Saturday Night Live Friday speaker meeting

My name is Harry. I'm alcoholic and addict. I'm not married. Just Just put that away, Jerry. Right away.

Well, I like these conservative meetings. I tell you. This is my kind of AA, man. You guys would have scared the shit out of me when I first got here. I'd have been looking in the pots, man.

I don't know how you guys were. Really. I'd have been smoking your tea instead of drinking it. I'm not kidding. Something.

This is really funny. This has been screwed up since I got here. I thought it was an 8 o'clock meeting, so I got here at quarter to 8 patting myself on the back and sit in the back for 45 minutes talking to Jerry, which is always a joy. So he's paying me back. He's sitting in the front row.

Now I don't know if you've ever been in on a conversation that me or him are in on, but you're never in on on it, man. We rarely know what we're talking about, you know, but we have a hell of a time with each other, which is what it's all about here. I don't know what you're talking about. You don't know what I'm talking about. I love what Richard said, you know, I don't know if you guys ever watch me play baseball, but, I'm not real mellow in the game, you know.

Even in practice, I'm known to slide into 2nd base after somebody's shorts because that's my base, you see, you know. And And that's the way it's been most of my life, you know. It's just been I'm aggressive and that's all there is to it folks, you know. And it's that's I just I forget who's playing with me and they're my friends and, you know, and, it hasn't got a lot better in three and a half years here, but it's gotten a little bit mellower. Asking me the guys at Sunnyvale that I've played with, you know, they thought I was bad in Campbell.

You should have seen me when I got with those guys. They told me they were good, and I said, oh, yeah? Catch me, suckers. You know, here we go, man. And we we had a good game over there for a while, and then they kicked me out and said that at your age, you should be a little bit more mellow than that, Harry, you know, because I'd be out there screaming, kill them, and it was a practice game.

You know? And it was a girl at bat, you know. Didn't matter to me, you know. I get I get into the spirit of things. You see, I get real high, real easy, and, I always have.

That's been my problem. And Then the great inability to say no, you know, you know, if you had one, I'll take 3. God, this I'm nervous, man. I'm sitting here blowing it. I'm real tired, and that's probably why I'm nervous.

But, I John asked me what I was gonna chair on tonight, and I said, what I wish it was like. So so there ain't no telling what you're gonna get tonight, but we're gonna we're gonna try to start it out at least reasonable. I got here because I didn't have any place else to go, and that's bottom line. I got here by getting in the back of a police car that was at my house for the 4th time in 5 days, and telling them I didn't know what you did with people like me, but you had me. And when I got in the back of their car, I had about a 100 little over a $100 a day cocaine habit and I was drinking a case of stout malt liquor.

And I was smoking as much dope as I could put in my mouth. And I've been that way for about almost about 11 months, 10 months, something like that. Weighed a hot 110. My eyes were crossed. My nose didn't work, and I couldn't tell you my name twice in a row, you know.

But I was proud, man. You know? I was I was a proud motherfucker boy. They, I didn't care. You know?

They had come on a Friday night because I was playing my bass guitar in my garage at at 8 or 9, you know, and I had 2 big Fender stage amps, and I was vibrating windows and fruit trees all up and down my block. And I was by myself as usual. Nobody else could stand me by that time. You know, I was a legend of my own mind by that time. And everybody that loved me had reconsidered, you know, and all had left.

And and I was having a hell of a time, man. I was, into my I was in I used to play one note, blues bass. I don't know if you know what that is. But that's where you play the same note until you get it right, you know. From the time I was 27 to 31, I played the same note, man.

You know, I never did get it right, but, practice, practice, practice. What can I say? Anyway, they came in and asked me to turn down my bass because the neighbors were complaining because it was 12 o'clock at night, and I got righteously indignant for them to serving an artist at his work, you know. And, I agreed to do that because I had learned at about 16 that when the police came and told you to turn down the noise you did it and they went away. You know, that's no big thing there.

It was all street sense and usually when I was loaded I had at least that, you know, most of the time sometimes even that was gone. So I turned it down the next night I had my stereo up, and same amplifiers in the same garage at the same time and they came back same 2 cops, both rookies. And I don't know if you guys had any truck with Campbell rookie police, but they are the assholes of the western world, boy. They really don't know what they're doing. You know?

And if you're like me and dealt with police a lot, that scares the shit out of you, man because those are the ones that will shoot you It's not the veterans man It's the dummies that are running around trying to get new, you know and trying to get old and whatever they're trying to do Anyway, I saved 2 guys and they said turn it down again and I said, okay, you know, and that was Saturday night and then Sunday night they came back because by that time I had graduated out to the middle of the street where I was throwing gallon jugs of milk in the air, letting them hit the asphalt, you know, showing the kids in the neighborhood the patterns. Now my neighbors didn't like me a lot, but their children love me, you know, because they never did know what I was gonna do. I was weird stranger than dirt all the way through. You know? I was up changing my antenna bunches of times falling off the roof, and I'd had Gil for 6 months, you know, but, that didn't bother me.

You know, things like that didn't bother me at all. Anyway, that Sunday night they said, you know what? You're getting in our face, man. We can't do nothing with you because you're basically just disturbing the peace and being rowdy. But same 2 cops again, you know, and he said, but what we will do is, is bust you if we see away from your house anywhere.

You get out on the streets. I don't care if it's walking on a bicycle or in a vehicle, man, and we see you, you're gone. And that was not the first time that kind of threat had ever been made to me. And I knew that they meant it because they were rookies and they were very, very emotionally involved in their job. And so I went back in my house and I sat down at my table and I got out my mirror and I got out my beer and I got out my pot and I thought, well, which one?

You know, because I was a master of roller coaster pharmaceutical. I don't know if anybody's ever gotten into that. But you take this one to bring you up and that one to take you down and this one to even you off and that one to make it better and this one to change the colors and, you know, on and on and on and on, you know. And I sit down and I could try to figure out which one of those things I wanted to do to, fix me that night and, and, you know, none of them was gonna do it. And I was 31.

My memory is not improved either. I think I was I was either 30 or 31 and I've been getting loaded since I was 16. And I had not I couldn't remember stringing together 5 days since I was 16 straight. I had manufactured chemicals. I had distributed chemicals.

I had smuggled chemicals. I had been shot, driven out of Mexico 2 or 3 times and various smuggling enterprises. I had, taken LSD every day for 3 years because I was manufacturing it and I had a constant supply and I got into manufacturing because I wanted that supply, not because it was I never got rich on it, folks. You know, I never got rich on nothing because I was into taking it as much as I was to selling it. And if I'd buy a $100 worth, I'd take 50 and sell 50, you know, and I was lucky if I sold 50.

Anyway, it scared the shit out of me, you know, because I could remember ever being out without my wanky, you know, I'd always had something to keep me from looking at myself and something to see about, you know, keeping me from really checking out the state I was in. You know, it always seems like it was really easy to lie to myself when I was loaded and I always say it's just around the corner of the next person through or one more time or whatever it was that always had carried me through to those days. Well, that wasn't working that night either. And, I got up from the table and it was I was done. It was done.

I don't know what happened. I really don't know what to tell you except that I was done and I went in and started shaking down. And I started out on the bed and I ended up on the floor because it wasn't moving far and I figured it wasn't as far to fall either, you know. And I was all Sunday night and all Monday and they came back Tuesday. Same 2 cops again knocked on my door.

And the first thing they asked me was what happened? We out of town yesterday, man. We, you know, we didn't have to come, you know. And I said, well, I ain't appreciating your sense of humor, man. And that's when I made my great line of I'm dying and I wanna get in your car.

And I don't know what you do with me, but you got me. And I didn't care what they did with me because I was literally dying, man. I was, you know, my my thing my body could have gone on a little bit longer, but I was crazy. My mind was had ceased to function somewhere about a year before then and it hasn't changed much, shall we say? Those who know me, you know, I'm a real serious studious fellow, all the time, most of the time.

Anyway, I take life so fucking seriously these days, man. It's just amazing. I don't. I like this you know what? It's just as much.

I find that in this program, the more I stay out of my own life, the better off I am. And my whole goal in this program is to stay emotionally uninvolved with me. You know? Because whenever I get emotionally involved in what Harry's into or going on down around him or or how somebody's trying to screw him over or take his or changes or whatever they're trying to do, then I find I don't think well. So I've been really into watching the flow in the last two and a half years of sobriety anyway.

Just letting things happen to me and not trying to change them too much and to see where they take me. And I tell you what, they've taken me a very, very long way, which are we'll get to maybe. Anyway, I got in the back of their car and they took me to Valley Medical Center. I thought I was going to jail and I really didn't care. I've been there before.

I've been there so many times that the thought of going to jail one more time didn't scare me. In fact, it was almost home, you know. I hadn't been there that that often that was home, but it didn't scare me. And I didn't know what we're gonna do and they took me to Vali Ned to the social detox. Well, I never been to the social detox in my life, you know, and I walked in and the guy looked at me.

He said, holy shit. And the 2 cops said, yeah, you know, and they set me down, you know, and they fuck. What did you know? Did you get hit by something before you got here? I said, no.

This is natural. I even dressed up. Yeah. Which was really funny too. Anyway, we started filling out his questionnaire, and it got down to the part where it says, when did you have your last drink?

Well, this was Tuesday and I'd had my last drink Sunday night. And he said, oh, man, we can't take you. And I said, you know, I said, what? And the 2 policemen went, what? And then I he said, I can't we can't take you.

You gotta be drunk within 24 hours standard of this facility. And the one the one really funny clock cop leaned over and said, listen, if you don't take him, we're taking you. You know? And I, you know, I'd had a long love affair with the men in blue. I used to sit in these meetings and hear all these old housewives stand up and say, oh, he changed my tire for me.

Pulled up right behind me. I'd sit there and go, they never changed my tire. You know? Every time I had any dealing with those suckers, I got in the back of the car, man, and that's the way it worked in my life. You know?

I they never did nothing for me. One time one real dumb policeman in Boulder Creek helped me out, but he didn't know he was doing it. You know, that's that's another story. Anyway, so so I entered the realm of Alcoholics Anonymous and I entered it not wanting to be here. I entered it not happy at being an alcoholic and an addict at 31.

I entered, not happy about the state of my affairs at all. I went from that detox to Benny McEwan Center and at the end of 5 days I was ready to go home, man. I was healthy. I I know none of you guys probably know about this, but you give an alcoholic on a dead run 3 days to recover it and we can lick the fucking world, man. You know?

We get that false adrenaline rush and we think we got it made, man. That's the one thing that kept us out there so long, you know, where we get nailed Friday night Saturday night. We maybe get well Sunday and Monday. And by Tuesday, we were back out there because it was all, you know, like that again. And somebody, I don't even know who it was, taught me to stay in.

And they said, we're gonna send you to a house. And I had a house and I had clothes and I had money because I was, dealing to support my habit when I couldn't play my music anymore because I couldn't remember the tunes anymore. And, I was, you know, my life was in a very start sorry state by the time I got here. And so I went to a fortune's end and I was there three and a half months learning how to stay here. And I don't remember my first meeting.

I couldn't tell you my second meeting. I couldn't tell you where I was at my 3rd meeting. I probably can remember my 4th or 5th meeting. You know, my state of confusion and I didn't go to a meeting until I was about 10 days sober because I was 5 days out of Benny McEwen's and I was another 3 days in the house before they took me out of it. You know, so I can't tell you where I went.

I can tell you that I sit in the in the rooms, you know, and and I thought, oh, shit. What is this, man? You know, what have you done to yourself now, man? You know, you seem to have this rare ability to find yourself in the strangest situations, you know. When I was out there using, I used to wake up with one eye, and the first thing I do is look at the wall.

Now this, you know, this doesn't sound normal or or logical, I'm sure, but this is the way it worked. If the law of the wall was blue, I was home. If the wall was green, I was in jail. If the wall was white, I was in Agnews. And if the wall was any other color, I didn't know where the fuck I was.

You know, and I had to get up and see who was there, who could tell me how I met them usually. You know, how did we get together, man? That's the way I drank. I drank full tilt boogie. I drank until the end.

If we laid stuff on the table, nobody left until that was done. And that's the only way I knew how to get loaded. I didn't know nothing about social drinking. I never tried to control my drinking. I never tried to control my using.

I didn't care about that shit until until it no longer worked anymore. I didn't try to do nothing, you know, I got thrown in jail. I was in jail off and on always for possessions always for disturbing the pieces and rioting and citing the riot and oh, man, you know, and it was all behind being loaded. You know, I was a political activist, and I didn't start out to be an alcoholic or an addict, man. I sit here for 6 months thinking it was the biggest joke in the whole damn world.

You know, why me, man? I used to run with the big boys. I used to manufacture drugs, you know, I used to smuggle this shit, you know, I used to be known for my ability to handle all this stuff. And why me? None of my other friends got it, you know, and they're all worse than me.

I used to watch them. I knew that, man. I knew that, you know, my problem was that I just quit doing things anything except getting loaded finding a place to get loaded, you know, finding a place to score anything like that. My life stopped. And I'd like to tell you that I was going to the market and stuff like that.

My days usually consisted of sitting in my backyard getting loaded waiting to be discovered. That was my big dream, and I was all out there in fantasy land, you know, in la la land, I've heard somebody say. And I used to wait for somebody to walk in my backyard and say, the Rolling Stones need you. You know? And I was gonna go.

You know? I was ready all the time, man. And it never occurred to me that nobody knew who where I lived. You know? And if they did walk back there, I could never play for There's no electricity in my backyard, you know, and half the time I didn't have my instruments.

They were in hock or somebody else in the band and, you know, life was really good for a long long time getting loaded. I I started getting loaded out of high in high school in 1963, and I was one of only 3 people getting loaded in my high school that I knew of. And nobody got loaded. Nobody smoked dope. Everybody drank.

If you were jock and I was a jock, you drank. And, but I smoked. I used to go into LA from the desert, Tyca Tina Turner's club with the black men and, you know, go on and hear Motown, man, and get down and pick up a joint for a buck in the bathroom, you know. Get down, man. Yeah.

You know? Come back, hide in my car, smoke it, go back in and be cool, you know, and be the only white people in there, me and my partner. He used to scared to death. He was scared to death. I was too little to care, you know.

And I kept running away from home to be a hippie and kept getting caught and bring back. He said, okay. Do you have the boys ranch or high school? And I said, well, I'll do high school, you know, because I didn't know what the boys ranch was. I just knew it was way out in the desert, man.

I knew that it was way out there. So I did high school and played sports, was all Southern Californian football, was all Southern Californian baseball. Got out of high school with, like, 4 or 5 scholarship offers and ran away and became a hippie, man. And I was a good one, you know. And my whole life after that consisted of staying one step ahead of the draft because I didn't want to go to Vietnam and it consisted of seeing life because I was gonna go out there and eat it, man.

I was gonna go out there and do life to the best of my ability because I'd watched for 17 whole years my parents stagnate and I thought, you know what? They don't know what they're doing. They don't know what they're doing, you know, so I quit listening to them at somewhere about 15 or 14, quit being a Catholic about that time and I was a full name Catholic, you know, I was really into that and I that's when I decided to run my own life. And I went to Mexico right after high school and then from there to New York City and, then traveled. Got back 5 years later to see my parents.

And, after that, I got into manufacturing. I got into being active against anti war. I got into being active in registering people. I got into the the things for the blacks and the things for the browns and the things for the reds and the things for the yellows, you know, the the people, the for nondiscrimination. You know, I got into all that stuff because I got I was idealist too.

That's one thing that I know about myself in sobriety. I'm an idealist too. You know, if I find something that I really believe in, you know what? I'll work my tail off for it. And this program is one of those things.

This program has taken the place of that. So I got in these rooms and, I sit in the back and I thought, god, you're much too cool for this place, you know. You you know, I don't know where they got all these people, man. But, you know, Jesus Christ, you know. And, the guy's people stood up in the front and he started saying, God, as I understand him, and I thought, oh, God.

Damn. Bible thumpers, man, you know. Where the shit are you now, you know. And then John stood up and said, I love Fred and I thought, oh, no. Homosexual Bible thumpers, you know.

And I thought I was really done for me and, you know, and I walked around and I, you know, talked about, Don Cuppo where Santa Cruz calls it talking out of the side of your mouth, you know, being cool. Hey. How's it going, man? You know? What are you doing these days, man?

You know? And we try to be cool here, and we ain't cool. That's why we're here. You know? But that doesn't ever register.

You know? That takes a long time for that to sink in. And if you knew how to be cool, you wouldn't have walked in here folks, you know, and if you had it under your control, you wouldn't need us, you know. And I walked around here listening to all these mamby pamby stories, you know, and I'm walking around securing the knowledge that I was a heavyweight dude, man, you know, lost count of acid trips at 1200, man. Drink you know, all these guys used to say, you know, I, spill more liquor than you drank, and I'd look at them and say, well, you aren't so fucking old.

You wouldn't old. You wouldn't spill nothing, man. You shake so damn bad. You know? I never spilled nothing, you know?

I never did. I drank out of the bottle. I wouldn't let it get near a glass, you know? I was no fool, man. I learned how to get loaded quick and early and and and got into needling and and came off a hard drugs three times on my own and and I was much too cool for this program.

You know, I didn't know what you guys could tell me when I walked into these rooms. I thought shit, I've done it all, man. I've I've ran with the big guys and I've seen it all, you know, and I've watched people sell themselves for drugs, man. And I've, you know, smuggled and and watch people sold and watch people killed and had people killed and and shot people and got shot and Did a lot of shit out there man because that was the life I had chosen. And I don't know what happened.

I don't know how I got into the real violent street life I got into. I started out to be a hippie. You know? I just wanted a flower child space cadets, you know. But, somehow it will get got out of hand, you know.

My whole life got out of hand, you know. I don't know if you guys can relate to that, but it all it was always there was always something going on that I didn't quite plan on. You know? Like, why am I here? Who is that person?

What is that in his hand? You know? Why is he pointing it at me? What did I do? You know?

Is that his wife? Do I know her? You know, you know, all kinds of things used to go through my mind, you know, and then they, you know, I used to listen to the people in here and there was one guy here that sounded like he was a barker for a carnival. And I used to take his inventory and then John up there, he'd stand up. And David Sorel, you know, described John the best I've ever heard when I was brand new.

You know, David stood up one day and he says, you know, I don't every time I heard that sucker's talk, I didn't know if I was getting married or buried. Goddamn right, you know, and and Carney fit in, you know. And, and, I went about my business, you know, and I'd go to a meeting and the guy next to me we were in a house and we had to go to 4 meetings a week and one of the ones I used to hate was closed men's because they were always honest and I hated honesty. I hated anybody to tell me how screwed up I was man, you know, I I they used to call me an angry young man here and And the only time I'd get angry is when somebody tell me the truth, man. And I could tell the degree of the truth how true it was by how angry I got at hearing it, man, and I'd walk around angry for weeks, you know, because they'd just come right out and so you don't know shit.

You know, you ain't nothing, man. You don't know how to live. You don't know how to do nothing, you know, And I wouldn't admit that. I was worldly, you see. I was I've been in, you know, a lot of countries of the world.

I'd had 3 ladies with a baby by each one, man. I had 2 businesses that I had started, flourished, and got bored with, and sold, man. I, you know, I was cool. And they say, you don't know the first thing about living life in anything close to responsible happy manner. And I said, what are you talking about?

And he said, your addictions are all over you, man. You know, your your inability to function without alcohol, your inability to function without drugs, without females, without a job, without a nice car, you know, if they're sticking out like you can't believe. All your status is in your arm or on your arm, man, and that's it. You know? You use people like you use drugs and alcohol.

I didn't know about that. I didn't know that I'd use people to escape with or make me feel good or make me feel better or, you know, jack me up in the eyes of others. I didn't know I did that shit, man. And they said, yeah, that's pretty real for you. You know, Half my life I had people in my arm that I didn't really love, but they look good there.

They look real good there and they made they made me feel good there. And I didn't know I did that sober. I didn't know I really did that getting loaded, you know. I just thought that they were mine and that was my lot and that's the way it went. You know, you snooze, you lose, and too bad sucker.

So I go to these meetings because I had to you know and, the guy next to me would would bump me in the arms, you know Everybody they'd say any newcomers and the guys stand up from the house and they go, I'm blah blah. I'm an alcoholic, man. And they go, blah blah blah. I'm an alcoholic. And then they'd punch me and I'd stand up and I'd say, I'm Harry, you know.

And the guy would say, you're an alcoholic. I'd say, hey, man. You know, watch your mouth. So it took me took me a while, you know, to even go for that. You know, I didn't want this program.

I didn't want your unconditional love. I didn't want your goddamn honesty. I didn't want none of that shit, man. I just wouldn't wanna hurt no more, and I didn't wanna get loaded no more. And that's all I knew.

I didn't want to be a good person. I didn't want values and morals and all that shit. I didn't want those things. I didn't see where they were needed. I just wanted to not get load.

I just didn't wanna go to jail no more, hurt no more, and get loaded no more. And that's all I came for. That's it. I was dying, you know. So I walked around and I didn't hear nobody tell a story like mine, you know, and it was pointed out at a year and a half that I was probably might have been going to the wrong meetings, but you know that that's neither here nor there because my all my addictions were rampant by the time I got here.

And then I ran into a dude named Albert, incredible Albert. I don't know if you guys know incredible Albert, but he's perhaps one of the most incredible people I've ever met, you know, actually as crazy as a coon, you know, and he hides it real well, you know, and I needed to have him there. Well, okay, Jerry's second crazy as a coon and Don't want to be disrupted on top of no thrones here, right? Anyway, Albert taught me the beginnings of, you can still be screwed up. You can still have a good time.

You can still sing at work. You can still turn over tractors. You can still probably not how know how to do relationships. You can still be a normal everyday real human being and make this program and have a very good time. And Albert's attitude at life was my attitude at life, you know.

All of a sudden this guy, I, you know, he comes to the house and says, I want people to work with me, you know. And I go, well, shit. I'm broke. I'll go with you, you know. And everybody in the house is going, no.

I don't go with that guy, man. He's crazy. You know? That sucker, all he does is talk AA all day. You don't wanna go with him, man.

You know? And I thought, well, I gotta go. I gotta work, man. So I I went with Albert and, you know, and we're working on this job. And I look over and this guy's singing at the top of his lungs in Gilroy, man.

I'm thinking, holy shit. Doesn't he know there's Mexicans in Gilroy, man? You know? You don't wanna be calling no attention to yourself. Right?

You know? And Albert singing like hell in about an hour and a half later, he dumps over the tractor that he's working on, you know. And I help him lever it up and we get it back on his wheels and he goes on about his business. And I thought, maybe, you know, maybe maybe maybe. And then right behind him I got I got introduced to a fellow named Paz.

Now when I knew Paz, Paz had 4 years here and Paz was from my street. And Paz walked up and he was one of the first ones that told me, I love you, dummy. You don't know nothing. You know, any idea that you got that you may know something worthwhile here, stuff it, man, because you ain't been here long enough yet. And I thought, what the shit has he thought?

I know all kinds of stuff. You'd be surprised at the stuff I know. He goes, it's not useful. You know? And he was the first one that told me about, you know, and then I met then I met well, then I fell in love.

Okay. You know, the great love affair ever. Cecil b Demille should have filmed this sucker, man. I tell you. I fell in love, boy.

Whoo. Yep. Tell you about Harry in love. It's pitiful. I'm a very pitiful man in love.

When I first got here, I was my addictions just switched. No problem, man. They just went right over to that person. And if I couldn't have them around me at all times speeding my ego, making me feel good, then I didn't think it was a good relationship. And the lady had lots of time and I had no time and I thought she had to listen to me.

And I didn't know nothing. I really didn't know much at all about living clean and sober. You know, it was only at 2 years old here that I finally realized that I didn't even know how to ask a person on a date clean and sober, when I walked into these rooms. I could not remember ever in my life asking anybody out straight, either me straight or her straight or both loaded. Couldn't remember it.

You know? And that amazed me, man. I walked around in amazement for, like, 2 days with that piece of knowledge. Harry, you never have asked anybody out sober in your life. Even in high school, I never did it, man.

I always got loaded in high school to ask people out. And then 2 days later, God goes, oh, yeah. Well, check this out. You never asked anybody to bed straight either. Now a person as worldly as I wanna be and as cool and as hip and as slick as I wanna be faced with that kind of information about himself has to start taking a second look at what's going down.

And you just may not know how to live clean and sober, and it's all about living clean and sober. You know, I got here, and they started teaching me how to live right away. One of the best things this lady gave me was a family, my first AA family, and I moved in with a group of people that were the hard line old time AA people that took me aside and started bringing me up here. They taught me how to they taught me to hold my peace. They taught me how to how to take care of myself, and it had nothing to do with my job and my car, my lady, and my money, and nothing like that.

They taught me how to become start become spiritually fit. They taught they planted in me the idea that just maybe even for me, this program would work if I wanted it bad enough. And the first thing they had to do was civilized me. I was a very uncivilized person. I was not polite company folks.

I didn't know which fork to use. You know, I hadn't been in anybody's house in a in a formal or even an informal meal and so on. I couldn't tell you. People didn't invite me over because I was crazy. And when I got loaded, nobody knew what I would do.

And so they used to invite me to their house for dinner, and I'd sit at their table eating their food. And I'd be thinking in the back of my mind Do they know who they're eating dinner with? I wonder, you know, I wonder if they know who they're eating dinner with man, you know, if they knew, you know, they would kick me out of here. The whole 1st year I was in this program, I was in deathly fear that somebody I knew from the streets would walk through those doors needing help. I was definitely afraid of that because they were gonna walk in and tell on me, man.

They're gonna walk in and they're gonna go, God, I need you people. Who is that suck wow. You let him in here? You know, I ain't coming, man. If that dude's in here, I am not coming in here, you know, because it ain't working.

Right? This guy, you know, has tried everything in the world. But, you know, they taught me I didn't have to fear those people. And at about 9 months, this marvelous, fascinating, great relationship broke up and I was gone, man. I was devastated because you see what happened to Harry in love that he found out as soon as he fell in love.

His program went out the window. He didn't call a sponsor. He didn't talk to his friends. He rarely went to meetings, and he thought he could do it all on his own again. And he just set himself up to get nailed.

You know? So the relationship was over, and I was wandering around here nine and a half months sober hurting, hurting worse than I ever hurt in my life because I never allowed myself to hurt that bad before. Every time I came close to hurting that bad, I always took something or drank something before that. And, I mean, hurt pain. And I wasn't used to that shit, you know, and didn't know what to do with it.

Didn't have a sponsor. Albert was my first sponsor, you see. And he him and Paz used to cosponsor me and, bounced me back and forth between them is what they used to do. And, on the day and Albert used to tell me, you know what? There's a lot of ladies here, man.

Go out and play. Just don't fall in love for a year. He says, especially you, Harry. Don't fall in love with it for a year, you know. You don't do it.

I'm telling you. You know? You ain't got a chance if you do. And I I told him no problem, Albert. Goddamn it.

I'm a man of the world and worldly and cool and hip and that ain't no way, man. And, you know, 1st person that took me at home, man, you know. I love you and I've been looking for you all my life, man. You know? You know?

Oh, man. It was terrible. You know? So I went up to tell Albert this, you know, and he was my sponsor. And I went up and I said, Albert, you know, you don't understand this.

Okay? And Albert understood everything. You know, he knew me like a book, man. He used to scare the hell out of me, you know, because he knew me well. He did.

He knew alcoholics of mites, our type well. Okay. And I said, you know, I said, well, what happened you see in this? You know, this is not like you were talking about, Albert. You know, there's there's none of your stuff applies in this one, you see, because I didn't set out to do this one.

It just happened. You know? Albert, it must be God's will. You know? You know?

I, I was a prime time out a rationalizer. You know? And Albert looked at me and he said, Harry, you got your head up your ass, man. You know? You got that I used to have a dog that was cross eyed, you know, until he got until he fell in love.

And then they straighten out and he'd get a spark in him, man. You know? And my eyes straightened out and had a spark in him, you know? I was in love and I was in lust, you know, and I couldn't differentiate at all. And, I don't know if I was in lust lust even, you know, my love when I when I first got here and for my whole life really I used to tell people I loved them and that used to sometimes meant I want to sleep with them and sometimes it meant I loved them and sometimes it meant I just need to be held because I'm lonely.

And I never knew how to differentiate those things. You know, this program has taught me to differentiate those things. This has taught me that it's still it's okay to walk up to somebody and say I need to be held today. Do you got time? Would you mind or whatever?

You know? Anyway, I went up to Albert and I said, okay, Albert. This is what's happening. You know? I'm moving out of the house into her He says, well, how long have you known her?

I said, oh, about 6 days, man. You know? Long time, Howard. You know? Well, that's just real.

And he looked at me and he made, you know, the fatal mistake that all you know, that that he could have made with me. And he said, Harry, I'm your sponsor, and it's either her or me. I looked him right in the eye and said, see you later, Albert. So at 9 and a half months, I got crazy. I was left all alone, man, and I didn't have a sponsor.