The Truth That Keeps a Sane Alcoholic Sane – Dave C.

I have been sitting here since 6.30 and I'm going to tell a story that's very appropriate and you'll know how I feel. You know, you sit down here and get ready and you can't eat in the first place if you're speaking. I can't because I've tried it several times and do a lot of burping and strange noises But many years ago, I was told they had a convention in the state of North Carolina and they had an long-winded speaker. And in the first hour, he talked on the 12 steps. In the second hour, he got into the 12 traditions. People began to leave. They will leave. I found it out one night. And sure enough, he got into the three legacies in the third hour. And everybody left but one man sitting on the front row. And, of course, he got concerned and ran down from the podium. Rounded up his talk, ran down to the podium, grabbed the man by the arm, says, I want to ask you one question. Everybody left but you. Why did you stay? And he said, hell, I'm the next speaker. Well, you kind of know how I feel now, don't you? And I told my sponsor many years ago that I'd like to talk sometime with a music background. and I didn't know it was going to be this type of beat but I had something a little bit slower but let me tell you now a lot of you are worried about how it's going to affect me and don't be worried about me I worry about how its going to effect you as I talk we'll get through this thing one way or the other and so if I get to moving strangely You know what the hell's going on, so don't be alarmed. And if some of you get to moving, I'll understand too. It's all fun, really and truly. I'm an alcoholic. My name's Dave Cook. Hi, everybody. By God's grace and because this program works for me and through the help of some understanding sponsors that have led me with a kind but firm hand And through the love of two women in my life, my former wife who died a few years ago and my present wife, Julie, through their love and then a lot of people in Alcoholics Anonymous, I haven't found it necessary to take a drink since I've come to AlcoholicsAnonymous. Now, when I came into AlcoholicsAnalymous to give sobriety dates, I didn't come in here in Texas, by the way. You know, in Texas if you don't give your sobrietry date, by God they'll shoot you. But I come in the Alcoholics Anonymous and the Old Central Group in Roanoke, Virginia. The second meeting I ever went to was a discussion meeting. And they had 13 or 14 wicker trails sitting in a circle. And I was no different from anybody else that goes out at the first discussion meeting I began to wonder what I was going to say when it got to me. And it finally got to be, and the man who had become my first sponsor told me what to say. He says, give your name and your sobriety date. That's all you're qualified to do. And he explained to me later that that's all I was going to be able to do for quite a while. The second reason I give my sobrietry date is in the old central group, they said if you remember that group and got behind the podium and didn't give your sobpriety date, you usually didn't have one. So that's the reason I gave my sobprietry date. And my sobRIETY date is September 12, 1957. And some people are offended by sobriety dates, you know, in different parts. There was an old fellow from Texas, he's dead and gone now, a fellow named, I wonder what I call the circuit riders, named Burton Crawford from Kilgore, Texas. Burton would get up and talk, and he'd say, my name's Burton Craword, and I've been sober ever since I can remember. Well, you think about that, that covers all of us. It's been so much since we can remember. I want to thank the people responsible for being here, and I didn't know what I was going to get in town or not. Dan was supposed to meet me, and I finally found him. And I understand he's carried me back to the airport, and I wantto talk to some other people about that before I go back. But it's good to be here, and it's good to see some friends and people I've known for a while in this part of the country and to share and care with you a little. And like I say, if you see me slow down a little, you know why. Pep it up a little as the music has something to do with it, I guess. I don't know. I've received a lot of benefits from this program, what I call marginal benefits. Peace of mind, serenity, happiness security a few material things but anytime I talk about my marginal benefits I have to talk about the basic and the basic benefit that I receive from this program is my sanity and today as a sane alcoholic I find I don't have to run anymore I don' t have to cheat or steal anymore don' d have to lie anymore and I don´t have to sober up anymore And I didn't know that's what it was all about when I got to Alcoholics Anonymous. I grew up in a home in northeastern North Carolina. A good mother, a good father, and two sisters. And because of his drinking, they led to the divorce in my home when I was 12 years of age. And I remember some of the, not physical abuse, but the verbal abuse. And I can remember as a kid telling my mother I'd never be like him. I despised my father growing up. And as I know what I know about alcoholism today, I can honestly say that my father was an alcoholic. Although I didn't know it then, I didn' t know anything about alcohol until I got to Alcoholics Anonymous. My father is one of these people you've heard this many times. He was a good man as long as he didn't drink. He was periodic. He would leave in his business and be gone for two or three weeks, and come back sober. And didn't drink much around home that I can recall. But I never wanted to be like my father. And lo and behold, when they were separated and divorced, I lived with the mother, and she took out their two sisters and raisers, gave me a college education, sent me off to school. school and that's why I came in touch with John Bollicorn when I was a freshman in college. Because this was the time when the people of Jetson Boys would come back on the GI Bill and I was in this environment and I've been in that environment long enough that I became a part of it. I've always said if you're in an environment, you'll become a part of it, sobriety or drinking. And I worked at it in the beginning, getting it down. You know how we work at becoming alcoholics. I used to hear the fellas a lot older than me now. They would talk about the pleasure that came from drinking. They didn't understand what they meant until one day I asked one of them. I said, when does the pleasure come you speak of? And he said, Dave says, you remember there's a little pause in between from the time you take the drink and when you throw up. That's the pleasure. I was in school partial on basketball ability. I played high school athletics and went off to college, and part of my being there was because of basketball. And then I got in a problem with drinking, but I studied pre-engineering in college. And when I got ready to graduate, instead of going to an engineering field that I'd studied, because of my basketball ability, I was hired to coach high school basketball down in eastern North Carolina. I was 20 years of age, and I don't know. I've looked back at it many times, and I guess I was seeking glory. I don' t know. But I fell upstairs in the coaching profession in a short period of time. Had a lot of success the first school, and then went to a much larger school. And as I look back at my drinking at that time, it was just on weekends, meeting friends and just having a weekend brawl is what it was. But no serious problems. no hangovers. And then my second school, after I'd been there two years, I began to have a lot of problems because it wasn't long before I was drinking all the time. I was going to school under an influence after four years. You know, I had a lot of problems in the job I was in, doing a lot things that I shouldn't be doing, writing bad checks. You never wrote a bad check that wasn't going to make good the next morning. And I know none of you ever had any problems like that, but my mother was sublimating my income for a long time until she got slow. And those checks, well, she would take a lot of them up and then she got real slow and that's when the authorities began to come to me to talk to me about bad checks, particularly at the school. I can remember seeing one of the deputy sheriffs call me out and we'd be out talking and the kids would look through the window, some of the teachers too. And, you know, I was thinking, well, they really don't know it, but I'm on the cover agent for the Sheriff's Department. Now, you can begin to understand there was something wrong with my thinking. I was living in a life then that I didn't know what truth was. I didn'T know what the value of a dollar was. And my mother was a, I had a mother that loved me to death. And later on, I'd like to tell you more about that. But anyway, what happened at this particular school is because of the fact that I called in the first time about my drinking. I denied it and resented it. And then, you know, alcohol is cunning, baffling, and powerful. Well, the alcoholic is cunning and baffled. And so what do you do? Well, you get people off your back. So I've sat out to divert their attention, and I've set out to get married. Local girl I'd known for about two weeks. And God bless her, we got married. And we carried two other couples with us on the honeymoon. And you can begin to understand what this marriage was like. And it's real strange how the alcoholic affects another person. Because of the embarrassment, we knew this marriage wasn't a mistake from the very beginning. And because of the embarrassment it would bring, because I was a teacher and a coach in the community, we decided we'd live together for about a year, a little over a year and a half. But yet I'm the community drunk by now, and everybody knows it except she and I. And my mother tried to help. There was a period of time that when I came along there was no such thing as treatment centers. They were drying out places. And my father was able to send me some of the best up and down the East Coast. I went to four different ones that I can recall, and I enjoyed going because you taper it off. I don't know if any of you ever tapered off or not. I enjoyed tapering off. You sip a little, and you sip a Little, and finally you're drunk. And I just enjoyed it. And I'd come back from these places in worse shape than when I went, and my mother didn't quite understand it. But I got a sabbatical leave one time in the summer to go to one of these places, came back. And I promised this lady that after we were married that I wouldn't drink anymore when school started. And when school started in September, I found out something I didn't know, that I couldn't stop drinking. I couldn'T stop drinking and I began to get into a lot of trouble because well I was coaching boys basketball and in the middle of the year the girls coach had to go into service and ask me to take over the girls team which was a mistake and I was going to these ball games real loose you know drinking vodka, leisurely breathless moving good not drunk but just loose moving real slow and sure and you know what I mean I wasn't drunk, just comfortable and the first ball game I had I'd been in the habit of the boys you know, giving them a rap on the reel when we started the ball game. And I had these girls in the huddle and I was hitting them on the rear and sure enough some parents start coming down out of the stands and all hell broke loose is what happened. And I didn't know what I'd done, I really didn't. School board met the next morning and I found out what I've done. And my drinking got to the point then that I was getting into a lot of trouble And I'd been there four years, and they allowed me to resign. And in my story, I just kept moving east. In my home state, you kept moving west, and there's nowhere to go. And that's eventually what happened. I went further east to another school and lasted there six and a half months. I was living in the community. This woman had left, by the way. She'd had enough. I live in a community, a nice town And I had to drive about 12 miles to the school every morning And the only way I can describe my drinking at that time I hadto get up 4 or 5 o'clock in the morning And drink enough booze to stop shaking Because I'd gotten to that point where I'd shaken mighty bad Drink enough boozes to stop shaken To take a shower, shave, get clothes on, go to school Knew what was going to happen at about 12 Shaked would start again and not have some hit in the gymnasium or in the automobile, drink enough to stop to shake, pray for 3 o'clock, go back to town and do the same thing over. Now, prior to this, I had experienced blackouts. I didn't know there were blackouts in short periods. But one day at school, the principal just stopped me in the hall and said, Dave, we don't need you anymore. We didn't have a conference. We didn'T talk about it. I didn't cry, and that's unusual at that time. But I really believe, as I look back at it, I really believed that what I know today about alcoholism and the result of my sobriety, I really belief that this moment I'd crossed that invisible line that we speak of. I'd become an alcoholic, although I didn' t know it. Because I'd gotten to the point in my life that I'd take one drink and I could no longer guarantee you my behavior. And to me, that's what an alcoholic is. And that's the thing that I don't understand about it today. The people that are going to come in the doors later on, the people that you've seen come inthe doors, and your own story. And that is the inability of the alcoholic to see himself as he really is in his worst moments. And this is the thingthat just about destroyed me. I left school that day And experienced the first prolonged blackout for about two weeks I don't know where I went I later found out where I was And woke up in jail for the first time in my life In the city I was living And a man began to talk to me through a cell door one morning And I later find out he was a county health doctor And he said, son, your mother's come down here and straightened out all this mess and we're going to send you to a place where they can cure you. Now, I didn't know what he meant by curing me, but I began to think I was going to one of those places where I could taper off. And that's not the way I went. I was 27 years of age and they sent me to the state insane asylum in the state of North Carolina, which is called Dix Hill. I've always said I too found my thrill on Dix Hills. 27 years of age, and I didn't know what I was there for. The first few days they put me in a ward called the inebriate ward. I didn'T know what it meant, but it sounded scientific to me at that time. And I adjusted to that environment too. The people around me chase squirrels most of the time. You know, they run under the beds, up the walls, under the tables. So I started chasing squirrels too. Hell, you know, never caught any, come close a couple of times. And then a few days later I was DT'd, hallucinations, and they carried me down and put me in what they called Skid Row, which was at the end of the bottom of the building, this building for alcoholics, a padded cell where they took my clothes away from me and let me have my runnings fixed. That was a cure for alcoholism in the state of North Carolina in the middle 50s Lock you up and hope you come out And I was able to come out a few days later And they put me back up on the ward with the rest of the drunks And, of course, I began to wonder what I was doing there Because there was nobody there my age The men were a lot older Well, to be honest with you I began to think, you know, how an intellect works in alcoholism. I began thinking, well, maybe I was there to write a book to expose this place to the public, you knows. And then, you now, I couldn't understand why my mother put me there. Well, my mother had done everything she knew to do. And then one night, these elders, I was the only man there at that age. I was their only young person there. And they were playing poker. They were using matchsticks for chips. and they began to talk the reason they were there. And one man spoke up and says, I'm here because my wife wanted to get rid of me. And I kind of identified with that. I thought my mother wanted to be rid of him. And then I heard a man speak up. And I can see his face tonight just as good as it was 40-something years ago. And this man says, I'm hier because I'm an alcoholic. I'm her because I am an alcoholic And when I heard the word, the only thing that popped in my mind was my father. And I began to play a game that plagued me until I got to Alcoholics Anonymous, comparing my drinking with my father's drinking. And he lost his business. He never got kicked out of his profession. But I got kicked Out of the Profession behind bars and a lot of other things that I don't like to talk about. I stayed in Dix Hills 30-some days. The day it came that I had to leave, I didn't have anywhere to go. Everything I'd accumulated since I'd finished college, I'd lost. The bank account, the cars, the automobiles, the homes, everything was gone. And what do you do? You go back to the only place you can do. I went back to my home to see my mother, and my mother let me back in again. And I don't know, the family doctor who was always, he didn't know anything about alcoholism. He didn't Know anything about drugs, but he was always worried about my nerves. And so my mother sent me to see him. I'd been at home two days, and she sent me to see my physician. And I don't know anything about drugs, but I do know something about tablets. And a good doctor gave me some tablets to take. Now you're talking about being loose. I was loose, and I was dangerous when I was taking these tablets. I was running around with a crowd that I'd have been in school with at night, you know, going out and eating big steaks and everything. They were drinking, and I Was taking my medicine. And I was usually in worse shape than they were. And then one night, one night I'd been home nine weeks and the bottle was passed and I decided I'd have a drink. And that drink took me back to the place that said never go again as long as I live, Dix Hill. Went back to that place again. As a matter of fact, to make a long story short, I went back to Dix Hills five times in six months. Five times in sixth month On account of one fact, I've become an alcoholic. Take one drink and it can no longer guarantee my behavior. The last time I went back to Dix Hill, they put me in the nut part of the bug house instead of the wrangler part. And there was a distinct difference, in case you're interested. This is when I found out about straight jackets and being tied down on the bed and how you live better electrically. I found that out about that too. And as an old friend of mine used to say, I always felt better after I had one of those things. You're damn right you'll feel better after you've had one. Shock treatments. And I look back at it, the people that I was in this ward with were nuts. And I was right there with them. We hear a lot in a word, and I have a vocabulary, and AA and everybody has a vocabulary. But you hear a whole lot about in alcoholic anomalies the word coincidence. A lot of coincidences happened to me before I ever got to alcoholic anomalities. And what happened in Dixie or that particular ward I was in, one day they came and got me out of that nut ward and carried me back and put me over there with the rest of the drunks. And I'd been there so much it more or less made me an honorary attendant. I worked in the kitchen, could get the mail to the main building and stuff like that. And one day two other fellows and myself decided we would escape. It was like cops and... That's what it was. It was big time. like cops and robbers then out there and sure enough we escaped that afternoon from Dix Hill and wound up in downtown Raleigh in a hotel, got us a jug and we were drinking and the six o'clock news came in we were watching that black and white TV you know how these streamers when a hurricane coming or bad weather one came across the bottom screen three Kremlin insane had just escaped from Dix Hills and one of those fellas wondered who the hell it is And we found out in a minute who it was that showed those steel pictures. There they were, popped up, boom, boom. One fellow started crying and left and ran. We haven't seen him since. I don't know what happened to him. And the other fellow and myself decided, well, since we're gangsters, we'd better split up, and we did. and that afternoon, or the next day rather I was on the streets in Raleigh a friend of my mother that knew me and knew my background, knew my problem put me on a bus and sent me back to my hometown and I got back and broke into my mother's home I didn't know it until later she was in Richmond, Virginia on a nervous breakdown and they found me there about a week later when they brought Mother home from the hospital Now, I don't know if you know who they are or not But they are those people that put you in one room And they get in the other room and they crack the door They begin to talk about how much they love you but what they've got to do And one of them came in the room I was in and said We want you to leave this part of the country, you're killing mother We want her to leave And I began to think it was a good idea too when I saw the money They really meant for me to leave I could have gone to the West Coast and lived comfortably for a period of time. And I bidded them farewell that afternoon and left. I didn't make it to the west coast. I didn'T go but four miles to a neighboring town and pulled into an old hotel and began to drink again. And sure enough, I had a lot of friends there for a while until the money ran out. And then when the money run out, you know we were desperate, so one day I went back over to my hometown. Fin of the family. I bought an outboard motor. Didn't have a boat, but I bought a motor. You know, write a big check, get some change, pick up the motor later and all that stuff. And they called my mother to tell her that my motor was ready. And she had put two and two together. And that afternoon John Law came and got me out of that hotel in the neighboring town and carried me back to my hometown and put me in jail. First time I was in jail and I'd been in there for about a week and raising a lot of rumpus about why I was there and finally I got the jailer down there one night and I said, I want to talk to my attorney. He said, Who is your attorney? I told him. He said talk to him all you want to in the next cell block and sure enough he was and God works in mysterious ways. This man later became a member of Alcoholics Anonymous and became a state legislator and stayed sober and died sober. But he couldn't help me that night. And a few days later, I had to stay in trial in court law for something I didn't know I'd done in the blackout. And the prosecuting attorney was my mother's next-door neighbor. He didn't seem to know who I was. Nobody seemed to know Who I was, and they got through there, and then the next day they carried me into another courthouse and I had to stand trial again. For them, I didn't know what I'd done in a blackout. And as I said earlier, I just kept moving east. And I went about as far as you can go in my home state, the Great Dismal Swamp on a chain gang is what happened to me. I've always been ashamed of it, and I'm still ashamed of It. And I'm one of these people that just had to be beat down to my knees before I could see myself as I really was. And this was part of it. And I went to this camp and I worked hard enough, I worked my life, nobody had anything to do with me. And I had heard about Alcoholics Anonymous in Dix Hill. On Sunday afternoons some fellas from Raleigh would come over and put on a meeting and they'd say everybody in there is here and we'd go in there. I was the joker that got in the back of the room and made fun of them. You know I figured out after I'd been sober about a year that they left every Sunday afternoon. But I stayed. That was the first time I heard about A, and then this prison camp, I heard about A again. This fellow was a superintendent of this camp, was a young man. He had a young wife, and on Saturday afternoon I had to cut his grass at his home, and he let me have the evening meal with him. And he began to talk to me about alcoholics anonymous one night, and I told him I was too young to be an alcoholic. Now my brain had been about pickled by then, but I'm too young to be An Alcoholic. The day came and I had to leave this place. I didn't know what to do or where to go, but one place and I was back to my hometown to see my mother if she would see me. And she did see me and let me in the back door and began to talk to me and they got together again. And I heard them arguing about me. I heard my mother say that's my boy and he stays here tonight whether you like it or not. And that's when I made a vow I'd stay sober for her and I don't recommend this before a year after a staying sober for somebody else and i was able to do it for about four months then one day was suggested maybe i should go to work it'd been a while i didn't think i gave the job teaching state of north carolina in coaching so through an agency up in virginia i was interviewed in the state of maryland the state of virginia four different jobs and one afternoon around up in ronald virginia a man began to my mother took me on this expedition and a man began to interview me. It was the largest high school in southwest Virginia at that time and he seemed interested in me and he wanted some references. I gave him some names and he said well sit right here I want to make some telephone calls and I'll be back in a minute I told my mother then I said well it's all over now and sure enough we sat there about 40 minutes and he came back and said, I understand you had a problem with drinking it. You're not drinking anymore. And I said, that's right. And I wasn't drinking. Went back to my hometown. Now, I had a new start in life in spite of where I'd been, in spite OF where I'D BEEN. My mother bankrolled the whole thing. I had A PLACE TO GO, a good job, a nice place to stay, and some money in my pocket. And went back to MY HOMETOWN AND LEFT THE FOLLOWING SATURDAY TO GO BACK TO RONO, CHANGE BUSES IN RICHMOND, VIRGINIA, They had a little layover, and I decided I had to have one drink. Bought two pints, but I had to have on drink. And this was the beginning of the only drunk that I really talked about because this is the drunk that got me to Alcoholics Anonymous. I got back to the city of Roanoke and started going to the place I was supposed to. Checked into the big hotel on the hill, living it up, writing checks and was able to work one week. The school authorities tried to help me. They found out what was wrong, and I lost the job, and my mother got in touch with the middleweight that's drunk and gave me the greatest gift she's ever given me since the day I was born, and that's when she kicked me out of her life, and i knew she meant it. And two days later, I wound up on the streets in Roanoke, Virginia, on Skid Row doing the best I could, Panhandle. On a Sunday morning, September 11th, 1957, I was in the back alley in downtown Roanokes trying to get a drink of liquor down. And I'd gotten to the point, I don't know about you, but I'd got to the moment that I remember when my moment of truth came and it came that morning, it seemed like to me the earth stopped moving. And I thought, when I realized, I thought I was going to die in that back alley from what I was doing. And I though I was a leper. I thought i was the only man on God's green earth like me. And I prayed out to a God I knew nothing about for some help. Coincidence may be the only men that knew me in that city on a first-name basis was the superintendent of the school. He'd been looking for me for several days. And he found me that morning. Carried me to his home and got in touch with a man that knew a man, an alcoholic synonymous in Roanoke, Virginia. And that afternoon I was carried down to a 12-step clubhouse called the Easy Does It Club where I was introduced to alcoholic synonyms. And I never want to forget it. I remember I'd gotten to the point I couldn't black out anymore, I couldn'T find oblivion, my hair hurt, my toenails hurt, tired of the high cost of low living, and that's what it is. And the only vision, no peripheral vision, just straight ahead, jake-legged and really didn't know who I was or what I was doing. But I wasn't drunk. I wasn'T falling down drunk. And they carried me up those stairs. And we say we don't look them over when they come in. By God, you look me over. Because what I had is what I hat on and a paper bag. I had a ear syringe, a toothbrush, and a razor. And 10 pennies is what I had when I got to Alcoholics Anonymous. And as I was in the steps there, there was a man standing to the right giving me a hand and said, come over. And I went over to him. And the superintendent and the other fellows started talking to some more people. And this guy, this old man says to me, he said, son, put his arm around me. I've never forgotten it. He said, Son, all you've got to do is listen to these people and do what they tell you to do and you never have to be alone again. A man was named Old Man John. He rang my bell. What he was telling me were the first few lines of chapter 5 that was read a while ago. Rarely have we seen a person fail who has thoroughly followed our path. That's what he was saying. That's all he was talking about. He rang me. And then I was introducing some people and I said something about a drink. I began to shake. He said, no, we don't do it that way. If you get too bad, we're going to get a doctor. Then I said something about some tablets, and I thought I'd started a revolution. And they said, drink the coffee, drink the coffee. Now what I'm about to say is no reflection on anybody here, but I've always said and I still contend that there are a hell of a lot of people and alcoholics and almost making coffee that don't have any business doing it. it was one of those days I mean it was that ropey stuff I thought it was real crime and I drank coffee the whole afternoon until I got sick from it they carried me to my first meeting that night and I remember a speaker I remember looking at the window talking about going out the window and that night proved to me I didn't have to be alone anymore three men got me a room at the YMCA and stayed with me all night long talking to me about alcoholic anomalies, what it could do and what it couldn't do, telling me their story. And I remember the sun was coming up at the light of day, and old Claude is dead now, but first time I ever heard it, and I never want to forget it either. He said, Dave says all we do, we just try to do it a day at a time, a dayat a time. And I don't know, I somehow really believe that ended up back, in my mind I began to think well maybe I could make it today but for some strange reason I had to be around them to do it and that's the way I feel about it tonight. I still got to be around you to do and that morning I was carried back to that clubhouse and introduced to the man who had become my first sponsor I didn't ask for him he appointed himself and this man was he gave me much. I've always said anybody I've sponsored, if they get half of what I got, they're going to make it because I got the whole load. I got a whole load and I'm a beneficiary or a good sponsorship. I'm on my fifth one. Four of them have died. I didn't kill them. The last one was kind of reluctant. As a matter of fact, I was telling somebody today he's a man that I sponsor. He's got 45 years and when my last sponsor died, I had to get somebody in, and he was it. And he's kind of shaking now about the deal. But anyway, this man got me a place to stay that day in a boarding house, and there was five other alcoholics living in this boarding house. We had meetings after meetings. Out of those six men, out of those sixth men that lived in that boarding house Three of them are dead. Two of them went back to drinking. One killed himself. Two of us are sober. Closest friend I have in the AA is still sober, a fellow named Charlie. And one other one that's still drinking calls me every Christmas, collect. And, you know, wants to know why I can make it and he couldn't. Same old deal. I just followed the directions. So I got involved there at that boarding house. And, you know, in that group I was in, the old central group, it was no tiptoeing in the tulips. I'd been sober for a while and I began to read a little. In a way it says we're amazed before we're halfway through. I asked my sponsor one day, I said, when am I going to be halfway through? He said, don't you ever worry. Don't you every worry. And they called it a conference room in the back of the hall. It was an inventory room is what it was. They would call you in there and sit you down. I said, sit down. We want to take the inventory. The old-timers. And they would. They would. They called me in one time, and this was in December, early December. I got sober in September. To talk to me about my employment problem. Now, I've always said I've learned much more from people with less education than I have. The man that saw my employment program had a third-grade education. It was a sign painter named Red. In that meeting, there was an attorney, there was a doctor, there was the nurse, my sponsor, and Red. Red speaks up and says, Dave, it seems to me that if you have studied engineering in college, that's what you ought to be doing in life. Well, hell, nobody ever explained to me that way before. And so with Red's help, and by that time I'd met Sue, who was my wife for 30-some years after I got sober. This was another gift from God. This woman was just a gift. She said it was a social work, but Sue and Red took me over to the Virginia Highway Department to be interviewed. I had set up an interview. Carried me over there, and then I went in for an interview, and AA had told me, he said, now tell them the truth, and I told them the whole load, and you know when you tell the truth is a complete amazement how they sit there, And I got through, and the man said, well, my God, if you're willing to help yourself, we're willing to help you too. This was two weeks before Christmas. When can you go to work? I said, I've got a lot of business to tend to. I was scared to death is what it was. I've got a little business to attend to, and it'll be about the 1st of February. He said, well, you come on back, and we'll put you to work. Went out to the car, and Sue and and said, how did it go? You get the job. Yep, when do you go to work? I told them what happened. They carried my butt right in there and I went to work that afternoon. That's what you call AAN action, I guess. I don't know. And I really fell upstairs. I did good at what I was doing. I was full of fear. And what happened essentially, really and truly, for me to get back to North Carolina, to marry Sue, I had to move back to South Carolina to get a divorce. This woman that I'd been messed up with for about a year when I was drinking, I couldn't get a divorced in the state of Virginia. So I came back to north Carolina in 59, and my sponsor had arranged with another man to sponsor me, and I was very fortunate then. I went to Raleigh for the North Carolina Highway Department, Department of Transportation. And the man who became my second sponsor was one of the first 100 members of Alcoholics Anonymous in New York. He had married a lady in RaleIGH and he lived in Raligh. And he was the man that rammed a big book down my throat. He's the man que got an interest in service work. and it was through him that I used to travel around with him when he was talking around conventions and so forth and got to meet a lot of the staff members from New York and some of the old ones and then when I was a delegate in 67 and 68 one of the stat members named Hazel Rice had made arrangements for me to have an hour session with Bill and I'll never forget it as long as I live having that hour session with Bill Wilson. And then later on, when I was delegate chairman, I had the pleasure of sharing the podium with him. Of course, he was the one doing the show. I was just there. But I'll never forget that. This man, my second sponsor, Tom, I'd been sober about five years, been going to some of these conventions and conferences and watching these jokers talk, and they got through, and everybody clapped and hugged and kissed. He kind of people to me a little. And one night I told Tom after the meeting, he was one of these that had a conference room there in Raleigh, the old Hayes-Barton group. And I said, I got to talk to you. I got a little problem. So we went in this room and he was one of those that made you sit down and he stood up and talked down at you. And he said, what's the problem? And I said, Tom, I think I'm a convention speaker. I can't repeat from the podium what he said Well, he put a moratorium on my speaking for two and a half years He said go all discussion meetings you want to You don't tell your story until I tell you Two and a halve years And I just got to the point A lot of people thought I was deaf and dumb But I did what he says And then one day he called me He said come over to the house I want to talk to you And I went over there and began to wonder what I'd done. And I sat down, and he stood up. And he said, Dave, there's something I want to tell you. He said, you're going down to Columbia South Carolina to talk at a state convention. Before you go, here's something that I want tell you, you've got to do this, do this ,do this, and do this. Before you got, there is something else that I wanted to tell him. You're going as a damn substitute, and don't you ever forget it as long as you live. They asked me to go first. And you're gone as a substitute. So every time I get behind one of these things, I think of him, and I wonder how many they invited before me. You know what? Just to set the speed. He was a doll, and then he gave me much. He's the man who really got me in service work. And then my next sponsor, Willett, he was one of these people kind of slow on the draw, I thought. But Willett was a great man, and Then Earl, and then the one I have now. So I've been blessed with sponsorship. I don't know if there might be somebody here tonight that began to wonder about this thing called Alcoholics Anonymous. It works. I'm here to tell you that I really believe that, you know, I got to a point that I didn't know what was true in AA. I had a lot of problems beginning around early sobriety. I caught on to this thing and after about nine months they let me talk one night at the group. The steering committee met, though, and gave approval. And I had prepared a talk in my own mind of what I was going to say, but one of the fellows at the home got drunk, and they brought him in and sat him on the back row. And I began to give a talk on how not to slip. Never heard of one being done, but I started one. And I heard somebody say, sit down. Now, when you start raving sober, you don't hear things like that. and I kept on going. He said, I said sit down and in a minute he came to the podium got me by the hand and carried me right off the podium and people sitting right down the middle aisle and eyes got big you know and I was thinking to myself my God I got too much power for him tonight and he don't want me to overdo it. That's all it is and I began to be around one of these people that hang around a bunch of people that say take what you want and throw the rest away you're going to be alright And then one night, the old-timers of my sponsor called me in that conference room and began to talk to me about my sobriety. I was a little over a year sober. And they told me, they said, Dave, if you don't get honest with yourself, if you're going to start working these 12 steps, you're gonna get drunk. Now this is a heck of a thing to tell the backbone of the group that he's gonna get drunk. But that's what they told him. And I got mad, and I wanted to get out of that room, and I got ready to leave. And he said, before you leave, my sponsor said, before you leaving, I want to ask you one question. He said, when was the last time you thanked God for a day of sobriety? And that made me mad, and I went on back to that boarding house, and I want it to be a good thing. I want you to do something to him. I want us to do some things to them. You know how we are. You go through different stages in sponsorship. ship. And I went back to that room and I sat down and I wrote a resignation to Alcoholics Anonymous. By God, I'll just resign from this thing. And as I was doing this composition, I began to hear his voice. It became louder and louder and loud. When was the last time you thanked God for a day of sobriety? To pray to a God then I didn't know much about. God to me after a year and a half of sobrietty was question mark in the sky. Maybe yes, maybe know. But as a result of this juvenile prayer, I was able to walk into the bathroom and look at myself for the first time in my adult life and know that I was just a speck on this universe and someday I'd die and soon be forgotten. And the only way I had to go was through the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. And I went back the next night and rejoined Alcoholics Anonymous and I rejoined every year, every time I have a year. And I had to eat a lot of crow, and I came. I remember the clique. If you want to know who the clique is, well, get there before the meeting starts, see who does the work, and stay after it. And I began to do those things that we were supposed to do. And, of course, then later I moved to North Carolina and got involved and been there ever since, and life has been good to me. Like I said, there's somebody here who might be wondering about this thing. I believe the core and guts of this whole program is based on one thing. That's the truth. More briefly, you've got to be honest with yourself. I've seen enough in my time in Alcoholics Anonymous not only to believe but to know that there is a power behind this universe that stands ready to help you and I if we're willing to help ourselves. I used to call it the man upstairs, and tonight I call it God of my understanding, the God that I found in Alcoholic Anonymous by your love for me. I really believe that I was loved sober I really believed that I was love sober and I never want to forget it I was sober nine and a half years before my mother would ever accept me back into life as a son really and truly and there was a struggle she couldn't understand for a long time how I could do this for a bunch of strangers and I couldn't do it for her and I thank God she later became a great friend of Alcoholics Anonymous, and I thank God for the fact she lived to see me sober for 32 years before she died. My two sisters, I got one of them wants to join AA and don't even have a problem with them. She said we have so much fun, and they got to know a lot of my friends in AA because when my mother died and then my former wife died and so forth, and that was another test that I went through. You know, God closes doors and he opens doors. And when Sue died, I thought the world would come to an end, and AA came into my life and a lot of friends. And then along came this woman that I met in Alcoholics Anonymous some time ago, and we've been married now seven years. She's going on 22 years of sobriety now. The only problem we have is she won't let me sponsor her. And another gift, you know, there was no children in my first marriage, and this lady, through her children, grown children, I've experienced four grandchildren being born since I've been married to Julie and now know something about grandchildren. The love that I never knew before. All of this is a result of the program of Alcoholics Anonymous and I never new life would be like it is today. I've bee sober for a period of time. I'm not an old-timer. The old-timers, as I've said many times before, of those people that got here before I did. They're the legends, I call them. The circuit riders that went all over this country carrying the message. And I thank God for the fact I've experienced and knew a lot of them. In spite of this God-given sobriety, there are certain things I really have to do and I know what they are. Sometimes I have to remind myself, you know, I told you when I came here I was willing to go any length to get this program and sometimes I haveto remind myself that when the telephone rings or some guy or gal wants some help. And I don't know, the thought pops in my mind, I wonder if they could wake up after breakfast. And thank God the fact comes back to my mind that those three guys that first night, they didn't drop me off at the YMCA and say, we'll be back in the morning after breakfast, hell no, it don't work that way. It doesn't work this way. It doesn' t work that well. I thank God for the way I was sponsored. It's a twist there. The second thing I have to do is But I have to continue to have a monumental desire to work at this thing. I have do the 12 steps because that's what it's all about. And then I have go to meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous. And that's where we survive among individual egos. And the love, the greatest thing that you have in your life, whether you know it or not, is the love of a home group. And I found out out in early sobriety the love for my home group and it's the laughter. You know, I remember when I came in the alcoholic's office, everything was so sad. So sad. Then later on, everything Was a lot of fun. And I think about the fun things. I have to be around people that enjoy laughing. Like old Henry, a member of a group that... Henry was a college-educated man. Had trouble getting sober, but he died sober with a 26-year sobriety. In his early sobrietry, he got drunk one time. And one of the fellows says, bring him on down to the funeral home. We'll put him in a casket and let him sober up tonight. And we did. We carried him down. John, another member of the group, was there and said, just bring him down, and we'll let him sobre up down here tonight. We put him on a casquet and left him. And the next morning, John was down there. You know how they're all at this playroom, clean and dusted and everything. Henry's rared up and says, where am I? And John says, you're dead, Henry, youre dead. And Henry says, how long have I been dead? He said, you've been dead two days. And Henry said, well, John, what are you doing here? He said. I'm dead too. And he said, how long have you been dead. He said I've been there ten days. Henry said well you ought to know where we can get a drink of liquor. That was the punch line. Where can you, Henry said where can you get a drank of liquor? And as people like that I got to be around really and truly. The fourth thing I have to do, and you know what I'm talking, some days I just have to hang on and do the best I can because there are days like this. I remember them telling me, they said, nothing's so bad that it won't get better if you just haveと hang on. And it's true this, that I feel like that yet yesterday is my experience and tomorrow is my hope and today is going from one to the other and doing the best that I can. And I really believe that as long as I can do this, I can walk hand in hand with you down this happy road of destiny that we speak of, finding sobriety one day at a time. Is it a coincidence that some old friends that I've known over the years that we get together and share and care like this? Is it the coincidence that I got to Alcoholics Anonymous the way I did and found the things that I have in life? If it is a coincidence, I define a coincidence as an act of God in the midst of time. the same God that has been doing for you and I that which we could not do for ourselves. God, the Father of all mankind. There's a few lines in the book that I'd like to close with because it tells my story and probably yours. And for a long time I didn't tell anybody where it was until they started checking up on me and I had to admit it was in the books. one. And it's very powerful and it means so much to me and probably to you too. And it goes something like this. This great experience that released me from the bondage of hatred and replaced it with love is really just another affirmation of the truth I know. I get everything I need in alcoholic tournaments and everything I need I get. And when I get what I need, I invariably found that it was just what I wanted all the time. Thank you very much.