The Twelve Traditions Are the Principles for Living With Other People and Nobody Told Me That for Twelve Years – Dick A.

About This Speaker Tape

Dick A. from Lithia Springs, GA tells a deeply spiritual Step 12 story that begins with his childhood in a decorated military family — his father a World War II pilot next to Chuck Yeager, ancestors generals under Washington and at Gettysburg. Despite the honor, discipline, and prayer around him, Dick felt he lacked whatever spiritual thing his family possessed, and he spent his life searching — through Boy Scouts, Edgar Cayce, psychics, and Rebel Yell bourbon. A childhood viewing of The Ten Commandments gave him his first glimpse of real power, but walking the aisle at Linden Baptist Church didn't change him, and he concluded Higher Power didn't want him. His first beer at fourteen finally gave him the connection he craved — and four hours later he was in Louisville City Jail, the first of 22 lockups.

By twenty-seven, after two tours in Vietnam and a stint as the youngest creative director at McCann-Erickson, he was bleeding from the stomach on a basement bathroom floor, screaming at Higher Power with a loaded weapon in his lap. A scene from Days of Wine and Roses filled the room, he called the operator, and a woman named Helen at Atlanta Central Office sent a man named Ed with a year and a half sober and a brand-new Pinto. Ed's simple kindness — 'it's going to be okay' after Dick threw up in his new car — taught him more than any words. In early sobriety he couldn't read, couldn't speak without crying, so he served by emptying ashtrays and sitting up all night with new drunks at a coffee house crash pad, and his sponsor Jack Sullivan walked him through amends — including a spiritual reconciliation where he knelt in an empty sanctuary and forgave Higher Power.

Twelve years in, married to Barbara but still fighting everyone, a man he sponsored fired him for the way he treated his wife. At fifteen years sober in a Palm Springs hotel room, a black hole came over him and he went looking for a gun — but a week of meetings where Tom Whalen, Cliff, and others shared about long-sobriety trouble gave him a new sponsor, John H., who told him he was in a spiritual wasteland. He started over with the Twelve Traditions as the principles for living with others, learning that nobody has power over him and he has access to his Father's power.

The test came in 2005: his eighteen-year-old elkhound, Barbara's father, her mother, and his own mother all died within months, and he was diagnosed with esophageal cancer with a 98% death rate. USC wouldn't take his insurance. Driving to speak at Key West, unable to pray, he recited the 23rd Psalm he'd memorized in third-grade PTA until the fear lifted. The USC surgeon had just moved to Strong Memorial Hospital in Rochester — named for Dr. Leonard Strong, Bill Wilson's brother-in-law and AA's first non-alcoholic trustee — and in that hospital chapel, thirty feet high in gold letters: 'The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.' Twenty-three operations later he is cancer-free. He closes with his best friend Keith Lewis, who in the grip of Lou Gehrig's disease prayed for newcomers four hours a day and made rosary beads in Marine Corps colors, and whose death at 12:30 a.m. on November 15, 2007 filled the hospice room with a presence of joy that left Dick laughing through tears.

Topics

Timestamps

• 0:00 Dick introduces himself and describes growing up in a decorated military family of humble, prayerful people where he felt he didn't belong
• 6:30 First spiritual experience at age six seeing The Ten Commandments at a drive-in — Charlton Heston parting the Red Sea as the power he was looking for
• 12:00 First beer at fourteen at a Babe Ruth campout, then the White Castle at 3 a.m. and Louisville City Jail four hours after his first drink
• 18:00 Bottom at twenty-seven — bleeding from the stomach, loaded weapon in lap, screaming at Higher Power until the Days of Wine and Roses scene fills the room
• 23:00 Helen at Atlanta Central Office sends Ed, who shares his story for two hours and drives Dick to detox in his brand-new Pinto
• 32:00 Early sobriety as the ashtray guy in Louisville, sitting up all night with new drunks at a coffee house to earn a place to stay
• 40:00 Kneeling alone in an empty sanctuary to forgive Higher Power — the burdens dissolve and a wind blows through his soul
• 52:00 At fifteen years sober in a Palm Springs hotel room, a black hole descends and he looks for a gun until a week of meetings and a new sponsor pull him back
• 65:00 2005 — four deaths in months and an esophageal cancer diagnosis; reciting the 23rd Psalm in the car to Key West until the fear lifts
• 72:00 Strong Memorial Hospital chapel — thirty feet of gold letters reading 'The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want,' named for Bill Wilson's brother-in-law
• 80:00 Keith Lewis dying of Lou Gehrig's disease, praying four hours a day and making rosary beads in Marine Corps colors until his passage at 12:30 a.m. November 15, 2007