Marilyn B. at AA Convention in Overland Park, KS

Marilyn B. at AA Convention in Overland Park, KS

▶️ Play 🗣️ Marilyn B. ⏱️ 1h 21m 📅 01 Jan 1970
My name is Marilyn SB
Really, and I am an alcoholic
and I'm a member of Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous and Emotions Anonymous
and Overeaters Anonymous.
They just laughed at me, sure enough.
But I'm a member of any organization that has as a basis the program of Alcoholics Anonymous that saves my life and my sanity and hopefully will help me to share with you what little bit I have to share.
It's raining a little bit. In fact, I think probably when I submitted it to As the World Turns
they it was returned as unbelievable.
I'm telling you the truth, this is
the greatest round Robin that I have ever seen.
And if you agree with me,
it took some fine people and I know personally that are very fine and some great organizations never seen anything like a coax that's doing what they're supposed to do and go when they're supposed to go. And and my good old Indian time I'm flailing behind, but I have never seen anything to equal it, especially for a first one. And I do congratulate you.
I am so privileged
to be here. I belong here,
but behind this podium is it is different
and I'm not really any different from any of you. Never have been,
and probably never will be
quite where you are, because I found that it's really true.
Reputation strengthened and confirmed
and I thought that was the most dumb shit thing I had ever heard of in my life. I
it lured me to tears,
strengthens and confirmed. Keep coming back every night, every night. Read the book, cover the meeting.
I didn't even know it'll want to hear it anymore.
But I have a real swinging dry date
and it's taken many years for a lot of those things to have any real meaning to me. Today. I can honestly thank it's God that understands me, that repetition does strengthen and confirm just about the time I think I've had it all. I know it all, I've learned it all. There's nothing left to experience.
Better lookout. There'll be something new
in my life to experience and to work through. And it goes on and on and on. And I haven't grown the knees.
I still have the lowest model in this room.
That's why I'm standing on this mark.
And I wasn't going to tell that.
I was not going to tell you the infamy of me in my box,
but they made such A to do about getting it up here tonight.
You know, I just very quietly said do you have something for me to stand on? And I usually ask that and somebody scuffles around and gets a Coke case or some of those. I really can't see over the podium
and that may be better not.
I'll try that sometime.
I like eye contact and I like to look at your eyeballs and I usually have to stand on something.
Someone made a terrible mistake one time, in my opinion, and invited me over to the hole in the ground over in Amarillo, TX where they have that spiritual retreat every year and I'm not really known to be a spiritual speaker.
In fact, I just begged that I not talk on Sunday morning because folks kind of expect that. And,
you know, I got my own thing going for me. But somehow I don't know how to share that quite as well as this launchiness I've been through.
A lot more folks relate to me. I'll tell you,
ask me over to Amarillo and you know, it really is a wonderful place to go and and someplace I would really like to go today and be a part of.
But then I wasn't too old in the program. I couldn't figure out what in the hell they want with me over there. It was going to be so spiritual. So I sized myself up good, you know, for about a week. Think spiritual Maryland, think spiritual. I read everything spiritual. Big look had to say and on and on and on and on.
And of course I had to have this box thing on and they found one for me. And when I was introduced, I walked up to the podium and there was no box there. And I looked around and I was really frustrated because it was a tall podium and someone saw my frustration and made a mad dash over to the side to get my coke carton and brought it over to me
and wouldn't know I was coming up. Watch this
first thing came out of my mouth was like, well, I've been here 15 minutes and somebody's been stole my box
blonde.
But that time I figured I might as well just be myself. And that's the greatest privilege that I have today.
I don't have to play roles and I don't have to be a comedian, even though I enjoy that sometimes. I don't have to in order to survive.
I was delighted to go over and meet Elmer and I'm glad that this civil rights person was here to be a part of this particular
talk because
all of you that have ever heard me know that I usually mention that I'm the only blue eyed child born into a tribe of brown eyed Chickasaw Indians
and there was a lot of doubt about me right from the start. It ain't no wonder I was different,
but that's the way it was.
And through the years, I have
come to appreciate
my father having a head right on the Indian roll in Oklahoma and my grandparents and their parents.
And I told my my grandfather,
he's the one that was
had got married and he married the Indian squaw. And they weren't too well thought of in those days, the white men that came into Indian territory and picked up squaw and married her because it gave them all the same rights that the squaw had, whatever the hell they were. You know what, 5 paces behind the horse and that's.
But my grandfather really loved my grandmother and
they loved each other and their love was sincere and they lived very happy lives.
They were married when they were 21 through an Indian ceremony as well as civil, and they were each allotted 360 acres of land.
And at the age of 22, they sold every acre, mineral rights and all,
because they had become Christians in that Nazarene church.
And they goes every time of it to the church.
We have a College in Oklahoma City, the Bethany Nazarene College that was built on my God, and they've been money
I have. The heart is fit every time I drive by there today.
But, you know, they were perfectly happy with what they've done.
They loved it, and they loved the rest of their lives, just like so, you know, above poverty. They dedicated their lives to working with other Indians
and to help them find a better way of life and they were just happy as hog and sunshine with it.
Never imposed themselves on me or my beliefs.
Love you very much, just the way I was,
and I'll never forget that. I'll never forget that. My grandfather asked me when I was very young if I thought I'd be willing.
I said sure, because I had a lot of talent and skills and abilities, just like the Big Book said. I could sing and dance and do all kinds of funny things and entertain, and I went with them many times to those meetings. I'm very familiar with those that Nell mentioned this morning
and I went along, but I soon became very bored with that.
I'll never forget he was asking me though, could I make a lifetime work of that?
Please be interested enough to try to carry on some of our traditions
and traditions I knew nothing about. Character I knew nothing about. Well, I've been exposed to it, you know, as a Girl Scout for nine years. And I knew how to be prepared,
always was
born and raised, you know, in the front few of that church. I was exposed to every character building program that wasn't exposed to. But I knew nothing about character and principles. But I do remember that. He asked.
We are very proud Indians
and we have a lock pass on. Would you be a part of that? Would you see that our traditions don't die?
Would you say that our spiritual beliefs don't die?
And I said sure, anytime.
I didn't recall that until the last five years. I really hadn't thought about it much. I just remembered that Nazarene church and that college.
So I'm glad Alma here and I'm glad this civil rights personal is over here, see, because you have a perfectly
beautiful racial balance right here up here to front me and Elmer and all y'all.
I always kind of wondered about all these speakers coming from Oklahoma. And then I saw after I got here that old Charlie was going to talk and Charlie wasn't from Oklahoma. So I figured they knew what they were doing. I didn't have to go help them run that show
by telling them Charlie wasn't Okie and you can't hardly live in Oklahoma and not be some Indian.
It's clearly impossible to their navies anyway and not be some Indian
and oh brother me out that good old country boys who here as I want. If not, I want to be sure and tell him that I've been screwed by girl country boys more than any other kind.
You know, there's real good old country boys and then there are those who use that. It's a good old country bullet hunt. You get paid today
letter nail salon
not here tonight.
I love Buttermilk for it for being just what he is. But he was from Pawnee, OK
I'm saying we got more Indians in the state of Oklahoma than the rest of the United States put together. And there's a vacuum down there. But there's only 5 civilized tribes according to history
and I noticed y'all know that that now. And Cleaver from Warrika. We got funny names. I imagine y'all do up here, but
I'm from Shawnee and y'all got a Shawnee up here, but from the state of Oklahoma, which means Redman and everybody seems to kind of have it all together. You know, even Charlie talked about his Cherokee bride
and I thought, well, that makes it unanimous. You know, we're all from one of those spring sounding places, but I don't have it all together.
If they are from Oklahoma
and Shawnee is a tribe. I live in Pottawattamie County
and that's tried and I'm Kickstarter
and nobody ever heard of us. You know,
we at all time or child what one time we were all chocolates back there in Mississippi.
And you might know that when they started trying to haul us off down here in Indian Territory, there was a little group of about 1000 that didn't want to go. By God
they didn't want to go, and they were known
to be famous lawyers,
and they broke off from the Choctaw nation and called themselves the Chickasaw.
And the words of the thou means rebel.
I'm justifying everything y'all about to hear.
I am one of those. I have all the rights in the world to be a rebel.
I wanted my children to
carry on the traditions because those things once lost are gone forever. And I had become very interested in our culture
and way back there, when I first started to try to work the 11th step of this program, I started seeking, really
seeking all of the religion to try to find the principles that would dive with those of ours here in AA. And sure enough, there was some little something wrong with every one of them.
I couldn't take the whole thing 100%, so I stuck with the principles of a A and I found that the basic spiritual principle of my own Indian tribe are identical.
And then I am enjoying
exposing my children to
and my grandchildren.
Some of them are hooking on to it and some of them are.
I had one special one that did.
I never hated being alcoholic. You y'all
I never did say man I want to be an alcoholic and I grow up.
I didn't know I lost one for a long time
and Miss Charlie says we always the last to know. And then he said no, we know we're just the last to admit.
And sisters,
I believe now mentioned in her talk today that I so thoroughly enjoyed
saves my sanity one time and I will be forever grateful to the Al Anon.
I am so grateful for every person that was willing and is willing today
to be an allocating sponsor.
Maybe later you'll know how grateful I am for allergies,
but I believe she mentioned today that I. Alcoholism is a family disease and you better breathe 9 What
you know endings ain't right.
My grandmother went to her grave believing that it was our Indian blood that caused us this crazy
far back
and that we could, you know, we couldn't handle it. Well, nobody in my family could handle it, I'll put it that way. My entire family with the exception of my mother
or alcoholic
and didn't know how to do anything in moderation and I still don't.
But none of us knew I had two brothers that died of alcoholism or as the direct results of alcohol.
And there are three of us
gals who are now members of alcoholic phenomena.
My father was an alcoholic and I can remember. Should I do that? Because I don't want to found those.
I can remember when beer joints and bootleggers and some restaurants
and those places had big signs over the door that said no Indians allowed.
You remember that hour,
I say. We got them all fixed up
now what is What the hell y'all gonna do this?
Well, I did find out. You know, I have a wonderful husband I wanna tell you all about, but not a lot.
He's a brilliant geologist and I decided of at one time, if I married him, I get my everything back. Drop my drop barrel. My barrel can't pull my tank.
It was since announced about him that appealed to me too.
Hit. In addition to that, he's also
a commissioner for the Oklahoma State Wildlife Commission.
Man, they keep heating. If he can handle those wild animals out there, he can sure help me.
And he lovingly does.
I know that he loves me very much, but I've never quite believed that he was ever at any time in love with me.
I think probably he is and still was in Philly is in all
that time. He doesn't know what I'm saying.
So we don't have a lot of problems with our relationship. And I hear a lot about that in a A and it says as plain as day. The thing we fail to recognize about ourselves is our basic inability to form a healthy relationship with another human being.
And I said, who the hell has to have relationships? Yep. So I used to don't have any,
but in this program there is a solution
as to how to go about doing that. I never had a healthy relationship with anyone
simply because I was always #1
I don't know.
I don't know
amount that is age of alcoholism being hereditary.
The scientists and research people now seem to kind of believe that there's something wrong with our genes, and I wire designer one,
take their name off and put mine on
some things. I just can't give up. Ice. There you go. I just thought this morning, God, I wish I could be humble.
Oh my. I've always wanted to be one of those people like Neil who is so precious and and quietly go around doing good.
I don't quietly go around doing anything,
but I don't got none of that. It seems like
it's not in me somehow.
I'm not trying to think of, you know, that was nice of me.
Somebody said. It wasn't either.
I drank because I wanted to,
and it's just that simple. It didn't make any difference what kind of tag I put on it, what kind of justification of rationalization. I drank because I wanted to. I could not bear life on a day-to-day basis. I could not bear the reality of disappointments.
I could not bear the situation and the trap I felt I I had myself in because I didn't go to Hollywood like I supposed to.
And
then if I had a drink, I think, what the hell, I'd have to go to OU for four years to get a degree in drama. Four years. Then I'd have to grab Highwood and found drug stores through them, stuff my bra and wait for somebody to come and discover me. And that's going to take a lot of time
and they're really wanting to test in doing all that when you can just curl up in a great, big comfortable chair and have a hooker or two and.
Why are you waiting on to go and never have to get out of the car?
Nobody here at this conference in the committee or anyone I know personally, said Marilyn.
We want to clean up the story.
I went down Louisiana and they did.
They did. Oh Aronofsky, y'all know Aronofsky? They had the old dad, so they had both of us on the same program
and he's raunches me or raunchy. And we had a family call us in the room before the convention. And and there was, oh, there was also a wonderful medical doctor from Colorado who had about 18 years sobriety and Aronofsky now far about 8 years old. You know, there's nothing like eight-year wonders,
and this guy came in, he said.
We don't have any committees down here.
I am also body down here than anybody else
so I chose y'all to come
and I want you to please if you will try to clean up your story and if you will don't use any four letter words.
William Louisiana are trying to upgrade the reputation of Alcoholics not
and after all, he said we have ladies down here.
Well,
the doctor was OK,
you know, they're not senior dad
and whisked it around and fretted about that and the doctor and all of his wisdom said don't let that affect you.
Do your fame, be yourself.
And sure enough, we did allow it to affect us. No all day talks fast anyway. He talks fast. He couldn't understand the word, he said,
Burning. And it's been set out.
He really did. And I allowed it to affect me.
I didn't feel like I was being me,
but the good doctor saved it all.
We didn't tell what had happened, but he did. On Sunday morning he got up and introduced himself and he told just exactly what had happened to us
and you can imagine the shock and the hush
over the conference, he said. That man asked us not to use any four letter words
and he said, I pray to God that he didn't include the word love
because that's what I intend to talk with you about this morning.
And he saved us all.
Well, in my young life, there was some four letter words that I hated a lot worse than those that Mickey Mouse all over when your kid calls him, walks in, you know, calls you, one of them mothers
cleaning it up.
There were some words full of words that absolutely made me want to puke.
I couldn't stand them. I just couldn't stand to hear them
and they were like Cook
and wash
and dust
made me sick
and I didn't know why
I didn't know what I didn't know why I couldn't be a wife like otherwise
and be happy about it.
Well, I already did because I should have been Hollywood, you know,
I couldn't talk to that. But I didn't want, you know, I I couldn't be a mother like other mothers.
However, mirror Polish and my kids shoes,
you know, make them white and shining and white socks. No, you know, I'd rather grab a jug of wine and go park and stay all day. And last kids. I've been good mothers as far as I was concerned.
I couldn't stand that role that had been assigned me. That's why I came into this program with a mistaken idea that I always wanted to be a lady
and I want to be a lady.
Really and truly wanted to be was a woman
and I found some ways as to how.
Now I could put on pretty good shows.
Sit on any barstool
and a lady would walk in
and she would even have an escort
and she had on nylons and high heeled shoes and maybe a little fur thing and look clean and neat and have pretty hair that shine. And I was down my end of the bar on my stool and my territory and my jeans and barefooted and hadn't bothered. Comb my hair in a few days
and I smell good
living the folks still serves me. But I look at her and I think to myself,
see it,
you know ha ha ha laugh of slaves. Look at that broad.
I've had all that, I've had all that Country Club, bridge club, PGA, they'll ever get thrown out of PTA. I just
then let's start having PTSA. I didn't even have a chance because all the kids understood me. See, those parents and teachers didn't. I've had all that. How dull. How drab,
how boring, how pointless, how silly.
And look at her, man, she thinks she's hot shit
and I just tear to pieces. Yeah, I've had my lungs, I've had high heels, I've had hairdos, I've had fur coat.
But I turn around to whoever had the nerve to sit by me. So I'll tell you one damn thing, Herman.
I'll bet you the next drink I'm a better lady than she is.
Yeah, well named out about that.
Greatest shock I've had in this program was to find out,
but I just kind of mediocre.
Is this so many tricks?
My greatest consolations were the funniest thing.
I'm glad that Charlie talked about bottoms tonight
and that AA is for everyone if they choose
and you don't have to be faced down puking in the gutter like me.
If I had another dime, I did. I'd drunk
not about my mind.
IAEA score, everyone. And today I know what a bottom is
because Charlie's been a friend of mine for a long time and his Cherokee bride.
If those people let because of finances and because of material things
that can come into this program and stop drinking alcohol have my greatest admiration
bums like me.
You know, I really didn't have any choice
and I'm John still had one.
But a bottom, to me is something that happens to you on the inside,
not exterior circumstances, Something that happens down here in your gut where you live
and go through every kind of treatment in the world. You see, I am so damned old that a treatment center was unheard of
when this thing happened to me.
State member institutions weren't taking Alcoholics. They weren't allowed.
I found that you, an alcoholic, got thrown out, so he had to con somebody into committing you as a something or other, a potential suicide. And I was, you know, I know to kill myself trying to kill myself.
There, there are a lot of things that I missed.
I miss treatment centers and I missed some of the new policies that I hear today that new people accept as a part of this program. Unless I'm there.
I still believe a lot.
I hope someday to be an elder statesman,
like those who put this thing together here quietly and with humility, and did it right and it came out great.
But right now, I guess I'm just a bleeding beacon
and I don't expect everybody to work this program the way I do. I wouldn't even dream of having you work it the way it works for me because you are as individual or personality as your fingerprint
and this program allows for that.
We can sort of do it your way and it works for everybody,
but if they tell me, I could till you make it hell out of face to myself, right on out the door.
However, the greatest calm and manipulator you know, nobody could be me anyway. It was the only way I knew how to live.
And I hear people say, well, I ain't hurt anybody but myself,
fine, yes, I'm going to spend the rest of their lives making amends to themselves.
But I heard everybody and I really didn't. I say that without without egoism.
You know, if you breathe air and sat next to me, you were harmed.
Otherwise you wouldn't have been sitting next to me
and I couldn't use you. I didn't have anything to do with you. I continually saw the people I could use and con and manipulate. It was a way of life that was essential for me. I know about that master that Charlie mentioned.
I'm very familiar with masters. I've had many masters.
When I died, all I could die.
When I'd hurt all I could hurt. When I'd cried,
all I could cry.
Then I hit the bottom and it was something that happened in here
because I went off straight.
I had nothing.
There was nothing left of me. Nothing.
I'd abandoned my children.
I let my husband. I left everyone that loved me and cared for me
and gave a damn.
I left them all to go pursue
the master that I'd found, and when that master wasn't around, I had another one.
They don't know that you don't have to think you can chew a drink.
I discovered that
when I couldn't get alcohol, I could usually manage to find some some drugs that would substitute.
And would take the place of and I used them all.
I've had upers and Downers and rounders and rounders
and all the things
that the government says is our biggest problem.
And yet alcohol still remains the number one drug problem in our country, the most drug oriented country in the history of our nation. And alcohol still #1 drugs in use today.
I was in psychiatric wards like everybody else. I went to strength. Now what about to tell them what I dreamed last night
was personal?
One their fault. They couldn't help me.
It was mine, incapable of being honest with myself, much less anybody else.
Medical doctors could just give me some pills and say they just didn't. Add in that
when insurance runs out, then you hit statement institutions and you know you get any way you can.
I love psychiatric wards. I just love them pulling out insurance. I was on top of the world.
They really kept me comfortable. I got too high, they bring me down, you know, I get depressed and they hook me up and had a nice fella talk to about 20 minutes, you know every day
at to not tell anything to but just chat with and met the nicest thing My mother always said you don't need nice people now and go to church and I got news for her. You know, I mean, nice people go to psych ward.
They really are nice folks. You know the best bridge players I ever met right there.
A friend of mine that I've had in the program for many years was in psychiatric board and he agreed with me and we played bricks together once in a while now over at the club. And
he told me that he cut his throat and was sent to the psych ward, you know, and was in terrible pain most of the time and all bandaged up, you know, but he was wanting to do something to get his mind off these problems and this pain and, and got up before some and sat down at the table. And one little girl didn't ask how many cards do you deal? But she did even worse than that. She said. I sure hope you all don't play cutthroat.
I can't stand pain. I never could stand pain
of any kind and if there is any way to avoid pain and avoid I'm dying. See that's easy.
Litter couldn't stand the pain
and I had to get away from it.
So when the pain was more than I could bake
and my masters no longer served me,
I wound up in a state middle institution, in fact the only one in the country that would accept me.
Clancy from high in the Sky.
Alma Mater,
the Big Springs, Texas State Mental institution.
And I think I'm here today probably to tell you that it doesn't make a bit of difference where the hell you are,
whether you're in a $5000 a day treatment center in a hospital, or if you're in a treatment center paid for by the government and all of us taxpayers,
it makes no difference. Or if you're in the basement of a statemental institution. If you're ready, you're ready. And if you ain't,
it's just that simple because I've been in mental institutions before and I had fun till they threw me out.
I was in no physical condition to be thrown out
and I'm not any big heavyweight right now, never have been, but at that time I weighed 60 lbs.
The medical master said I have the insides of an 80 year old woman
and it was not likely that I would survive physically and if I should by some chance
I would never function again in society mentally.
They were convinced my brain was gone
and any God that I'd ever heard about in my life
ever
had certainly better be dead as far as I was concerned,
because I had scars on my knees. And somebody finally wrote that song for me.
I had scars on my knees.
I'm saying God help me out of this one.
Not for keeps, but this one
somehow another I managed to survive. And these steps that are on this wall up here to me are not steps like stairs. They all go in a circle. Now to be in a circle, maybe that's what that circle store on the emblem, hell I don't know. But for me, they're in a circle because step one starts with step 12.
I was in a withdrawal award for five days and nights
and I didn't know reality from from the fantasies and the hallucinations
and there were two people in that room with me,
strangers round the clock for five days and five nights.
Now that was the requirement of the hospital. I learned later and later when I was about ready to leave, I said once I hallucinating, I know I did a lot.
But were there two people sitting in straight back chairs over in the corner every time I open my eyes? And they'd be different people. They weren't. They weren't like a buttermilk horse.
They, they were different people with different faces and different clothes that they were sitting there
and they said yes, there were people in the room with you. They volunteered to sit with you an 8 hour shifts round the clock for five days and nights
and I said who in the hell would do such a thing?
I, you know, in all my tribals, I had never known anybody that would do that on a voluntary basis.
And I was told that they were members of Alcoholics Anonymous and had driven from a little town about 40 miles away.
They had never seen me before, nor had I ever seen them.
And the loudest message that I've ever heard in this program came to me in stark silence.
They're being there screaming at me
now and we don't believe you're not going to live. We all believe you won't function in society again.
We don't believe God is dead.
And for the first time in all those stupid, sickening, revolting, drunken years,
I saw a ray of hope.
I saw
a seed planted.
They never asked me to believe anything they believed,
never mentioned it. Their being there was love
and I've never seen that before.
Thought I'd clean it out, but I've never seen that before.
And they said you don't have to believe the way we do,
Marilyn, Can you believe that we believe this? I said, are you kidding me? Been here. You've been the ones that volunteered. Of course I believe you believe,
and they took all my hand and they've not turned loose of it yet.
The only thing they ever asked of me was to be willing to stick out your other hands
if somebody else wants what we've got.
And I've gone through all kinds of stages in this program
that everybody seems to go through
and their learning experiences and sometimes, most times painful. I hate for pain to be the touchstone of spiritual growth. I hate that.
That's it, that's the way it is.
Me you could never say in pain today. I can honestly tell you that I am grateful for adversity.
Not thrilled to death and not high as a kite, but I'm always grateful for adversity because that's the only way I learn. I still have to be backed into a corner and this God that I understand and seems to understand me knows that.
And about the time I think what the hell else is there left for me to do? I've experienced everything there is to experience. Wham old
and I'm going to have an opportunity to learn some more.
I am here to report to you that we don't ever learn it up.
I've learned more in the last five years than I did the previous 11
simply by remaining
open minded. Light from the start,
honest with myself like right from the start
and willing like right from the start.
I have a son that went to Vietnam and I was sober. Everything in the world has happened to me since I've been sober. Now remember what happened bad when I was drunk it didn't really matter. I I heard some research folks say the other day that the two most painful
pains that we can experience as human beings,
number one is child birth #2 was kidney stump.
And I thought, bullshit,
they don't know about us
and that we heard harder
and we live harder and we cry harder and we love harder and we do everything harder because we're extremists.
Moderation is the key. Moderation is the key. And I don't have that pendulum swinging right yet. You know, I still have to go all the way the other way before I can ever get back to some degree of moderation.
And then I thought about what they said and the reason the pain of childbirth is not remembered by women. And you ask any mother and she'll tell you, yeah, this guy has that. Don't remember the pain. And that's because the pain is bringing about something productive.
What can you do with a damn kidney stone?
Non productive,
but childbirth. Yes,
so productive and so wonderful and so glorious and so magnificent and miraculous that we are willing to turn around and do it again
and again and again.
The God that I understand
made sex a pleasure,
tried to tell me that was to propagate the earth,
but that never occurred to me.
But I do remember the childbirth and the pain. I don't remember. I remember what came out of that
and I remember that my children were
not what they were supposed to be.
If I was to carry on the traditions,
here came this cotton headed thing
with blur eyes in mind.
I told you Geronimo had blue eyes in us. He did, man. He got a lot in common.
I had two toe heads
and they look like me, didn't act like me, walk like me or talk like me.
Why did Matt 10 years and forgot everything
Clinton birth and gold and I'll ask
and I had my child.
I had my log chicks so Indian
any idea for black has shiny straight hair and it was OK because they had my blue eyes.
But this was the one I would teach.
This was the one that would carry on the traditions from my grandfather
and he picked it up and he loved it.
We came into this program together,
you see. I took him with me every place that I went. I only abandoned the Co heads and the wide eyes.
I took my little Indian with me,
and maybe there's what Marshall I set him on,
or what Glory, grimy, dirty, filthy company I put him in.
He went with me all the way.
He was three years old, going on 30,
and got older by the day and wiser,
and he was nine years old and we came in this program together
and he was so frustrated and so confused
about a lot of things that the Alice In sponsors made an exception because of his great wisdom from having been around the world with me. And they allowed him into Aliphene early,
and it fills them up.
Answered every question that he ever had,
and we went to meetings together.
He went to his and I went to mine and we talked about steps
and he'd say, well mom, I'm ready to give my will over to God, but I don't know about my life.
He told me how to take the step.
We helped each other. He found a God of his understanding
and he had that, you know, he didn't have to go through the mess of erasing old tapes like I did
to break into those Nazarene churches, in the Pentecostal churches and those revivals that were talked about. They didn't have to ask me come down there and get saved. Hell, as a first one mayor
going to get played through
and here this sister will be saying hang on Marilyn, hang on. There's no we're be saying let go Marilyn, let go. Shit. I don't know what to do. I just go get lost.
I had been exposed. At least this child had not. He didn't have to unlearn a damn thing about spirituality.
His mind was wide open
and he soaked it up like a sponge. Just like I did. I remember. Sat down. People, please be careful what you say to me
because I and my mind is like a sponge
and soaking up everything you say.
And I should have said please walk what you talk
because this path we're supposed to follow I believe is the one in the big book. I don't suggest any of you go following mine
or anyone else that you know.
If you stay on the one that's in the big book,
then you won't fail.
Guarantee you that you won't fail. Hell, if I followed some other people's paths that I know, and if I had done everything I was told to do, hell, I'd have been screwed to death
without a doubt. You know more ways than one to kill yourself
because I lost that death wish. You know, anyway to get out of it?
Our primary the wrong man. Many times
it would have not have been the way for me,
but assessed to the path in the book. Thank my God.
And today I'll say, if it ain't the big book, don't say it to me. Don't hear it. And that's why I get upset about the little policies in the new group. 90 eighties, 90 days bullshit. If you want to stay alive, you'll go to a meeting to save your ass that day
if you want it.
Somebody had to tell me to go to meetings. God, I wanted it more than anything in the world, if for no other reason it kept me from being someplace else.
And fake it till you make it. Let us love you till you can love yourself.
I get you in the fact quicker than anything on you,
they said. Marilyn, you better totally abstain from sex for about a year
and immediately I thought my Well, why they don't tell married people last?
I still haven't figured that out 'cause sponsors are still telling their little chicken no sex.
And I believe the book says that it's dangerous for us to become emotionally involved on these quote campus romances.
There's 6 pages in that book about sex. And they aren't judgmental. They don't stay safe and safe. It doesn't say sound fact,
but sponsors thank you all too.
Except if you're married.
Oh, there's no things I know are well meaning, but they're not in this book. They're not in the book.
Stick with it. You'll be a winner
with the book. You'll be a winner. And you'll hear somebody someday that will be just your person to listen to.
You know, I hated sponsors and I've loved sponsors
and and I've had a lot of them took a loft. But then the book says our sponsors doesn't.
I don't mean that I played the game. If I didn't like what this one said, I went to another one. Not that way. All of you sponsor me
and I'm grateful for that.
I've grown up, but I don't. What the hell? Time is time Today. I dance too.
I'll have pretty soon.
I read something on the airplane that just tickled me to death and I put it on the mirror in my dressing room
and as a couple of lines of a song.
Nothing could be finer than the crisis to be minor in the
morning,
and I thought that was wonderful.
Some people would have you believe that when you get sober and get these 12 steps under your belt, everything is going to just be marvelous and everything turns to says yes,
how you haven't lived until you get fired sober.
You always had booze to blame it on before.
Get fired sober. That's a crusher. You know when you're still walking around saying, well if I hadn't drunk that stuff, I wouldn't do that. That's bullshit.
Everything I ever did under the influence of alcohol, I did
because I would love to have done it sober and didn't have the gut.
That's the truth,
like other masters we know about. That's where I got my strength and my courage to pick a fight with the biggest, broadest blonde in the MAR. Knew I was going to get creamed, but I drinks were going to be on.
Insanity has nothing to do with that stuff.
Nothing.
The insanity of my powerlessness and my compulsion,
That's what I had to have help with
and so far have. I'd like to report that it's only been about three years since I honestly and truly experienced
metal defenseless.
Now I thought I had a lot of times
you see my straight bait and my dry date.
I know it's true because my sister and Alcoholics Anonymous then told me, Marilyn, this won't mean anything to you today as the bonds were going down and she stood there with tears in her eyes.
But today is the first day you've not had a drink or any drugs
and it's June the 6th 1966 which makes my dry date 6/6/66.
Can't be sober a long time too. Think how long I'd have to drink to have nothing like that.
If I live and a lot of people do think about men, my birthday, you know, they start to date their checks or whatever and they see 6/6 and I get a phone call.
It's wonderful.
It's really wonderful
and easy for me to remember.
It would have to be
mentally, mentally defenseless. I read it and I read it and I talked about it. And at one time I was so determined that I was gonna walk when I talked. You know when we go through the spiritual years, when you know, I was so spiritual, as a fellow said, I was of no earthly use,
none, but I was and I went to save everybody Billy Graham missed and I was eating on Orles leg too. You know I was going to save them all and we all go through that, but I was so spiritual I was going to transcend any minute. Determined
walk When I talk and I walked around. I looked like I was constipated, I think,
and I should have known better. I never did. Martyr. Well, never did.
And I knew by now, you know, having worked through some of the steps worked on some of them, that that my defects of character had all been removed.
And what I didn't understand that the characteristics that are listed in the 12 and 12 for us to use as a guideline and they call them 7 cardinal sins.
How animals name was still don't
women still learn?
But that for me was a guide
and I used it for our guy. Those are all human characteristics to me.
Can you imagine a human being walking around totally free of lust and jealousy and envy
and all of those seven things listed?
Unless I've been ahead and, you know, lightweight, I would have transcended a long time ago. But I thought that's what I was asking, to be removed from me, those things that had caused me such pain. You know, I wasn't just jealous. I'd kill your ass.
Tell whoever it was up there you died or something.
Nothing in moderation. All of those things,
all of those characteristics in me, had great big gaping holes
where they've been misused,
and today I've seen me jealous and could actually turn it around and make something productive of it.
What I ask my higher power to remove were those things that stood in the way of my usefulness to him and to other people.
I'm saying, you know, no, I don't want to be jealous anymore, don't want to be envious anymore, don't want to be lustful, don't want to be any of those things anymore. Take it all away and I would be sitting at his right hand side.
I had to learn to live as a human being on this planet. That's what this program has done for me,
but it took a very rude awakening
because I was wonderful
at least halfway there and saving everyone. If you want to know anything spiritual just go ask. Meryl
and I was in a low group meeting one night and we all stood up to say the Lords prayer like we have here. Every meeting we held hands and I said our father that is the best looking new guy that just walked in that door
I have ever seen in my life. And I know he's young, but he God, he's good looking man. I wonder if he needs a sponsor. Maybe he might die. He might need a mother. You know he can't ever. I bet that I bet he's good late and I went
and then he don't donate and I couldn't even finish the prayer.
Saint Maryland has fallen.
I'd always been called a fallen woman, and then I knew what one was.
Stop
Repetition strengthens and confirms.
You're allowed to do everything wrong
as many times as you want to.
As long as you continue to repeat, it will confirm and finally you get it right. Hopefully
I've taken too much time and I don't care.
I don't know when I have felt such overwhelming love
as I'm feeling right this minute from you
is the most wonderful thing in this world.
I wish I could feel it all of the time.
I have a son that went to Vietnam and I prayed that he would not get hurt and that he come back alive. And my sponsor said you dumb shit, that's not how you pray.
I learned how to pray in this program,
she said. When you probably like that, you're, you know, some other mother's kids gonna get it. You want him to get it instead of yours. What kind of plan is that?
I said. What I do. I'm worried sick. I want him to come home.
We had been reunited as a family, my dad,
she said. You do what the 11 step says and you get pray that God will give him the strength and the courage to cope with whatever comes his way.
And you can also ask that for yourself. And that's all.
And that worked because he just came home doped.
He learned how to hope like I did.
I'm really happy to report to you that he is beautiful young man today and he has six years sobriety in our program.
I got a dollar out there still doing it,
and I love her more than the day she was born.
She'll find it one of these days.
And our team,
my little Indian that told me about God and how he felt about him.
The one that was going to carry on
really is
He is carrying on.
He is so much more spiritual with his thinking today
than I'd ever hoped to be.
He is closer to his higher power
than I ever hope to be.
I have more strength and more courage
and more hope
for everybody, including myself today
because of him.
And I wanted to sort of explain to precious Sally, incidentally, honey, my daughter's name, Sally
to her, since she couldn't do it for me,
why I came to this conference in costume.
I think you've noticed that every day I've had some kind of Indian attire on that is authentic.
My Alotine got into the into the beads and he got into all of the crafts
and I didn't have time, you know, I didn't have time to. So I was going to lay it all on him and it didn't turn out to be that way.
So today I'm doing it for him.
And every time you see me, I'll probably have some little indication of that heritage
for him
because he died two years ago.
And tonight
my being here is for him.
He's here, too. You know he's probably saying Mom when you go shut up.
Every time he crosses my mind, he sang to me.
I'm where we wanted to get to.
I'm with you
and this makes this night so special.
I've not given a talk anywhere.
I've not shared anything with anyone from a podium
for two years.
This one I chose to exit
because as my newfound strength and my newfound courage
that I got from Nell today,
I got from everyone here today.
Sometimes I feel sad
but depressed,
sometimes I feel a longing and a missing. But don't you all,
don't we all have bad days? Sometimes we luxury, we allow ourselves. I do once in a while to have a bad day.
I learned to set the alarm clock though, You know, I allow myself to suffer about 30 minutes
and then devil, I suffer when the alarm goes off. That's that
as the biggest waste of my time, and my time is my most precious asset.
I don't have time for that.
Don't want to hear anybody say
shit.
I have reason to be here. And yes, I may. You know you feel sad sometimes. I understand. I understand when I do. You have bad days. There are times when I feel useless and helpless and worthless,
and I know you do too. Because we are human beings,
and we're going to be that until
the day we basically leave this planet.
Learning how to live as a human being is an exciting experience, and I highly recommend it. If you've had a bad day, if you're new in this program, if you're wishing the hell I'd shut up so you could go dance too close with your partner, I don't. If you feel down
and a little bit depressed and a little bit sad,
Please remember one thing for me.
You're being here
and inviting me to be here.
Has made my day.
You may feel helpless about your own moods and your own feelings,
but today, without even knowing it,
you've given me everything I needed.
I feel whole and I feel good
and God knows I thank you.