Jennifer H. from Dallas, TX at 19th Annual Singles in Sobriety convention, Lake Murray, OK

I'm nervous and I'm Jennifer. My name is Jennifer Huddleston. I am an alcoholic. I've been kept sober since December 5th of 92 and that's my miracle and into action in Richardson is my Home group and I'm twitching hard. I think when I close my eyes and open them back up, the attendance in the room doubled.

Oh my, why are you people not at work?

You know, I would really like to thank the committee for inviting me. I kind of feel like I snuck into the drive in and somebody's trunk. You know, it's just, this is amazing and it's I, I, I, it is an honor and a privilege to get to do anything in Alcoholics Anonymous, but this isn't a specially neat privilege. I'm I am some speakers tell jokes right at the beginning. I just have to tell what happened in my day because. And y'all are going to start feeling better about

wives.

Anybody is delusional enough to think you get asked to speak at something like this because you've got it all together. They messed up tonight

because I kept looking at the website going. Have they found out yet? Nope. My name's still there. OK,

I

I bought a dress OK yesterday, you know, I have to have a new dress and so I didn't have time and so is it the Cracker Barrel? I am shopping for clothes

at the Cracker Barrel and

because I just, I don't have time. And so I find this dress and apparently I'm still delusional because I think I am much taller and much thinner than I am. And apparently I think I'm really stacked.

But the really funny part is that the dress and I'll wear it because now I've told the story and you have to see it. This is not the dress from the Cracker Barrel, but it's made out of like grandma bedspread material and

it was really cute on the hanger.

And then I put it on

on and there's a spider, OK, and and it looks like grandma's featherbed and

a queen size featherbed. And

and so, you know, on the way I have to get a new dress and and I'm just laughing going. You know, this is how my thinking works. The hanger beautiful me bed. And but I will wear it. I'll wear it tomorrow night just so you can see my and but it it really is good and to be here and I'm going to start calming down just any second now. God's going to kick in because I ask Him to.

I am not an authority on Alcoholics Anonymous, 12 Steps to 12 Traditions, or Alcoholism.

I'm only here to share my experience, strength and hope, such as it is today,

and it really is a privilege to be here. I love the setting. I was sitting down on the patio reading We agnostics and trying to get in a place where I could talk to you and, and looking out at the lake and and I I feel God here and and I'm so privileged to be around people who have woohoo sobriety. I'm a big fan of woohoo sobriety and

and that's just a neat deal for me to find out that there are people who are just like me. And I have no clue what I'm going to tell you about tonight. Probably what I was like, what happened and what I'm like now. But if any of you have heard me before, you know, I don't know what I'm going to say. It just sort of flies out and we catch it later.

I was born at a very early age on November 16th

of 1966. I was born to a football coach and an English teacher, and they're very sweet people.

They're not Alcoholics. I I did not grow up on the firing line. I grew up with people who went to church and went to work and did the right thing even when nobody was looking. I I have that one younger sister and she's a good girl. She was always, well, she was a mullet when she was little, but I

and she still has the capacity to be a mullet, but she keeps making me nieces and so I like her now,

but but she's a really sweet girl and, and I know that we got all the same messages growing up. I know that she was told and taught the same things. I know that she came in contact with the same people that I did. And she grew up and went to college and graduated show off and,

and she planned and got married and she planned and had children and she planned and bought a house

when she graduated from college, she chose a career. And you know, this really messed up my my chances of blaming any of my alcoholism on my upbringing because she went to work for Jesus and she became a missionary in Bulgaria and I became a pool hall waitress.

I, I became convinced very early on that she only did the the right thing to make me look bad,

but she's a good girl and, and I was raised to be a good girl, but I had better ideas. You know, I grew up always looking over there with them doing something else. And I have some redneck leanings. I drove into Oklahoma and it just felt good.

This is this is a garden spot for me.

I saw a redneck and some Wranglers with a denim shirt on and a Jeep and I was like honey I'm home.

Found a place called Maw and paws. Reptiles and lizards.

I like it here already.

I

I was sort of raised a redneck and

my first fantasy was that I would become a wrestler's valet. I was going to, I was going to marry one of the Von Erichs, and

I was going to have dinner parties for Under the Giant and Willie Coconut, the Midget wrestler. And, you know, my fantasies were not glamorous, but they were different. And

I just kept thinking if I could be over there with them doing that, I'd be OK. You know, from a very early age, I found out that I needed to

develop some skills because you can't twitch the way that I twitch

normally and not wind up in controlled living environments if you don't learn how to be funny. And so I had to act like I meant to act this way, you know, and but the truth was that I was always afraid. I felt like I didn't fit in. I felt like I wasn't tall enough or blonde enough. I tried that twice. Not a good plan.

You know, I didn't have a waist and I'm just sure that life would be better for me if I had a waist

and and I just was always comparing my insides by your outsides and and everybody looked better than me and everybody seemed calmer than me and everybody seemed to know what they were doing.

I was a twitcher from very early on and and I didn't know that I felt less than and apart from because I was so busy trying to elbow my way into the middle of everything. I went into high school and life was good. You know, I'm a suck up and I'm a show off and I'm a talker. So, you know, everything rocked along pretty well for me, except on the inside. You know, I focused on all the things I didn't have and all the things that I wasn't, and that's what I became.

I was watching Rocky Horror Picture Show the other night and I felt really old

that that's a big part of my story was Rocky Horror Picture Show. And you know, I discovered the underbelly of life and thought this is where I need to be. These people are freaks just like me. And, and right around the time I hit 16, I mean, life was just not pretty for me. I scared the boys to death. And so, but there was this guy

and he, he moved to Plano. I grew up in the main streets of Plano and

the East Side,

but this guy moved to Plano and he was everything that I would never be. He went to our church and he was tanned, he was toned, he was quaffed, he had a waist, he was Barbie. He was,

and I wanted what he had and I was willing to go to almost any lengths to get it. And, and he found me fascinating too. As I said, I had a had a sort of Rocky Horror Picture Show look going on and you know, and I had air supply records at home and I was the president of the youth group at church and I was doing Rocky Horror at midnight. You know, I already had about 6-8 lives going all at once

and just switched channels, you know, and,

but he came into this church and, and, and we just hit it off, man. We connected in a really big way and I fell in love as only a 16 year old girl can. I mean, I was planning our wedding and naming our babies because we hated the same people. We were disillusioned about the same things.

He taught me how to shoplift and we were both the same size so it worked out great. This was the 80s, so girls were wearing ties anyway. And so we were out on a date one night and

and he let me in on a little secret. We had something in common that I hadn't planned on. And that was that we both like Boyce Baron, we like girls. And so I decided I was either going to have to perform a miracle or get a sex change. And I was really mad at God. I was tired of this, you know, I felt like I was God's personal little practical joke, you know, that he would bring these wonderful things into my life. And they go psych. Just kidding.

So,

so that was about the time I decided that if he wasn't going to be my introduction to sin and it was time to do some drinking because I was tired of being a good girl, wasn't paying off the way that I wanted it to. And, and you know, I came from a spiritual place. I came from spiritual parents and and I had a relationship with God. And for a long time I used to say that I had a good relationship with God. The reality is my relationship with God was just like everybody, my relationship with everybody else. When he did it my way, we were tight and when he didn't,

I'm done, you know. And so I decided that I would start sinning. And my sinning started with two bottles of wine. I, I started out of closet drinker. I sat in the floor of a closet.

I have heard many speakers talk about the 1st 15 minutes of their drinking being their their only exposure to social drinking. I had a resentment. 2 bottles of wine in a closet floor full of shoes.

It's a party

and I'm setting up in that closet floor and I I drank a bottle of Boone's Farm Tickle Pink and a bottle of real sangria. Those are your starter wines. And

I drank those two bottles of wine, and I'm not going to lie to you, I hated the way they taste. It tastes like nail Polish remover to me, but I got it. Don't ask me how I know what nail Polish remover tastes like. But I drank those two bottles of wine and I was so busy trying to keep it down that I couldn't really tell what alcohol did until it was time for me to come out of the closet at literally.

And. And the floor kind of shifted as it will after you've had your first 2 bottles of wine. And I slammed my face into the back of the closet door and

and that's when it happened. I knew there was a God and I knew he lived on Boone's farm.

I mean, doesn't it sound pretty tickled pink Strawberry Hill? You know, I, I just, I couldn't feel my face and I am. There are two things that are outstanding characteristics about me. I am intense and I am sensitive, which makes me intensely sensitive. And,

and I mean, people recognize that from early on. My, my big old daddy would sit me down. He'd say, Jen, honey, I believe there's people who feel too much

and I would think, uh-huh, but he didn't know how to tell me that I was selfish and self-centered to the extreme and that perhaps I ought to try being of service to someone else. He just said you really feel a lot, don't you honey?

And I said,

but I drank those two bottles of wine and I came out of that closet and everything was OK. It didn't make me blonde. It didn't make me tall. It didn't make the big stuff smaller or the small stuff bigger. But what it did do was it made me OK. I didn't have to be those things.

I didn't have to care, I didn't have to twitch, I didn't have to worry. And so I love the way that made me feel. Now I got sick.

We brag about puking in AA and, and I puked.

I, I puked a lot actually. And

because there was a little game involving the ceiling fan, you can make fun out of nothing when you're drunk. And,

and the ceiling fan was a bad move on my part. And so I got ill and went to sleep real fast, which is how I would describe it. All of my drinking went to sleep real bad. That's not passing out. Let's just go and sleep real fast. And so I went to sleep real fast and I came to in the morning and I had what I like to call angora teeth and chinchilla tongue.

It tasted like a hamster had slept in my mouth,

and I had never been that thirsty in my life. I leaned over the bathtub and I glugged down a couple of gallons of water. And because I'd never had any wine before, I didn't know that it turns you into a lava lamp, you know? And my stomach was kind of going wah and

we were in a Hispanic girls house and we went downstairs and her mother had made huevos fronteros.

I can't eat a I can't look at a fried egg sober. You know, it's like get that off your plate, please, quick.

And so, you know, I went and threw puked again and, and then I got on a bus and went to sing for Jesus.

I because that's what I, that's what I'm all about. You know, I, I have this, this very deep desire to be a really good girl, to be sweet and to do the right thing and for everybody to like me. But on the other side, I want to feel the way that I felt when I drank. I wanted not to be afraid. I wanted not to have to worry. I didn't want to have to keep trying so hard.

And it's embarrassing to say that at 16 years old, I was exhausted. But I was exhausted. And I took a drink of wine and it was like, it should have said fear be gone on the bottle. You know, I was not afraid anymore. It's like that line that says, you know, wearing the world like a loose garment. The problem is it just keeps getting looser and looser and looser and everything. You're walking around naked.

No, I really didn't. That's the only rule my daddy ever made that I kept. I'll just brag about that,

he said. If it don't look good, keep it covered up.

And I believed in her.

So I was laughing when you were talking about all the festivities

because I didn't hear sober quarters. Playing a quarters is my sport and

it's really the only sport I'm designed for and I can play some quarters and I love that because I got to be around the guys and and to me it was, it was like my ticket in. I could drink them under the table and I tried to take advantage of them. But but if you get a guy drunk enough, there's nothing to take advantage of.

As soon as y'all stop laughing I'm going to stop telling that. But

sorry, I'll just throw me a fish every time I say that one. So anyway,

that was my motive. It didn't workout that well, but you know, in the end the guys pretty much treated me like they're ugly little brother. But I got to be with them and and I had a good time. Drinking was a lot of fun for me and, and it just felt good to be bad, but I wasn't that good at it.

And so I drank and I drank every time I had the opportunity to. I got in trouble in high school. I was the president of everything

and and I went to jail with the gay boyfriend.

He didn't stop being my boyfriend because he was gay, because he still looked good. And that came in very handy. Actually. I was his beard. But but we were out one night and we're drunk and I think anyway, we were drunk and, and, and the police car comes up behind me. And I knew it wasn't my driving because I was doing some of that fine alcoholic driving

where you lock your arms

and and you time your stops by the trees and stuff. You go, OK, when I get to the third tree, I'm going to slow down.

And the problem was I wasn't paying any attention to the lights. And so I'd stop on green, go on red, whatever, just so that I got that stop thing down. And but I got I went to jail the first time for stealing a street time. And it took me. It wasn't a little street sign, it was a big street sign. It was in the back of my daddy's car and had the gay boyfriend with me and

and we forgot about it. And so the policeman pulled us over and he was absolutely convinced. I mean, Mr. High Drama, he was convinced this because he peed in a park

and I think that's a felony. You know, he's freaking out and and I'm freaking out and make a Long story short, took me two years of sobriety to realize that it was alcohol related.

What it said on the little paper was that it was a Class B misdemeanor theft over $20.

It only occurred to me much later than I drive past street signs every day and I never feel compelled to put one in my car.

But when you've had about 12 California coolers, we need a sign, dude.

So put it in the back of her. My daddy's Buick and and I went to jail that night and it was so funny. He's in a a now too. I forgot to tell that part. Not a coincidence. I I had antennas early on. I knew who I.

But we went to jail and and I was crying and he was in another cell and he kept saying tell your mom and dad it's my fault. And I thought you can bet on it buddy.

You don't have to suggest blame to a girl like me. And

OK, the Intimate Spider is just going to hang with me for a while. And so that's just, you know, these are the kinds of things that are really in my drinking start happening. So it gets better. I, I went off to school and it was great driving up here because I got to pass some of the landmarks. I went to the beer. I, I drove past the beer barn. And that's where I bought my first legal 12 pack. I was going to say six. I know I never bought a six pack in my life.

We drove through it backwards. It was wonderful.

I got to Denton and and it was just, I signed up to go to college. I didn't exactly go because it was scary. I had been a big fish in a little pond at Plano East. And then I went to North Texas and I made a lot of decisions by not making decisions. And I moved in with a roommate who was much older than I was. She had a, let's call it an alternative lifestyle. She ran around with a bunch of drag Queens and I would come out in the morning and like

would be sitting in our living room.

It's very scary to run around with men who have better lingerie than you do.

You know, but I absolutely I thought that this was just a cultural experience. I'm finally out from under mom and dad's wing and the party's on and and I started drinking on the square in in Denton and and life was beautiful. My first night of drinking and this is so creepy. I think I saw this guy today. I didn't speak to him, but

seriously, my first boyfriend in college. He was beautiful. He was the perfect man. I met him my first night of legal drinking. He was 28 and he was a freshman.

He had been a freshman for 10 years. He had

no job and no car. He's the perfect man. I love men with no jobs and no cars because they stay put.

You can you can drop them off somewhere. When you come back later, they're still there.

Clancy calls alcoholism a disease of perception. And I'm on board with that because I thought this guy was perfect and I thought he was tremendously loyal. It never crossed my mind that he was still sitting there when I came back because nobody else wanted him.

But the first night that we met, we got drunk in a little bar and, you know, we. I put his bicycle in the back of my car.

I

and the honeymoon was on.

Here's a neat guy who's

hippie wannabe. He had long hair and a long beard. He didn't like shoes. He did a lot of hallucinogens. Don't you know my English teacher? Mama was proud

and I just thought these people were so cool. They they tripped on acid and they read Nietzsche and I listened to electronic harp music. They planned trips to go see the sea turtles mate. Dude. And

and I just became a chaperone for their acid trips. You know, I'm running around with people who are living on buses.

I've never even written a bus. And suddenly I'm around all these funky hippies and it's so cool because I can blend. I became the chaperone for their acid trips. They would light these giant bonfires and strip off their clothes and go talk to Jesus and, and I would sit on the cooler

and and make sure nobody ran into the fire or touch sharp things.

But see, alcohol did that for me. It allowed me to blend. It allowed me to fit in. I had no idea what these people were about. I didn't understand 4 words that they were talking about. But when I drank, I felt like I fit in. I have a friend who says that alcohol turned him into tofu. He took on the flavor of everything he was around.

And that's my story too, you know, I, I hung with the hippies and it was great. And I liked having a boyfriend so much that I got a couple more

and I got very different kinds of guys. There was big black football player and there was a little Stoner dude and there was rock'n'roll guy. And there was, you know, and it was just we are the world. And

I

I was definitely equal opportunity and

I had no clothes. I just had costumes and, and I just played dress up

and I became what I thought they wanted me to be because all I knew was that by myself, I wasn't enough. And that's not what I was told. That's not what anybody told me. I was often told I was too much, but but the way that I felt was that I was never enough, that I didn't measure up, that just any minute now somebody was going to find out and then we're going to kick me out. They were going to ask me to leave. They were going to tell me that I never belonged and I never need to come back. And so I just tried.

And through it all, I drank and life was wonderful. North Texas caught on. My academic career didn't last that long and and right around the time that North Texas was kicking me out, the boyfriend started finding out about each other and none of them fought for my honor.

Pretty much all of them said Nah, it's OK,

he can have you. No, it's all right, really.

So I look up one day. I got no job. I got no school. My parents don't need Alan on. They're saying if you're going to do it your way, feel free to pay your way, which I thought was really unkind. And so I decided that I was getting way too metropolitan for Denton. You know, I was practically grown. I'm 19, maybe 20, and I have, you know, all of 12 hours of college behind me and ready to choose a career.

So I moved. I had to get out of Denton because the town was just too small. So I made my big geographic.

I moved from Denton to Lewisville.

I got 1 zip code away. I am not brave.

Then I moved from Denton to Lewisville and before I even unpacked a box, I decided I was going to have to begin a new life and. And most of the women know if you're going to get a new life, get new hair. And

so before I even unpack the boxes, I went to the hairdressers and I was driving down Main St. in Lewisville and I looked across, you know, I was looking around trying to see who I was going to be in this town. And there was a life sized orange horse

downtown and I thought, that's it, I'll be Patsy Cline. So I went into the hairdresser shop and I said, tweezel me up some cowgirl hair. And that's what she did. This is the 80s. And we permed and permed and per and I've got hair. And so it just kept getting bigger and bigger and bigger. And it was really cool 'cause she gave me a beer while she was firming my hair, and that helped a lot.

And then we did an asymmetric cut, so there's a big shrub on this side. Not very much over here.

So it looks like I was confused at all times,

but I bonded. I bonded with the hairdresser just right away because I sat down in her chair and she said you party, don't you? And because I had been running around with with all those hippies, I knew it was my aura. I had a purple party aura and she could see that from from, you know, just snip, snip and she was like you party. I didn't know that Coors Light was coming out of my pores

so she offered me a beer and and by the end of the tweezing

she had invited me out to the honky tonk. So I went and I got myself some hot pink ropers and a belt buckle the size of my head

and that night she took me to Lake Dallas and we went to the Moonlighter. Now I like honky tonks and when I'm in North Dallas I have to explain that just because they have country music does not make it a honky tonk.

I like places where the dress code is toothless and tattooed.

I want dually trucks in the parking lot and gun racks with guns on them.

When I walk into a bar. I don't want to see more than three women. I would prefer that one of them's name is Mimo.

I want to walk in the bar and know that I'm getting the gold, the silver or the bronze and.

I used to say that I fell in love with the Honky Tonks the very first time I walked in, and that is not true. The truth is, I walked in and it looked kind of like the JC Spook house. It was dark, it smelled bad, and people grabbed you and you couldn't figure out where the hands came from.

But I will tell you that something magic happened in those bars. You know, I, I, I listened to a little Patsy Cline and I drank some long necks and I drank some shots. And by the end of the night, Papa was twirling me and I was the hillbilly homecoming queen. You know, life is going to be good.

And that bar became just like those wrestling matches for me. It became real. Everything that I was looking for was going on in that bar. There was loving and fighting and cussing and horror moons all over the place and, and I just had a good time out there, you know, and I drank and I shot pool and, and I fell in love. That's what I do. It's a hobby of mine and

I fell in love almost every night.

But I started getting in some trouble now. By day, you know. By 9 I am a honky tonk homecoming queen. By day, I am a preschool teacher.

Now, this is not a good career choice if you're going to be hungover every morning of your life. And so I come in, you know, and your designer flip flops, the wrinkled shorts that you've been walking over for three or four days, a T-shirt that you kind of straightened out. And I got that bed head going on dragon breath. And here I come to the daycare. All right, here we go. And there's 18 four year olds going. Mr.

Jennifer. Miss Jennifer.

So we just kind of start the day going y'all, let's paste, okay?

I don't care what you paste. Paste each other. Eat the pay,

you know? Even the kids were a little freaked out by me, you know,

But they were four year olds and they caught on, you know, Somebody would start walking towards me and one of the other little kids would go. Where's the blood? Where's the fire? Leave her alone

because that's kind of how I took

treated them, you know, and, and I liked teaching preschool. I love those babies and I wanted to be good to them. But you know, I had this emptiness inside and I had this fear and I had this shame because as an alcoholic woman drinking in those bars and going to those places that I went, I wound up in situations drunk that I needed to be sober to get out of. And I was not sober. And I had to do whatever was necessary to continue to drink or to get out of the situation I had gotten myself into. And it was absolutely baffling to me that that kept happening. And I kept,

why didn't I see this coming? But you see every day as it neared 5:00 or 6:00, you know, I would just think, I'm just going to go have a couple. I'm just going to get the edge off. I have earned this. I have earned this. And I just need a little relief because, you know, this is a stressful job. There's all these people and these little people and their parents, and they want to know where the socks are and they want to know where the toys are. And have you seen Claire?

Pick, pick, pick, pick, you know

now. But by night I'm going to these honky tonks and and for a while it was just a lot of fun. But I found that. And here's a little hint. If anybody knew and you're not sure whether you're an alcoholic, here's my little tip. If pacing has become a problem for you, you might be an alcoholic. Because pacing was my obsession. I really needed to be upright when the fun was going to start and I had no clue what time

the fun was going to start. So that throws you off a little. So I had to figure out sort of a ratio of beer in a shot, beer in a shot beer, beer in a shot, beer in a shot beer. And I drink, you know, beer for an hour or two and then beard a shot because you just want to kind of be flying the

sideways, you know, not too boing and not too droopy. You just got to figure out how to manage it. And I miss, I've missed the mark over and over and over again. Then at the end of the night, I'd go. Now, if you can drink that way, here's another little tip.

Hurry home

because as I said, you get sleepy real fast.

And I lived on the

on the third floor because that's where drunks live. You know, that $30 off your rents real important. And and I get home at having had and and I just look at those stairs.

I need to meditate a little bit on it.

You know, it's hard to convince yourself you're drinking normally when you come to in your car in the morning.

What day is it? Where am I supposed to be? What kind of lie am I going to have to tell today? You know, and, and I'm coming into the daycare in all sorts of shape, shades of disarray. And, and they're, thank God I worked in daycare because there's all those helper women there and they wanted to help me.

And, and they call me into the office and they would say, you know, Jennifer, we really like you and we want to see you succeed. How can we help you? And I always have an answer for that. If you ask me tonight, how can you help me? My car is dirty. I always have some kind of suggestion of things you can do for me. And so they asked me how they could help. And I said, well, let's start the day. A little later

they went for it.

So, you know, I went from 8:00 to 8:30,

little baptism there went from 8:30 to 99 to 9:30 ten o'clock. And and then we ran out today. We couldn't scoop my hours back anymore. And you know, they were just so picky about that morning thing. So they call me into the office again and they'd say, Jennifer, really, we like you, how can we help you? And, and I didn't really have an answer. And, and they so they made me sign those little papers that they give to people like us. Do you understand?

And we want you here in the morning functioning.

Get a little rigid about that. And

so I'd sign the little paper that said, I understand morning here functioning. And, you know, as I was walking out of the office, I would say, you know, I really appreciate it. You guys have been great. I love working here. I love these kids. Thank you so much for your patience. But I'm an alcoholic and I got to mind this out to kill me. And I would turn around and take 10 steps and my mind would start twisting that around. And I would think who does she think she is?

I mean, she knows what she pays me. And besides, I give 147%

for the two hours that I'm really fun.

There's absolutely nobody here who's better than me during those two hours that I'm really functioning, you know, and, and there's all these kids and some of them don't even behave very well. And why in the world does she? I mean, she's lucky. I show up here in the morning and by the time I leave, I am so tense. I, I, I mean, I had planned to go home and go to bed, put on like night clothes and get in the bed

and, and you know, and tomorrow it's going to be a really good day. But, but I mean, I start to drive home and I'm just tense and I can already tell I'm not going to be able to go to sleep because, I mean, I'm just so persecuted. These people are out to get me. And the only way I'm going to be able to wind down, the only way I'm going to be able to get some relief is just to go have a couple of drinks and I go to that bar. But then I'd stop taking my show on the road. I'd gotten 2 DW is in less than six months. That happens to party girls. And

one of them was really kind of funny.

I well, the first one was, you know, that just, it was just one of the dangers of drinking. The second one, it was an emergency and the cops so didn't see it my way. I ran a red light in front of the police station. But but I explained to him that it was an emergency. It was like 3 in the morning and I needed some egg rolls

and jack-in-the-box was about to close. You know, you don't eat before you drink because it ruins the buzz,

but at 3:00 in the morning, you're just hungry. And so he took me to jail again and in the state of Texas becomes convinced I have a drinking problem and I become convinced to have a driving problem. So I move next door to my bar of choice. Problem solved. I started doing some outside issues because I found it allowed me to drink bionically. It also allowed me to be a very quick preschool teacher. We could do the whole Lesson plan by 10:00,

you know, And it was like Sonic puppet shows, you know,

I'm just going. And

and if that doesn't frighten you, it should,

you know, And that's not how I was raised. I was not raised to do those things. As a matter of fact, for years, I turned down outside issues because they're bad and they're wrong and they're illegal. And I heard my daddy one time say, how sorry would you have to be? And I thought pretty sorry. But there was this night and I was at a Halloween party. I was dressed like a bag lady. And a friend of mine invited me into the bathroom, offered me a little powdery substance. I said

bad, wrong, illegal.

I don't do that. And she said the magic words. She said it'll make you last as long as the party.

And I said get out of the way

because that pacing thing, as I told you, you know, it becomes problematic for me. And, and so I started doing those other things and it was a really great diet. But I, I scared other people when I drank. I frightened myself on drugs because the curtain started talking to me and I would say I can't understand you. And the curtains would go and I I still can't understand you.

Got a little paranoid on that stuff and street signs started falling my car and

so I I had to stop doing those things and I put on 100 lbs in 24 hours. I mean, it was like

a

all the guys at the bar were like, don't do speed anymore, do you?

Because I was eating Taco Bell in a blackout and

it was really kind of cute because even in a blackout I am concerned about appearances. I would drive through Taco Bell and order food, lots of food and four drinks. Like I'm taking it home to the family at 2:00 in the morning.

My babies are hungry,

you know, and things are just completely out of control. You know, I'm having to change tires that are not flat. I'm I knocked my oil pan off my car and just kept driving.

That tips the old cops right off, because apparently flames shoot out of the bottom of your car.

So, um,

and I mean, there are just some things. I, I, you know, I wound up a couple of times with three flat tires all at once. And that's, that's really hard. That's hard sober. And, you know, and I called my dad and, and bless his heart, he didn't know what to do. You know, he comes and he can't even speak of so cute little vein in his forehead like and and he just walk around the car and he go,

you know.

And,

and he'd ask me those questions. He asked the questions that they asked drunks. He'd go wow.

And it's, you know, it's one of those easy ones. I even know the answer to this one. But he doesn't want to hear it, you know, because the real answer is Dad. There's curbs on both sides.

I,

you know, things are just getting more and more out of control. I fell in love with Opie Taylor's. He was, he was a redheaded stepchild. He looked, he was tall and skinny. We look like spaghetti and meatball together. And

and it was disguised as an Allen. On the first night I met him, he made a beer last like two hours and I thought this guys going to come in handy