“You Only Go Around Once: Grab All the Living You Can” – Gene D.
About This Speaker Tape
Gene D. from Calistoga shares his full story at Sober Village III in St. Lucia in February 1990. He opens by defining alcoholism simply from Chapter 3 of the Big Book: men and women who have lost the ability to control their drinking. No reference to how much, where, or what happened — just the loss of control.
Gene describes living in the Napa Valley, the premier wine-growing region in America, where he has lunch every day with eleven men in the wine industry and he is the only one who does not drink. When foreign guests notice his glass is upside down and ask why he does not drink, Gene says simply, not today. But for years he could not explain to himself or anyone else the deeper reason. That changed in a motel room in Stockton watching a beer commercial: young people on San Francisco Bay, swinging from lines, diving off boats, and the tag line — you only go around once, grab all the gusto you can. He looked up gusto in the dictionary: expression for living. You only go around once — grab all the living you can. That is why he does not drink. Not because he is in AA, not because he is an alcoholic — he drank plenty as both. He does not drink because every unit of time that passes is life used up, and he refuses to waste another minute of it.
Gene tells the story of how he works with newcomers like the blind man and the seeing-eye dog — you lure them in with kindness, then you tear their defenses open so they can see the truth. He closes with the philosophy that kept him sober since that morning: one life to a customer, one time around, and he intends to grab every bit of living he can.
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