The San Jose Roundup in San Diego, CA

thank you very much hi my name is Norman I'm an alcoholic hi

for Maria

and I'm extremely happy to have the opportunity to be here and I want to thank Burson Henry and the entire committee for the opportunity to be here nine to participate the average data and Susan are friends and to reunite myself with some new from old friends and to meet some new people here to have the opportunity to say are welcome to all of the new people out there and I fear for second or third mean I've only been on this as well and I Y. try to keep an open mind which you can use right away here and you can use it right be good enough to get out of the chair and leave it here

you've got to remember that anything I might try and say that I think are the things I personally believe in is going to be what the program of Alcoholics Anonymous means to me it's going to be some things I used to say so over over a period of time that I'm not by any stretch of imagination and authority a consultant or a concert on a program not only synonymous I'm an example good or bad the day work but it has been a very minute take a drink anything about a job now for over twenty eight years I'm sure that

I am obviously I never brought it up

and you never know I've been talking about every year yeah we had a lot of changes in a and I keep thinking you know somewhere down the road we're going to get a pension program gone and

my god where do I sure want to go over all my time so I bring up any time I have the opportunity and if I don't have the opportunity to talk about it anyway but the new guys in the other night is difficult to digest when you hear people talking about this the right way you know you're sitting there in your couple today sorry you're nervous as hell Hey you're sitting on your hands jumping out of your knickers and you hear guys say voted over twenty eight years anybody would've run outside and throwing up and I can

so I can understand that I can still relate to it I hope the hell I never forget yeah I'm sure they're not first Alcoholics Anonymous meeting at that time I was twenty nine years old and I sent out via the group that I need to find another way to take a drink still and go to jail after nine and a half years I felt the same way what a liar Jesus

he doesn't drink

I get out there not rotten jungle in duals lousy people in news responsibilities and and be sober for nine and a half years and I just couldn't visualize that anybody can do it and I hadn't come to a a for nine and a half years compound the problem I had gotten a a for a little while I think most of us did die I came in here because I had a lot of heat on out there and I want to get that heat on I wonder find some ways to control this thing that was giving me some of my trouble I wanted to get back out and get going because I had a great deal to do alcoholics are busy people and I have a lot moving out there

I don't want to get out of work all gone you know how that goes and I had a lot of my friends are out there my best friends and they were out there and I couldn't think of their names but they were my best friends and I

I was concerned about their well being and I was like you know they have a difficult time to survive if I wasn't there and I went on and on with this damn thing I almost racialized myself right out the door and back into the Jen mills right I kept going to meetings and I'm going to say anything tonight that may be significant why you got to go to meetings you see it's a very very important when you've been around for twenty eight days or twenty eight years really does make much difference not as far as I am personally concerned yeah I'm going to maintain any semblance of sanity and serenity and peace of mind and sobriety if I'm going to

find the equalizer in my life I'm going to find here an Alcoholics Anonymous the answers to my problems most of my problems like I'll be able to relate to talk to the people here you hear the people out there on that streak of answered my problem hello Mister man out there there's no question about it but I had I couldn't and so I came here and so they became the allies are in my life and today more so than ever last year was kind of a mass exodus of a half a dozen of my friends they were from sixteen to twenty six years and they all went back out again and this all still out there and I've talked to several of them in the stores are all the same that they just haven't had any time for the last ten fifteen years to get any meeting today they will collide during their life was long gone I got involved in other things they thought were more important and now they're out there struggling to try to get back again is here to stay here you say how you know it's a very important because you've got a lot of questions and like Hey I'm concerned about the next night and a half years and they assured me in a short period of time but I needn't be concerned about the next hour and a half years is all I had going for me was now right now is a norm is now and there isn't anymore you couldn't change what happened a couple of hours ago and I can tell you what's going down a couple of hours from now there there's anything moving in my life as well and is right now and you've got to get all you can get right now good bad or indifferent because you may not be through this way again or maybe it's not going to be through again so you better get a hold of you know all you can get and now they're in your brand new one is going good for god's sake don't talk don't say your sponsor

one good man good at all you can get right now because I'll tell you buddy it'll get finally later on I'll guarantee

and I got a I come to find out that I just got to take it all right now the day of day care of itself and I've been moving away now for over twenty eight years I would rather day really that I walk through the door and I sat there and I was AA meetings and I'm a brand new guy and I'm going to the mental gymnastics that everybody goes through is that what the hell am I doing today why am I an alcoholic this is something I've been looking forward you over a long period of time

I had not gone down to my high school concert he said what would you like to be

Ali

he was overjoyed

as you said models we don't have a problem with Jack and his wife yeah

I did that program I revision for fifteen years and I've been a as a matter of fact I was not even an alcoholic that

I'm not as worried

where all heavy drinkers in other news a second chances on rotten driver

you know

you know wondering why is it all of a sudden here I am and I am an alcoholic find out only

virtue of my family my family are all heavy drinkers

a lot of those in out there but I was the only

and family and

why have I been given the classic

and it was never any question about that because I talk to myself about that several times and they came out you are the greatest guy you know yeah

I couldn't

that might be more fine people don't get me wrong I love them they Love Me and my favorite

they're not overly intelligently talk a lot with our hands

thank you for the pain to paddle whitewater should not take care

my god when you want to know something about you come to see us and we'll tell you about it we not only told me about it we made it the Italians made of the Irish dragon I got the a and that's about the way yeah

five I fell between my family and the environment that the problem was there on the product L. A. and anybody coming out of loss and is not allowed to travel to

is a city in and hang out anywhere you want to get out of the automatic and you only make the sacrifices together to do it I have the braces and things don't make anybody anything now risking an alcoholic and here's another note in Iowa maybe around the same thing is identical to

I think it all out all by myself it was a risky

that was it I'm going to address you on their hardness

and somewhere in the lottery and I live across some invisible line from the social aspect to drink it in the composite area once a man in a thousand I don't know if I can really enjoy them in the garbage can again find at the whiskey was the problem and I'm the guy that did the drink and so when you get out of the bottom line and the problem that hasn't changed dramatically today no matter where I go on the first guy to get there

I don't think any of us had to call somebody up and say Charlie I'm down here in Vermont we please come down and help me get screwed up

I have never had to do that

I've been able to over react to any situation anywhere anytime I don't

before I ever took a drink I still revert back to that old personality and the time I'm the first guy to admit that making money is good but getting even better a lot of times

that's the way it used to be that was me these are all the qualifications I have long before a lot of those I travel around the world and have my live amid a complete as myself I spend money I didn't have binding to the new drug overdose people didn't like

thank

I sat around and bar stools and doctor and high rollers

about being all things to all people I build the castles in the air and from the corporations are docked in millions spend thousands and never had a dollar in my pocket I do all the Cadillacs up and down the bar night after night after night and

one in big money people said what do you do and I said I do it all

I'm the general manager of the universe and don't you ever forget

they only spend a lifetime impressing a group of people he's never met these life that he is something he hasn't

you might find in August drive around LA with the windows rolled up in the car to make him think I had an air conditioner you know

the beauty of it is when I came into the program I found out that I didn't have to operate enough to live that way any longer when I got there the people said to me straight out sunny done impressive here we have been impressed by experts in the business because everybody is an expert

that statement is you didn't take my word for it all together to just kind of talk to the guy next to you

not anything I don't care what it is

to comment on it

they don't know what you're talking about your brother

every year around noon a lot of expression on

I've got here before you did I remember one night I was on this guy's gonna be impressed it was known as a try you know I've been jailed on twenty five times as early as I did that a year you know the

Taylor religious land all around grab the packages available to you here

in the south I don't have to compete with anybody today I don't agree with you are you hi all I got to be today is to be sober and a little bit better than what it was yesterday and that's enough

thank you for reading my general thought and you just might grab that package in my day out with me tomorrow on a city street and I spent a day there is V. in southern Virginia south and a little bit better than what your yesterday I can tell you about a reservation whatsoever is the best deal I ever had in my life and I'm a guy to look half the world out there trying to find the best deal and I didn't find it not until I got here I was surrounded and and reduced and subjected to a model of your favorite shows call themselves out only synonymous

it is raving about what I was like I got a great deal I got a bad attitude and by virtue of my bad attitude I got a right now to do it as a matter of fact and because of my right now to get a lot of rotten trouble out there my rotten trouble started in nineteen thirty nine I wouldn't bring in in thirty nine states I was very young to drink I am a thief by trade I'm not only by absorption

the vice president general manager Ali outside operations of the midnight hours of

I was in the car business I guess I'm all about is that it was too big to carry I lay down the side and claimed it and that was

I became one of the greatest and finest cars deserve him out of the valley but it was illegal I was arrested I went to jail and that was the end of that location after I got all the canned I started I suppose looking for something that was going to get me on that Fantasyland I'd rose rock then

the first time I was driving while I was in nineteen forty one it was easy to recharge address historic Balboa beach around a little ball room Stan Kenton padre bear I'm not ideology is right that we do a little padre and we get a little bars on the on that damn song would answer them values with X. four times

we agreed on I'm gonna make my

got a little bit

there was a lot of fun beginning I didn't have any trouble in getting the jams it in like in the morning more to drink on the weekends

have gotten top down collar city of the south gate at the Pasadena civic ballroom and down by one it was the Dorsey brothers in Kenton and the rest of those facts

I got a ground out a modem project because I never get enough he has a lot to get a buzz on and I got a look for the buzz I'm over the Padres in the rain the old green death and from the green that's the most interesting I want to get the rest you have found that the greatest thing made his money in girls rose westie

I even got a vinyl I like the taste of it yeah god what a great my rate rose thirty years and hated every drop everything

I got to the point that I like the taste of it but I like the buzz man man whiskey gets your attention and I get that right now get your downtown and man that's all I ever want to be a lot of the downtown

get there on a little bit on it right now

Hey you got to admit that rishi does

we're gonna be getting when you're young you train out there hi and that was about as rotten as you can get that okay and high

Bayern gone in common and ran out of my nose and made my eyes water but I hung in and I think that's important

yeah the guy's going to be an alcoholic he does yeah he's a little busy

today because you're doing about it listed on here anymore you kind of feel good

and I was the beginning of the end that was used again in more trouble I had been in before I violated my probation and a forty one MM sent me back to jail I had a war broke out by then and rather go to jail again the I'm doing John service I joined the navy and the navy in January nineteen forty eight four years or one in three men came out of

very hard to do people said Donna Jimmy on on how do you do

you just put your mind to it that's all right now the only he can do a lot of the ones who

and the guy's Iraq immediately kicked out of the CD or some or should I I said I'm I'm sure like most not only tell I'm a hard worker are you saying about mostly okay

because I got to work twenty five percent higher than anybody else just to stay even out there right now he's always coming from behind he's always got the heat on

when he's right he's got a goal my best days Tuesday

we miss Monday night and we

it only

and I was enjoying my life I like ships are like this when I was a virgin when I was a stay at a job adding a new driver I sure I drank some of that **** barges level around them by talus need debate I had a little fanatic organogenesis

things like that

has not made by our manager to stories right I was able to kind of keep it under control but I support an important I was on a beach family jam one jam after another I never got back to the ship don't all me and I was crying my shown for many many things right now the deck a salmon and jump right at eleven AM mountain and they break up and I don't I don't have a Democrat Marshall has seventy eight a solitary confinement on Redwater Saddam's regime

news provided the service

my game back Allen forty six

price check that invisible line I may mention I fast

I'm not a guy out there really like

one rescue now family wouldn't want to

I process doesn't align and I really couldn't tell yeah nineteen twenty doesn't really make any difference but in nineteen forty six and now starting to always come from behind in nineteen forty six strange things happened in spite of myself I heard about a

in nineteen forty six I was having a bad time around down down south Pasadena bad down bad jobs rotten judge panel jail I was having a lot of problems in that town

I got picked up on my second one from the judge and the judge says there is a standard three year probation

the provisions of your right from the if you're a prices surge or sells alcoholic beverages you're in violation when I hear about it right you're gonna be violated and if I make a jail and going into the year get the hell out of my car but I remember that day like yesterday I'm walking out of parliament

one more gem but I'm saying to myself self don't drink in Pasadena right

you don't have to have a hundred very argued in are you having a hell of a lot of trouble in that town

please don't do anything I'm not going to

and I stayed out of town to three months the inevitable happened things are going good so I'm drinking one night out on the beach house I don't know the cardinals sand bars writing aside thank

not only should ever do that he should think or drink but he should never do about the same time

I got to thinking about silly things like I'm going back to Pasadena yeah

since about ten o'clock in your hand smashed I got a mile back to Pasadena for an appraiser golly green grass I'm not a buddy of mine and we decided to close a price we did and the last thing I remember is and radio rockers after hours joint over there and that's the last thing I remember talk on a left turn from me and I couldn't see it and I smashed into the side of it and when I woke up in the morning I was in jail in Pasadena yeah

five out of my pocket and I'm sat on the final one felony drunk driving hit and run by Landry involved and I might add by the grace of god to look after them frozen Johns I didn't care for people out there in the city streets at night we are always in the game a second edges you know just a few seconds of the finger three and a half four feet that's all you got to talk about the vitamin over about three and a half Roger that was driving and killed people I recognize that today

how strange it is not moving in the strange mysterious raising on or what I do I don't do it works out that way anyway

I am I am back into town and I said I will be back there again

I want down and sends out a judge who has no choice but to send me to jail

the jail I shared a jail cell or the guy I was gonna say that's crazy and they wanted to run for the guys run time one guy gets out of jail once a week to go today some people use to pick him up they tell you know meeting it was addressed it was an honor system today in our meeting at remaining bring him back I would like a mob and we would sit there and we'll talk about this program I didn't want to talk about it do you want to talk about it is that we talked

you don't have a big

I'll come back to the norm why don't you come to a meeting here in here because of those in one meeting with me and and I don't even know it religion has affected his family I'm not an alcoholic no I don't need to bring whatever you

the thing

I am having a lot of problems and bad luck and rotten people out there and I know a lot of bad drivers

good god I'm much too young to be an alcoholic is Jesus I used to be ager thirty six

Florida

what do you want to contribute anybody out in my

nothing else laugh

when I was in a bad mood right here right on my images are a seed was planted I never forgot about that guy and over the next

we now have I used to run around around the valley on every store around I wanna days here I'm one of these go on

in nineteen fifty four in February and ran on the floor in about a second I've been a long time and and I and I think I don't I just can't go on this way and I I got to wondering why there was some of them do I want to be surrendering a nine one and I think that the telephone and I call center I was in Los Angeles because I was trying to find a guy named Sam and I shared a jail cell as in nineteen forty six that is extremely strong

I didn't have any meetings I know very little about a visiting other planets and I you may choose to go back out again and you may just be sitting around engine mails out there but that's going to be with you by god

because I one thing repairing heaters right absolutely and lots of beer drinking that much is for sure however the hell you don't have to go but if you do I hope you come back to see if I stayed out there a nap here and I might qualify for this program

I went away from the largest construction firms in the world

I came alive in years the company at that time was owned and operated by three of his last game in our country to make

you can go to wish his wife at

we had worked on the eleven western states ratify blinders metallic business at that high road you know I'm in the right place at the right time and the jobs are bigger and better and the money's coming in and out of those and other places and life is god

in fact

I met and married a red headed Irish woman

I had a violent temper disposition yelled at me a great deal never recognize my sensitivity

I was pregnant every other year it was

incredible

I know

advisor should control me now I'm gonna marry alone I got a job and the job

major he's writing about double your income about midnight

I've been running around we've been going around together and we decided I would try and check we got married

all of the job things could have been better double walk in the house the impossible changes normally benefactor

I'm pregnant

I had to quit my job I got to get on my feet I couldn't

I went in on a thing like that

I was gonna be and

today's about nine months

the rotten job back in

Jesus I was thirty four years ago she

at times it was on

all

I don't know but I'm not home

that number fourteen every other

Jesus

and I'm not

we got a couple of days I walk in the house and

and I'm sick a little drunk and I'd like to be greeted with a lot of affection understanding

from ten pages

I wonder how does he know

disagreement

I got it all on the side of my face Russia is trying to get one show on

and I was trying to figure out how to

yes what conversations I think for me like thirty guys are right yeah yeah

yeah yeah you cannot get a

maybe

no really really talking

and don't you ever

and then he would mimic me

standing in the kitchen of his new business partner

given by

please

and

in the name

best friend

not only because I'm not

in an hour now well not that old clothes back in our

these guys down the street

end of the friends and never returned I got a couple of days later on the front

freezing heads

right

man and

nine years ago

he

well

he wanted I wonder

not only would change of rights

on the

because you know

everything

you're driving on the rim

well a lot of ram drivers in a

the name is inspected

this is a

I want to show me

this

because he's deeply concerned about what people think about it

we

we don't do anything about

engine mails the dark eyes around music I like the intellectual giants

nine

yeah I get that mailing list

kind of wide eyed

you

no one around the dollar

good luck and

sure the thirty dollar smiling thank you Ron the decision the charities are running their

now that you can't get the money to get in

you got a slide in the dollar

I bet there's a door sliders here tonight

yes it is

Daniel white out

here's a drone hit only once you get in all you gotta do

shown

and we laugh

in a very long

on the other life yeah that'll

it's gone

but not all of them

a very fine young enough time in the eventually

there's nothing

one day

but I want to find a business with us add that set

browse around fifty one a nation from program and they said that Seth the next time I have a small bruise on your breath you throw get out a

on Monday

South

one one

promised the skimmer

how many times did I stand there with the kids gone down and dirty

right I found out I got a deal

a new priest was telling me about I'm gonna take another plan that's that's what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna give

disclaimer

right now I'm your drunken bomb

I'm sorry I mean

we're gonna have to death thirty five years old

the idea of my life I'm an erotic the kids in a rowdy

all I do anymore

all night looking out through the front room window distance through your car come up the street

and I never come in I don't

and then I don't sleep I have a fireman's run

and I'm thinking I can't catch it your dad I'm not sure anymore hi crown attorney norm I filed a seven million of the restraining order against the north I'm going to yeah

in my life

I'll always love you

but you try out all the feeling

I'm not a feeling for a run where another

has it out all the I can't believe I'm listening to these things always happen everybody else and every time you and I can get a very long enough hard enough

like I guarantee it's going to get it right as I was driving on down the street wondering why me why

good enough time to get

you're standing in the morning Russian station refugees

thank you Sir something you can't tolerate

respect yourself of the human being as an individual

in Iraq around continually without not stomach every marginalized you can't face reliving the psychological second in your life when you're sick and tired of being sick and tired and it is the first time you come in it was a test of the fifty five centimeters place I surrender

and you don't even know yes yes

finally on one February nineteen fifty four and for some unknown reason I just don't wanna grow anymore

and I made mention I

information

the guy over there and his name is Johnny C. John was run hello guys

on a

sounding recipes in that sense given away what he found

the central offices manufacturing paper I need to be

action about it

that same guy on a Thursday night it went down

the stairs not the top of the stairs and honor and I was gunning down easy

for the new guy in the meeting you grab a granny by the army

I got a copy of the check you're never on his son and you're young and keep an open mind when yes

coming back

meetings three and a half and buy yourself a Brock

do things you never have to take another drink again if you don't want to

and that's the guy that I talked to her on that Sunday afternoon that's a guy's head yeah I got a drinking problem

I don't know if I did that and he gave me that

that information is also getting some phone numbers you just call these numbers

I'm not the opposite so I started calling abrasion

hours later I got walked in

he says now thanks to talk to any one of the hardest sponsors Hey I think I found a school in the heart

and his attitude was by

here on this program one is that if you want to

want that fast

it was your time you're wasting my time away to your time don't you ever forget this you need us and we don't need you that's the way it is and you got a common data got a car you're driving yeah I'm gonna cut you take the bus and the bus money a lot

for the program it's a better deal

I want to be a sponsor I thought it was good I don't know what else is

because I didn't want him

I want to think about is I'm going to let me

the deficit in the night he has a devastating rose made the town

I want to ask you want to change the name but I don't have the guts to asking

come on down here I'll be there is that I'm gonna show you around I'm going to give you the numbers and I think yeah I'm gonna make it three meetings

whatever you want to do

yeah I think he believes you know if you had a car there is already

the last couple of years ago they drop another great deal had been taking chances on guys with cars and

you guys are making it an even a wrist watches

I went down to that meeting I went down in spite of the

I went there in spite of myself I don't even know why I went down I went down there sure my other car maybe running

I like to do

thank god directed the angels on my shoulder call it what you will

I fell in the parking lot there and I got it was written and I was kind of surprised the card on the door and I got out and he put his arm around me and will act in a meeting and then got a lot of internet data day died I living today

very controversial individual tremendously gave the message to hundreds and thousands of people out there god knows how many people really helps right the last time he couldn't turn Israeli news live over the care of anybody on our time basis chapter six everybody else out there which after six

time for that

there is a god given qualities that says I don't know

wants to

program only once or another I want to do anything you could do it he couldn't release anything

resented that

and then he resented them

none of them is an alive actually they are going to California residents

the general

right out there twelve years you try to come back time and time again

how many times there is a norm norm Jesus all the guys I sponsored Christ on their money sponsor now

background

there was another heart attack after dinner twelve years going back to see if the seller and a half they died and I love them the guy who took the time to come to see me

if I needed out on a Sunday and bring an end product of coffee and everything around

the finest drunk driving him out of

an extremely wealthy governor days my god we have so much money on the Grosvenor

after the meeting

jelly donuts are flying a true status red jelly donuts

not

I mean Donna to rotten go

that's good for now my god

a guy comes in the door is all green and hung out on the red jelly donut committed

your new

did you

thank you Jesus jogger and he

New Delhi was

right now they only sent me on those days right

once a month right sometimes I go to get me on and I was

I remember their names

sharks Reagan Ronald on internal K. another name that goes with our name was reading my name is Adam actually for a movie based on an island and she found the present to him he had never made the program but she

and then I mean it is bigger than others

okay you're going to go to jail for nine and a half years and I I couldn't

it's about how people

when I went to jail in already any jails

Jamaican ginger and even the government about a

it's been over a couple of months

they're going to do

the funny about it

Dragway

I don't even know

I'm

thank you J. I've been in twenty

regular life Alison as needed

and I'm too young

and any relevant

don't make any difference that's what you drank

I'm not too concerned

this one is doing

turn up any part of your life you don't have to go any farther and as I sat there that night wanting a new position or without that is going on in my life I'm not so sure I want to quit drinking

now I'll tell you one thing for sure and try to rid myself not only did I died at nine I knew

but I didn't have to ever ever hurt myself again if I didn't want to

because he had

Hey

nine and a half years and he is an example and that's right it is a program of example

but it is far out I cannot hear Rudy says

St mass

a hundred and twenty seven figure on maybe

Sam there last night and he's playing

that's good news

on a set of friends probably because among hundreds

nothing and he didn't get anything else out of the Senate Dr G.

I have another issue

is

really impressive what I see what I can do it I can do for you okay and I'm thinking he's talking to me and I'm thinking maybe but I know he's got a tough girl is running a divorce and remarriage

they are

yeah

the package of this program and then one day at a change of attitude

and they are not like in the respective another day another one

and I didn't

is it a big tough guys

six Hey shakers

Israel Mar but now the tears are streaming down her face I don't care

let him roll with dignity they cry the majority of it

and the story was told that they would laugh because I remember when I cried because they were happy and they call it I was always anonymous an inmate there tonight certification