponsor learned to be a sponsor from hitler my sponsor's name is mary reagan she told me to tell you she loves san francisco and that when she dies she's got it in her will that she wants her ashes out of golden gate bridge yeah she partied in san franciso that's what i went to her i said mary usually she tells me i don't have to sit in my own shit just because it's warm. This time I just I like whining and so she lets me whine and she says, Angie he's a nice guy if you don't want him I'll take him. Wow! Just tell them you scooped him in before somebody else did. And what I found out that if you are scared somebody is going to find out something about you, tell them. And then you won't be as scared. My mother-in-law wanted to know about my story. Well, you know you don't want your mother-on-law to hear yours. I gave her a tape and said, here it is. Now this guy whispered in my ears and send me chocolates and oh just wonderful one day he came in with a cattle truck you know where they haul the cattle took all my furniture and we went off to Blythe to live happily ever after and you know we love and cherish each other I've had women ask me how can you tell the difference between love and lust and I say six months This guy inspires goodness in me. He says I'm the greatest cook there ever is, so I'm over there cooking. He loves Mexican food and I'm over there sweating in that 123 degree thing. He said his house has never looked so clean, so i'm over here scrubbing and burning. And he says his shirts never look so good, so he's got 85 shirts all color recording. They're my shirts, I just let him wear them. He uses the right psychology. You see, I never had it so good. My daughters and I, my daughters are members of Alcoholics Anonymous. We are friends, we are friends but they have their sponsor. Thank God! My job is over. And I have two granddaughters. You know, I was not a good mother, but I'm a good grandma. Oh, I found out how to get along with kids. Just give them everything they want. I am now a great grandmother to one poor little boy. I have 2 daughters and Two granddaughters and one poor little guy. They reached in a fist and moved everybody else out. You see? And his name is Andre and I call him Awesome. And I told him that before I came here on Thursday, I said to you he's two and a half years old, I says Andre, do you know your granny's precious baby? And he goes Oh God, it just I took one of my oldest granddaughters to a conference once where I was speaking and had a long white blouse that covers a multitude of tortillas and beans and white baggy pants and she looked up at me with a shiny little face and says, Grandma you look just like the white angel You see this little girl has only seen what you've done with me She's never had to see her grandma crawling in her own filth so battered she doesn't look human, or have the batterings that her mother had, you see. All she's seen is what you've done with me. If you were a drunken person who lived in a dirty bedroom like I did, there is no road that leads from there to here except he touched me. Thank you.