What Dr. S. Taught Him About the Abnormal Effect – Wayne B.

I'm Wayne Bowden, I'm an alcoholic. I want to thank Harmon and Linda and their committee for bestowing upon me this opportunity to be at service to the fellowship that caused me to know the feeling of love. I'm deeply moved to be here tonight I know there's many people I know personally in the aid are far more deserving of an opportunity such as this than I it humbles me to to know that someone loves me enough to come here and be with you and participate at this level of my sobriety it's hard to believe you know I from where I was 22 years seven months and two days ago to where I am today and somewhat in my right mind though you may debate that when I'm done I have many friends in this room tonight I uh I was getting a little nervous. Well, I was getting really nervous and so I went up and had Ray touch me so I could feel saved a little bit. I got some friends that I want to have stand up just for a second they flew out here from California just to support me that's why they came they loved me and they wanted to support me stand up for just a second come on They're some of the most diseased people you're ever going to see. Have I mentioned that I love AA yet? Okay, I'm going to do it again. If you're new in this room and if you're stalking me back there, I want you to know that this has been the greatest ride of my life. It's not even over yet. I know this isn't no big deal in the scheme of things I was trying to calm myself down by thinking this is just another meeting then I remember someone once said just visualize everybody naked but that yeah Ray said no, I'd have a coronary for sure I want to thank Gary for hosting Nora and I And I've had a great time. I lived with the early history of Alcoholics Anonymous. I'll just share this with you. I know you had Sister Ignatius' picture here somewhere. Right there. I knew she was close. She's saying, now listen, you. When I was new, I was about two minutes sober. My sponsor gave me a book called A.A. Comes of Age because he knew I couldn't sleep. Now, some of you tough guys, you're not going to like this very well, but we're going to have to get along with it. I saw Sister Ignace's picture and when I would lay the book open on my chest, I could sleep at night. I don't know how to explain that to you. I'm just telling you that's the way it was. Some people in my home group was getting concerned about my fetish with books. I wasn't doing nothing with that picture. I love AA. Did I mention that yet? You all love AA? Happy birthday to AA, huh? See, I'm not the important one here tonight. You are. Because without you, I am a dead man. I know the AA math. One plus one equals three. You hear me? One plus none equals none. You hear Me? Because when I'm alone, I'm nothing. I'm empty. I'm powerless. But you put Me with another alcoholic and God enters. One plus One equals three . . . And I live the life alone. I mean, I like what Keith said. I love to drink. It helps to drink to be an alcoholic. And I love Budweiser. You know, some people might suggest... Am I talking too fast over there? They're not even paying attention, are they? Some people might suggest that if all you drank was beer you can't be an alcoholic that's all I drank and I drank Budweiser and I love Budweischer so much it's like I have a kinship with Louie the lizard you remember him remember how he talked about his chiseled features and I loved the Clydesdales when I see them in a parade I weep I'm going to tell you how much I miss Budweiser sometimes today. As we were driving in here today off one of them tours, I saw a Budweizer sign and I tried to make that bus driver slow down so we could have a moment of silence. I think about it, I like fine wine too. Ripple. Now I'm going to make you sweat. Boone's Farm Strawberry Hill. You know why I like Boone Farm Strawberry Hill? When I puke, it looks like I'm bleeding internally. I tell you I got cancer, you feel sorry for me and you buy me a bud. I also like Mad Dog 2020 great. That brought on the wave. Now I don't know about you, I really don't want to get crappy because I know we're all cleaned up but I gotta when you mix all that stuff up I'm going to tell you what it did to me because I'm a skid row drinker I know I don't look like a dumpster diver but I am any other dumpster divers? I know I don' t look like one but these are store bought teeth by the way seriously if they come out you just catch them for me when you drink Boone's Farm strawberry hill mad dog 2020 grape and ripple long enough it'll give you alcoholic terminal diarrhea you know what that is that's where you go till you're gone i'm telling you when you got that you got to have split second timing and you got a good decision making skill and if you're an alcoholic like me i'm a power puker i could get this whole row out there and I wouldn't even touch my own shoes and you know that's the one home that my wife, God love her would never tread I could be in the bathroom all alone and I would die of a cardiac arrest before she'd come in there to help me because you never know what's going to be going and when and from where I remember this one morning I was in there about 3 o'clock in the morning shortly after the alcoholic wake up call and I had my head resting on the toilet trying to get the Hamilton on print. And I started losing the contents of my stomach, if you will. And all of a sudden, my denture flew out right into the stool. Now that's a moment of pitiful and incomprehensible demoralization. Because I knew if I didn't get them before they went down that shooter, they were gone for good. And I caught them just before they Went Down the Shooter, and I thought to myself, what the heck? I just rinsed them off and put them right back in. I sure miss drinking. Now, I know if you're new in this room, I know I don't look like that today and that's why I'm willing to come here and do this and share the secrets about myself is because when I first came to Alcoholics Anonymous, I didn't know what was wrong with me. I've been to so many psychiatrists, I was like in a fizzy factory with a flood. I didn't know what was going on and where. And you know what? Just because I'm in a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous does not indicate that I know I'm an alcoholic. It does not indicates that I even know what an alcoholic is. It just indicates I have a massive unrealized potential. Is there any other potential in here? Yeah. Yeah. I love AA. not yet had no idea what was wrong with me let me tell you about me coming to alcoholics anonymous i want to move into that quickly i'll tell you a little bit about my well let me talk about that now i don't i don' t talk about my family too much because dr silkworth in the big book of alcoholics says that what we share about ourselves you can rely upon absolutely says that in that blue book says what these people say about themselves you can rely upon so I'm going to talk about myself tonight because if I start talking about other people you're not going to listen anyway I know because I don't as soon as I start hearing people tell me and I don' t mean that to be offensive it's just that I know how I am and I want you newcomers to hear a message of Alcoholics Anonymous not my message because my message brought me to AA I'll tell you this much about my family and I'll leave it at that my dad died from untreated alcoholism my mother died from untreated Al-Anonism and I lived in an alcoholic home and if you grew up in an alcoholic home such as mine and you know the attendant suffering that goes on I don't need to tell you anymore and there's another reason I don' t want to tell ya because I've got other siblings and they've got so much alcoholic pride just like me if they think I'm here telling you about what they did to me fancy to real they will never come to AA and I want them to know I'm not talking about them at all I hope to God they find their way here surrender and get help like I did however I think I'd be remiss if I didn't give you an insight do you want to know what my whole life was like just watch Jerry Springer for about a week On any given Tuesday, it's a Butler family reunion. I had problems as a kid. I've been psychiatrically institutionalized 17 times, and I like it. Anybody else here have been psychiatrially institutionalized? Yeah! Well, in case you slip, I'm going to tell you why. I like It There. See, given the way I drank and the way I acted on the street, I couldn't get a date to save my life. But you put me in a psych ward and I got a 50-50 shot. Now I'm going to tell you how to do it in case you slip. See, anybody had... I've had Thor... I've got enough Thorazine pumped into me to slow me down until I'm 210. Thorazine is an interesting drug it doesn't do a single thing to slow down the speed of my thinking but my feet will never catch up I know if it does it to me it does to you girls too so the psych wards I was on they brought the med cart right out onto the floor and I'd watch them take their little paper cup of pills and I would see which one I was attracted to and I wait until she took her pills and then I'd time it because I knew in about an hour she couldn't outrun me and that was the only way I was going to get a date and yet I know as I stand here tonight I'm just an alcoholic I know that I suffer from something that has befuddled mankind for over 5,000 years of recorded history with the exception of the past 65 years. I want you to think about that tonight. Think how fortunate and blessed you and I are that in our lifetime that the ark that was struck that opened the door to these wonderful old timers that have blazed the path for me and thee and we that is here for us and you know what I'm such a goof that I can't even see the forest for the trees sometimes and so I need a sponsor I need a home group I need fellowship around me that consumes me and encumbers my desire to go back to the old way and offers me the opportunity to give outside of myself so that I become free. That don't sound like no conventional treatment for alcoholism I've ever heard of, but it's the best thing going for 65 years. It's the record known to mankind anywhere and it humbles me it makes me weak in the knees to know that for some reason that's inexplicable to me that a guy like me from where i came from to where i am has been given the opportunity to submit commit and surrender myself to this way of life that i might afford myself an opportunity to live free the confines of my mind because if i don't i've got to drink again i've gotta I've got to have another Budweiser. And you know, I'm only one drink away. I don't ever want to pick up that drink again. My God, if I do, what's it going to cost me but everything? I've Got a Room Full of Friends right now I can't even imagine. I've had people coming up to me this weekend. They know me from around the world. On campus, the old-timers used to refer to it. And that's how I refer to this. I tell people all the time, I'll see you on campus. And they think I'm going to school. They don't know my history. Last time I tried to go to college, I hit my professor. I was taking political science wanting to be a police officer. He was the professor but I knew I was right. I don't know. When I was a kid, I had funny feelings and this is what makes me an alcoholic. This is what make me something from alcoholism according to the good Dr. Silkworth in the book Alcoholics Anonymous as he ministered to Bill, Bob and the rest with the amplification Of the understanding of what I'm afflicted with. With Iggy, if you will. Father Ed Dowling. Reverend Sam Shoemaker. Dr. Harry Thiebaud. Just to name a few. How they ministered to them and us. That we might find a way to overcome this mysterious and remote condition little known by mankind. This soul sickness they talked about. That didn't make sense to me. it does today. I know exactly what's wrong with me today and I know what the solution is today but yet there's a part of me that wants to renege on the commitment I made 22 years seven months and two days ago that I would do this thing one day at a time and you know that 22 years seven months in two days I'm not trying to impress you with that that's not the important day Today's the important today. Today. Right here, right now. And I know you newcomers ain't here right now, and you're looking around the room thinking, or you've noticed the perfume or the cologne, and you'RE thinking, what's that bald-headed toothless goof doing here? Why is my sponsor making me act like I'm listening? Welcome. November 1972 was a very cold winter in Illinois. If any of you were around, you'll remember it set records until the winter of 1977, I might add. And in 1972, I was no longer allowed at my wife's house for a few misunderstandings. Larry's Oasis was my saloon Larry wouldn't even let me sleep underneath the pinball machine anymore because I'd wake up in the middle of the night hearing things and I'd start firing my gun off that made him nervous and you know the only place I had left to go was to the dumpsters and you knew what? I moved into a dumpster behind Larry's oasis he had duplex side by side I'm going to give you a tip I know I don't look like that and if you think I do you don't need to help me out but I've moved into this one dumpster I found out in winter time it's an interesting fact when garbage begins to decompose from the freezing weather it gives off a strange kind of a heat and you don't get frostbite and if you're hungry I remember one night I was at home in my dumpster Keep an eye on that one. I heard a knock on my dumpster door. I was home. So, I may be hopeless, but I want friends, so I opened the door up to the dumpster and guess who's looking down at me? My daddy. My dad looked down at us. He looked down on me. can you just imagine what that must have done what he must have been feeling to do that and then I heard him say Wayne do you want to come home no dad doesn't this look warm and cozy in here I'd invite you in if there was room after all it's you and mom's fault I'm in here don't you know of course that's not what I said that's what I thought what I said was no thanks dad I'm doing fine and he didn't need Al-Anon he left by the way that's not menacing offense to the Al-Ans he just closed the lid and left he wasn't about to talk he's probably doing it just for my mom to get her off his back and by the good grace of God It was too cold for me to stay in that dumpster, and so I had to move out of it. And I'm pretty charming with 80-year-old waitresses at midnight. Long hair, no teeth. It was just a vision for you. I went to Harvey's restaurant, and I talked this 80-years-old retired waitress into giving me a hot cup of water and some Heinz tomato ketchup, and then she cut me a deal. She felt sorry for me like so many people do. They feel sorry for people like you and I, and they mean to help us, but they just don't get it. That's not their fault. That's the beast within. I don't blame them for not understanding me. It's my responsibility to try to understand that they don't understand and to be okay with it. So she talked me into mopping and waxing the dining room floors for two sausage sandwiches on whole wheat toast. And I couldn't wait to do it. It sounded like a good deal until I got the wax out. And then it seemed like I was being underpaid. And I did it. And a few days later, I'm doing nothing, mopping the floor again. And the owner of the restaurant comes in. His name's Harvey. Harvey is a little guy. No offense. A guy about Barney's size there. And he's got this giant weird nose. You've seen him here in Ohio. I know you have. They're straight here, but then they get big on the end. and they look like bombs have gone off. And right beneath the surface of the skin of his nose, you can see these red and purple and blue blood veins and I swear to God, when his heart beat, his nose throbbed. He had whiskey nose. He was one of them alcoholics. I had no idea what that was. I got a lot of problems, but I'm not an alcoholic, I know that. And I'm going to tell you why I know that in case you're new i want to tell you the power of an old idea i knew what an alcoholic was because i saw one on tv he was sleeping in the doorway of an alleyway in a tattered and torn raincoat had a rope tied about the waist he had the bottoms of his shoes had holes in the soles and he was drinking out of a brown paper bag that is an alcoholic now i've been in and out of dumpsters. I have never to this day drank nothing out of a brown paper bag. Therefore, not alcoholic. So left in my own thinking, I'm doomed. I had to find out what's wrong with me and I can't because I haven't found you yet. You're the ones who know. We say were not the experts and we're not, but yet we are. One alcoholic can reach another alcoholic before anybody else can. One plus one equals three. And I know that because Harvey reached me and he didn't even mean to. Now I've got a hearing thing. I think, I can't remember which speaker referred to Clancy's remark of the disease of perception. Before I go any further, let me share with you how I understand that through my experience. When I hear about the disease of perception, what that means is I hear funny, see funny, and think funny, and feel funny. The best way to describe it is when I was about two minutes sober, my sponsor took me to a meeting in Chicago, Illinois at the Mustard Seed Group. It was their anniversary. And there was about 300 people crammed in this narrow building, and my sponsor was taking me to Chicago to go to AA because the police were looking for me in Moline. And there was a speaker up there speaking, you know, just like I am and my supporter was in the front row about where Searcy is right now and the other old cronies were sitting next to him you know and they put us newcomers in the second row in my opinion so they wouldn't have to look at the disease and the guy was up here speaking. Now I'm kind of an out loud type of a personality and a guy, and you know what I've been around AA five years drinking so I know all about AA and this guy's talking and I'm sitting next to my best friend Jimmy who's I've known three minutes and I're critiquing the speaker you know, judging him telling Jimmy how crazy he is I mean how can New York send him out here to talk to us? I said, my God, Jimmy the guy's lying just like some of you think I am right now. It's alright, I saw you. And he's talking and as he talks, I couldn't believe what he was saying and I nudged Jimmy and I said oh Jimmy, he's a liar he could have drank like that, his guts would be on the floor, I know and I'm talking out loud in front of 300 people and my sponsor Barney is getting that sponsor twitch You know what I'm talking about but he ignores it for a while and then the guy's talking and i said oh jimmy he's such a liar how can they let him talk he couldn't have done that he'd be locked up in a psych ward i know i've been there 17 times and jimny goes and i went and then he talked on and i thought oh my god jimby that's a lie he couldn'T do that he'D be in prison for the rest of it and i guess my sponsor got sick and tired and he turned around looked me right in the eye and in front of 300 people here's what I heard him say shut up you big damn loser you ain't got a thing to say we want to hear and if we ever think you do we'll go out to that abandoned car we pulled you out of behind Harvey's restaurant we'll toot your little horn and invite you into share now until you hear that horn sit there, keep your big mouth shut or leave. That's what I heard him say. Here's what I found out he really said. By the way, newcomer, laughter is identification. We gotcha. Welcome to AA. But that's what I heard him say. And based on that, that night at that restaurant, Harvey pulls his brass coin out of his pocket and he hands me this brass coin. On one side, he's got two AAs. On the other side, it's got this prayer, God grant me something. And it didn't mean nothing to me. It didn't say anything about money, food or shelter. And he said, now I'm going to give you an address for 1616 Street Moline. You take it over there tomorrow. They're friends of mine. You tell them Harvey sent you and they're going to help you. Now that's what he said. Here's what I heard. Give you some free food to eat because we know you're hungry. We'll give you some pocket dough because we knows you're broke. and three or four packs of pell-mell tailor-made cigarettes. I hadn't had a tailor- made cigarette in a long time. And I swear to you tonight that that's the only reason, had I heard what he really said, I would have never went. Thank God for the old-timers because they know how to trick us into doing what we would not do any other way. of course now that I'm sober a while I know they're not tricking me they were flat lying to me but we call it spiritual trickery to make it palatable to the judging newcomer so I went down there I get down to 416 16th street Moline with that little coin burning a hole in my pocket And I see this, and he told me that it'd be in the basement. And he said there'd be a light bulb hanging on a cord. He said if that light bulb was on, you follow me? If the light bulb is on, go in. They're expecting you. I don't even know where I'm going. I never heard of no shelter doing that kind of stuff. I mean, I've allowed people to help me my whole life. So I get there, and I see these big signs posted on the building that said, Building Condemned. Do not enter. Right beneath it was another sign with an arrow pointing right into the basement that said AA 16th Street. Welcome! That created questions in my mind. I had to do a little think-think-thinking. If it's condemned, are they really welcoming me? And then I looked for the light bulb and it was there, but it wasn't on. It was flickering. Did you hear me? Apparently it had a short in the cord. Now, Harvey didn't tell me what to do if it was flickering. It almost drove me insane. I thought, what's it mean? And I left. I went over to Larry's Oasis and had a couple of Budweiser's. And then after I had some Budweisers in me, I'm not afraid of nothing. I went charging back to get my freebie. I went charging through that cellar doorway, no longer needing to be welcomed And I didn't notice that the basement doorway is 510-ish I'm 6'3"-ish I caught that door header right across my eyebrow It knocked me off my feet and I slid into my first meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous about six feet inside the door was six or seven old men talking about death and dying i'm certain and i slid right between two of them and this old cranky one gets up out of his chair and goes just like this. Then he says, slide right in here, dummy. That's what I heard. We got a wrench to fit every nut that comes in the door. I didn't like him right away. So I'm reaching into my cowboy boot to pull that 357 out to teach him a lesson. And the next thing out his mouth and he says, dummy? And I looked up at him and I said, my name's Wayne. He says, I got it, dummy. That's how I heard it. He says, I'm going to be your sponsor. And you know that saved his life. Now you might wonder why since I've never been to A before. I did play baseball. Sponsors pay for everything. I got up that floor and promptly stuck my head right up Barney's butt. I went everywhere he went. I wasn't letting him out of my sight. And I hated his guts at the same time. Isn't that an interesting thing? Nowhere does it say you've got to love your sponsor. You know, for the next five years I drank. I drank every day. I drank before meetings. I drank after meetings when I could no longer tolerate the feelings I was feeling from watching all you good people smile and have a good time. I had to drink during meetings when i could. And I want to suggest something to you here tonight. If you ever find a gathering like this, where a drinking drunk is not allowed to sit and listen, in my opinion, that's no longer AA. It's a gathering of people. It's just a gathering. It's gathering of the people who forgot from whence they came. However, if you are new in drinking, I want caution you about this little detail. We do want you to behave while you're here. Therein lies my problem. I can either drink or I can behave, I just can't do it simultaneously. I remember one night I had about four years drinking. I came into my home group late, of course, so I could get the attention I needed to help them help me to help themselves. And I don't deal well with authority and i can tell the presence of authority anywhere and all of a sudden one of these old-timers gets up and he says you got to quiet down and i was pretty spiritual when i came in because i knew you told me if i let you help me it helped you so i was coming to let you help me i was spiritual when I got there and this guy says you gotta quiet down and I looked at him and I said I don't want to another old-timer gets up and says you've got to sit down you're disrupting this meeting and I said i don't have to another one got up and said you gotta leave now you can come back tomorrow because we don't kick anybody out of aa however we do have a right to a peaceful undistracted meeting so not only the newcomer but we can hear the message of hope you have to leave and i looked at him and i said you can't make me oh yes they can you see that old boy right there artist raise your hand you're an artist right I got a resentment and it wasn't even you four guys about his size each one grabbed an arm and a leg talked some newcomer into holding the door open I noticed as I flew by just before I landed out in the middle of 16th street I heard one of the old timers yell out keep coming back I hated their guts. Four and a half years drinking, I came into a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous with that despair that you and I know so well as the only friends I had. Terror, bewilderment, frustration, and despair. The only friends we had. The only ones I had left. And I came in to my home group one night, drunk, and I heard my sponsor yell out, Hey, dummy! Well, I heard. He said, do you know this program tends to work better if you don't drink? I didn't know that. I've been going to meetings for four and a half years and I never heard that one single time. And you know what? I heard it. And it fragmented my mind. And I did the only thing I could do. I reached down into my cowboy boot. I pulled that .357 out. I wheeled around and fired a round off at my sponsor's face. They say if he would have been six foot tall, he'd be six foot under. I came to the next morning at Franciscan Mental Health Center in Rock Island, Illinois. It was my 17th trip to the psych ward. I was tied down in six-point leathery strings to a steel bed in the center of a padded room and I was black and blue from head to toe from a little AA group therapy they did it with love boy I was tore up from the floor if I'm telling you they put a therapy on me never needed to happen again you know I had a visitor the next morning you know who it was barney i couldn't get rid of him no matter what i did he was like a maggot on a mission now i'm in leather restraints i'm naked face up broke up tore up and i'm waiting to be judged because you know what mankind has to do that because they don't understand you and i they're scared of us this old man had nothing to fear i didn't know that He comes in. He visits me. He's walking around my bed, making faces at me, snickering to go. And then he says, dummy, there's something wrong with you. He said, I don't even know if you're an alcoholic. You might just be nuts. And I'm thinking, yeah, you're brave enough to tell me that while I'm tied down, pal. I know where you live. and as soon as I thought when I get out of here I'm going to get you he says to me you know what dummy they're talking about keeping you and studying you a lot it's like he had ESPN he knew exactly what I was thinking and then he said it listen to this newcomer he said he says you know if they let you out of there and I'm not sure they're going to if you come with us listen to these and do what we did and still do, you can recover too. And then he did something I don't know if I could have done it. He went to the board of psychiatry and got me released into his owner, I mean custody. I don'T KNOW IF I COULD HAVE BEEN THAT HUMBLE, FOLKS. I LOVE BARNEY. AND YOU KNOW, I KNEW HE DIDN'T LOVE ME. in the big book it says an alcoholic in his cuffs is an unlovely creature. It doesn't say love child of God. Not yet. I got to get down to that point. And I asked Barney one time, I said, wasn't you afraid of me? I didn't even get that out. He said, I ain't afraid of you, bucko. I thought, I am? Then he says, it's in the book. You know how they refer to that book? The book, the book, the book it's in the book that big blue book the book I don't want to hear about that book no more Marty he said good reading he said it's in the book he says now we do not need to fear to go to the most sordid spot on earth to carry this message that God will keep me unharmed and listen pal you are the most sordid spot I've ever been. God, I hated his guts. Something was wrong with me and I didn't understand it. I didn' t even know why I was coming to AA. I had no... Why in God's name? I had not honest desire to stop drinking but I kept coming and you know what? You let me come. Thank God you let me com. I wouldn' t be here tonight had you not let me cum when I was drinking. I mean people aren' t lining up sober to get in here. Usually. November 8, 1977, I'm at the Rock Island Rescue Mission. It's 4.30 in the morning. I've been caught rifling pillowcases. I failed to notice there were heads on them. I got kicked out and I decided I wanted to go to the noon meeting. And I walked to 65 blocks from the Rock island rescue mission to the Moline group. On the way, I stole a six pack of warm bud. By the time I got there, it was cold. I'm sitting on the front stoop of the Moline Group drinking my beer. I had three cans drank, then guess who shows up early for the meeting? Thank you. That's what I heard. You know what? He's a good old-timer. Do you know he ignored the beer? I mean, I had 3 full cans of beer left. I had 2 empty cans and he never even said that. He said, hey dummy, why don't you come in and help me set up for the meet? And I looked at that beer and I looked at him and I said, okay Barney, I'll be in in just a minute. So I hid those three cans of beer and I went in and helped Barney set up for the meeting and then an interesting thing happened that I didn't put together for a long time, but I know what it was today. A newcomer came into that meeting. Now I wasn't a newcomer, not really. I've been around five years and I only had three cans of beer that day. This guy had never been to AA before and he was drunk so I'm going to sponsor him. I mean Barney's been my sponsor for five years and I've been drunk the whole time. So Barney intervened, made me sit down and listen but I figured I was going to sponsor this guy and then Barney talked to he and I was hearing more than that guy was you hear me and then barney took us out to lunch after the meeting and you know he and i are both still sober today we worked with each other one day at a time when i quit trying to help him he had a chance i mean i took my sponsor literally we got to watch what we tell newcomers they use the word anal but i don't know if dr bob would like I took my sponsor for law, and he says, if you want hope, if you want help, grab a newcomer. I said, okay. So I was laying in wait. I was two weeks over at my home group, and I saw one come in the door. He had that deer-in-the-headlights look. So I raced up to him, and I had the best of intentions. I had my hand out there to shake his hand, then all of a sudden and I went right up to his throat. And I lifted him up against the wall, and I said, listen, asshole! If you want what I got, you gotta do what I did. I sold him two weeks. Here's what I heard him say. You ain't got nothing I want. So I let him go. I thought, come see me when you get back, loser. You're going to drink again and then you'll have to eat crow, baby. You know he stayed sober in spite of my help. And I went to my sponsor, I said, Barney, he don't want nothing I got. Barney goes just like this, really? He says, listen, nobody else does either. He says what we hope is you don't walk where you got. And he says, but you keep chasing him. You're bound to find one too sick and delirious to know it's you. I'm paraphrasing. That's about what he said. And then I want to tell you about the gift and the miracle of Alcoholics Anonymous. I'm three and a half weeks sober. It's Thanksgiving 1977. I have absolutely no conscious intention of staying sober. I'm just following Barney around. Humor in him. And not drinking one day at a time. And there was a convention that came to Moley. It actually came to Rock Island, Illinois over Thanksgiving 1977. And my sponsor says, I want you at that conference. Of course, what I heard him say was, go there or you're going to die. You know how they have a way of wording things to make their point? He says, you can't go smelling like that. That's not what he said. That's what I hear. He says you need to clean up. and so I went and got a haircut and you know I had a full beard and mustache and I have no opinion about that it's just that's not who I am but I had it because I was so ashamed of the fact I didn't have any teeth and I was so ashamed of who I was that I let my hair grow down over my face and become matted with the stuff of the dumpsters and my sponsor says I don't want you to go to this convention looking like that so he took me to his trailer and cleaned me up took me to the barber shop and cleaned be up then he took me to his favorite department store so I could be suited to go meet these good people of Alcoholics Anonymous. We went to the Salvation Army. Boy, he was a big spender. We go into the suit rack and the only suit they got that would fit me any... Remember the disco day? The only suit they had that would fit me was this lime green double knit polyester. It had bright, see those posts right there by Searcy? It was as bright as that. And it had green tennis rackets. So we bought it. Then we went over to the shirt department. I don't know nothing from nothing about shirts. I went right from the retargeted class to Skid Row. This shirt didn't have no buttons. I didn't disco. I didn' t know what it was, but I liked it. It was cool. It had animals on it. And then we went to the shoe department. the only 13 and a half inch gun boats they had in supply any disco people here yeah you remember those black and brown box toe oxford with a two and a halftinch platform sole and a six inch heel that's all they had that guy's about ready to dance you know yeah we got out of there for a buck eighty five Then my sponsor takes me to this convention, stands me at the front door, and makes me a greeter! Some of you old-timers are for sure going to recognize these giants of Alcoholics Anonymous. And I don't mean to blow them out of proportion or to feed an ego because that's not what we're doing here. We're here just trying to be of service and give away what we've been so freely given, and I'm so grateful these six men and women gave up their Thanksgiving weekend to come and minister to me especially because I don't know nothing from nothing, and yet I want to know everything. You know who the speakers were at that conference? A guy by the name of Chuck Seed, and he had Elsa with him, and that was the weekend he was reunited with his son Richard. He flew over from London, I know, because I got to pick him. Can you imagine me picking him up at the airport dressed like I was. Maybe you don't know that story. Clancy I, Johnny H, Norm Albee, God rest his soul, Dottie Shore and a guy by the name of Tom B from Charlotte, North Carolina. Funny thing is I was standing there greeting and they'd meet my sponsor and they just be cordial and then they'd look at me and they couldn't even talk. Oh, listen newcomer, we're not laughing at you. Chuck grabbed my hand and pulled Elsa on the other side and I heard this. Johnny bent me over and fished me for weapons. And you know, I couldn't take it no more. I finally looked at Barney and I said, Barney, are they laughing at me? Barney took a deep breath and he said, well, yeah. There they are. You are a sight to behold. He says, you know what, dummy? Well, I heard. If you ever learn to laugh at yourself, you'll never be left unamused. And something happened to me at that conference. I'm hearing you. I'm telling you. I didn't know I suffered from a soul sickness and you know what that means? It means that I have this separation of myself from you. One plus none is none. I've got nothing, I'm powerless. Alcohol has an extemporaneous ability to make me feel normal and natural and that's the effect produced by alcohol that Silkworth talks about in The Doctor's Opinion. And that if I ever drink again it's because an obsession for the effect produced by alcoholic drinking or alcohol has overtaken my mind and demands that I pick up a drink that the body will pick up that next drink. I don't want that to happen to me ever again. If I'm with you, I'm not with me. You hear me? If I am with you I'm left with me because I know for a fact when I'm out with you I'm lost with me and I'm alone. There should be a neighborhood watch sign right there. My sponsor sat me down and said give me an AA year of your life. He says I know you got great plans and lots of time to do it because you don't work. He said, but what I want you to do is put everything you think is good about life on hold and do everything we do because you're going to build a foundation upon which God is going to place a mansion, a house with many rooms. And he said the reason you have to have a mansion is because you are going to amass so many loved ones throughout your life in Alcoholics Anonymous, you're gonna have to place for them to visit. And he says if you don't build that foundation structurally sound, some emotional storm is gonna blow up in your life and if that foundation isn't built soundly and structurally, it will collapse and you will drink. And so I gave him a year. I did it all, stood at the door greeting, wore that stupid lime green double-knit polyester suit everywhere I went. I even took a job! Can you imagine that? I couldn't understand why I had to work. i washed cups i cleaned ashtrays i mopped the floor i greeted the new people at the door i tried not to steal the seventh tradition i know i'm a sinner i paid it back we have the ninth step and at the end of that first year i want to tell you what happened to me i'm a loser i mean i've been psychiatrically institutionalized 17 times i've been arrested for attempted murder twice, and I've been domestically violated nine times. There's no hope for me. Society doesn't want nothing to do with me, and I can't fault them for that. There's only one place I fit. My God, think about that for a minute. I fit with you. We are people who normally would not mix. Really? That looks like murderer's row right Keep an eye on her. So at the end of the year, at my old home group, the sponsor gives you a little coin, says something nice about you. They talk to the other toll timers and make it up. They want you to feel good at your year. And then they sit down and then I'm supposed to come up and say something nice about AA God and my sponsor. Sit down. Of course, something happened to me on the way to the podium as I ascended. I happened to look down there where Circe is and my sponsor was there and I looked above his head and I saw a picture of Bill and Bob on the wall and there was just enough room for mine to float up between them. And I looked at my sponsor and I thought, you pathetic old loser. Do you know in Alcoholics Anonymous this is the only society in the animal kingdom where the young try to devour the old? Beware, newcomer. I looked him and I said, and I talked to myself, boy, look at you. You've been sober 900 years and that's all you are? Look at me after a year. I realized I was walking hand in hand with God and that I was the miracle. So I realized I didn't need my sponsor anymore. I fired him and got me a new sponsor. You know who it was? From my second year to my seventh year I did steps 1, 12, and 13. Wait a minute, wait a minute. Ladies, ladies, if I come up to you tonight, perhaps I'll say something like this. Hey. Hey. Would you like to go have coffee and talk about God? Run! in my seventh year i'm more depressed now than i've ever been and i'm absolutely convinced a doesn't work listen to me newcomer i'm actually convinced that a doesn't work i'm sober seven years i weigh 146 pounds i've got a 29 inch waist i am more depressed than ever i've lost my teeth and what makes that worse is i don't care I've got no friends left I can't call my sponsor because I've been lying on him I can not come to you good people because it's you whom I have been lying to in my mind I can overcome that I called the only friend I got I called my psychiatrist I mean no offense here and I'm not leaving you with an opinion I'm sharing my personal experience only I called me doctor and my opening words were doc AA don't work I'm dying I need help he called me in he drew my blood He tested me, told me I have a chemical imbalance and I need lithium. And then he asked me if I'd be voluntarily willing to participate in the program to test a new antidepressant, which we all know now today is Prozac. And then He wanted to put me on another drug called amitriptyline to block the pain. And I said yes, because I believed AA doesn't work. And so I'm on my way to the pharmacy to pick up my prescriptions. I got them. And then all of a sudden this thought came to me from nowhere. Hey dummy. That is what I heard. Don't you think you ought to call Barney on this one? So I picked up the phone. Do you hear me, newcomer? I picked out the phone, I called my sponsor, and I said, Barney, can I come out to your trailer and talk to you about something? He says, I'll meet you at the maid right. And I said he wanted me out in public where he had witnesses. So I walk into the maid's right, and there Barney is with a court around him. You know how they are. And I walk in there with my bag of pills. I set them on the table. I looked at Barney. He looked at me, and I said, Barney, I'm bipolar. He looked to me and he says, I know it. We all know it We've known for a long time you're bipolar, pal. Listen to me One of these days you're going to be walking down 16th Street and you're gonna hear the loudest explosion you've ever heard It's gonna be your head popping right out of your ass And you won't be bipolar no more. I hated his gut. Then he says to me, he says, I ain't no doctor but I am your sponsor and I know for a fact that you shouldn't be better and you should be worse because you've been around here seven years and you have done absolutely nothing to alter the course of the progressive nature of a spiritual disease called alcoholism. He had me. He said, bipolar, smi-spoiler, I don't know. He says, well, why don't you give us two years of your life? See how greedy they get if you don't make it the first time? He says if after two years, if you do what's outlined in the basic text, use the 12 steps and 12 traditions to understand the symptoms of your condition. If you're not better in two years I'll go to the doctor with you and I'll give you the medication myself. I said, okay, I'll Give It a Shot just because I hope that God, you're wrong. That was my thought. And you know what? My seven years of sobriety, I took those 12 steps the way they're outlined in the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous. I went along in the 12 and 12 to understand the emotional aspects of faulty emotional dependency that Bill Wilson talked about. And I'm here to report to you at the end of nine years of continuing sobrietry my depression was gone and to this very day it's never come back. I can't explain it I'm just reporting if you go over to the archives office you'll see a letter hanging on the wall from Bill Wilson how he states in an open letter to another person suffering from depression that he suffered up until 1955 from which time he never suffered from depression again I'm glad I found that letter because it empowered me to believe that what I have is spiritual in nature I have a soul sickness. When the soul hears the music, it'll dance to the tune. See, this is language of the heart, not language of the head. I'm here to report to you that if AA had a head rack instead of a hat rack and we could talk a newcomer into putting their head there for just a couple of years, there wouldn't be a stadium big enough in Akron, Ohio, anywhere to hold a regular scheduled meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous. Let's talk to their heart. When you come up here and share like Keith did and like Sheila did and like the old-timers did and I know like Ray's going to in the morning, when we share like that, that message hits the heart. We know you newcomers ain't listening. I wouldn't either. My God, you've got important stuff to think about. We honor that. We respect that so we're not talking to your intellect we're talking to the identification of one alcoholic reaching out to another because when i pick up a drink of budweiser it does something to me it is not supposed to do it allows me to feel and believe i'm actually normal at an unconscious level that causes me to believe when i'm in turmoil if i pickup a drink it'll go away I need a solution for that you know I had no idea I was finding it here I thought I needed some real help let me tell you about the first time I drank real quick I was 17 years old I was in a retarded class at high school truly I got diagnosed retarded when I was a kid got put in a retarded home and stayed in a retired class until I graduated high school part of that was my fault I found out the retarded boys could go to the girls bathroom and not get detention I think it's important to tell you about my first drink because it's the very reason I took my last drink and every drink in between though I don't know that and neither could you if you're new because there's no profession out there that's been researching it enough to understand because it is a spiritual thing it's not a biochemical thing it's a spiritual illness when I was 17 years old I was in the senior retarded class. I was 6'3". I weighed 120 pounds. I was ugly. I was retarded. I mean, I remember I looked in the mirror when I was 8 or 9 years old and I said to myself, Butler, it's too bad, pal. It's going to be a long life. And it's goingto be lonely because you are butt ugly, pal." I don't know where that came from, Ray. My mama never sat me down and said, Oh, you poor little son of a... You are so ugly. Just out of mercy alone, I put you back. that's not what my mama said but that's what I heard when she said Wayne I love you hear me I'm 17 years old and Tom who takes us retarded kids on field trips took me to the senior dance I've never been to a dance I don't know what's going on I'm into myself so I'm standing up against that wall and I'm looking at all these people mixing and dancing I'm wondering what they're doing I can't take a step forward because I'll step over my feet, you'll embarrass me and I'll have to hurt your family. I can't do that. Tom brings me over this long brown bottle with a red, white, blue label of Budweiser. He said, here, drink this. It'll make you feel better. I drank it. I said, Tom, that tastes terrible. I want a pepcola. He says, that's okay, kid. You'll get used to it. Now what he meant is not what took place. He meant like anybody drinking, I'd probably pee in the wrong place, get a little too drunk and get sick, and then moderate like most social drinkers do. Something happened in my mind that Silkworth talks about an abnormal effect produced and he goes on to say it's an illusion. Somewhere between four or five Budweiser's I got so good looking I couldn't stand it. I went from six three hundred twenty pounds to three two hundred forty pounds and I felt bulletproof. I looked down at the dance floor and eyeballed me a blue-eyed blonde dancing with some loser. I walked right up to her and asked her to dance and she said yes. I found out later that night sex meant two people. I didn't know that. I needed therapy right away. She ruined my sex life forever. Now don't be offended by this because it happened to you too in some way. I've been having sex since I was 13 and I thought I was good at it. She ended up pregnant, she was 16. You know what that is in Illinois? That's called statutory rape. And I said, Dad, what's that mean? He says, 20 years to life. I said, even if you're retarded? You follow me? And the effect produced in my mind, like Silkworth says, it's unconscious, it's cunning, baffling, and powerful. When I feel like I don't fit in, I don' t belong, I'm not part of. When I drink alcohol, somehow the metabolization process in my mind makes me feel whole and complete. I have to have a sufficient substitute for that. And you know what I found is right here with you. I didn't know that. I didn' t know that until I had been around here a while. My ninth year of sobriety, I looked around and I realized I had some type of an awakening. Something has happened to me that I can' t explain. I begin to realize I have hopes and dreams. I had the risk of sharing with my sponsor what my dream was nine years over. I said, Barney, I want to be a cop. Now my friend Bobby is out there somewhere. Where are you at, Bobby? Raise your hand. There he is. He'll understand this real well. I want to be a bad so bad I want to be a cop in the worst way and I told Barney I want to be a cop he looked at me and he rolled his eyes and he said oh good you got to try to make your dreams come true or someday you're going to wake up regretting the fact you didn't try because if you try and fail that's your will if you try and it works that's God's will he said if you fail it means God's got another door to go through you know what he trick me. I went out and got my record expunged the way my sponsor said to. Now it's hard to become a police officer when you've been arrested twice for attempted murder, nine counts of domestic violence, and 17 psychiatrically institutional license unless you're in Iowa. They consider that good experience. I had to join the reserve program, I was a bit too bold for full-time. I want to tell you what happened, I had to go in the academy. I went there for 16 weeks having graduated retarded classmen right to Vietnam came home and went to the streets. I don't think I can make it through the Academy. I told my sponsor I can't do it he said okay and then he said, go do it anyway. And then he said, ask them for help. Now these are those earth people I made fun of. I told them what my problem was. And every time before a test came up, they wrote every possible question and answer they could think of that might come up, and they showed me flash cards. And I wrote and memorized what was on the flash card. And when the test came up the next day, I matched the flash card to the question on the test, and I graduated fourth in my class at the academy. I remember I called my sponsor up I said Barney I made it I'm graduating and I was crying I felt the same way I felt sitting here tonight I felt like I felt the same way I said Barney I made it I'm going to graduate he said I'm proud of you I've never had a human being tell me they're proud of me and then he cried and then I said Barney they gave me my gun he said oh shit that's what he said and then he came to my graduation and he brought the group you hear me there's 16 of us graduating and they had this citizenry out here and over here they had Wayne's World i have to report to you there's only been four times in my life where i haven't felt retarded four times one of them was when they pinned that badge on me and i swore to uphold the law can you think about that for a minute i mean i'm crying nobody else is crying i'm crying they don't know what i've been through in my like i'll tell you what the fourth time is when i came up here tonight Thank you. Damn it. For those of you who have been where I was at and you are where you are now, you know what I mean? It's only happened four times in my life and maybe someday it'll last, but I cherish every moment because I'm in the right now of now. It's hard for me to believe where I once was. I'm going to tell you something. It's a long walk from the backseat of that squad car to the front. I did that for five years and then moved to California because I love AA in California. You know, I got displaced, if you will. God took the cereal box of life and dumped all the fruits, flakes, and nuts over in Southern California. Somehow I got sprinkled in Illinois, but I found my way. Water seeks its level. And oh, I love AA. I got a 13-year-old son who's a product of an AA dance. last year he was 12 I want to tell you about the power of being given the privilege of doing this and the responsibilities is I get to hear a lot of other speakers talk and they gave me the faith to hang in here on this one two main things I want to close up with so that you newcomers know there's a lot of hope in being hopeless. You hear me? There's a lot of hope in being homeless. Last year I don't want this to be misunderstood. I'm not throwing dirty laundry on anybody. My son's mother served me, I was served with notification last year that my 12-year-old son was going to be adopted that it was going to be done forcefully. I moved to California. The letter said I abandoned my son, deserted him. You know, lawyers do what lawyers do when they're paid. I'm not judging. They're doing their job and this one did a good one. It said what I was like before I got sober and then it said what i was like my first seven years and it was all true and I called my sponsor up and I said what do I do? He said we talked to a lawyer and the lawyer said I don't have a chance so he said call your son and I want to tell you about my little boy. He's so good looking, I can't hardly stand him. I mean, when he goes out for a walk, he's just, everybody loves him. He's a good kid. Looks just like me. Only he's not retarded, you know what I mean? So I went out to a place called Monterey Park Courthouse where they do the juvenile and the child adoptions. A friend of mine went with me. My sponsor said I'd be okay because I trust God, I've cleaned house and I'm open-minded to possibility. And I called my son up and asked him what he wanted and he said, I want to be adopted. I dropped the phone and just curled up in a fetal position and bawled like a baby. And then I did what I was told to do. I went out to the Monterey Courthouse and I met with a judge first, then we went out into open court. He took all the nasty dialogue out. You hear this? He took the nasty dialog off the record and put on the record that I was a good man doing what I believed was right for my son. And then he asked me, he says, Do you realize, Mr. Butler, that you're signing an irrevocable consent to adopt? I said, I do. Do you realise that you'll never have any power to even re-adopt your son? I don't know the law. I said sure. And I signed the papers. I left the courthouse. I went in the bathroom and threw up for the first time sober and died. And then some well-meaning people who didn't understand judged me and I know they needed to. I forgive them. A great man once said, Forgive them, Father, for they know not what they do. and I went home and I just died couldn't even talk about it but I had a lot of commitments in AA and I kept on did everything I was supposed to do and didn't talk to you about it above and beyond just chit chat because I've learned to suffer well and capitalizes an opportunity to grow sometimes not so well but most of the time pretty well now my son's mother was nine years sober and her husband was 12 a few months later i got a phone call from her and after nine years she drank and he drank after 12 and she said you've got to come get your son he needs you right now but he's not my son you took him from me you destroyed me it's a cancer that's in my soul that won't go away. I hate your guts. That's not what I said. That is what I thought. What I said was, can I call you back? I hung up and I called my sponsor. Twenty-two years over. I called my sponsor because that's what God would have me do. You know what he said? Buy a ticket, go get him. So I bought a ticket and I went, listen to this. I spent five days with my son dying because I wasn't going to put anything on him about his mother. I wasn'T going to say a bad thing about her. And in fact, I have not for this moment because you taught me better than that. And for five days, I told Zach, I said, now I'm thinking, I don't know. He's not, I don'T know. I'M THINKING HE'S NO LONGER MY SON. HE'S THEIRS NOW. AND I'M SAYING, ZACH, THEY'LL BE OKAY. ZACH. THEY LOVE YOU. ZAC. THEY'RE GOING TO TAKE CARE OF YOU. I COULDN'T BELIEVE I WAS HEARING MYSELF SAY THAT CRAP. I SURE DIDN'T BELieve IT, BUT I SAID IT. AND I watched my son's face relax. And then I went back to California and just kept doing the drill. A few weeks later, I got a phone call. Let me tell something to you about God who works in a mysterious way. I gota phone call! I'm not a lawyer. Apparently the paperwork had 90 days or say, I don't know what it was, to get from the Monterey Park Courthouse entered into the record at the Rockhound County Courthouse. Do you know it got lost in the mail? Do you know he's legally my son? Do you know that he's coming with me this July 24th? I wonder what might have happened had I told him what I thought she was. I wonder what would have happened if I would have been the old Wayne Butler with the defective character glaring, trying to prove what a bad person... You hear me? Thank you. You gave me my son back. I want to finish up with this. At the age of 18, I drank a bottle of tequila and tried to kill my entire family. I had put in a psychiatric unit, diagnosed by a panel of psychiatrists as being an untreatable psychopath. They weren't going to let me go. You know how it is, if they'd let me and I would have done it, they would have been responsible. So instead they sent me to Vietnam where they figured a guy like me could help out. But those doctors told me I would never know the emotion of love nor would I be able to to find anybody with the capacity to love me the way I needed to be loved until I met you. You see, I found out love is an action verb. What I do means I love. When I tell you I love AA, that means I'm willing to come here on a moment's notice and do what I'm asked to do. When I say I love AAA, it means I'll wear a tie so I can look my best for you, the newcomer, and to let the old-timers know I respect what they've done. you notice they were all dressed up I want to emulate them old timers because they're doing something I haven't been able to do yet I can't be sober 54 years I can only be sober today but they've lit the path and I'm darn well going to take it I forgot where I was going with that. I had a retarded moment. Until I noticed the blonde hair, then it came back. I need freedom from blondage. They told me I would never know the true emotion of love. I haven't been married sober. Sober 22 years, 7 months and 2 days. I don't want to go into all that dialogue. All I know is six months ago, a special person came into my life. I'm a hard man to love. Especially after they hear my talk. Nora, stand up. Come on, baby. I hate she gets more attention than I do. But I'll tell you something. I'm just not trying to show off for her. She's not afraid of me at all, do you hear me? It's an amazing thing. God works in mysterious ways. I've met many women, but the ones I've met have always been abused by men. And at some point, they look at me and they think, oh my god. They see a Charles Manson inside. Isn't it interesting that Nora's, can I tell that? Nora's never been hit by a man in her life. She has no reason to be afraid of men. And I think that's the only way I could have found this miracle of my life through AA is because she doesn't feel a threat. That doesn't make me look good, that makes you look good. Look what you've done for me. So it's time for me to leave you in a way that Dr. Bob did, I think. Dr. Robb was the silent partner of AA. And like all silent partners, he was the anchor while the promoter was out selling the idea. And without that anchor attached to Sister Ignatia, Without that anchor and that silent partner, and if you know about electricity, it runs quiet. But it's so desperately necessary. And without the power, I'm absolutely powerless. And between Bill and Bob and Sister and the rest of the founding pioneers of Alcoholics Anonymous, but for the grace of God, I wouldn't be here with you good people tonight. And we wouldn't have the opportunity to carry this message to the still sick and suffering alcoholic. I truly love you. Thank you. Thanks for watching!