The 14th annual Spring Fling in Sacramento, CA

Oh, yes. Alright. Get them, Tom. I'm up here. You're not.

Get them. He's watching me through thick lens Hello, everybody. My name is Babs Black, and I'm a grateful recovering Al Anon. Hi, Babs. Hi.

Of all the things we imported from California, I think I'm most fond of that. I figured you say hi. Some days I'm recovering, and some days I'm grateful. And rarely am I both. Well, what are you gonna do, you know?

I was grateful until I decided that I would make a restroom call prior to our opening this meeting. For all of you that stood in that restroom, in that line, and refused to let me cut in even though I was the speaker, you're going to be sorry. When Tommy called me and asked if I would come join you, my mother overheard part of the conversation. And when I hung up the phone, she said, well, are you going someplace again? And I said, yes.

Some fellow called me from California and wants to know if I'm interested in flinging my spring. And my mother assured me that it had been sprung years ago and it was a waste of good plane fare. Everybody needs a nurturing mother like I am. Am. I was going to give you my wisdom with the steps.

I'll tell you, I do a step study that just bring tears to your eyes. God, beautiful, it's beautiful. And Le Bon beat me to it. Then I thought, well, the traditions, I mean, they're not so bad, you know. You can flesh them up a little bit.

Then I sat in in that morning meeting and Lord Dean went through the concept. So that leaves me with nothing but my experience and what strength and hope this program has given me. So I'm afraid you're stuck with that. Tommy, if you and your table want to leave now, it's alright with me. They sent me a note prior to my coming.

Speaking of nurturing, I do want to share this with you. Sent me a handwritten note from Hib's table. They counted up how many 60 minutes of theirs that I might waste if I poop ground up here and don't have anything reasonable to say, and threaten me with dire consequences. So I hope in 20 minutes they're all sound asleep from boredom. I wish I could tell you that the first alcoholic I ever knew was the one I found myself married to because I think that makes us look a little swifter.

I don't know about your meetings out here but, my God, going to an Al Anon meeting in my part of Texas and you say, How many of you are raised in alcoholic homes? And there's a wave of arms, you know. And you wanna say, Didn't you catch on? And, you know, I'm just like them. I think one of the most destructive aspects of this blessed disease that has brought us all together in this room is that it has an almost overwhelming power to obsess us.

God, You know, I had a lot of bad stuff in my life, didn't you? But it seemed to kinda come and go. I mean, I would take as much of as I could and then I'd say, oh, to hell with it then and I push it away, but I was never able to do that with alcoholism until I found Al Anon. It has the power to obsess me and I was raised in that kind of a home where somebody else's drinking was my problem. To this day, I don't know if there's somebody else's problem.

I really don't. My parents were divorced when I was an infant and, I was originally raised by my grandparents. My grandparents were marvelous. They loved to be in the way that I have come to understand every human being has a right to be loved by at least one other human being, and that is it was truly unconditional. If my grandmother came in the kitchen and caught me in the act, the first thing she'd say is, alright, which one of you kids put Barr Bran's hand in that cookie jar?

Because I'm telling you I was innocent. And if in a rush of honesty I might confess what I'd done, My grandmother's reply was always the same, you didn't know what you were doing, Barbary. I loved them very much. The only problem was they were in their sixties and I was 4. And, you know, grandparents kind of start out old.

Have you ever noticed that? And I wasn't catching up to them. But up on the hill in that little town in Illinois, there lived a family like we used to read about in the 1st grade reader. He was a dentist, the only dentist in town, so he had a thriving practice and he was the mayor and president of the school board. He had a big bushy moustache and a head full of black hair.

He had a beautiful, lovely, loving wife, who happened to be my mother's only sibling, her sister that was 11 years older. So she was settled and they had 2 little girls a little bit older than I was. They had a white dog and a black cat named Smokey Joe. They lived in a 2 story house up on that hill that overlooked the Mississippi and I wanted more than anything in the world to live with them. And one day I got my wish.

I guess I was 4 or 5, something like that. I think my grandmother just gave out and I was allowed to go up there to live and I lived up there until it came time for me to go to college. And for most of that time, it was just what I thought it would be. It was neat. I was a part of something that was normal and good and important.

You know, they were important. And because I was kinda tagging along behind them, I was kind of important too. I was always one of the girls, especially when I get in trouble. Was that one of the docs girls? I think that's one docs girl.

You know, and by the time I got home the phone calls had been made and my aunt was waiting to have a little chat with me, but I loved it there. And I don't know, see, I really can't honestly tell you it was alcoholism. The only clues I have are the feelings I have, my reaction to what went on. Whatever it was, by the time I was in high school, all that, adoration and that love I had felt for my uncle had flip flopped and, oh, I hated him. You know that kind of hate you can feel in your throat?

And you'd never dare, never dare voice it. Because if you do that thing, your throat's gonna explode and you're probably gonna die. And so I never talked to anybody. And that became a way of life to me. Never talk to anybody.

Deny it and push it down, it'll go away. By the time I was a junior in high school, my light at the end of tunnel was to go to college. If I could get out of there and go to college, I'd be okay. I could leave all that behind and I'd be fine. A typical lie we tell ourselves.

And so I began to apply to colleges. I chose the one that accepted me and made a deal, a tuition deal, and was the farthest away. I wish I could tell you that I chose the one that was academically sound, but not many young girls growing up in Northwestern Illinois dream of someday going to the University of Texas. Hell, I didn't even know they had a university. It was in a town called Austin.

Can you imagine naming a place Austin? And they accepted me on 1 August in 1951. I landed in Austin with my little suitcases and enrolled at the University of Texas. It was my escape. I didn't like it there.

I didn't like Texans. What little I knew about them, they talked funny and slow. God Almighty. Don't they talk slow? You just wanna reach in there and yank your little tongues up.

You know, my God. Say it, man. Say it. And they brag. What are they so proud about?

You know, they just, oh, I didn't like them. The men wore high heels. And these tight little pants, these little bitty butts, you know, and I just didn't like it there. And then about my 2nd week there we were forced, literally forced, by this old bag that ran the dormitory to go to a thing called the freshman reception. Please give me a break.

My god. I was 17 years old. I was far too sophisticated for that kind of junk. I knew what it'd be and of course it was in the gymnasium. It was for all the little freshmen to get to know each other.

And I knew it'd be those little acne faced boys all against one wall, you know, with their hands in their pockets doing whatever they do. And we're over there wanting to get out of there and, you know but she played dirty pool. She threatened social probation if we didn't go. So some of my other fellow sophisticates and I trooped off to Gregory Gibbs and I was over there at the punch table getting some of that god awful taste of stuff, you know, trying to figure out how long I'd have to stay before I could get out of there. And all of a sudden, I turned around and I looked in that room.

This is the first time I'd seen that many of us together in one and I started taking a quick count. Now I'm not kidding you. There were at least 9 or 10 fellas to every girl in that room. This was 51 and the Korean War was winding down and all these vets were coming home, and they could either work in daddy's drugstore or take the GI Bill and go to a college and every last one of them was horny. And I looked around and I thought, you know, this higher education not be, might not be a bad deal after all.

For those of you who aren't as old as I, you missed it. Because I'm telling you, in 1951 the only requirement that you be a sex goddess on the campuses of this marvelous country was that you'd be breathing in and out. I really liked it. I I just really, really did. Occasionally, we go to class.

By the time I was a junior there, I discovered that most of the good ones had been picked off, you know? The ones I was kinda narrowing the field down to and all of a sudden they weren't there one day. And I found out they ran off the valley and got married or some damn thing. So I realized that I'd I mean, I've been having a lot of fun but this was getting serious business now because I was already a junior in college and I didn't have anybody on the string. I mean, I had to get busy here.

I sure as hell didn't wanna get a degree and go out and work. Come on. What kind of a life is that? So I began to look in earnest and I knew that my time was limited. I mean, I wanted to get married.

I wanted to have babies. I wanted to buy a station wagon. I wanted to have a house. Menopause was breathing down my neck. I was, what, 19.

So I kinda made a deal with God. I said, I tell you, you send me anything halfway decent, I'm gonna grab it and make something of it. You know that's exactly what happened. He came as a result of a blind date. You know, I was really terrified that I would marry someone that had a drinking problem and if I ever made a mistake in my life that wasn't one of them to be one of them.

I wasn't interested in how much money they had. I did care how they looked. I'm sorry to tell you that but I'm old enough now I can admit that at long last. It was very important to me how they looked because see, the better they looked, the better I looked. And so I wanted something good hanging under my arm.

And here he came, 62. Good looking dude. A little bit shy. Uh-huh. Oh, wow.

It's like a lamb to the slaughter now that I figured it. The date was to a fraternity party and the strangest thing happened to him when we got there and he began to drink that slop they said, you know, whatever that stuff is they serve. Some magic happened to him. He's a shyness left. He became quite glib and very clever.

He had trouble walking. He was tripping over the flowers in the rug till he had a couple drinks and all of a sudden these friends stare. I mean, he's tangoing and they're not even playing a tango. And I was the envy of every female in that room. I mean, he was neat and I remember thinking to myself.

Now, this is what booze is supposed to do. Well, he drank them dry, you know, and they took everybody home. It was a Saturday night and he said to me, I'm going to 6:30 Mass in the morning. Would you like to go with me? Now see, I never put that stipulation on God.

I said just send me something decent. Never in my wildest dreams that I'd think I'd get a Catholic. Well, now think about those. See, I mean especially a Catholic that that knew how to drink. Of course, I didn't know that that was a redundant idea.

But if I had a Catholic that knew how to drink, I'd never have to worry about alcoholism and the bastard could never divorce me. I mean, what more? Well, it's all I wanted in life. I'll tell you that. And we indeed went to that mass and I was far more impressed with him than I had been the night before.

Afterwards, we went to brunch and he confided in me that back in his altar boy days, he'd always really wanted to be a priest till they explained to him what celibacy was. Wow. I've got a horny almost priest on my hands. I mean, his fate was sealed from that moment on. I think to this day, the poor fool thinks that he, that he pursued me, but that was not the case at all.

He was the best thing that happened to me in a long time and I went about to let him go and I didn't. And one Saturday morning, about a year and a half later at Saint Anne's Cathedral in Houston, we took our eternal vows. I walked in that cathedral in my swishy white dress and I was engaged and I walked out and I was married. I mean with a capital m. I was Missus Black.

Now, I don't know where in hell he was for that hour and a half because it was obvious to me as soon as we walked out that he did not have the picture. He acted as if he were the same. And I remember saying to him early on, stop that, I said. There's people who want to take your hand off that. We're married.

See, married people don't do that sort of thing. Married people don't have fun, for example. You know, married life is very serious, very serious. Oh my god. You've got savings accounts to start.

You gotta start those getting that money together by that station wagon and all that. And he just went on as before. I mean, I it was as if he was unconscious during that thing. Didn't he realize what had happened to us? And I remember I used to follow him around that little apartment and I'd say, I'm your wife and he'd say, I'll drink to that anyway.

And then one day it came to me. I knew what the problem was. There were just the 2 of us. Well, it really wasn't that different, was it? But if we had a family, that would bring out the best in them, wouldn't it?

So I got pregnant. No big deal. Later, I found not getting pregnant. Now that was a big deal. And I gave birth to a little girl.

I gave birth to a little girl. We didn't have that partnership foolishness that they have today. I'll tell you, when you're laying there on that labor on that delivery table, I love what Carol Burnett says, you know, take your top lip and pull it up over your head. That's about it. I don't think daddy dear says, oh, the pain is unbearable.

I can hardly stand it, doctor. Hell no. He tells dirty jokes with the doctor. Well, you're laying or dying. Anyway, I was in there all by myself, me and this idiot doctor.

Gave birth to this little girl and I knew this would change things and I was indeed right. It did. My life has not been the same since. But it soon became apparent that I had had a child. We didn't.

He just went on his merry way. I remember he said to me quite earnestly one time when I thrust the baby at him, you know, I used to do that. Go to daddy, this screaming kid, you know, and he didn't wanna hold her and she didn't wanna be there and she'd scream louder and he'd say, when she's older and we can do things together, then I'll spend some time with her. I said, finally, after about the 5th time each, I said, about how old is Eddie? He said, about 19.

And then I knew what it was. We only had one child. You can ignore 1. So I had another one. Then I had another one.

You know that interpretation of the second step, doing the same thing over and over and over again and expecting different results. I tell you that labor and delivery suite to me was like a revolving door. I'd wake up in the morning sometimes with this belly And so help me, I couldn't remember if I just had 1 or I was fixing to. It was it was crazy. It was it was it was insane.

It was insane. Eventually, we got transferred to San Antonio. My mother had hoped it was something in the water there in Houston and, I had mentioned to her that I was pregnant again. By now, I'm trying to hide it, you know. She was saying cute things like, you know, Babs, I bet the government would do something about somebody like you if you ask them to.

So I said, Antonio, and I'm a little bit pregnant and, finally got a lot pregnant and found a doctor and a phone book and went to see him and he said, I'd like to take some pictures and he did and then he sat me down and he said, well, miss Black, I think there are 4, possibly only 3. And I said, babies? And he said, yes. And to share honest with you the way I felt then, I was pissed. I don't know how else to describe it.

I had been a damn good sport up to now. No. No. I really had. I had these little babies, you know, and I'd go to the Safeway and somebody would say with pity in their eyes, are they yours?

And I'd pull myself up and very proudly say, yes, and every one of them was planned. I think that's big of me to do that. I really wanted to fall into that stranger's arms and cry my eyes out and say, my God, can you get me out of this mess, lady? But see, I never said that And, now, this joker tells me they're coming in litters and I don't think that's coming. Anyway, I left his office and, you know, Mother Nature does strange things to people like me.

In that short trip it took me to drive home, my mind began to work, you know, and I start thinking, shoot, if he thinks there's 4, there might be 5. Well, now wait a minute. If you got 5, the government builds a wing on the house. They send them all to college. Gerber sends all the food and all that.

The tour bus from Sacramento comes up and everybody wants to see where the quints live, you know. Yeah. We'd be on Edward R. Murrow and Life Magazine and by the time I got home, I thought I had the biggest news in the world. I just, of course, father Guillen was babysitting.

I could tell the kids were locked out there in the backyard and I went in to tell him. I don't know what I expected him to say but I didn't expect what I got. I went in and he had a few beers, you know. He needed to kind of steady himself when he had charge of the children. They did make him nervous.

And he had just that edge off, you know, that kind. And this was my first experience with instant sobriety. I'm sure all of you have seen that, you know, when the state policeman pulls you over and anyway, I walked in and, you know, he's just a little fuzzy and he said, well, I knew what the doctor say. And I said, well, he said there are 4, possibly only 3. And he looked me, I mean, sober.

Yeah. And he looked me dead in the eye and he said, my God, Babs. What have you done to me now? And I felt guilty. I felt guilty.

There weren't 4 or 3, there were only 2. Very, very small. They were born 2 months premature and that meant that when we brought the twins home, we had 5 children and the oldest had not yet celebrated her 4th birthday. Yes, I know. Oh my God.

And I found that I was running a little ding dong of school there. My husband, in the meantime, had gotten a traveling job. So he left before dawn on Monday and came home very late on Friday and I began to have a meaningful relationship with Captain Kangaroo. A true resentment really set in. And I'm sure none of you in this room are guilty, but it seemed no matter what neighborhood we lived in, there was always some Slattern that lived a few doors down, whose 1 or 2 little children would get on her nerves about 10 o'clock every morning.

And so she would say to them, why don't you go on up and play at the black? She'll never know you're there. And they did. I mean, I couldn't have told you which were mine and which weren't. I was 38 years old before I could go to the bathroom all by myself Because for years, I had held conferences.

I mean, none of those kids would look at me twice and and they just had a 6th sense and one of them I know would say the other, I think she's going in the bathroom. As soon as I got comfortably seated, in they come. My kids, your kids. They wanna know where clouds come from. Why is the grass green?

You know, I still get kind of a nauseous feeling when I remember those years. It was about this time that we sent Kathy off to preschool. Now she wasn't old enough. She was only 4, but I lied. I never thought I'd have the guts to lie to a nun, but I would have lied to the Pope.

I stood right there in front of that nun and I had my hand over Kathy's mouth because, unfortunately, she knew how old she was. And I said, oh, yes, sister. Her birth certificate is in the mail. Sent Cathy off to nursery school. The only thing she brought home from that preschool was pinworms.

And I know we shouldn't talk about this after lunch, but life is full of little nasty sidelights. And those of you who call yourself parents and are not familiar with pinworms, I question whether you have a right to even carry a card. None called me and told me they're all over the school, and she told me how to find them. That's another meeting all in its own. So every night, I'd watch Jack Parr and then we'd have the jets peel and I'd salute and then I get my flashlight and put it between my teeth and I go looking.

I have to do it when the kids sound asleep. If you wake up the child, see it's not gonna work. So I became an expert. You're really easy, pull that little sheet down from their little knees, and you peel those little knees apart, then you shine the light, and then you get low and run out of the roof. To this day, my daughters sleep with 4 pair of underwear on and they're like, I'm not.

What's how what is that name? Angayla? An Angayla Breen. Angayla Breen. Is she in here?

B r e e n. If you know her, she has a message, call a hotel operator. At any rate, 1 night I found 1. Oh, God. I was so excited.

About 2 o'clock in the morning, I called the pediatrician, roused the dead sucker out of bed. I said, it's right here on my finger. What do I do? He said, don't get excited. Go back to bed.

In the morning, you go to the drugstore and you get a bottle of the red medicine. I'll order it. Now this day, I do not know the generic name of the red medicine, but it has to be one of the most potent concoctions known to man. I can still get my 24 year old youngest son, Timothy, to mow the grass by just explaining that I unearthed a bottle of the red medicine in a box somewhere. And, I mean, that mower's going like that.

I got it and I brought it home and you gave them so many teaspoons for so many pounds of weight, you know, vicious, vile red looking stuff away. And I pumped it down to kids and, you know, I mean, no big deal. I don't know why people got so excited about these little parasites. Hell, there's nothing to them. And I Lysol everything in the house and in the morning we had potty time and the kids were so excited and I nearly had a stroke.

It was rather, it was Technicolor is what it was and I thought, I called the pediatrician. I said something terrible's happened. He said, oh, I should have mentioned that. The red medicine, it seems, loses none of its color on the way through, but don't worry. Don't worry.

It'll go away. Fine. Couple weeks, they're gnashing their teeth and squiggling around and, shoot, we got them again. I called him back. He said, how much of that stuff did you take?

I said, I don't go to that nursery school. No. No. He said, everybody's gotta take some medicine. So I drank a couple of quarts.

I don't know how much it was. No big deal. I'm a big girl. Downed her down. And in the morning, we all had our little technical time and no problem.

In 3 or 4 weeks, we got them again. And this time he said those words I so dreaded to hear. How much did you give your husband? I said, well, see, this is the sort of thing I discuss with my husband. If he knew the kids were wormy, they'd have to go back.

And I said, besides, my husband travels. He's hardly ever here. He said, yes. And he's probably spreading worms all over South Texas. You're gonna have to dose him up, miss Black.

Well, you know, my way was clear. Poor fool. When he got in that Friday night, I had the kids all in their rooms playing. They'd been fed. I had steaks on the grill.

I said to him, can I fix you a drink before dinner? And I hadn't said that in sometime. And he said, well, don't mind if I do. Thank God he was drinking a thing called Rusty Nails back then. Do you know what that is?

That's dromboule and and oh, take the enamel right off your teeth. And so I fixed him a rusty nail, a little unlike one he'd ever had before. It had, I don't know, maybe a teaspoon of the red medicine in it, you know. And we did the steaks and I said and did all the things I was supposed to and I keep pumping those rusty nails too. By the time by the time it's about 10 o'clock, I mean, he is feeling no pain.

By now, he's getting a lot of red medicine in each drink and just a touch of rusty nail because I had a lot I had to get down to. I can still remember as if it were yesterday and sitting on that couch and I'm picking up dishes and he said, honey, are you coming to bed soon? And I said, any minute. And then he smiled and said, I sure do love you and his teeth were bright red. But I knew I'd done what I needed to do.

We would never again be visited by the worms. In the morning, I was making coffee, and a blood curdling yell came from the bathroom. I rushed in there and Mary stood stark naked and just white as a sheet. And he looked at me with hollow eyes and said, my God, Beth. I'm bleeding to death.

I know I have not had his attention in easily 2 years. I tried all sorts of ways to get this man to listen to me and I could never get through that wall they put up, you know, and here he was, mine for the taking. So I did what any Al Anon in training would do. I looked down at the evidence and I shook my head sadly and I said, I told you what would happen if you didn't stop drinking like that. And I tell you, if terror would get him sober, he would have never had another drink.

As it was, it lasted about 3 weeks, you know, and then he had just little one and then just little one and in no time we're back where we were before. Our life went on. We had another child and eventually ended up in Dallas, and there was nothing left anymore. Most of you in this room, whether you're alcoholic or Al Anon, you have been there. You have been there where there's nothing left anymore.

Something had happened to me that I'd never heard of before and I first heard about it I've been in Al Anon 6 or 7 months and my God, I was so relieved because I thought it was my own special brand of madness. Somewhere in those years I had begin to freeze over and shut down. I was never ever hurt in the same way twice. As soon as a nerve was stepped on, man, I pinched it off and it's very effective. It does indeed handle the pain in life.

The problem is you can't be selective about what you're gonna feel and although I felt no pain anymore and no loneliness, I also didn't feel joy. Life to me was something that I would have to endure until the end came. I knew that the best years were over. And besides, I wasn't so young, was I? What more could I expect out of life?

After all, I was 32, 33 years old. And that's the sort of shape I was in when we got to Dallas. I don't know what happened. God, if I did, I'd go into business. I don't know.

I do know that I called a lawyer to file super divorce, but, Lord, I'd done that before. This was a little different and this one wanted money up front. See, they'd done business with me before. But I called my mom. She said she'd send me the money.

No problem. I don't know what happened. I can only assume that my husband in his illness, got sick and tired of being sick and tired. I wish I could tell you that it was because I filed super divorce. Makes me sound powerful, doesn't it?

But I know indeed that had nothing to do with it. That Monday he went to talk to a man about his drinking and agreed to go to a meeting that Monday night. The man called me and asked me if I would take him to the meeting, and of course I explained to him that I didn't drink. He said, I didn't think you did. Of course not.

I quit years before to show him you could have a good time without that stuff. You know how much fun I was, don't you? And then the man said the magic words. I need you to take him, Mrs. Black.

I'm afraid if you don't take him, he may not go. Well, I need you? Man, that is music to my ears. I said, give me that address again, buddy. He'll be there.

He came home. I helped him dress. Somewhere in those years, I had become keeper of the fly. I don't know why I did that. I mean, it wasn't it isn't the sort of job that you see in the classified ads and you apply for.

It's just that my husband's mind seemed to have slipped. And almost always when he would use the restroom he would forget to zip his pants. And so it became my responsibility no matter no matter where we were to as unobtrusively as possible, zip him. And I did that. I never asked for thanks or gratitude.

It was just part of my responsibility. I remember getting off that elevator that night to go into that AA meeting and I checked him over, of course. And, of course, you know, what can you expect? And so I zipped him up and in we went. Big room about as big as this.

Couple 100 people in there, very nicely dressed. I couldn't wait for them to let the alcoholics in. I figured we'd set them maybe a little circle in the middle the floor and all of us volunteers or whatever we were, we'd stand on the outside and then I figured they'd ask them questions And, of course, the drunks would lie. You know how they are. And then those of us that knew them would explain what the truth was.

So help me God. That's what I thought I was there for. About 5 minutes an 8, an ugly, ugly woman. She was ugly on October 4, 1970 and she remains ugly to this day. Walked up to me and said, pardon me, my dear.

Are you an alcoholic? She might as well have accused me of being syphilitic. My God. I had dressed very carefully for this meeting. I had on my Aqua maternity pedal pushers.

Well, I wasn't pregnant, but they were so comfortable. My little aqua I mean, my little white maternity over blouse, my little aqua Japanese thong sandals, I had those in every color. I had my miraculous metal hanging out on that, like a headlight on the front of that blouse. I had my campfire leader's pen up here. I mean, I thought I'd covered all the bases and this idiot woman asked me if I'm an alcoholic.

My God. Couldn't she tell by looking? And so, of course, I answer. I said, good Lord, no. And she said, then you'll have to leave.

This is a closed meeting. Oh, and I wanted to say, wait a minute. What do you mean? I mean, see nobody explained the rules to me. Ask me if I'm a giraffe.

I'll say I'm a giraffe. I don't care what that's what do you mean I have to leave? My god. Do you know how long I've waited for this woman? I have waited to see him humiliated and you're telling me I can't stay and watch?

I mean, I have a right to this. And while that's going around in my head and I'm trying to get out of my mouth, they very expertly ushered me right out the door. I mean, you know that business about whenever anyone anywhere reads it, don't you believe it. I read my very first AA meeting and I was taken out. And they put me in a little stinky room with some very sick people.

I had never heard of Alan Nunn, nor did I care. What it had to do with me, nothing. I mean, if these people wanted to stay married to those jerks, that was their problem. But I knew what I was doing, man. I was getting out.

And so I had to sit there for an hour because I had the car keys. I listened that night to the second speaker. I don't know what the first one said, I have no idea. She was now on it, she had nothing to do with me. But the second one, he was a sober member of Alcoholics Anonymous.

Now we're getting down to it. Here was a font of knowledge up there and he began to talk about what it's like to be an alcoholic. I'd lived in it all my life and I didn't have the slightest idea what it must be like. So obsessed was I with how I felt. It never occurred to me to try to imagine how an alcoholic might feel.

You did a beautiful, beautiful job. I don't know how long it'd been since I'd cried. A long, long time. But I sat and listened to him and I cried. He said if my husband had never laid eyes on me, he would this day be an alcoholic.

Oh, my God. Could that be true? I mean, I didn't think I caused all of it. I mean, so you didn't know his mother. But I know between the 2 of us we had done him good.

And now he's saying that's not true. He talked about recovery. Recovery. You mean just not drinking anymore? There's more than that.

He described the blessed recovery in AA, and he started a fire in me that I have to this day. They gave me a priceless gift that night. Hope where there had been none. We walked out of that meeting and, that cautioned me not to question him about what happened. But, you know, one little remark wouldn't hurt, would it?

And so I said rather nonchalantly, as if we've just been to the museum, well, how'd it go? And he looked at me very soberly and said, I think, Bev's, if I'm able to do what they say, maybe someday, I can like just a little part of myself. I had never ever felt that way about myself and I came to believe that night that my husband had never felt any other way. As I said, that was October 4, 1970. He hit the AA ground running.

Oh, my God. You know how he was at 3 months. Some of you were that way at 3 months. I wouldn't live with a 3 month sober member of Alcoholics Anonymous with my life dependent on it again. Somewhere he caught the Holy Ghost.

Oh. And he brought God home to the wife and kitties. God was the answer to everything. Plus, whatever member of it a a he had last been with, that's who he became. So when he came home, I never knew if he was gonna be Roy Rogers.

And while I'm busy trying to get my Dale Evans outfit on, he becomes, you know, Billy Graham for God's sake. He was trying all these personas on till one felt comfortable and I'm going bananas bananas. Going to Al Anon meetings, our 2 oldest children were teenagers and they were forced against their will into alatine. They were forced to go to 6 meetings. My sponsor explained to me that if my children were constipated, I did not ask them if they wanted an enema and that alcoholism had allowed them to become spiritually constipated.

And alatine was the name of the enema, and whether they wanted it or not, they were gonna take 6 doses. Thank God by the 5th dose it took, and they got just as gung ho as their father. It was all sickening around there for a while. I'm going to Illinois meetings and I'm really not hearing, you see, because it really doesn't apply to me. But he's looking better and better.

And he's zipping his own fly. He's paying bills. He's going to work. He's saying things like, forgive me, I was wrong. First time he said that I thought I'd have a stroke.

He's pleasant to be around and you know he's looking better. Isn't it amazing how they clean up so good? And then I then I opened my eyes one Friday night in an a open AA meeting and I noticed how many good looking broads they've got over there. Have you ever noticed that? If those are alcoholics, I'm an aviator.

Come on. You can't look like that and be alcoholic. And he's surrounded with them. And then these women are coming over to me after the meeting and saying, he is just darling bad. Suddenly it occurred to me, what if I throw this guy out in a dumpster and one of these bleach blondes picks him up?

I didn't like that idea, so I called the lawyer and said, just put it off. I'll I'll have to get in touch with you. Don't call me, I'll call you. Decided I'd sit back and see what's going to take place here and I'll tell you what took place. He began to change.

My only teen children began to change. You know, they get so full of love. You can get diabetes if you stand next to them. Younger sister would wear the skirt to school, you know, and get caught. And the older one that owned the the Alatine that owned the skirt would say, before the program, I would have beat the crap out of you.

But now I know you just envy me and you wanna be just like me, and I love you. And the little one look at me and say, it's weird, it's weird. I said, yes, I know. Finally, my husband and my 2 oldest children kinda went off without me. They were talking together and I don't know what they're talking about and I felt abandoned.

I felt betrayed, and I went to my sponsor. And so help me. That's the first time I ever heard anybody say that I understood. Why don't you try those steps? You know, we didn't used to say the steps adapted from Alcoholics Knob.

I'm glad we stuck that in there, because they were always identified as AA's 12 steps, and I always thought they were up there on the wall, so I'd know the buzzwords. You know, so I'd know what they're doing in there. Kinda like the Rebecca Lodge or something. So so help me. I didn't understand that I was supposed to be using them in my life and my sponsor suggested that I might try that.

I'd I'd really got hung up on this compulsion and obsession, you know. I thought that was the biggest cop out in the world. That's one drunk's excusing another's behavior. Well, you know, I got this compulsion. Well, you know, I'm obsessed, and I want to string them up by their thumbs, you know.