The Texas State Convention

My name's Scott Redmond. I'm an alcoholic. Can you hear me okay? Yeah. My friend Cliff Roche was, at a a meeting once, and a a guy in the back of a room yelled to the speaker, I can't hear you.

And a guy in the front row yelled, I can. Let's switch seats. I just remembered that. I couldn't see Todd at the sign because he was turned around backwards watching, some young women, so that's why I couldn't see him. Today is my 28th wedding anniversary.

And the reason why I'm here on my anniversary is Char asked me to talk so long ago. I wasn't married yet, I don't think, at that particular time. Charles, great to see you my friend and thank you for the gift of coming out and hanging out with my friends in Texas. There are few places better in the world to be sober than, than Texas, and I I'm convinced that the greatest places in the world to drink are the greatest places in the world to get sober. And there are few better places on the planet to get loaded than Texas.

South, North, West, East, it does not matter, especially for our boy from the Bronx. It's fun. Are you from the are you here with the witness protection program? No? Are you here?

I wanna thank the committee. I wanna thank you all. I, Mark and I were talking earlier. We think this should be the standard for all conventions. It's just been absolutely remarkable the way you guys treat the speakers.

It's sort of like the fattening of the lamb, I think, because then you actually have to have to talk. But, I I can't tell you how much I appreciate your kindness and the, hospitality that's been lavished on me. I love you guys, and again, I I love, coming home to Texas to give a talk and hang out with you all and and, and just to be able to say y'all because, if I, I do that. Can I see the hands of the people in their 1st year? Wow.

Wow. Wow. Wow. Wow. Man, oh, man.

Welcome, welcome to Alcoholics Anonymous. I, that is really exciting. I'd like to welcome you to AO. If you're a drug addict, I'd like to welcome you to Alcoholics Anonymous. If you're a a dope fiend, which is somehow worse than any of us, I'd like to welcome you to AA.

If you're, like the big footed dope addicts or a dope goliath, welcome there. I'd like to welcome all the Tweakers. Welcome Tweakers. Glad you're here. Yeah.

Right. There. She's got her arm up. She doesn't even remember why she put her arm up. But welcome to AA.

I'm glad you're here. You're special and I love you. And, and I love you guys. You stay quick for a while. Every part of your face is moving in a different direction.

If you've ever licked all the features off your own face, welcome to Alcoholics Anonymous. We're glad you're here. I'm not making fun of you. I'm coming close. But I'm really not making funny and I'll tell you why.

I don't care what you are. I don't care if you're a crack monster. Oh, that's scary crack monster. I don't care what you are. Just catch alcoholism.

Catch alcoholism. We'd love to give it to you. I was not an alcoholic when I came to AA. I did not have alcoholism. I, I caught alcoholism in Alcoholics Anonymous meetings, and it took a lot of them.

And the more I go to, the worse my alcoholism gets. I, I developed a very mild case at first and, and it's gotten worse. The infection enters through the ear, but I could not possibly have been alcoholic. So if you're not alcoholic, I wanna welcome you to AA and urge you to stick around long enough to get a diagnosis. If you have been building up a bright outlook for yourself and your family and ripping it down around your ears within a senseless series of sprees, you could be alcoholic.

If you fail to recall with sufficient force the memory of the suffering and pain and agony of, of a day, a week, a minute ago, you could be alcoholic. If you, protect your right to vomit, you could be alcoholic. If you're not alcoholic, what is wrong with you? Really, what, what is, what is wrong with you? You might catching alcoholism might be a lofty goal.

I mean, it really, but I was not alcoholic when I got here for a lot of reasons. Number 1, I'm Jewish and Jews don't drink because it might dull the pain. And, you know, You don't wanna squander any agony opportunity. And I had done something that many of us do in different situations. I had clung onto this idea that as a Jew, that kind of suffering was, was something that I was attached to.

Just like any members of different races and creeds and religions can identify and cling onto some fake identity, which can't stand up to the light of God. Those things become transparent and they disappear. But that was my idea, you know, and it's an idea that I discarded many years ago. Otherwise, I don't know that I'd be sober today. In addition to the Judaism, I could not possibly have been alcoholic.

I had been in psychotherapy for 18 years. I was gonna be dead, but I was gonna understand it. And, I'm not putting, therapy down. Therapy's great stuff. It says on page 133 of our book, and I love your theme this year, and I love those two pages that are recorded.

I love the reading, that was done tonight. But it says on page 133, if you need a doctor, go get one. That's not too clear, is it? And I don't, I don't have malpractice insurance, so I don't tell people what to take or where to go. The fact is is and by the way, I gotta tell you, I'm I'm gonna ask you one favor tonight.

Please don't take anything I say about AA or what I'm doing in AA as a personal indictment of what you're doing. I have no idea what you should do in Alcoholics Anonymous. I'm convinced this is why God made more than one of us, so we would have different kinds of behavior in Alcoholics Anonymous. You know, there's stuff that people do in AA that I would be drunk in 2 seconds, and there's stuff that I do that people would look at me and go, you call that sponsorship? You know?

And I'm convinced that that, I've just been asked to do tonight, I've been asked to do what what the stories in the book were asked to do. I'm I'm supposed to tell you about this journey I've had to a power that has brought about a personality change sufficient enough to bring about sobriety. And just like it says in the beginning of the book, I don't mean to piss anyone off. That's a paraphrase. And, and if I do, you Shar's right here with a wreath.

She asked me to talk. Talk to her. I I don't, don't see me after the meeting to straighten me out or to correct any details. Write her a letter, you know, and rip it up at any rate. But I I, I was in therapy and I, it was like going, there was nothing wrong with therapy.

I had good therapy but my colossal mistake is I was trying to treat my alcoholism with psychotherapy, which is like showing up at a gunfight with a knife once a week and just getting these colossal ass poundings, you know. And, the idea of therapy and and, Andres read it tonight. We we long felt that some form of moral psychology was necessary. That's that's self examination with a moral application, not what I was doing, which was self examination with self examination. It uncovered, discovered.

And and the my problem is is I've you say I've got anxiety. I'm I'm a neurotic. I don't know if any if that resonates for anyone here. I don't know if anyone here's ever been called neurotic, but the idea of a neurosis is you get anxiety, anxiety, anxiety and then you come up with a solution for the anxiety and it's worse than the anxiety. Your your solution is worse than your problem.

I don't know if that resonates for anyone here. Okay. So I've got anxiety. I'm I'm resolving it in terrible, terrible ideas. Right?

And it's getting worse and worse. So I go to the therapist. I got anxiety. What's the matter? I feel terrible.

I, I was so drunk today. I was too drunk to walk, so I drove. Well, what are we gonna do about that? Let's talk about it. I got an idea.

What were you thinking just before you did it? Nothing. Nothing. How are you gonna treat? Nothing.

It would take a board of therapists 24 hours a day, 7 days a week to file my stuff, just to file it, to do intake on it, just to put it on a shelf in a folder because alcoholism's too efficient. It does its job way too efficiently. It generates anxiety and insanity at such a horrific rate. There's no way to stack therapy up to it. Not my therapy.

No way. At any rate, I did not have alcoholism when I came to Alcoholics Anonymous. I had a terrible, terrible journey to a to a I don't know if anybody heard Mark, talk last night. Mark, really, in terms of a bottom, really springs the bar way down. You know, by the time his story's over, he came to AA packed in 27 mason jars.

It's, you just wanna go up and touch them at the end of it. It's pretty remarkable. But I had a terrible journey to Alcoa Sonoma. I, grew up in the Bronx, to a completely insane family. My wife never believed me about my family until she met them.

And, my mom threw an engagement party for us and, my aunt Rose came and wore her wig backwards and it had a bun on it. And, the whole night the bun was bouncing off her forehead and, this was not a mistake. This was a look she was going after. She kind of wore it askew, kind of like a beret. And, if you, if you, if you got anything for free in my family, it meant it was stolen.

And, I had an uncle who was a welder who used to get free bales of steel wool. Like, here's your check and your complimentary bale of steel wool. And his his wife took a decorating course and made throw pillows and filled all the throw pillows with free steel wool. Now that stuff works its way through on you after a while. So when you were at their house, if you looked at the room, everybody was moving a little bit, you know.

The whole room was like a pulsing, breathing, living organism. They were psycho, absolutely psycho. And, there was, mental and physical abuse and chronic institutionalization, suicide attempts, and if you're new here, all I've got is good news because my family didn't have one thing to do to with making me an alcoholic. I'm not telling you that they didn't injure me. I was terribly injured as a child, and I'm not telling you I haven't had to do a lot of stuff to deal with that.

I have. But I'm telling you, they didn't make me an alcoholic because that's a whole other animal. I cannot control or moderate once I drink. I'm a member if you're new, I'm a member of a really small relatively small group of people who actually are allergic to alcohol. And if you're special and a drug addict, try some controlled crack smoking, you know.

Just, fill your mouth up with crack smoke and say I'm not in the mood and blow it out, And, and hats will fill the air. We'll make you president. And that wouldn't be so bad if I didn't have this nutty thinking. I mean, it would be okay. People who are, are, allergic to strawberries don't eat strawberries.

They even are careful. They say, Hey, is there any strawberries in that? Because if there are, I'm not gonna eat them. They're real careful about it. They don't buy strawberries.

They don't have strawberries. But I've got this nutty, nutty thinking that goes, strawberries, schmawberries. Who cares? Right? Because my alcoholism goes below the horizon, it stops presenting itself as a real piece of business, and I drink again no matter what.

No matter what. And I still have that kind of thinking. That's why I do more in AA than I have since I came in on April 22, 1985. I do more today, and that's who I've hung out with since I became a member, those who are who my sponsors are and who have been. The people who when things get good, they do more, and when things get bad, they do more.

They just do more. And, because I still have this thinking. I was about 14 years sober a couple years ago. I'm 19 years in now, and it's about 14 years sober, and I had to get surgery on my hand. And the doctor said, you know, mister Redmond, you're gonna need general anesthetic.

And, I said, general anesthetic? That's great. That's great. Normal people don't get excited about general aesthetic. There's no normal person that goes, oh.

Oh. And I'll tell you why. Because you're generally anesthetized for it. You're unconscious. And there's one thing they remember, which I forget, there's gonna be an operation.

I forget that. That's forget about that. Right? Oh, man. But I know some about general anesthetic and some of you know it too.

When they hit you with it, they say count backwards from a 100 and you go a 199. I love 99. I love 99. So a couple years ago I'm like 17 years sober and I go to a different doctor and he says, you know, I see you're gonna need the same surgery on your other hand, the surgery that you had on this hand. And I looked at him and I said, I guess we'll be having some of that general anesthetic there.

And he looks at me like I'm nuts. He says, you don't need general anesthetic with that operation. And my first thought was, no. I need another doctor is what I need. But I didn't go get one because my ex Nazi.

If you don't tell them these things, you then go get a second opinion. At any rate, I have this nutty thinking that keeps driving me to take a drink I can't stop taking, and I developed this cancer of the soul, this spiritual tapeworm that ate me up from the inside and left me hollow and insane and alone. And I'm sorry my family doesn't have the power to make that person. They're not alchemists. They're not wizards.

They can't come up with that horrifying, hopeless mix. Only the disease of alcoholism is capable of that. I, grew up in the Bronx. I wanted to be a good guy. I didn't seem to be able to act that way.

My dad was a hardworking guy. He worked as a bartender and made $10,000 a year and my brother and I never went to school with ripped clothing and never missed a meal. I grew up in a a very loving, insane home where things were very consistent. You know? And, I, started drinking real young.

I got thrown out of a gang, who was stealing cars. And, I went and, went and joined the hippies. They had no, no, paperwork or anything. There wasn't a test. This is around 1965, 1966.

And I, you know, I didn't wanna be an alcoholic like I was with those the greasers I was hanging out with. I was 12, 14 years old. I and I so I started I overcame my alcohol problem with marijuana. I'd like to welcome all the pot smokers here tonight. You remember Wow, right?

Wow. Wow. Wow. And right after wow usually came, what? What?

Wow. What? Wow. What? Wow.

What? What? Wow. What? Watching a pot smoker is like watching a dog try to run on linoleum.

There's, you know, there's like a lot of movement. Activity, actually. No movement at all. But a lot of activity. They just can't get a claw in the rug.

I, I kicked that gold darn, marijuana with pills. I triumphed over pills with cocaine. Cocaine is an excellent drug. It's particularly good for sex if you enjoy sex from the neolithic period. And then I, overcame that gall torn.

Cocaine with heroin. Heroin's a very dark, complicated, artistic drug and, then you cross the line and become a vomiting pig. And, alcohol was on the table every day and I started therapy when I was 14 and moved from substance to substance and started dying from alcoholism, and I wasn't even close to catching it. I was in my early twenties. I was hitchhiking down the West Side Highway from the Bronx to Manhattan, and my aunt and uncle pulled up in a car, and my father had had a massive stroke.

And I was taken to the hospital and I couldn't show up for my old man the night that he died. I couldn't even go into the room and touch him on the cheek and give him a kiss and tell him I loved him. I was a pig, an animal who didn't deserve to be in the same world as him. And the ice around my heart had, had become so thick by that time, and I had so rearranged my life to accommodate the walk to the drink that, I was I was dead. I I couldn't even fit the pain in my head.

And I had to do some very quick work that night. I had to I had to I couldn't be that guy. I and I figured out real quick it was heroin and needles, and all I had to do was never put a needle in my arm again, and I wouldn't be the guy who couldn't show up for his old man. And that's that's what I did. I did not.

I didn't touch a needle from that night forward until I did. Shortly after that, I was acting in a Broadway play, and a new usherette with long brown hair walked in. I took one look at her. I didn't even say hello to her. I walked back into the dressing room, got on top of a chair in the male dressing room, and announced to the male members of this cast that if anybody talked to the new ushererette with long brown hair, I'd break all the bones in their hands and feet.

And, and today is our 28th winning anniversary. And why I'm here really is for the same reason that Zelda and Marc went and talked when their kid was in the hospital. It's the same reason. I don't got a marriage. I don't got nothing without you.

That's not true. I got a lot of something without you. A lot of pain. A lot of agony. And, Nancy and I just, oh, we just fell in love.

The earth just opened up beneath it. We had a great time. I mean, one of the most misquoted and misused lines in the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous for me and and look, if you're new you are gonna hear wacky stuff about alcoholism. You're gonna hear some wacky stuff. Some of it might work for you.

Some of it might not. Some of it has worked for me and not I've never found any of the stuff that not never found it in that big blue book. Never. And but it works for I've heard that alcoholics don't like change. I don't like change I don't like, but I love change that I like.

I I like it. I've never heard anyone get to the podium and say, well, I hit the lottery and I'm having sex with identical twins. It's killing me. I I just, can't stand this change. I've heard that alcoholics are perfectionists.

I'm a pig. I'm a pig. I'm not a perfectionist. I the only time I become a perfectionist is when my wife is caring for me. Then I'm explosively perfectionistic, and I'm I it really my favorite though is that alcoholics are above average intelligence.

I have only heard this at Alcoholics Anonymous meetings. I have never heard it at an Al Anon meeting ever. And I've heard people in AA say, you know what? My worst day in here is better than my best day out there. No.

No. I had such a good time out there. Such a good time when I was having a good time, you know. Let's see. Let's see.

An all female jazz band, a pound of cocaine, or a panel to the prison. I don't know. What do I like to do? My my worst day in here what what actually the book says on the end of chapter 3, what the guy says is I wouldn't trade my worst day in here for my best day out there because I won't trade this way of life. I won't do it.

I won't live like a sap anymore. I won't settle for a nickel today when I could have a quarter tomorrow. I won't do it. And I don't have to do it because my alcoholism presents. It doesn't slide below the horizon anymore and stop presenting itself as a real piece of business.

You know? Nancy and I got married and, she became very troubled and, she started getting very sick. We became so sick that at one point, a guy lent us his car and we sold his car. I will never forget this guy's voice on the phone as long as I live. He said, you sold my car?

I what are you talking about? I lent you my car. That's like it's like house sitting for someone and they come back and you're in escrow. What what what are you talking about? But the alcoholic life becomes the only normal one.

We didn't have money for rent. No, really. And, and I looked into my wife's eyes and I said, I am so sick of being a punk irresponsible kid. Let's stand in our own 2 feet. Let's do the right thing.

Let's sell the car. And my wife looked at me with tears in her eyes and said, let's do. I came home one day. We had these 32 ounce iced tea tumblers in the house. I popped the cork on a bottle of wine.

I emptied the entire bottle of wine into one of these tumblers. And I turn around and my wife is giving me her pre El Anon rat face. And I said, what? She said, what are you doing? And I looked at her and I said, I'm having a glass of wine.

What the hell do you think I'm doing? Can't a man have a glass of wine in his own home? No. What are you gonna do? Are you gonna debate that?

Are you gonna debate are you gonna get the dictionary out? What's a glass? Oh man. Man, oh man. Our son, Michael, was born and we were surrounded by friends and family.

We got a ton of phone calls. He was really welcomed into our community. And 2 years 9 months later when our son, Jesse, was born, there was no one at the hospital, no friends, no family, no phone calls. In just 2 years 9 months, we had so we just we pressed ourself on the people that loved us like a thumb upon a bruise. It hurt too much to be around us.

And Jesse was sick. He had to go in neonatal intensive care. And that night this doctor who I'd never met before, huge hospital in in Los we were living in Los Angeles by that time, Said, you know, mister Redmond, your wife's in extreme psychological duress. There's no one here. The baby's in an incubator.

What what is what where are you? And I said, you know what? The fact is is I can't find anybody to watch my 2 year old kid. And this doctor who I had never met before said to me, you know, my my husband is home. I'll give you my phone number and my address.

You can take your son to my house and my husband will watch him so you can be with your family. And I said no. I had no way to accept this woman's generosity. And now my poor kid, Micah, has gotta be locked in the house with this insane man wracked with guilt and remorse. I would have done better to take him down to the hospital and leave him with a coloring book in the waiting room.

At least he could have got the hell away from me. And this is you know, and and Bill says it in his story. You know, he paints this horrifying picture. And for us, this was our this is all alone completely isolated by alcoholism. And and little were we to know it was gonna go on for almost 3 more years.

You know, and I I mean, one would say that's enough, you know, to be to have have your have this tiny I didn't come into AA with this big anger. I came into AA with this pathetic I was like a tiny, incredibly painful wound. And, this is where we wound up. We started on Broadway. This is where we wound up.

This was a good night in the Redmond home. Good night in the Redmond home. Good day in the Redmond home. I I got into an accident and, I, they took me to the hospital. My blood pressure was about a 160 over a 110.

They said, mister Edmond, you're gonna have to your your your blood pressure's gotta come down. Are you marking me? Am I getting notes or what? Thank you very much. Student paperwork.

I'm talking. What the hell are you doing? Can I have the sergeant in arms up here, please? What a suit, the doctor said you have to lose weight. And I said, you know what?

I would like to do that, but I drink alcohol and smoke marijuana before I go to bed every night, so I'm not gonna be able to. And the doc the doctor said to me, why don't I prescribe some medication for you? And I said, what a country. And what he prescribed for me was a a drug called chloral hydrate, which is a a a MIC KEY. It's a fast acting, tranquilizer.

It's just like getting hit in the head with a sap, and I love these pills. I love love my knockout drops. So Nancy comes home. I'm eating handfuls of knockout drops and I'm slamming my arms into the wall to keep myself awake so I can enjoy my knockout drop because you don't want to waste a perfectly good knockout drop. So I'm eating handfuls of these pills, smashing body parts into the wall until I just seize, ah, keel over, and now I'm going up in the bed, and now I'm in continent like the rest of the 33 year old men in America, because I can't get out of bed to go to the bathroom because I got so much Mickey in me.

And one night I got up and wet the wall and Nancy was excited. It's like, honey, you're you know, we've got some movement here. You're headed towards the bathroom. She was dead serious. This was you know, she made me a big breakfast which I ate and puked up and and, we got things moving there.

About 4 months, about 6 months before I got sober, I got a job, directing the TV show in Dallas and I was down there for a while and I wind up working for a guy in Texas and I got a running start on my bottom in Texas like nobody's business. And I'm a kid from the Bronx and now I'm in Texas and I'm cooked all the time. And they're sending me out into the West Texas desert with a full Panavision crew and I'm a tongue chewing, babbling idiot. I'm standing with the guy I'm working for and I turn around and there's some huge black birds and I went, what the hell? And he said, they're turkey buzzards.

I said, oh my god. They're vultures. Those are vultures. He says, you ain't got no vultures? I said, no.

We don't have any vultures. And the the guy says, what eats things when they die? This guy had a lot of dough and he had an airplane, a little little jet airplane. There ain't no such thing as a little jet. You know, if you have a jet you have a jet.

Right? So we're up in his jet. We're scouting locations and, the pilot says, hey director, come on up here. Look at the window. And I went, I'm not going anywhere.

I smelled some. It was brought up in the Bronx, you know. And I I've sat in my seat. The producer gets up with a cocktail, starts walking towards the front of the plane and they barrel rolled the plane 3 times because that's their deal. You know, we're gonna, you know, we're gonna get one of these Jews to stand up.

It's gonna be fun. See his yarmulke fall off when the thing goes around and around. And it pounded into the ground like a it was like a shimmering bowl of Jell O. Not one drop poured out of his drink. And I I fell in love with these guys.

I fell in love with Big T, you know? And he had he had a a swimming pool in the shape of a cowboy boot outside of his house, man. And I was just in 7th heaven. I was drinking with Kings, you know, walking with giants, but they knew how to stop, you know. And, I wound up back in Los Angeles, after this job and and, and on, by that time our sons were just crippled.

They were 6 and 3. That was the last job for me. I had to get out of LA for anybody to hire me, and when I got back to LA, there there was nothing for me there. My life and career had just slid out between my fingers like a handful of water over and over and over again. And, my younger son was 3.

My older son was 4. My younger son couldn't stop pretending that he was a robot, and I mean couldn't stop. And not a healthy game. He, it just it hurt too much to be a a person, and it just and he got locked into that world. My older son was reading and writing years below his grade level.

His small motor skills were screwed up, and I and I and there was nothing organically wrong with him. They were so scared all the time. They were so disrupted by living in an active alcoholic home. And if you're new here, God bless you. Welcome to AA.

If you can stop if you could take advantage of this opportunity that's been afforded you, if you're not drinking, then you can stand and take the whooping. God bless you, man. It was terrible, absolutely terrible. You know? I didn't know.

I hadn't read the 2nd and third chapters. I didn't know about the the warped lives of blameless wives and children. I didn't know what was wrong with my kids. I didn't know that the fact that they were aimlessly aggressive en route to a goal that never got achieved, or they would just throw the towel in it and say, what's the use anyway? I didn't know that that was alcoholism.

That's hardcore basic template of the thinking that gets hardwired into alcoholics and their families. That's been my experience. It's been my experience in my family, and it's been my experience working with families coming in. And on April 22, 1985, I crossed the line. I swore I'd never ever, ever would cross again.

I put a needle in my arm. And, why? Why not? It was time. And I have no idea why I didn't continue to do it.

Don't know. It's a complete mystery to me. It's an absolute mystery to me. Even though my life was in that shambles, my life had been in the shambles 2 years 9 months before when we were all alone at the hospital. But I called my therapist of record in my 18th year of psychotherapy, my first Jungian therapist.

I told him what I had done, and he said to me that day the exact same thing that Carl Jung told the man who 12 stepped the man who 12 stepped Bill Wilson. I didn't know this until I was gonna until I read our literature, and it really made me feel good when I read it. He said to me, there's absolutely nothing that can be done for you. And I said, what? He said, I can't help you.

The only thing I can suggest is we have you institutionalized. And then he said something that Carl Jung couldn't say. He said, or you attend a meeting of Narcotics Anonymous or Alcoholics Anonymous. Now why I went to the AA meeting? Couldn't tell you.

I I like general anesthetic. I get excited about dental surgery. A nut house, that's a chance to be with my people, colorful and adventurous people, and that's an uninterrupted source of narcotics, for a period of time. So I don't I don't I have no idea. It is an absolute mystery to me why I went to that AA meeting, but I did.

I woke up at 5 o'clock in the morning. I got a bad check to write you. We went down to a place called Unit A in the San Fernando Valley, which Nancy Ann knows it's the end of the world basically. And, and I walked into this room. I took one look around and I said, oh my god.

How did I wind up in Alcoholics Anonymous? How? How lame is this? This is beyond lame. This is beyond church, beyond synagogue.

This is some plateau of lameness I never even imagined was available to me. Alcoholics Anonymous. And everything was America. I'm America. You're America.

You're just a miracle. The furniture and coffee are miracles. They're miracle. I I I just I I couldn't believe it. I couldn't believe it.

And the room looked like it was the product of, like, 200 years of inbreeding to me. You know? There were, like, identical twins carving their initials on each other's feet in the back of the room. I mean, that that that's the way it looked to me. And I'm waiting for the Jew hunt to break out.

I know that's gonna start any minute. Right? Come on Jaime, strap these antlers on. Always wanted to run a big buck Jew. Then at the end of the meeting, the AA unsolicited information guy he you know him.

Right? He came up to me. Do I want what you've got? No. No.

But thanks for spitting on me Clyde. I really appreciate it, But the kind of bully I am, I won't tell the guy to go screw off. I grinned and I nod, you know, and I just pray that his face will burst into flame, you know. That it'll just go up in a column of smoke. I'm here.

Isn't it bad enough that I'm here in Alcoholics Anonymous? I went back to that meeting every morning for a year and I'll tell you why I think I did. I think I did because I was out of plans. And if you're new here, I pray for you that you're out of plans. Are you marking me now?

What the hell is is this like a test? I start talking. These guys do paperwork. Is anybody I was out of plans. If you're new here, I pray for you.

I pray that you're out of plans. If you're new and you have a plan, it's probably a beaut. Don't use your plan. Grab one of us after the meeting and tell us your plan. We wanna know the plan.

The most utilized newcomer plan I have run across and I know it's big in San Antonio, I know it, is the one more dope deal to set myself up financially for sobriety plan. I got a buddy that lives out near Mark who was sponsoring this guy. This this guy raised the bar. About a year or 2 ago, this guy was sponsoring a guy who was sober for a while, stopped doing the work, drifted drifted away, got drank, got 2 DUIs in rapid succession. Small town in Nebraska.

And the guy came up with a plan. This is his plan. He didn't want to go to jail. He made 5 Molotov cocktails. He went down to the small county courthouse in this small town.

He put a he was this one of your guys? Oh, my God. I'll, I'll, I'll try to get it right. He put 1 Molotov cocktail on each corner of the building. Now I've never read the instructions on a Molotov cocktail, but I believe throwing is involved at some point.

They they might even have, you know, the universal sign for throwing, this. And then he took the 5th cocktail, laid down in his car and fell asleep. Right? Now this guy, he didn't get 40 AA meetings. He's probably in Guantanamo Bay with a black hat on, right?

I mean, yeah. So if you're new, I really hope you're out of plans. I, I really hope. And I went back to that meeting and I, stuck around Alcoholics Anonymous. My wife reached out to the Al Anon family groups and I just can't tell you how much I appreciate the great atmosphere in and around Al Anon that I've heard and seen and felt and tasted this weekend.

It makes me proud and it makes me so glad. Because when I was a newcomer in Alcoholics Anonymous, there was a time or 2 where I would go to meetings and I would hear people telling jokes about Al Anon, and I'm not talking about good natured, wonderful jokes. I've told a few tonight. I'm talking about mean, ignorant jokes. And I and until I stuck around long enough to find out that these were just mean and ignorant people, although I judge no man.

But until I stuck around long enough to know that I was very confused and very injured by it because my wife had reached out to the Al Anon Family Groups and I was really proud of her her and really glad she did. And I'd sit in my seat and I'd go, man, isn't this like isn't this what we're supposed to be doing? I mean, can you imagine going to a meeting and hearing people tell ignorant, ill tempered, untruthful jokes about Alcoholics Anonymous. I I know that as a member of AA, I think, oh, you can't imagine how wrong you are. You don't have any information.

You don't This is not based on any real information. You know, so if you're doing that on a public level, that's your vote is that it's okay to do. I, I used to have all the votes. I've been whittled down to just this one measly vote by good sponsorship. Damn.

And, my vote is that it's not okay because there might be a newcomer, and a family that's making a beginning here and getting it going. And, I think we have I think I have a responsibility as part of the responsibility edict in AA to blow on the embers of that fire, you know, and and make that that that burn. And we had a lot of insane rules in our house. My kids were not allowed to eat sugar, curse, or watch TV. So my wife would, give him granola for breakfast and put him in the car with me, doctor death, and say, hope you live boys.

You've had a hearty breakfast and hope you make it back. And she would take the boys over to her Al Anon sponsor's house. Ruby, who is still her sponsor today, and Ruby would, give him a big bowl of M and M's, turn on the love boats, sit him down in front of the TV, and cuss up a storm. Cuss up a storm. I'll use one bad word and if it really bugs you, talk to Char later, but it's just one little one, just a little one.

Her husband, Milton, who was 10 years sober at the time, called my sons over. We needed we were made out of wood. We needed to be lightened up. We needed to be loved up. We needed to our circulation to start again.

And Milton called the boys together. They were little, little boys and he said, boys, your parents don't know shit. And my kids went, oh my god. We suspect it, but now it's been confirmed. This is like this is fantastic.

Fantastic for them to hear that there's an elephant in the living room, that they've been insane. At any rate, I stuck around AA 6 months. I enjoyed the gift of step none. I was doing nothing and receiving nothing, and I was getting nuttier and nuttier. And, and I knew I was gonna drink because I had seen the AA drill 100 of times, from the time I came in.

And people came in, did the work and changed. People came in, did do the work, didn't change, got terribly ill. And I asked God to sponsor me, a great guy, and he made sure I had done some reading from the big book of AA, and he invited me to his house, and he read chapter 5 to me. And, we took me through the first two steps. We reached step 3 and got on our knees and said a prayer, which I felt was unnecessary and embarrassing, but I did it anyway.

And, and then he went back and he gave me instructions on how to do a 4th step. And, I I will tell you this. I stopped feeling like I was still in somebody's chair here. I really did. I stopped feeling like I was still in someone's seat.

I came back to him at 9 months of sobriety 3 months later, and I read my inventory to him. And I will tell you this, I feel lucky that I stayed sober long enough to do that inventory at 6 months. And if you knew, you know, we we some of us get so excited if you actually stop drinking. The the not drinking part's a moose. If it wasn't for the not drinking part, we would be a much bigger organization.

I guarantee it. Our ranks would swell, really, if it wasn't for the god darn not drinking thing. Here's a weird thing. If you're new, when you wanna drink, don't. But we get excited when someone stops drinking.

Some of us get excited and we want, and maybe some of us sound like we're bullying or being pushy, but some of us, I think we are so anxious to see you try to get a crowbar into this thing and keep this portal open, keep this because we see these opportunities disappear so quickly sometimes. So forgive us our exuberance. And I sensed my portal, could certainly, close. I didn't think I was gonna stay sober on my wife's participation in Al Anon. Thank you.