Big D Roundup in Dallax, TX

hi my name is June I'm an alcoholic

I I really want to thank you for inviting me here and allow me to be part of your conference really want to thank Mike for the phone calls and letters in the cards it's really been a

SO privilege to get to know him a little bit better and and I really appreciated that and is very special to be able to be here and spend little time with Jack because we go way way back I also I have the privilege of

sponsoring one woman who lives in Texas and it's her a anniversary today so it's pretty neat that I would end up getting invited to be in Texas on that particular date and so for all those reasons I thank you for allowing me to be part of your conference I

I'm going to start out by saying those things that I consider to be the most important just in case the people here I like I was and am sometimes still today as far as not being able to focus for very long so I can start with the important things that I can not get that out of the way I guess the first thing in keeping with the tradition of of Texas it's not us I give you my sobriety date which is July the thirteenth nineteen seventy two

you know I

I live a life today that I never would have wanted

and I am a person today that I wouldn't even like when I came down

and yet for the most part most of the time I'm happier than I've ever been so Alcoholics Anonymous is still filled with a lot of mystery for me how it has worked and and how things unfolded in my life I have I have often I've been a surprise to me and it in in in a way that's a comfort when I come up upon a a dark path I'm not sure what the hell coming down the road sometimes those things have just since I've been through them in the years of sobriety I've seen the way that things can often times work out and they don't have quite as much fear sometimes I

I want to start out by saying particularly for those of you who might be new

to Alcoholics Anonymous or new to a conference that I'm not an expert on alcoholism or an Alcoholics Anonymous that I'm just a member of Alcoholics Anonymous I've been asked to stand up here for a little while and share with you is it suggests that we do in the book a little bit about what was like what happened what it's like today and that's what I'll try to do on here strongly encourage you to go to lots of meetings about comics anonymous before you make a decision about whether this is the place for you because there's all different kinds of people in Alcoholics Anonymous and I believe that that's one of the most spiritual things about Alcoholics Anonymous is one it says in the book that we are people who normally would not mix

and those people who have added the most of my life over the years have been the people that I oftentimes would never have imagined myself having anything to do with I

gosh you know I

I want and I want to let you know to that I'm not paid to stand up here and talk

I nor is anyone paid in Alcoholics Anonymous and I want you to know that for a couple of reasons one because after the meeting if you're sitting a copy you know I. ways around thing they had to pay her for that you know

but the main reason that I'd like you to know that especially if you are new or not familiar with the traditions of Alcoholics Anonymous is that I want you to know that Alcoholics Anonymous is absolutely free

had Alcoholics Anonymous not being free I never could have come here had Alcoholics Anonymous not remained free I never could have stayed I was over ten years sober in the problem about politics not even before I was able to put a dollar in the basket for the seventh tradition on anything like a regular basis I said this is not about money and and that's important to me that I remember I had to pass that on to you I

you know what I I want people to believe morning alcoholic

and I want to have a philosophical discussion about that with anyone after the meeting

just what I believe and I believe that because there was something wrong with me long before I ever started to drink or use the chemicals that I was to mix with alcohol and my first obsession in life was not alcohol and drinking my first obsession in life was to assign and from as far back as I can remember which is about five years old I began to try and kill myself on a regular basis and I used to cut my hands and fingers and wrists with a razor blade I used to take over dozens of baby aspirin which is all I knew about at the time I I used to beat my my hands and face and body with the hammer used to bring my body and a lot of different places and ways and I I did a lot of things to try and hurt myself and mostly try to dying and you know in the years that I've been sober in Alcoholics Anonymous I have certainly recognize that I have a capacity for being a bit dramatic

but you know up to and including today as I look back on my life before coming to the program of Alcoholics Anonymous I I have to tell you that being as rigorously honest as I can be I truly wanted to die I can see that some of my suicide attempts were to get a little bit of attention but I really really really wanted to die and I know again if you were a new to Alcoholics Anonymous you may not identify with that or certainly may not identify with any of those kind of feelings until you came to the end of your drinking and that's why I encourage you to go to lots of meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous because we all have a lot of different paths as far as getting here I've never had a social drink in my life nor have I ever wanted one I have never not gotten drunk I have never not overdosed that that's all that I know and so you know if you drink the way that I did and you mix it with the kind of chemicals that I did which were always downers or Reds or yellows reverted to its or whatever you might know them out then you don't have a very exciting drunk a lot either you know I

I've thrown up a lot of overdose a lot and that's really about all I did

before I came from about pricing on a miss and and so for me I did not have a lot of fun years drinking

but what alcohol did for me was it it didn't make me feel good

it just helps me to not feel at all

and thank god it did that I started to use drugs at seven years old I begin to drink on a regular basis at eight years old and by the time I was nine I found that combination that I never altered in any way which was the part which was in the alcohol because the combined effect of those got me exactly where I needed to go and that was out

I didn't have to experiment any further you just worked perfectly well and in between times I tried to kill myself I truly believe that I would have been locked up in a mental institution I don't see any way that I could possibly have remained out in the world had it not been for alcohol and so I'm extremely grateful that I had that it worked for me the way that it did I grew up in an alcoholic home I knew a lot about alcoholism you know because of that a lot of there's a lot of violence my home there was a lot of different kinds of users lot of broken promises are a lot of the same things going on in my home is went on a lot of other alcoholic homes I did not see alcoholism as a disease

I just saw it as a weakness

and in my life before coming to the front of the Holiday Inn on us and actually after fact I one of the most difficult things I old ideas that I've had to work through those things that I was to decide where weaknesses and and I decided that that my mother was weak and I never forgave her for it and when I was about five years old in my memory you know basically starts I went off to school I guess like a lot of other people do it five and and I can remember you know I used to be able remember with perfect clarity it's no longer that important to me because I have I'm busy now but he's the only male with perfect clarity the names of the kids called me and what they were wearing what I was wearing and just how much it hurt and we live that experience just completely because it's five years old when I went out into the world and those kids tease me about being Tom being skinny and having curly red here and being in the family that I was in and where I came from and those things I I felt like I was being cut up inside with nine

and and sometimes I would actually start to cry and so I found out about myself that my for my earliest recollection that I was the thing that I hated the most in the entire world I was weak and I never forgive myself for it and the only thing that gave me some relief from that feeling of being weak with alcohol

because they have to feel anything at all and I didn't feel weak then I could control my emotions and that was

probably the number one thing that I wanted to be able to do in my life I

in growing up in the south hot home I know today that most of the people that I was looking at around me were alcoholics but I I didn't know that then on the fourteenth from Alcoholics Anonymous I do not ever remember seeing me and cry under any circumstances I seaman status in the shot him arrested I seen there well I believe the my seeing their kids over does that seem a lot of different things happen in their lives I never saw a man should if you're under any of those circumstances I thought the women in my life go through each and every one of those circumstances as well some of them didn't cry but most of them did at one point or another they seems to have a a breaking point and I look at those two different groups of people very carefully and I decided immediately which one I wanted to be like and I spent my whole life trying to be what I thought a man what men men with someone who cared about no one

felt absolutely nothing and if they did they never let anyone know it and the only exception to that was anger and rage were okay

that's all I thought man ever stops and that's all I wanted to be able to feel it again alcohol allowed me to have the kind of control so that I I was able to to live like that I little kidnapped do I want to be when I grow up I said a boy

whether it's easy to do back then as it is today

but it was really what I wanted and

my family began to realize that I wasn't just kidding about that

it wasn't like when they entered the one employee was like not just a boy you know and so they begin to take me and my family is in was very active in the Catholic Church and they begin to take me to different priests offer counseling about this desire that I had to be a boy and somewhere in that time or not too long after we run welfare and possibly through one of the priest so I I don't know but my mom learned of that we were entitled to so I was allowed to go see a psychiatrist and psychologist and I began to see these people as well

you know I I really can't tell you what why the psychiatrist you know it's not that I want to be a boy or why I kept trying to kill myself for when I cut myself I prefer myself or any of these things because I felt about psychiatrists and psychologists just like my friend Patty Hicks always did I thought they should have to work for their money and

though I never told him anything

I never answered one question

I never filled out one form I never played with one dog I have nothing to say to these people

and I would sit there the required period of time and then I would leave

so I wasn't really able to get help even if it had been available that way anyway somewhere along the line I guess I learned that I was my first lesson if the acceptance that I was going to be able to be a boy

because of the way that I saw the world which certainly as we all know doesn't mean that it was the way the world was but the way that I saw the world the only option for someone like me was trying to be a tough broad and so I spend all my time before coming from Alcoholics Anonymous and a number of years after trying to be what I thought of top Broadway

and I grew up in a town in Los Angeles called Venice it's a beach town

it's a very interesting town I fit right in

I hardly stood out at all

and invented the it's a because it's a beach town maybe I mean I don't know you know it's just my own experience strength and hope I travel around the country and a lot of other top prize in there do seem to be some geographic requirements that kind of you know alter how you act and what you do but being a beach town it was very important that you have a tough feat so you don't wear shoes so that was it for shoes and it was important at that time to me anyway to be a top right you being a gang and I was

Martin that you do a lot of fighting and I did it's important that I remember to let you know tonight but I've never won a fight in my life

but my ego still wants me to let you know that I have never bought less than five people at a time

and my sponsor was able to explain that to me after I got there were you know if you find one person and you lose someone might think you're not a very good fighter but if you always buy groups of five or more

then they think Hey she must be pretty tough or why would that many people have to jump for you know so you have it

and I walked around with my with a small lip and a black guy in my face you know beating up a lot but it was it was a small price to pay you know for that for that chance that someone might think that was a tough brought obviously never convinced most important person that being myself but I I was going to go to any length I mean you know at the time tattoos were particularly popular back then they were a little bit but not you know not as they have come into age these days and I'm kind of grateful nowadays because I you know we're probably gotten something you know like a sharks that would swim in my arm when I did this so my god I don't know and I would have thought of something interesting born to die or some you know

anyway I I would stand down on the boardwalk with my gang looking tough

and we would be smoking and I see some touristy looking people and I take my cigarette and I would throw it down the sidewalk and I would put it out with my bare feet

and I I would see these tourists you looking people kind of stare at one another and then they'd whisper back and forth and I knew what they were saying they were saying

that is one

well and I was very impressed that I could do this and I was sure that they were to get African sober for a while my sponsor explain the perhaps what some of those people were saying to one another was did you see that

that person just put flesh to fire why would anybody do anything so stupid but I didn't know there was another way of looking at

those are the kind of things that kept me busy before I came to apologize not

I was brought to a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous by my mother

my mother had been in and out of program about comics anonymous for many years the time was during links of sobriety

and

she brought me that meeting that night not because I asked for help not because I want to help not because I need it having a problem but simply because she thought that I might get rejected from another apartment if she left me alone and I went to the meeting in the miracle that cost honest begin for me that night even though I didn't get sober in the beginning because there was a guy in that meeting that I admired more than anybody else in the whole world and I did not admire very many people I have my standards and I was very strict about them but I admire this guy and again if you're new you may not or or been around awhile and you may not identify with the things that kept me coming back but it's important that I hear them I think I I in my R. this man because he was from benefits from my hometown is actually drinking friend of my mother's

and

even in jail in prison has had to he rode a motorcycle get a nice and had it with him at the meeting that night and I looked at him and I just thought wow

I did not think that people this tough came to a a you know I thought it was just for a week people like my mom and so I was very impressed that somebody this task would be in a meeting I

you also bye and tell you what I want out of life in one sentence when I came in from about Cognos I wanted the ability to walk into a room full of strangers and have everyone there back away from me and terror

and when you're eighty seven pounds that almost never happens you know

but that was what I wanted out of life

and this guy Paul when you've been drinking

if you want to have your table you just gave a whole table I mean just even discuss it because you know what how was going to do to get the table you know and so I look at this guy and you have the ability to clear rooms in table

everything that I wanted a life and he was sitting in a meeting about talks on so it made a big impression on me I got drunk the next night and then I came back to some meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous and I did not raise my hand because I was not an alcoholic and even if I had been I wasn't going to join an organization that was allowing my mother to belong to it so I just went to these meetings and

in between the meetings I talked to Paul he was the only person that I considered cool enough for me to talk to here and I explained calling between the meetings that I was an alcoholic I couldn't possibly be an alcoholic that I was far too young to be an alcoholic and I had people to see places to go things to do I have my whole life ahead of me and I was clearly not alcoholic I later learned of that non alcoholics don't have to spend any time trying to convince other people that they're not alcoholic you know they already know that but

Paul turning anything you know June I'm pretty new and it's a a thing and they told me that I cannot diagnose anybody's disease but my own he said but in your case I'm can I make an exception

so I've seen the way do you drink and I seen the way that you use chemicals and I happen to believe if you don't come into this program and take with these people have top for use in a period of six months or less gonna be out on the street you'll be shooting stuff any selling your house and I wasn't trying to scare me he wasn't trying to make up a story about something he'd he'd heard or read about or something like a high school teacher my due to scare the kids he was just talking about facts he was talking about things that happen and we're beginning to happen in my life and I thought a little bit about what he said but I did not want to be an alcoholic I did not want to join Alcoholics Anonymous and in that two week period of time as I went to those meetings not raising my hand absolutely every alternative but Alcoholics Anonymous was removed from my life I was living with my mother at that time by the time I got to the program Alcoholics Anonymous the only person that I hated more than my mother was myself

my mother being alcoholic in my life I blamed her for everything that it ever gone wrong and take it for me the short version a lot had gone wrong so I had a lot of things you know they were going on here and because of the kind of person that I was because the amount of anger and hate that I Kerry with me at all times I used to attack my mother physically because my mother was getting sober at this time she can think she had to be subjected to Jack's in our own apartment and she asked me to leave and I did the rest of my family have not talked to me a couple of years and I was not allowed to call or come by under any circumstances and I didn't bother trying I've been in number of foster homes I've been thrown out of all the minimum would take me back I tried to get into some alcohol recovery and drug we have houses that were in the LA area at that time there were not that many really but none of them would take me some because of my age and some just because of my attitude I tell you get into a program back then or call sitting on that was basically desperate for membership it was starting to go underground and they wouldn't take me either things were really starting to look pretty bad

and then

one day as I walked down the alley all five members of my own gang beat me up

I tell myself sitting in here about nine of us I had a black eye and a small lip I had no shoes one to one and if I have them but I didn't have any shoes I had no family I have no friends I had no place to live I have no money and so I raise my hand meeting backlogs not you can see where it's kind of simple wasn't like would you like to go to Hawaii or join a any

and when I raise my hand in that meeting those meetings

I know today that there were some people there who did not know about the traditions of Alcoholics Anonymous in particular the third tradition the one that says the only requirement for a membership is a desire to stop drinking and the reason I know that some of those people did not know about the traditions of Alcoholics Anonymous is because when I did begin to raise my hand some of those people knew because of my mother's membership how old I was and they came over to me and they told me that they don't want little kids sitting in their meetings while they talked about serious things and they told me if I came back to get together and throw me out and I didn't know Alcoholics Anonymous couldn't do that I just figured a didn't want me either and that was okay with me because I didn't want me either and I had it for a really long time and I fell back on my number one answer the answer I've been using since I was five years old I went over to a friend of my mother's I went into her house I found the bathroom and I looked for the kind of pills that I needed to kill myself and I took enough of them to do it one more time before I got passed out for passed out that day I ended up going

interesting Hey that'll be fun anyway and I'm going to area

going to a a noon meeting about fox nine and by the time I got to that meeting I could not stand and I could not sit now I don't know where you guys go to meetings here in Texas but when I got sober in west Los Angeles they almost never called anybody here who was laying in the meeting

but they called on me that day and I certainly don't know what I said I know they realize I needed to be in a hospital and that was where I woke up

the doctor give me medication planing to me that the pill that you're taking her to slow down my heart and had I been there five or ten minutes later I would have been in a comment that they probably could not have brought me out of

and I really can't tell you why that overdose is any different than all the others that I reflected upon myself up to that point I just know that it was because since that time one day at a time I haven't taken anything that affects me from the neck up and that's how I personally to find

you know and you know I I I realized at that time and I've known this ever since you know that I am not one of those people that stayed in Alcoholics Anonymous because I was afraid going back out there on the streets and dying I tried to die as long and as hard as I could out there what scared me and has kept me sober many times is the thought that maybe I could go back out there and continue to live the way that I was living for another twenty or thirty or forty years because by the time I walked in the doors of Alcoholics Anonymous I could not imagine going on reading in and out two or three more times hitting myself anymore than I did it does not seem possible to me up to and including today I I'm extremely grateful for the people who were here when I came down college synonymous and for those old timers were here and who tolerated me the way that I was they were far more tolerant of me that I believe that I am capable of being up to and including today I came in Alcoholics Anonymous with a bad attitude I don't want you to think I got sober and suddenly a bad attitude came upon me I simply came here with the only attitude I had ever had and it had always been bad

I

I did not like women

I didn't like any women

I didn't like me I didn't like my mother and I mean like any of the other women around here either and I want to sit next to women I want to talk to women hello certainly was not going to have to shake hands with women and I did not like listening to women speakers which is something that always makes me feel better because I know there never is many people listening to me is it looks like

so now the only man that I had ever known in my life again I I realized later were alcoholic and most of them were extremely violent and the men here in Alcoholics Anonymous scared me and I don't want anything to do with them either and so I had a problem because in July of nineteen seventy two when I came down the hall with Norman well we had here for men and women and I didn't like any of but I went to twenty one meetings a week anyway for the first couple of years that I was summer

and I had a commitment at almost every one of those meetings

and my entire life

revolved around going to the next meeting

and staying until the meeting ended and then cleaning up the meeting so that I could stay as long as possible to be somewhere indoors and then I would begin to either walk or hitchhike or take a bus or whatever it would take to get to the next meeting so that I could do with the set up job so that I would be indoors again I

I mean I I just I had no other life you know I I have to remember sometimes it's it's difficult it's been an interesting processes sometimes sponsoring people that come down comics anonymous you know with some semblance of a life you know because I didn't have that you know what I mean I can remember you know like people would say you know I said well you know what your your first you're going to go to meeting like every night you know well Friday night is yeah you know and I say well right next to me to drinking call J. R. I mean you know like what that

didn't have a lot of compassion for that you know and and now I've got you know people calling him they've got to go to the gym

like Jesus Christ

well that would give somebody something to pray about anyway

anyway

let's see I I have very limited vocabulary

it consisted almost solely of profanity

exception of a few words like that and mother

done a lot of people Alcoholics Anonymous were extremely offended by that type of language and so I tried to use it more when they came near me

I did not wear shoes most of the first couple of years that I was server

hi were motorcycle chance on my wrists and ankles had a motorcycle jacket that on the back so do you want to others and then split it with my own spiritual slogan

no three packs of cigarettes a day and I let all of them myself

only someone would hold the match and I allowed to hold as long as they live

but they never let my cigarette within and then after I mean server short free time I took up smoking cigars and then later a pipe

I wore T. shirts that had things on on that most if not all people including myself today would find extremely offensive

and what I want to let you know is if you choose to dress the way that I did to talk the way that I didn't smoke the way that I did you too can have the meeting about the size actually have an entire row all to yourself

and and so for all those reasons I'm extremely grateful to the people that because none of us were tolerant and they let me stay here I yeah I remember I was the greeter at the west with meeting

I would stand at the door barefoot my motorcycle chains and jacket and sick are welcoming the newcomers as they came to a a

when I got sober I was eighty seven pounds

and I had a black eye and a small lip and it took a really long time to heal so I was the head of the door welcoming any comers and sometimes they walk by here to sponsor with three seats to keep drinking you can end up like

at that time people Alcoholics Anonymous we're guessing my age at thirty seven and I was thirteen at the time

but it's been really it's been a very interesting last couple of years for me I I just turned forty this year and it's so odd to me because you know a couple of you know my friends are you know different people kind of asked me if I mean like scared or you know if I've you know felt worried or you know whatever and I I suppose it doesn't hardly possible for me at the years come up you know but the the overwhelming feeling for me is that I I don't know that it'll be possible for me to ever

ever feel is

as I did when I walked through the doors of Alcoholics Anonymous because I was so

when I got here but I I just don't know that it's but that there is anything that could get near that you know I I can't imagine a time when it would I just feel I feel like a thousand years younger today than I did when I walk through the doors of alcoholics anonymous I

let's see what we're we go here

I have a seventh grade education

I dropped out of school you see they you know they don't like they're not in the smoking they want or shoes no chains I mean there are a lot of problems

everything you know and I dropped out before I got sober and I I just really didn't fit right in and so that's what allowed me to go to these twenty one meetings a week and my sponsor who wanted me to go back to school Gail you know she said look you know if you're not going to go back to school then you're going to get the kind of jobs that people with seventh grade education yeah and that's what I did and it allowed me to work a lot of strange shifts you know graveyard split shift and different things swing shift or whatever so that I glad to get to watch the meeting

you know I

the fact that Gail became my sponsor is one of those things that always makes me think about the fact that says in the book for people who normally would not Max

I

there was a woman

and I've already mentioned how I felt about that

and

I you know I I really can't quite you know put together how she became my sponsor the best that I can figure out is that it seems to me as I went to these twenty one meetings a week the woman named Gail Wilson spoke about seventeen of them every week

and so I thought perhaps if I asked this woman to be my sponsor I could find out ahead of time where she was speaking and then I would have to hear her all the time and

that was the motivation I have forgetting woman for a sponsor and

you know Gail became my sponsor I confirms this later in you know I think I'm just being you know trying to be funny up here but Gail became my sponsor because she'd been taught to never say no to request

you know we we were just people who normally would not Max Gail was three times my age at the time

she was from the south

something that I automatically did not like about anyone okay of course there were so many things that I automatically did not like about people that I really wouldn't even have time to go through it tonight but suffice it to say he didn't like anyone in a day so you know you can see it was a fairly extensive list anyway I don't like that

and she not only did not use the same language I was using she didn't know what a lot of the words I was using meant

she come from a warm loving supportive family I really hated people like that

she traveled all over the world you know I mean I grew up in Venice I ran away once I made it three miles east of Culver city so you know I really think we have much to go on there and

and and if all of that was not bad enough which in my mind it really was me she had been seen on numerous occasions in public wearing pink

so something that you know I mean I didn't wear anything pink until I was ten years over you know I mean it just it was a really slow thing for me so

Gail and I you know we would meet secretly after meeting

I would fear at my home group which is for home group the Thursday night Brent would workshop and I go over and I say hi and she's a high speed please don't sit next to me at the meeting tonight I can't take the cigar smoke well that's okay and I turned to walk when she say in June please don't tell anyone that night and your sponsor

and now it's fine with me because I didn't even know I was hanging out with someone as lame as she was you know so we have a secret you know sponsorship relationship

I am

yeah

because of Gail and because of my sponsor because of my home group at the time which is a Monday night Dennis group I'm extremely grateful that I I grew up in Alcoholics Anonymous in a very very active group and learned that it was really important to be of service and to show up and you keep your commitment and

you know it's been such an interesting thing to me I I I do believe that if I had to to point to one

major thing that was changed my whole attitude and outlook on life it really has been those learning things about being of service in Alcoholics Anonymous that we're totally changed my life in ways that just don't make any sense up to and including today and yet they have I

let's see here

when I first came from about parts on a space we talk about you know it's very important get the big Bucks

sell it for exactly what they paid for it and they wanted to you know they say will make little credit arrangements except for the Venice group they say now if you're too afraid to talk to somebody about it or something you can just go ahead and steal it and I've been stealing longer than I've been drinking so I sort of you know it's not that might be a good idea but then I was a little nervous you know in my jeans my sobriety so instead I went to the library in Santa Monica I still the big book of Alcoholics while I was there I saw a copy of the twelve well the I want to make two trips and have a call

and you know that was just really the best I could do you know and I didn't feel bad about it I just thought I needed to book in the library I didn't so I stole it you know never been sober a number of years I'm not sure exactly how many maybe four or five maybe a little bit more than that I

I realize that I had to make amends for that thanks for the forty or fifty other library books that I'd stone throughout my life great classics like misty the sea horses and things like that so I loaded a lot so I took down the librarian in Culver city and explain to her that I was a member of Alcoholics Anonymous and it was necessary for my sobriety to return those books and I was wondering if maybe I could make payments because they wanted three to five cents a day and I had some of the books for eleven years you know and she said that'll be fine and she said you know it's so funny so I used to work in this library in Laguna beach and this man came in and he just on the big book to I guess you guys do this all the time

lessons of learning the other I'm not unique