Vince Y. on High-Functioning Alcoholism, Medical Licenses, and Spiritual Awakening

My speaker tonight is Vince Lye. This is just too precious, isn't it? My name is Vince and I'm an alcoholic. And I am particularly happy to be here tonight. It's good to be sober and it's good being part of AA. And I'd like to thank Judy for inviting me to speak. It's always an honor to do that here especially. And I'm glad I'm here to do it. i uh i couldn't help but remember when brian was talking he was describing his drinking so vividly and it and it brought me back i really remember i don't think i've talked about this much the very first time alcohol really was the greatest influence in my life from the time i was 18 until the time I was 31 most everything I did was influenced by alcohol in one way or another but the first time I really got drunk I was 17 and I was at a high school party with a real pretty girl that I wanted to impress and I got very drunk and she was a year older than I was so she had a driver's license and we were in her car and we left the party and I wasn't there I was too drunk to drive and so I was in she drove and I was sitting next to her in the front seat and I remember feeling quite ill and I immediately projectile vomited into the dashboard of her father's car as a matter of fact it was not her car and I remember thinking it ran down the air conditioning vent and I and I and I and I and I and I and I and I and I and I and I and I and I and I and I and I and I and I and I this is really going to be hard to clean up you know really is going to be a tough job. And things stayed about that way. That was pretty much described what happened to me from the time I was 18 until the time I was 31. And I should tell you that I'm not one of these alcoholics that come from a family of alcoholics or a long line of alcoholists or a, quote, dysfunctional family, unquote. The only dysfunction in my family was me. Everyone else was really wrapped very tight. You know, nobody had a hell of a lot wrong with them. I've said it often and it's the very best way to describe my family. I'm Irish and Catholic and I'm a very huge family, big family on both sides. A lot of cousins and uncles and aunts and nephews and, you know, There's just a million of us, and in the entire history of both sides of that family, there have been a total of four divorces. Three are mine. So you can tell that whatever is wrong with me doesn't seem to have a lot to do with my family or where I came from. It's just, it's just alcoholism, which is, and I drank like that through high school. I went to four different high schools because I was thrown out of one every year for misbehavior. Usually had to do with drinking. The last school that I was drawn out of in May of my senior year before graduation for stealing a priest's car and joyriding while drunk with a number of other incipient alcoholics, probably members of this program somewhere now. And that's the way that it went. By 1965, which was a real significant year in my life, a lot of things had happened. I had finished under... In 1965, I got out of the military where I'd spent a couple of years receiving some very extensive medical training in the Navy. They gave me a very good medical education in the navy. I went to a number of different schools, one at a more advanced medical school that trained hospital corpsmen to go on destroyers where they didn't have physicians. So it was really sophisticated medical training and I got to do a lot of very sophisticated stuff that in civilian medicine only a physician did. And so it's very good training and it was that all of it was just kind of came about me I managed to get through that training as I got through undergrad school in college I never so I always seem to be able to get grades and to get through school but I was dysfunctional and drunk in just about all key moments I don't know if you identify with that but if there was an important moment I was drunk you could count on it. I was going to be drunk, and sometimes I would manage to slide through those moments, and it would be okay, but I was always drunk. But in 1965, I got out of the Navy and I went back and finished my undergraduate work, and I got married, which was really a momentous year, wasn't it? And I married a girl who I'd met in the Navy, and we got married because it just seemed like a good idea to get married. I didn't have a better reason than that. To say that we were incompatible would be an understatement. We never should have had a second date, let alone get married, but we got married and she immediately got pregnant and we moved to Southern California. My parents had passed away and she was an only child and her parents are out here so we came out to Southern California and we moved in with her parents and I my drinking was just beyond the pale I got a job as a bartender as a stopgap job till I found something better in that within two weeks they'd thrown me out and I ended up spending the summer of 1975 working as an ambulance driver in Orange County where I drove an ambulance drunk for the entire summer and I was a blackout drinker which made it even more colorful. I came out of blackouts in this ambulance with the lights and the sirens going and not really knowing where the hell we were known. You know, he's just really a... I'd have to ask the attendant if he could help me out. And he's in AA now. As a matter of fact, I was his sponsor for a while. And you know, it's a funny thing about those days. He recounts to me a lot of different things that happened in that ambulance that I have no recollection of whatsoever. Much more colorful of the things I remember. And I remember one night we got dead. We were in Costa Mesa on some kind of an ambulance call and we got stuck in a cul-de-sac going around and around. You know, how you lock onto something and just go around in a circle and the red light was shining through people's bedroom windows and they were coming out and I just kind of went around that circle and they sent a police car in to lead us out. That was in the summer of 1965, and that's how I spent that summer. In November of that year, I came to Alcoholics Anonymous, and I stayed here for three years. And during that three-year period of time, it's real important to say I knew everything about it. I learned all of AA in that three year period. I learned all of the words and all of things, but I learned none of the music. I never really did hear the music, and I know why that is today. I didn't then, but i know why it is today, and during that period of time my life straightened out. There was a new profession created in civilian medicine where they utilized people like myself who had this rather sophisticated and unique training in the military. We were put in emergency rooms out here, and we functioned as the title of the new medical professional was called Physician's Assistant, Physician Associate. And I became one of the very first ones in California. I got a great job, and I worked in an emergency room down in Huntington Park in the industrial complex where we saw all of the surgical trauma that came in from places like Kaiser Steel and all of the glass companies in Norris Industries. And I was essentially the night primary physician in that emergency room, and it was a very good job. It paid very well, and it Was rewarding in many, many different ways. And I Was sober in AA, but I was not of AA. I had nothing to do with the AA program. I was simply Mark in time in AA. I was not like you and I knew that you were different because you seemed to have found something here that eluded me and I couldn't put my finger on it but I knew there was something special that happened to you in AA I could see it in your eyes and I could feel it in my heart and I watched you seem to have direction and you were going somewhere and I was still aimless although I looked like I had direction it looked like my life was going somewhere. And in that emergency room, I wasn't going to A&B. This was a working night and I got depressed and I began to use dexedrine and later on Demerol and all of the things that go with that happened to me. The end result of which is I lost my medical license and I spent the summer of 1972 living in an apartment by the airport in Englewood with another wife the daughter of a long-time sober AA member, and we ended up in this dreary apartment over in Englewood in July and August of 1972. And I spent that summer drinking close to a half gallon of vodka every day out of the bottle. Alpha, beta, grand vodka. Premium stuff, I'll tell you. I remember walking I couldn't find my shoes one day I remember and I had a walk to Alpha Beta which was only about a block and a half away but it was hot and I remember I got halfway there before I realized I had secondary burns in the bottom of my feet and it was that kind of thing it was insidious it was alcoholism I guess in bloom and that's the way that I spent the summer of 1972 and eventually my wife's family came and they moved her out of that apartment and I was left alone there I remember I had some money enough to get over that Alpha Beta several more days after she left I don't recall how many but I do know that I was deathly ill I was vomiting bile and I'd lost 30 pounds over July and August of that year and I would sit in and out of blackouts all the time I would come to in downtown Englewood and I wouldn't know how the hell I got there I certainly didn't have a car so I must have walked and that's where I was I came out of a blackout in Newport Beach in September of 1972 on a park bench on the Balboa Peninsula and I don't remember how I got down there except I was all dressed up I had on a three piece wool suit and a white shirt and a tie and it was 110 I was sitting on this bench and I remember getting a copy of the Orange County newspaper going through the ads looking for a job and I found a job as an assistant to a mortician in Costa Mesa, apprentice embalmer which was my medical license what was I going to do and I went and saw this undertaker who was just, Jesus he was really out of a bad dream He drug his right foot when he walked, you know. And he hired me at $85 a week, and a fringe benefit was this bachelor apartment that was over the room where they kept the casket. So in the morning when you were hungover, you'd walk through the casget room. Mahogany on this side, metal on that side, and it would just set you free. It was just... and I didn't like him and he certainly was becoming rapidly disenchanted with me and I got drunk one Wednesday and I stole his hearse and I came out of the last blackout I hope I ever have to come out of driving the wrong way on Pacific Coast Highway by the arches on Pacific coast highway facing the wrong way in the stolen hearse and I remember there was a young lady with me who I didn't recall meeting oddly enough that night who was upset and hysterical and I'm going to tell you I remember thinking another unstable woman you know and it really I have a penchant for neurotic women I really do they all end up the women in my life all end up hysterical. It's a character flaw I have. I pick these kind of women, I'm sure. And I remember bringing that guy's hearse back to him that morning and he was upset. He'd been up in the bachelor apartment over the casket and was throwing my clothes out the window and it was 6 a.m. and all of my earthly belongings were strewn all over this blacktop parking lot of this mortuary. And I picked them up and I came back to AA. I came to the Costa Mesa Alano Club in Costa Misa and I sat at the coffee bar and I had a cup of coffee and they had an AA meeting there that noon and I stopped for that meeting and nothing remarkable happened to me and I just sat there simply because I had nowhere else to go which has always been my motivation for AA and I suspect if it's new it's probably yours And if you're new here tonight, by the way, I'd like to welcome you here I'm glad that you're here If you come to AA during the Christmas season You are an alcoholic I gotta tell you There is no I don't know much about you But I know that you've had a colorful Thanksgiving I'll bet that's for sure. So pull up a chair here and hang out, because what you don't know is you've come to the best possible place in the entire world if you are new here tonight. There is nowhere on this earth that you could be that is better for you than here in this group tonight or any other Wednesday night. that's for sure so for God's sake stay here but I stayed sober for the first two years in Orange County and I really had a tough, tough time my medical license was gone and I wasn't really trained to do anything of really much use to anybody that they would hire you to do and I got lost in jobs that were just God, they were demeaning I remember I had a job as a gas station attendant And I got fired for being incompetent by this guy from Texas. I've had problems with people from Texas, too, I should say. I was always running into this my entire life. It seemed there'd always be some jackass from Texas who'd just really given me some kind of a bad time. And it was awful. I got a job as a drill press operator in Costa Mesa. It's a machine shop where you sat on a stool and you put holes in copper plates for $1.87 an hour. And I remember I put the hole in the wrong place on a whole gross of these hideous copper plates one day, and the foreman was from Texas too, and he told me, I've got to let you go, boy. He said, I've Got to Let You Go. He says, it's too bad, son, because you're a trier. But you're not quite bright enough to do this. And I remember telling him, who are you talking to, you moron? I explained to him how I was a graduate of Cornell University and he explained to me how I ought to go back and take the course in drill press operating. That's the way that it went. And that was my earliest surprise. and eventually I went to work for a carpet layer for $10 a day plus meals and I was his gopher I carried the carpet I carried coffee and I did everything he wanted me to do and he paid me 10 bucks a day by that time I was living in an $11 a week room it was not really it was really quite a you know I had low overhead so it was a hell of a job wasn't bad at all he'd take me to recalendars every night give me my 10 bucks and buy dinner and I would go off to an AA meeting And during the latter half of that year, I acquired some material possessions. I got a car, a 1964 red Chevrolet convertible, boy, with a hole in the top and no brakes, you know. I used to drive that to meetings in Newport Beach. I'd pull that into the parking lot at the E-Belt Club down there. And everyone would jump in their Mercedes and BMWs and put them on the other side of the lot in a hurry. They were always asking me questions. Do you have insurance on that car? It was a big question. I hadn't had a driver's license in three years why the hell would I have insurance redundancy that's the way that I lived in Orange County now when I was two years sober I asked Clancy for help and he told me I should come up and meet him in his office on Skid Row and the reason I asked him for help is because something existed in my life that never before existed, whether I was in or out of AA. Never before have I had the feeling that there's this one special ingredient in my life that I had never had before, and that is this. I was desperate for the very first time in my wife in 1974, not especially when I got sober, but I was after two years of sobriety in Orange County because my life was going nowhere. I still didn't hear the music in Alcoholic Sonata. And I didn't have any hope. It didn't seem that anything was ever really going to happen for me. I seemed locked in a terrible rut where I would just go to meetings and try to find some makeshift job and try to act better than I was. And it was a terrible existence. and I knew that something happened special up here because Clancy had we saw people from Orange County leave Orange County and they would come up north and join the Pacific group it was kind of like being sent to Devil's Island you know, in Orange County it was looked at they'd talk about something oh no, he's gone he joined Clancy's group and they'd be very sad when they said that it was almost like somebody died you know they joined the Pacific group and they would drop out of sight you wouldn't see them anymore you know they were gone they would just vanish and then sometimes later on you would see them some months later when they would turn up back in Orange County but they would be different they wouldbe completely different theywouldbe focused and theywould be usually employed and fulfilling their responsibilities so I asked Clancy to help me And he told me to come up and see him in the mission. And I drove this old Chevrolet up to the midnight mission in early November of 1974. And I sat in his office, and I asked him for help. And he said, He told me he would help me. But he also told me there were some conditions to that help. That I would have to do what he suggested I do without debate. and he indicated to me that my judgment about my life was faulty at best and that his judgment about my life was infinitely better than mine and that if I were willing to take his direction why he would help me and so I made that pact with Clancy I said I would do that because again I was desperate by that point I just wanted some help I didn't care in what form or who it came from I just knew that I was dying on the vine It was only a matter of time before I'd left Alcoholics Anonymous again So I told Clancy I would do what he said And he told me I should move The first thing he did is he looked outside at my car And he said, do you have insurance on that car? And I said no He said, give me the keys and then it occurred to me what really went on here they wanted my car he was going to take my car and give it to one of his favorites but I gave him the key and he said I'll tell you what I'm going to have one of my babies come down here and drive this car up to my house in Venice and we'll park it up there because what you're going to do, kid, is you're going to move into the mission here and live. And while you're here, you're gonna look for a job, and on Saturdays you're gonna come up and play ball and go to my backyard and you'll be able to see your car up there. You can visit it every Saturday. And when you get a job and you get a driver's license, some insurance, why then you'll get your car back. And so there was a guy here then named Ed Udom who was about seven foot tall, and he was assigned to drive my car to Venice. And he got in the car, I'll never forget watching him get in that car in front of the mission, and his head went up through the hole in the top, kind of crouched down, and he pulled away, and as he was going down the street, I could hear him screaming that there were no brakes, and you just kind of drove off. So he got the car up to Venice, and he parked it right out in front of Clancy's house, and Clancy was right. I did get to visit that car every Saturday. I would get up and go see, I'd take the bus up from Mission to the yard and I would visit my car and it got very depressing. I happened to, you should know, I lived in the Midnight Mission for eight months, much longer than I ever thought was going to be necessary, quite frankly. And I'll tell you what my assignments were while I lived there in a moment, but I just want you to know about that car. You could mark my progress in life by the way that car deteriorated in front of Clancy's house. Because every Saturday it would be a little bit more deteriorated. I mean, it would get... You know, I don't know if you've ever parked a car in Venice and left it for months, but it just really is not... And this, you know, it wouldn't be good. It would be savaged. I remember one Saturday I got up there and the entire top was torn off this car. It was just gone. An open-air convertible, you now. and a couple weeks later I went up and someone had taken one of the rear wheels the whole wheel so the axle sat, you know, catty-cornered and the car just kind of sat like that and it had rain and there was this filthy rainwater sloshing would all have gone back to the side you know where he had come down into the side and I remember it just was depressing I mean really and one weekend the whole steering column was missing and it was just this rusting red shell with ugly rainwater in the back sitting there and then then the final insult a couple weeks later i came up there was nothing there but this huge oil spot that was kind of my life that's what it was like and clancy made me move into this mission and uh made me move and i had nowhere else to go i mean where was i going to go but i lived in the mission and he had an assignment for me he told me he wanted me to come down to his office every every morning and during the week and put on my three-piece suit and he would give me an allowance. He said, you've got to find a job and I'm going to give you $8 a day and I want you to go outside and ride the bus up Wilshire Boulevard and get some transfers and then get off periodically when you come to hospitals and medical practices and go in and tell them what your training is and that you've had some problems and thatyou've hadsome problems abusing drugs in the medical facility andthat you were an alcoholicand you're now an AA and you're sober now two years andthatyou need some help gettingyour license restored and you need a job And I told him, I said, I don't think that'll ever work. And he said, well, if I wanted your advice, I'd ask for it. He said, is this really telling you what to do? And I said well, since you put it that way, maybe it will work. And I would go down there and get my eight bucks and I'd ride the bus up Wilshire Boulevard and I became a very active member of this group. But it was funny in those days because I was the first guy that ever really lived in the mission. And Clancy didn't have a job that long. So living in the mission then was an anomaly. It was really an odd thing. You were kind of a strange character here if you lived in the... Like I remember people, I would get the feeling that I would come into meetings and they'd say, he lives in the Mission, Clancy's Mission. He's two years sober. Can you believe that? Really? Boy, he must be screwed up. He must really be screwed over. And I was. It's true. And it was really difficult to strike up a conversation with one of the pretty ladies in AA. As soon as you feel you were getting somewhere, somebody would come up and say, Hey, Vince, you want to ride down to the mission? You know, really cool a romance in a hurry. But I did what he said. I rode the bus up Wilshire Boulevard and I stopped at every medical practice between downtown Los Angeles and the San Fernando Valley, I suppose, probably four or five times during that eight-month period of time. And during that time, nobody ever indicated they were likely to give me a job or help me get my medical license. It was all so futile. My life was an exercise in futility, as near as I could tell. I would end up on the West Side and I would go to one of our meetings and I Would take the bus back down to that mission and it was just, I spent my first Christmas in the Pacific Group living in the Midnight Mission. i slept there christmas eve 1974 and uh it was a depressing time but it wasn't a bad christmas because the christmases incidentally have never been bad for me they've always been great i love christmas i don't get depressed at christmas and if you're new here it's not mandatory that you get depressed either it's trendy in aa to say oh it's the holidays i'm in a black depression Well, it's not mandatory. You don't have to be. But Christmas is about giving. I've come to learn it's really not much about getting. And if you're willing to give something of yourself in any way that you can, you can have a hell of a holiday season. It can be great. But at any rate, I did what he said. I rode the bus to Fulcher Boulevard and I did it for eight months and I've got to tell you it was so discouraging. I mean, nothing happened. And I remember maybe the worst day that I can remember was a day in June of 1975 on a Friday morning. I got my $8 and I went outside and I got on the 83 bus and I had some transfers and the first thing I did is I sat down in this huge wad of chewing gum and got it all over the back of my suit and I remember thinking, God, this is just... And you know how chewing gum goes down the leg and just grotesque and I thought if I got off the bus at Wilshire and Western and I going to this Union 76 station and I thought I'd try to clean it off with wet paper towels. And so I don't know if you've ever dealt with chewing gum on wool with wetpaper towels. It's just not the answer, trust me. It's all over the back of my pants and I said, Jesus, you know, I just really... This is a... I am the most grotesque human being I know. If you want to come right down to it. I don'T know a bigger loser. I was two years and eight months sober in Alcoholics Anonymous. I lived in the Midnight Mission on Skid Row. I did not have a car, a job, or any money. That's not dazzling progress, I've got to tell you. And I was about as depressed as I could ever be. I suppose I was close to a drink that day as I had ever been in sobriety. And I remember getting back on the bus and riding up to the end of the line. And I got off the bus at the old Santa Monica Mall before this new mall was built and uh i went into this cafeteria they had a i don't know what kind of traffic down on the cliff there's some kind of a cafeteria up there i got this tray i went through the line and i got my lunch and i sat my lunch on the table and i went outside to get a newspaper and the bus boy came by and he took my trade that's the kind of day it was that's what was happening today and i remember thinking if i sit in a movie i won't get drunk and that's the best i can do today and i walked from uh i had about six dollars left and i walked from santa monica to westwood and i ended up getting down to i guess over to the westwood village about two in the afternoon and i got online at the bruin theater where the godfather 2 was playing i was going to go see the god father too and i stood in line to buy a ticket and a guy called my name and i turned around and came face to face with the administrator of the medical center in which i had been arrested for stealing the drugs several years before and he said vince where have you been and i said i'm in aaa and i'm sober for over two years and i don't use drugs anymore and i don't drink i'm i'm a sober member of alcoholics and i haven't been there a long time he said it's just good to see you and he was moved to tears he put his arms around me and he And he said he was so glad to see me. And he says, how are you really? And I said, well, I've got this chewing gum all over my rear end. But aside from that, I'm really okay. He said, have you worked? I said I haven't worked in a long time. And he said, Well, it's a funny thing. We've had a urologist who's joined our group practice who's a member of the Medical Quality Assurance Board. And I'd like you to come down and meet him tomorrow and have lunch. Maybe he can write some letters and help you get your license back. And I went down the next day. I met that urologist, and we had lunch, and he wrote some letters, and within 60 days I had my medical certificate back. And I was there for two years, and during that period of time a lot of things happened. My life took shape. First of all, no drugs were missing You should know And I took these steps I wrote that inventory And I read it by flashlight Beneath the dashboard Of Clancy's old Chrysler Coming back from Colton one night A cold, wintry night And I felt at that time Like I was finally a part of AA And my life flourished I became a member of this group and I fit in and I made friends and I wish I could tell you that everything's just been wonderful from that day to this but that's not really what happens in AA, is it? There are ups and downs and there are good years and there're bad years and you make mistakes here. And if you're new or relatively new God, I've had this experience with babies recently I have to tell you something if you are relatively new in AA try to forget about looking good. The worse you look the better you look if you're new if you really want to look good here be willing to look bad because that's what happened to me I had no choice I wanted to look good but I just looked bad so it really wasn't by choice but it served me well because I was able to grow that way and my life flourished and I made some mistakes I mean I met in August of 1976 I met this cute little redhead and I went down to Klansky I said we want to get married she was not an AA hey, I think we should get married. And he said, well, that's not a bad idea, but you've just met her last week. Why don't you wait a while? As a matter of fact, give it six months, be engaged, and then we'll have a big group wedding. And that sounded good to me until I got talking to her. And after talking to she, we decided that we'd just kind of secretly go off and get married to not say anything. And then we'd just have this big group wedding when the time came. I mean, who would know? I mean I didn't want to tell Clancy it would hurt his feelings so we just decided to do it that way. Well that was in September. We began divorce proceedings in October. But along about January Clancy said well we're getting ready for the wedding, huh? I said Clancy I have something to tell you. We're divorced. And he said, how could you be divorced? You're not married. And I explained to him what happened. And I said, but you know, it's terrible. I feel awful. He says, well, I'm sure you do. I said because now that I've told you there's one thing I want to get your counsel about. I've ordered these napkins and invitations and it's really so painful for me to go pick them up. He says, oh, you know what? I know that's painful for you. He says I'll tell you what to do. I don't want you to worry about it. You go pick them up and bring them down here to my office and I'll dispose of them for you so you don't have to worry About them. And I did. And then I'm going to tell you about the cruelest thing that ever happened. It is so unkind. That Saturday in the yard everybody ate their hot dog with a napkin that said, Vincent Linder, congratulations. And that was in the beginning of 1977. But I'll tell you what, what's really great about that is, and everyone thought it was a riot, just like you did tonight, everybody but me. I didn't think it was very funny at all, but it was hilarious to everybody else. But I'm going to tell you But I will tell you what happened as a result of that in an odd sort of way that I can't even really define, I felt a part of. Even when people were dripping mustard on them goddamn napkins and laughing at me, I felt like a part of this group, maybe for the first time. I felt Like I fit in and I belonged here. I felt that people loved me. And my life went on and flourished and I got into a new profession and I made a lot of money and I met Pat and we fell in love and we got married and we've been married for 15 years and I'm amazed at this relationship as every day goes by I'm incapable of the consistency and the continuity and the things that are required to stay in a relationship 15 years I'm glad that she isn't because our relationship and our marriage not only survives but it gets better each and every day I love my wife unabashedly I will tell you that and she is my friend my best friend and we walk this way together we're a team we're apart and I think that's what Alcoholics Anonymous has done for me maybe the biggest thing we've had a bad time last year and a half everybody knows that I mean, but you know the great thing about Alcoholics Anonymous and the Pacific Group is when you look at my life, before and after I got here, you can see nothing but hope. Nothing but hope! You could not but have hope if you're me. And I know things will get better. They'll get better soon. And they're getting better already. I feel great this holiday season. It's going to be a great Christmas. We don't have as much money as we've had in other years, but it's turning out to be a better Christmas somehow. I can't really describe it except we're finding a way to be apart of the holiday season. We decorated the tree Saturday night. We got the whole tree decorated and put in the plug and all the lights went out. It was a big short. We had to take all of the lights off a decorated tree. I spent Saturday night going from hardware store to hardware store looking for Christmas tree lights. and we found them and we put them back on and it was wonderful it was a good evening if you're new here tonight I have one thing to say to you there's one thing that must be necessary in your life it's not necessary that you be a nice person it's the same it's it's it's it's it's necessary that you love us. It's not necessary that to be kind, it's not necessary that should be honest, it is not necessary that would be willing. It is only necessary that will be desperate. Desperate enough to give up, to quit, to listen to someone else, to understand that what you think you ought to do is wrong. Almost all the time. If that exists with you, the better, the more desperate you are, the better your chances are here. I love the desperate people in Alcoholics Anonymous. And all of you, new and old, I want to wish you a Merry Christmas. I hope you have as good a Christmas as I'm going to have. And don't be depressed. You don't have to. It's a great time of year. And if you're really down and out and you're feeling bad about the holidays, drive out to West Covina on Saturday night. I guarantee you, you'll feel better. I'm going to be there. I've been there 22 straight years, and I'll be there Saturday night. Thanks a lot. The Pacific Group is an open meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous, and all members of the community are welcome to attend. The single most important aspect of AA recovery, however, is the principle of one alcoholic relating to another alcoholic. Therefore, only alcoholics actually participate in our meetings. If your primary problem is other than alcoholism, we think it would also be helpful to you to contact an anonymous organization which more specifically deals with your addiction. In any case, we hope that what you learn here may be helpful for your recovery and your understanding. Good evening, my name is Pat, and I'm an alcoholic. The format of this meeting is two 10-minute speakers, a coffee break, and a main speaker. And the first 10- minute speaker tonight is Brian A. Good evening. My name is Brian. I'm an alcoholic. And I've been out pacing the hall. There's something about when you have a 10-minute speaker that it seems they read the long form of Chapter 5 and, you know, they had one. I'm nervous. Thank you. It's like the Rocky Horror Picture Show late night showing, the way people respond to things in Pacific Group. I'm here because I'm an alcoholic, and I seek recovery, and for me this is the best place that I've found it. Um, it's been a strange week. Um, my sponsor has had a tragedy in his family and I don't know what to do to comfort him. Um, I know I've been sober almost 11 years and I'm grateful for that and a lot of it is due to his help. the book tells us to tell in a general way what happened, what it's like and what it was like what happened and what its like today. Thank you. And I'll try to do that. I was born and raised in Canada and raised on Air Force bases all throughout Canada and the United States And it's a kind of existence that doesn't make you an alcoholic. It makes you feel different because you are saying hello and goodbye all the time, and you never quite make real long-lasting friendships. And I have three older sisters. One is the alcoholic recovering in this program. The other one has been under psychiatric care for the last 30 years. And the other one is normal. We've found where she came from. My mother is an alcoholic, and my father was a born Al-Anon. Growing up, my mother used to have nervous breakdowns, and she was drunk a lot. In our house, we walked on eggs. If you woke up before 10 in the morning, there was hell to pay. When I was 15, I left my house, I lost my home, and it was really the best thing I could have done. I was living in Los Angeles. We had come here in 1968. It was a junior high for me. In high school, between 10th and 11th grade, somebody asked me if I would like to get high. i had never gotten high i've never had a drink when i came here as a very square kid i wore green pants blue pants i didn't own a pair of levi's i was put into a lowrider junior high school and my parents bought me a bicycle so i could get through the barrio without getting killed every day um but when this fellow said you want to get high i felt that marijuana should be legalized because I was politically to the left, so I agreed to get high just to, you know, support my political beliefs. And I went over to his house and I smoked a lot of weed and I really got stoned. And then I spent the next 15 years in an altered state. and one thing I used to tell adults when I was in high school is that marijuana does not lead to hard drug use of course it does but we all know that but uh it did for me really quickly um I enjoyed weed so much that I started taking everything I could get my hands on and I mentioned drugs because that's where I started and I think a lot of people my age started there. Alcohol is something that, for me, adults did and they were, you know, it was us and them. You know, us had hair down to here and we did dope and them, they were the other people and they did alcohol. What happened is I got drunk the first time and I was stoned and I missed it basically. But I had a hangover the next day so I knew I'd gotten drunk. And alcohol quickly became my drug of choice. And I like all kinds of things. I like amphetamines, you know. You can drink longer and you can drink more with amphetamine. I'm a very nervous, hyper guy, and there's nothing I like better than to get more nervous and more hyper. Also, I like psychedelics a lot because I don't like to be in my head. They took me strange places. I once went to a Tupperware party on LSD. I didn't mean to. I was told that there was a party. And being Canadian, I was too polite to leave. But I drank. Primarily I drank Eventually I quit using all drugs because I just like to drink, best of all. Drugs do certain things for me. They make me feel this way. They make you feel, you know, they make me speed. they make me slow down. Alcohol makes me feel like I don't care, and that's the most profound relief that I know in my life because I care always about what you think about me and about what I think about. I mean it's a 24 hour a day deal for me to care about what you think of me and that just drives me nuts. And alcohol relieved me of that. It's the only thing that ever has relieved me of that and uh so when i discovered it i i was 119 pounds i was six foot and you know it's tough to get dates when you're at that rate and alcohol you know just allowed me to forget things you know suddenly i could talk suddenly i wasn't tongue-tied suddenly i was shaking and nervous all the time like now and um it was Because it worked for me for a long, long time. I was a perpetually bright young man. I could always start over. And the way I ran my life, I was always starting over somewhere. I've had 40 different jobs in my life. I've been a window dresser. I've sold just about everything there is. And I'm one of these people that goes through relationships too. Relationships are very important to me. Unfortunately, when it comes to emotional needs, I am a black hole. I'm a vacuum of emotional needs and I did not know that for a long time. Unfortunately, I used up a lot of people along the way not knowing that because they could never love me enough. They just can't love me and I blame them. What happened to me, I'll tell you my last year of drinking, is I was asked by my wife if I could not drink two days a week. Monday and Wednesday. And I said, that's why I think she wrote it in Dear Abby or something. I agreed to not drink Monday and Tuesday. Monday, I would wake up, I'd go to work, I was planning a lunch with somebody who drank a lot. We would go to lunch, I had a drink all during lunch. I'd stumble into work late in the afternoon. And when work was over, I would go to the Savon drugstore. I'd buy three or four Michelots. I'd drink those in the parking lot and put the empties in the shopping basket next to the car. And then I'd go home, and I'd chew up a lot of gum, and I smoked cigarettes so that it wouldn't be on my breath. But we weren't kissing anymore in my marriage. We weren't talking. So that wasn't a tough test to pass. And I'd go in the house, and right after dinner, suddenly we were out of something. We needed something desperately in the House. Comic cleanser, vacuum cleaner bags. Something had to be done. And I would rush to Hugh's, and I had a bottle of Southern Comfort that I kept in the back of the car because Southern Comfor doesn't get you drunk, it gets you comfortable with anything. And I would drink at the supermarket, I was drinking in the car on the way home. And when I got home, well, she's not an alcoholic, my wife. She's mortal. She has to sleep. And eventually she'd cuddle off to bed and then I could drink the way I wanted to. And so I was good and drunk by the time I called into bed. And these are the nights that I didn't drink. The nights thatI drank, I enjoyed myself. What happened is, my best friend in Canada died and my mother called me and she told me that Gary had died. I told her to hold on. I put my hand over the phone because it was a non-drinking night. And what I basically did is said, just a second mother. And I said, Gary's died. Could you bring me a beer? Because I knew I'd just gotten an excuse to drink that night. Unfortunately, it was the death of my friend, but it was paramount that I had that drink that night. We spent a miserable Christmas in 1985. I got sober in January of... Pardon me, miserable Christmas of 1984. I got over in January 1985. I've been sober 10 years. And I'd like to say that, you know, there's that saying that your best day sober... No, your worst day sober is better than your best-day drunk. You know, alcohol worked for me for a long time, so I can't really say that. I mean, I had some great days drunk, but every day that I've stayed sober has been worthwhile to me. And I wish you all a Merry Christmas. Thanks for listening. Thank you, Brian. Our second ten-minute speaker is Diana Dee. Thank you. Hi, I'm Diana Dee and I'm an alcoholic. I want to first thank Judy for the honor and privilege of speaking tonight. I am came from I was a born and raised in California and generation and I came from where we were poor I remember the third grade we lived in a house that had a dirt floor and mom used to sweep it. And I thought that was really funny. But we were always clean. And we, I lived in 15 different towns before I got into high school. And then I ended up in high school in Santa Clara. And the only person that I thought, that I saw as far as drinking was my crazy uncle Frank. He was a Catholic and every time he'd come over to the house, which wasn't that often, he was roaring drunk and he'd walk through plate glass windows and do all sorts of crazy things. And I did associate that with drinking. My dad, I think, was a periodic. He never drank except once in a while and every time. Whenever he did drink, it just meant that there were going to be horrible fights at night time between him and my mom, and he would be very cruel and nasty to her, and I would just stay in the bedroom and cringe, and it was awful. But it was basically a pretty healthy home outside of that and I was really a perfect child. I went through high school at the same school, which is really neat for me. It was the first time that I was able to make friends and stuff. I had a choice. My folks moved when I was a senior in high school and I didn't want to move up to where they were going over one room shack with an outhouse up in Northern California. And so I lived with a girlfriend and, and I decided to go to college. And I started working and spreading myself and I went to college, and that's when my drinking started. And I was really resentful about the people, you know, the paternity guys and girls, and I didn't feel good enough. When we were growing up, my dad's family was Catholic, and because my mom didn't convert to Catholicism, They didn't speak to us all the time that we were growing up. And so my view of religion wasn't real good. And the only time that I saw my dad's side of the family was when my grandma died, when I was like in the eighth grade. And we had been living up in Canino, up in the Sierras. And my sister and I, we bought all our clothes through Montgomery Wards, and I had this very bright colored coat. We went down to my grandma's funeral and she and I wore coats that hers was like a bright fluorescent orange and mine was like a bright blue. It was like fluorescent blue and we drove down to San Francisco for the first time and we walked into this funeral and everybody was wearing black and I felt so different And I remembered that always, that it really became important to me to try to get the nice things and be different. So I was always working, but when I got into college I discovered alcohol And I turned into this nice, quiet little unique thing into kind of a party girl. And I love to dance and I would go out, you know, start out Friday night with my crazy roommate with a gallon of Red Mountain wine and we'd party. And I would suddenly think that I'm, you now, a go-go dancer And I would feel, I feel the same as everybody else, even though I just didn't think I was, you know. And I carried a grudge against, I just had a chip on my shoulder all the time. And drinking made me feel okay. Then I ended up working for a guy who we started doing acid. And I endedup marrying him. And we did a lot of LSD and drinking for six and a half years. And then he walked out, and I had two little kids. And then I just went through raising two kids. And I would drink and use according to the men in my life. And they were, you know, I would just do whatever they did. And then I ended up coming back here to Southern California in 1977, and I got a job. I really started doing well at my career, and I was in sales and I stayed at this job and I really did well despite my drinking. I always figured that I was okay and I didn't have a problem because I was working. And because of the fact that I Was able to maintain a job and pay the bills and support these two kids, then I figured I don't have a problem. But I was drinking a lot of wine. I love champagne and beer. That was my drink of choice. And I loved marijuana also. My older sister lives on the Big Island, and she grows it, and she supplied me with some really good stuff. And that was great, except that my kids kept intercepting the shipments. And they were really popular in grammar school. Then as I became financially successful, it seemed like my life just got emptier and emptier, and the more I tried to make it okay with alcohol. And then eventually I got fired from my job after 13 years in 1989 because I was lying and cheating. And I thought that was okay because there were far more glamorous, wonderful things out there for me to do. And it was really quite devastating. and my drinking escalated, and I started going to a shrink because when I told her the object, you know, I was goal-oriented. And so I said, the reason I want, we have a must-setter goal, and my goal is to be able to feel like I do when I'm drinking and using but without drinking and losing. And I hope to reach that through therapy. and I was suicidal. I did not want to live and I had a nice condo in Hermosa and a new beamer and all sorts of stuff and I wasn't able to live and I felt miserable. So about a year through the counseling one more situation happened where I really embarrassed myself with drinking and it just made us, you know, did what we do. And I ended up passing out and saying things that were just really inappropriate. And I went to her the next morning and I said, you Know, I think I might have a problem. And she was very happy to hear that. And a friend of mine I knew was in AA and I called him and he took me to my first meeting which was on a Wednesday night in 1991 in Hermosa Beach. And the first two years of my sobriety, I did my own thing. I did stay sober, but I had a real difficult time with commitment. I had never known about commitment. And the thing that has really turned my life around has been when I walked into this room two and a half years ago. And I have a sponsor now, a wonderful sponsor. I have friends. I'm learning about commitment. I just got a new job, and I just had a promotion. I have an amazing relationship with someone. And, you know, I can't, when people ask me now, how are you? You know, it's great. I'm sorry, and I really mean it. Thank you very much. I want to remind you that if you have taken a commitment at this meeting, please keep it. We appreciate that. We celebrate birthdays at this meet-up. We believe a birthday is 365 days all in a row, free from alcohol, marijuana, or anything that affects you from the neck up. If you would like to get a cake here, please see me before the meeting and then sign up with Renee. Tonight we have some birthdays. As is our custom, we will sing briskly. We will speak briefly. Our first birthday is for two years for Sherman W. Happy birthday. Good evening. My name is Sherman Wilson, and I'm an alcoholic. I'd like to thank God for another year. My sponsor, Keith, for all his love and support. Tom Beach for his past sponsorship and for being here today. Shannon S., Shakar M., Pacific Group, Clancy for the structure of the group, and all of you. Happy birthday, Sherman. We have a three-year birthday for MJF. Hi, my name is MJ Schooner, and I'm an alcoholic. I'd like to thank Millie Clancy, the class of 92, my higher power, my friend Kevin, and all of you. Happy birthday, MJ. We have another three-year birthday for Sherry D. Happy birth... Hi, my name is Sherry, and I'm an alcoholic. Let's thank God, AA, my sponsor Sandra, the class in 92, the stepsisters, The women in the house from McCabe and Robin for being a very special love in my life. Thank you. Happy Birthday Sherry! We have an 8 year birthday for Linda B. Happy Birthday! Hi, my name's Linda. I'm an alcoholic. I'd like to thank Shiva for their cake and her past year of sponsorship. I'd like to thank God for my sobriety, Craig for being in my life. I'd also like to thanks my family for being here this evening, all my friends, the Pacific Group, Clancy, and AA as a whole. Thank you. Happy birthday, Linda. We have a nine-year birthday for Larry R. Happy birthday. My name is Larry Rudy. I'm an alcoholic. I'd like to thank Tom for that cake, God, AA, Clancy, and all of you. Thank you. Happy birthday, Larry. We have another nine-year birthday for Debra M. Happy birthday. Hi, my name is Debra. I'm an alcoholic. I'd love to thank God, Judy, for letting me take cake. My sponsor, Laura, for her sponsorship this year. I'm so grateful. my previous sponsor ringy um charlotte clancy in reverse uh my eight sisters and the craft happy birthday deborah we have another nine year birthday for brenda w i'm brendan watching i'm an alcoholic and i want to thank god alcoholics anonymous my sponsor susie for the last four years of sponsorship and for giving me that cake my previous sponsors i want to thank uh the love of my life for being the eskimo that brought me through this group and for the beautiful children we have like that classic infrastructure of the group this is a group class of 86 in all of you happy birthday brenda we have a 15-year your birthday for Krishana H. Hi, my name is Krishna Henry and I'm an alcoholic. I want to thank Millie for that cake and for the last ten plus years of really good sponsorship. I want to thank the Pacific Group for making the last 10 years much better than the first by. I want to thank God, the 12 Steps, my husband Carl, and all of you. Thank you. Happy birthday, Sushana. That's all the birthdays. Except that we received a check in celebration of 26 years of sobriety from Hank Johnson in Charlotte, North Carolina. Happy birthday Which brings to mind a custom that we have here, if you'd like to participate. We donate a dollar for each candle on our cake to General Service in New York, and at the end of each year we send that in as our... I'm sorry, we give a dollar per each candle to our cake, and atthe end ofeach year we sent that in is our contribution to General Service. Last year we spent just over seven thousand dollars just in birthday candle dollars. So if you would like toparticipate in that custom and retrieve your birthday candles. Please see our assistant treasurer tonight, Steve W., the love of Brenda's life, or any of his assistants in the back of the room right after the meeting and they'll be happy to trade you your candles for your dollars. A reminder that we don't save seats here.