Two Siegel Brothers Sober Side by Side — Family Disease Working in Reverse – Alan S.

Our speaker tonight is Alan. He comes to us from the Triangle Club. And while I don't know it firsthand, I do hear he's a regular attendee of The Rock and a great sponsor to have. But I have faith that there is a lot of experience, strength, and hope that comes with a 1989 sobriety date. So with that, we have Alan. Good evening, everybody. My name is Alan Siegel. The name sounds familiar. That's because that was my brother's original promises. So if you don't believe it's a family disease, there's proof, okay? My sobriety date is 10-17-89. It may not be a big deal to y'all. Like I always say, it's a big deal to me. It's a big deal to my brother and my family, okay? Born in Atlanta. Let me go back one more. Mother, my sobriety date is 10-17-89. By the grace of God. I haven't found it necessary to have a drink in over 36 years. That is a big deal. Okay? And other substances. But born here in Atlanta. In fact, what, 60 miles from here? Born in Jules Emory. Grew up with. Didn't do me and didn't drink. And not one of us who I'm dear friends with that I was telling my story. And they say, We don't need to come. We know your story, okay? They actually, and Mark will verify it, when I used to drive through the neighborhood to visit or come to see Mom and try to beg for money, they turned their arms out and locked their doors and put the burglar in. Don't think that they knew I was coming. But I am now fortunate to go to their house, babysit. Was in my brother's daughter's wedding. We're in two other of my friends' daughters. Weddings. And it says a lot about this program. What it's done for me. So getting to my story. What it was like, what happened and what it's like now. And what it was, what it was like. You know, it was wonderful at first. I'm sure everybody can agree to me, you know. My first, I felt whole, a big void. And I drank. The other alcohol, as my first sponsor, who used to be a member here in his past life, had. Four sponsors for this clubhouse, the Thursday night men's meeting. Okay. That was my regular home group. The things changed. All that. About this, that for 30 days, sober shaking. I used to laugh and I couldn't face over. I used to sit back there when they closed that thing near, they used to hug me, tell me, keep coming back. And I just came to use the phone to call the dope guy. You know, if they dropped me off, I'd wait for the meeting to start. My mom would go home and I'd go to the old telephone that was right by the front door, to call the dope guy. And then I'd sit back there and drool. And after a minute, they'd hug me and tell me to keep coming back. Well, I did. It took me 17 years later, but I came back. Okay. So just let y'all know, you know, it is what it is. When it's time, you'll know. When the teacher appears, you'll, you'll learn. And it took me 17 years of hard knocks. But I'm very grateful. I'm very grateful for those 17 years. I'll never trade them in for whatever I got today. Okay. It's a big deal. So getting back to, you know, I was born and raised here. Ran the streets here. I can tell you all the crazy stories and all the rock and roll superstars that I hung out with, which is true. The first time that my brother ever got stoned due to my thing, it was, I think, was it with Rod Stewart? Okay. Okay. Rod Stewart was at my house. Okay. And I couldn't find him for three days. But I did find him. I found him. He was putting the bed on the wall. And he called me Bubba and said, Bubba, now I know what you're talking about. So I have a lot, good and bad, you know, as we both sit here with over 30-something years apiece. So, but now before I go any further, Tim, I'm sorry, I forgot the beginning to which you, I'm 23. Because I've known Tim. Well, the other Tim says they came in and I met Tim at the rock. Reminded me today when I called him to tell him happy anniversary that I was one of the few people that sat down at the table when he couldn't talk and I listened to him babble for a couple of hours. But it was the same way when I went to rock for the first time. I identified exactly what Tim told me. Exactly, exactly what happened. I sat by a tree and a guy came along. I won't mention his name. He came in. He sat and talked to me for two, three hours and listened to my bullshit, okay? And, but that's how this program works. It really does. People from different places and in places that I've met, but. So I've been in the street hard. Grace of God that I didn't go to, I didn't go to jail, but I didn't go to federal penitentiary where a few of my friends did, who are now sober, believe it or not, by me being an example. But, you know, by the grace of God, there. There I go. You know, it was really the grace. But I ran hard. And then when I finally got my first sponsor, who was Emmett and his wife, Jan, worked in the office here and Emmett grabbed a hold of me and gave me my first white chip. And it wasn't at an AA meeting. I went to a CA meeting and I wanted to be in the GSR of that group. Not my choice of drugs, okay? But I never forget. Gave me my first white chip. And I should have bought that because he gave me the book, Daily Reflection. And I read that daily. Okay? That's my Bible. He came up and Emmett was a drinker. Nothing. We never talked about drugs. He came and told, gave me my chip. And he says, I'm Emmett Kirkland. I'm a drug addict. And my mouth dropped wide open. And I didn't understand that. Okay? He's a drug addict. And I'm going, so I entered the meeting. You entered the chip. I said, what are you talking about, Emmett? I said, what? The oldest man-made drug is alcohol. So, you know, no matter what, you know, I'm a drug addict. Whether it's alcohol, white power, whatever you did, my first drug of choice was really alcohol. No doubt about it. And I enjoyed it. And I won't tell you, I didn't. I got introduced to it in the late 60s when I finished high school. I was a ball player. Wasn't a great student. My mother used to tell people. She's Mark over there. She saved all my report cards from kindergarten on. And she showed every one of my friends, whether it was my regular friends, my girlfriends, anybody I brought to the house to eat dinner. And she just said, let me show you Alan's report card. He never failed anything. He wasn't a great student. But he failed one subject. It's the same subject for 12 years or 13 years. And it was conduct. Anybody? Anybody with anybody with that? Okay. And it said, it said plain and simple, Alan can't sit still. Alan can't keep his head to himself. Alan, you know, Alan just blah, blah, blah. And it was true. And so back then they didn't have any treatment for ADHD, which I had been diagnosed of having. So what did they do for me? They gave me a prescription. They were too young to know this. They sent me to Evelyn Woods Spear Reading School. I can't really remember what I read from the Daily Reflections from this morning. I can read it on my phone again, but I can't tell you what I read. But they sent me to Spear Reading School. It really helped. Okay. You know, as my life went on, it went just like that. You know, as a ball player or whatever, it didn't matter. Got into fights, got into trouble. I'm sure everybody could identify with that. I was the leader of the pack. I needed attention. That's another thing I'm sure everybody could identify with. To move along with my story to get to the point, what happened is like, as I grew into my addiction and really got in, like I said, by the grace of God, I wasn't killed or didn't go to jail. Or didn't go to fiddle-pen and chancery. And got in a lot of trouble. And my father was very good friends with the sheriff of DeKalb County. I had an attention. I had a friend that I played ball against who went to Avondale, and I went to Drew Hill. And we dated sisters. And on a Sunday, his father was a member of Drew Hill's country club. And it was an esteemed country club. And they, there was no beer served on Sunday. It was served on Sunday in Atlanta, Georgia at the time when I was growing up. So we wanted beer after getting loaded, okay? And John says, well, my dad wants Drew Hill's country club. And underneath the pro shop, they have a Coca-Cola machine full of beer for the members. We went. Had a young, young, young, and John took his. But when we decided, we were shrieking. The Drew Hill's country club down to the Coca-Cola machine and emptied out. We took a bunch of quarters, and we emptied out the Coca-Cola machine. And as we were walking, the guy playing tennis approached me and says, you can't be doing this. So what did I do? I took a tennis racket and beat him with the tennis racket. Got in the car and drove off. And P.S., my father got a phone call from the sheriff of DeKalb County. He says, your son is going to make the paper. I said, what are you talking about? But, you know, by the grace of God, you know, that wasn't the best thing. My father was. Kind of, like, helped me with my drug addiction. So what happened after all of this, and I can tell story after story. But to get to the point, what happened then is, by the grace of God, my brother and I were partners in business. How about that? Okay. And believe it or not, it was a successful business. Don't ask me how. I'll never know that. But we had a bar and a, and a, and a. And for our customers and, and friends would come by. And we had a business and we hear about geographical changes. Okay. So I want to step back. 1982, when my addiction was just about to get sober and I came up with this. Well, I didn't come up. Some other people in my family and friends came up and suggested that I got a one-way ticket with $200 in my pocket. Didn't know anybody there except for my friend, Harry, who Tim and Tim know and Terry knows. Warren came back and sent me and I, I was very welcome. But on the way there, I'm, I'm detoxing and I'm with this Dutch team, a soccer team, and they're asking me do I want to get drunk. Duh. He was drunk on his airplane and I landed at Tel Aviv airport at Lod. And, uh. Security is tough. Okay. Here I am with a full beard, hair down my, don't understand this, people pushing their, their feet. But they're all waiting in line, waiting, going through security. And security is not like even here. You've never seen anything like it, trust me. And they pulled me aside and they put me in this little office and asked me what I'm doing here. I said I'm going to a kibbutz to work as a volunteer, you know. And. Here I got a passport with a one-way ticket, full beard, hair with a ponytail, and $200 in my pocket. Naturally they thought I was a terrorist. Okay. So I stayed in that office for about six hours till I never met the father that was going to pick me up and take me to where I didn't know where I was going. Was never over there. So I was lost in a land that I'd never been before. But I got. They came back for me. And I lived there for five years. And I actually joined the Israeli Defense Force and drove a tank. And I'm proud to say it was a help. Now, I didn't do any more drugs, but that's a lie. I did, I did. I drank a lot. I didn't, I didn't. That's a lie. Can't stand is a lie. They can't stand a liar. Don't think. You can go anywhere your shadow goes with you. Okay. Now you know I found it. The better one in the Druze in the desert. And hashish was very cheap. And so a kilo. Like for 10, 15 bucks. And every American that lived on the kibbutz was my best friend. It was like teaching Chung in my bathroom because we had to close the window. You open the windows, it was just. And that's why I went into the Israeli Defense Force. But you have to. And it was one of the greatest. It was one of the greatest experiences I ever had. Mark came for two weeks and I couldn't get rid of him for two years. Okay. So he came and spent time with me. And he came back and started the business. That's what I wanted to get to. And then I came back and joined them. I don't know how we did what we did. Still don't know. But we made it a successful business. I kept telling him to get sober. I was telling him to get sober. Okay. Me. Okay. Well, he got sober first. And then by the grace of God, him and his fiancee, now his wife, went to my mother who was the, take care of her son. And finally they sat me down. And at home they said to me, my mother said this to me. I'll never forget this. And I cried. And it was the first time that I took, knew that I had to do something. She looked at me. She was with Mark and Kim sitting at the table. And she said, son, I miss you. I cannot believe she meant it. I was sitting there, as my anniversary is in 1989. No one knows what that is. Because you're again too young. That was the day of the San Francisco or the World Series. Okay. The earthquake. I'm literally sitting in my room loaded with one of my dear friends. Me and him went back to San Francisco. Me and him went back to the old Triangle Club. We would come in late, finish late. He'd park in one corner. I'd park in another corner. He'd come in. He'd sit in one corner. I said, we never knew him. We finally met. He got sober. He had about a year and came over to my house. I'm 10, 17, 89. I was in college. TV went blank. I thought I lost my mind. And he said, hello. I said, can you please take me? And I went to Decatur Hospital for treatment. And he was a member here and took me to my first walk. Okay. Now, I was scared to death because the first guy I met, I can say his name now, he passed away. He's from Lincolnton, Georgia. A gentleman named Jimmy Smith. Very famous. They got a bridge name for him. Okay. Gentleman comes up and hugs me. And tells me he loves me. And I looked at John. I said, John, you have to take me home. I can't be in the woods with 300 men and play this kind of shit. Okay. And they just all laughed at me. Okay. They just laughed at me. I didn't know what I was getting into. But let me tell you something. If you haven't been to the rock or workshop, it took 10 years for me to get him to go. It's one of the greatest experiences I've ever had. I go once in a while. I don't go as often for different reasons. I go to one in Rose Oak, which I love. And I go to one in Leesburg, Florida. There's multiple of it. It's one of the greatest things I've ever done. If you've never done it, as a man in the house, I have women's retreats also. I suggest you do it. But getting back to it, so I got very involved through sponsorship. And sitting in this room after my second sponsor for years, this gentleman moved back from Tennessee, but he's originally from Oakland, California, and went to hell with a dog on the roof. I've buried three sponsors, and one of them, I think, abandoned me, or I abandoned him right now. We still talk about that. But anyway, he came from Oakland, California, and this was a clubhouse where gentlemen were bikers, and they used to throw knives and bring guns, throw knives on their desks. But they were very big book-oriented. So I'm sitting in the meeting, and Dennis just moved back from Tennessee, and Bob was my sponsor, and Bob introduced me as Dennis' speaker or discussion leader. And Dennis was Bob's sponsor, so he was my grant sponsor. And he looked at Bob and said, Bob, you're fired. This guy is so sick, he's mine. I got hired by Dennis. I didn't have someone sponsoring me. He told me he's sponsoring me. That's how sick I was. But this guy, he really worked. He was, as we call it, a big book Nazi. We had his house or my house every Thursday night. To go on further, he got to work in the steps, and he came to the fourth and fifth step. And I wrote down all my, and discussed it with him by making amends to my mother, who I stole, had to make amends to her. He just started laughing. I said, I can't do this. How am I gonna do it? He says, it's very easy. And he just laughed. We sat at a Waffle House, this step, and it was near the old Skyland Clubhouse, because we used to go to Skyland. Well, look, you'll never be able to pay her back what you stole from her. Here's my suggestion. I said, we don't ask people questions or trust anybody enough to discuss it. And by me doing this, it totally, it was, it's so simple. It's her flowers, and I did. And she called me over one day, and she said, Alan, quit buying me flowers. We were kind to run a business and make a life for ourselves. And he says, as hard as it was to want to make, to know how to do it, the results, how silly and how easy it was, you know, it's really not easy. And when you feel about it, till you feel that it's time to do it, it's not easy. But it was. It really, it made the whole thing, my whole life changed. My mother was my mother again. We had a great relationship. I was the oldest of the three. And like my father used to say, he has one of each. We have a sister in between us who says she's sober 35 years, but that's another story. Okay, she may not have had a drink in 35 years, but sober, I don't know. But my father said he has one of each. I'm the oldest, and my sister's the only girl, so we haven't figured out what Mark has yet. But we had one of each. But he's sober. Now, he's got more time than me, and I kept leading him down the path till he went to the workshop. But my brother is very active in AA. He's probably more active than most people that I know. Okay, I'm very active. Sponsorship, party meetings, opening meetings, still trying to open up another room right now. Very active. This is all about the steps and doing it in the family healing. Now here, we broke up, and it wasn't a pleasant breakup. When you say, what happened? This isn't sobriety, okay? We broke up. And it was not nice. And it wasn't pleasant. That's why I changed clubhouses and went different directions. I didn't want to be near him. But we talked. We talked. Not often, but we talked. And by working the steps, by him doing his thing and me doing my thing, we went full circle, like we used to be, mother, and I could depend on him for anything if I ever needed anything. And I think he feels the same way about me. And I think he feels the same way about me. And I think he feels the same way about me. And I think he feels the same way about me. And that says a lot about the fellowship, sponsorship, okay, AA, for people that don't think it works. I can tell you it works. Pregnant and, you know, she writes me lovely notes, anything I give her for stuff that we do. I mean, she is a part of my family. My daughter and her are a few months apart. Two different people, but they are very good friends, okay. And my new nephew loves my daughter. They're very good friends. And we go out to dinner. I mean, they always sit next to each other and talk. It's unbelievable to see the healing of a family. So if you guys have family and don't think it works, I'm telling you, if you keep coming back, it works like that. When I sat back in that corner drooling from being high, waiting for the meeting to end for my mother to come pick me up, and they hugged me and kept me to keep coming back, keep coming back. I wanted to go through the 17 years of me. When I picked up my first chip at the Ohioan Club, and it's moved 10 different times now, but I did. And I won't tell you how many white chips I had. People say they only had one white chip. That's BS, okay. Because even if you only picked up one white chip, you realized 35,000 times before, okay. Maybe one white chip, this next thing is one white chip, okay. That's my opinion, okay. Anything that makes you feel good is fine. One white chip. I relapsed for 17 years, okay. But I know people that said they only picked up one white chip, but they relapsed 25,000 times before they picked up one white chip. But they didn't, what they got relapsed from a white chip. But by the grace of God, so anyway, we split up, and it was terrible. And now you see our relationship. He came here. I've told my story four or five or six times here. Tim asked me to do it for his birthday. I've got a friend coming, Mark. Mark did it, I did it seven, eight months ago. And they asked Mark. Mark came up the next month and did it. We had a friend, Eric, that did it last month. And I got a good group of guys. We go to a meeting on Saturday morning. A couple of them go to a different, but we have breakfast every morning. We meet on Saturday morning and breakfast. And it's nothing about AA. It's the fellowship and having fun and having it. I treat people that you can depend on. If I have a problem, I can call any one of them, and they will be there for me, and I know that. Okay? I know Terry for being sober, okay? I think we got sober about the same time. Had a great spot, and I loved it. And he got very involved in the White Idea because of his sponsor. And I don't see Terry that much, but I know if I called Terry, he would be there. I don't know if I'd call either one of Tim's. That's how it works. There's someone dear to me in this room that says, One or two things are going to happen. Come on. That's right. He says that. Just the way it's supposed to. Not the way you want to, but it's going to work out. Reflection, which my first sponsor gave me. My first birthday. He signed it, and it's got the date on it. I read it every day. It's falling apart, but I keep it, and I won't throw it away. I read it every day. 365 days a year. Like I said, I can't repeat what I read this morning, but I read it. I promise you, I read it, okay? I read it. That's all he asked me to do, and I did. With God. And this may help you. It helps my sister, God rest her heart, that's 35 years. I'll make fun of it. She hasn't really done it for 35 years, which is still a big deal. And she has other things going on, but she does the best she can. We make fun of it, but she really does. I told her this. I told my daughter, who just turned 30 this summer, 30th, she's never seen me drink, okay? His daughter's never seen him drink. Dennis told me, the clock, digital clocks, when they turn like 111, or 222, or 333, or 444, she said, that's God's time. And it stuck with me. Every time it does, I would text my sister. I'd say, it's God's time. If I didn't do it, if I turned, she would say, she would, it caught her. It's God's time. And then my daughter started doing it. It's just a way of having some kind of connection with God. And, you know, once you do that and you establish it, and your life, you'll see it change to give it a chance. You know, I sit here, I sit here and we talk. I truly got a friend, federal penitentiary, that they should have made me with him. And I wasn't, me staying in touch with him, he is now sober 15 or 16 years. Okay, and we, I call him back and forth. And I've got friends that come by where I work, and I'm running heavy, and they don't go to meetings, but they don't drink, and they come by, and Ashley and Fabrice come by, and we go to have lunch, lunch, or take me to lunch. But, you know, it's, my life's changed, and they want to be around me. They see the difference. I mean, I go to my neighborhood, and I'm welcomed again, you know, and I, I lost a girlfriend, it'll be six years in March, after being divorced three times. And, and, my wife introduced me to, about a month ago. I haven't dated in six years, okay, so, that's a big deal. It's God doing for me what I can't do for myself, okay. So, if you don't believe it, I'm just, I can give you instance after instance. As long as I stay in the program, stay in the middle of the bed, do what I'm told, have a sponsor, or sponsors, because my fellowship is like my sponsors, because my sponsor, my sponsor thinks I'm doing so well that I, he don't need to sponsor me. That's, that's what drives me crazy. Oh, you're doing great. That's great. That's not what I need. I really need a sponsor. I'm, I'm actually looking for a new sponsor now. That's 36 years. I need a sponsor, you know, to my own device. You know, there you go. I'll build it. I need a sponsor, okay. And for you people that don't have a sponsor, I would say please get a sponsor. And when we raise our hands, I still, I'm going to be honest, I have a problem. The big problem is I say temporary sponsor. I really don't, a lot of times I don't raise my hand. Temporary sponsor. You need a sponsor. You can always change. I fired, Dennis worked for me and my brother. I fired his ass as an employee and a sponsor. Okay. And it says it. It says it in the, they'll come a time, we'll, we'll, we'll be on the same journey by going on different paths. Okay. And we were, we're, we're like an example. We both had been going to LA, but we were going different. It was just time to move on. And you know it. And then my daughter, who's wonderful, turned 30, like I said, December 30th. How many men ever heard that as a, as a 10 year old, I got custody of a child from a divorce. Did the judge look at me and tell me I'm crazy? Most men would say, I got my secretary and my Corvette downstairs. We're going on vacation. Can we get, move on? And, and I thought for my daughter, I got custody of my 10 year old child. She's now 30 doing great. And I'm very proud of her. You know, but you know, that's a big deal for a single guy. You know? And we had broken up and I started over again. Three jobs and every job I've had, I've excelled and been at the top of the field responsible for my child. My child now, 30 years old, owned her own home for, 24 year old girl bought her own house. Said a lot about her. She's got a job, not responsible, kind of doesn't understand money that well, but does well enough to, and she does. I can't knock it. Cause I had 24. I couldn't do it. And anybody who said they could do it, I think they're lying. I, I couldn't do it, but she, she, she does it. And I'm proud that she does it. And she says, daddy, I learned from you. Cause I used to drive her in my jobs cause I had no choice. I had to pick her up after school and then continue to work. And she would see me and she, she says, I watched you, dad. I watched what you did. I knew what you, you know, when I was in the car business and I bought her a car for her graduation. And she said, you know, I'm proud of you. I'm proud of you. I'm proud of you. I'm proud of you. I'm proud of you. I'm proud of you. I'm proud of you. I'm proud of you. She graduated three years, summa cum laude, and she goes dad, get an apartment back in my freshman year of college. I said, well, did you have any student loans? She said, no, I got it last summer. I checked and it was as I mentioned, three ones three, four, five, and six and half and five. I got a scholarship. I said, do you have a credit card? Yeah, but it's your credit card, but it's my name on it. I said, well, do you owe anything on it? She said, you know, I didn't tell her that, but I said, you owe nothing on it. You got a car? Yes. You owe anything on it? I don't know. I said, no. She went. She went. She had a great credit score. She got an apartment. She's lived that way since. I mean, I've helped her, but she takes care. She doesn't need me for financial reasons. She just needs me as her dad for support, and I'm very proud to say that. I'm proud of her. So from all this to where I am today, here I am, top of my field, what I'm doing. Telling me to retire, going to work, and share with my family is great. It's the same thing. Life is good. I've got it on my heart, okay? I've got to tell you this. This is one of my favorite things. When I moved in, got divorced. I was six and a half years. Sober. She was six and a half years sober. Got divorced. 17 years sober. I moved into an apartment. Sold the house. And right across from the apartment, right in the apartment, there was a store. And they said, life is good. And I bought every shirt. Every time they came out, I got tons of shirts still and hats. Because life has been good to me. I would have sold myself short. But life has been good to me. My family is back. And it's... 40 minutes, really. I went over time. But anybody I can say, and congratulations on your 23rd birthday. I remember both of you guys coming in. So I'm proud of both of y'all for listening to my story. Thank you very much for your experience, strength, and hope, Alan. Great. We have asked... You have a chip system to mark our time of surviving. It marks our quantity, not our quality. If you're coming in or coming back, we have a white chip. Come on up. After 30 days, 30 nights, we have a silver chip. For 60 days or 2 months, we've got a gold one. After 3 months or 90 days, we have a red chip. Or a yellow chip for 6 months. Green chip for 9 months. Blue chip for 1 year or multiples. Tim Moore is my sponsor. And he's... He's the first guy that basically shook my hand when I came in for my first meeting. And he handed me a big book. He said, listen, just keep it simple. Go home. Get on your knees. Drink not to drink tonight. And open up this big book. You won't have to drink. And he was right. I fell asleep with that book on my chest. And I woke up sober for the first time in months. I remembered that. I never forgot it. Next time I came back to the speaker meeting, he was here. I'd just been following him around like a little puppy dog. So if anybody needs a really good sponsor, Tim is great. He's smart for that. Thanks, Tim. My name's Tim. I'm an alcoholic. And I've been here for 3 years. Thank you, Mark, for coming. You know I love you guys. And I really look up to you. I really do. Talk about the rock. I was reminding you today. I doubt he remembers it. But I was a few months. So I went to my first rock. 300 guys running around in the woods there. And I don't think I knew two people there. And he knows everybody. Absolutely everybody. And we go over and we sit down at a table. And we talk at least an hour. Well, I talk. He listens. Thank God. I don't think he's hard. I don't think he had a. Thank God he didn't have a tape recorder. But he listens. I'll be here. Who knows? Because I'm scared. I don't know anybody. And all of a sudden, I belong. And, you know, I mean, so if you've got a newcomer that sounds crazy, you never know what will happen if you've been so good to me. I know we always have a lot of new people at this meeting. And it's great. I don't want to talk a little bit. Just to give you an example, I came in. I'm still in AA 101. I've got to tell you. And I'm happy there. I'm still in AA 101. But I met my wife in this room. Now, we were friends for four years before we ever kissed. But I got a year more than her. And it wasn't because I was so disciplined. She just was not sure I was for real. But we've been married now for 18 years. I was here. And I heard Bobby Jones. I was maybe three months. I heard Bobby Jones pick up a chip. And he talked about it. And he said, I got my felony. My attorney has helped some friends of ours. You guys were at a hospital in the business office. They met with the person. They said, man, we love this. But we found this little thing on your record here. I said, well, my partner. I said, that's all we need. I've been there. 18 years. I'm still working at Northside. And I love my job. You don't know what's going to happen if you come in here and do the best. You really don't know where it's going to lead. My son's 30 years old. He's been sober seven years. He does it through a religious organization. And that's great. But I've got three grandkids. He's a successful attorney. We couldn't be closer. And it all started with one of these. It just all started. And if I can do it, really, anybody can do it. And my wife says it best. She says, it's like water skiing. I just came in and held on. And you guys pulled me up. And that's the way I feel. So thanks, everybody.