The Northern Plains Group of Alcoholics Anonymous in Fargo, ND

We could just do that for an hour. My name is Jeff Simmons and I'm alcoholic. Hi, Jeff. Just about knocks your hair back. Due to the grace of God's sponsorship and a home group like this, this home group, I haven't found a necessary drink since December 25, 1994.

And, I've, I've got a lot of people to thank for that, my sponsor who's here tonight. And, I tell you what, I felt pretty good about how I could speak until I found out he was coming to the meeting, and then anything I thought I had good to say, I just felt bad about. Oh, god. I'm gonna screw up. Oh, but it is a pretty exciting night.

My ala mom and my dad are in town tonight. There were some hands raised when, when we asked if there's any newcomers in the crowd and I'd like to welcome all of you to the NPG And, one other very exciting thing is that Kelvin gets a cake tonight and, for 7 months. And oh, 7 years dog. I love you. Sees a little girl running around.

Ain't she cute? I tell you what Trixie gave a real heartfelt talk and Jerome gave a talk that, man just seeing Jerome looking like Clint Eastwood. That alone. What you gonna do, punk? Oh, that's all I got.

I'm done. I tell you what, I related with what they had to say because, because I I was real heartfelt when I was a kid, and I wanted to look like Clint Eastwood. You know? I, I wanted my outside to be tough enough that so that nobody could see my inside. And, that's pretty scary thoughts for somebody for a kid.

You know, I remember feeling that way for as far back as I can remember. I just don't really feel comfortable in my own skin. My my hair doesn't look right, and and my gut's a little big, and and I gotta wear these funny shoes, and I got coke bottle glasses, you know, and I I got a million reasons why I don't match up on the inside to how you people look on the outside. And, now obviously, when I'm in 2nd, 3rd, or even a sophomore in high school, I don't tell people. I just don't feel like I match up to what you look like on the outside.

I, I just don't relate to people. I don't think anybody feels the way I feel. I don't think anybody is emotional the way I am. I don't think anybody feels lonely the way I do, and, that's a pretty that's a lonely place to be when you're a kid. And, I tell you what, I had no reason to feel that way because I was given anything and everything I ever needed.

Absolutely. I grew up in, middle class America, you know, north of Minot. If you can imagine that, there is a north of Minot. And, you know, a dad that was where he said he was gonna be when he said he was gonna be there, did his job, loved his kids. I had a mom that would breathe for me and you know any less than 70 degrees out I had to wear a snowmobile suit because she didn't want me to get cold.

And, I do have one reason to be alcoholic, my perfect sister. She, I plowed the way for her. She couldn't she could've done anything after I got done with my folks and got away with it, but she didn't. She had a 4.0 and a nice boyfriend, I was hoping she could be here to hear that to I was hoping she could be here to hear me say that, but she's doing her job, which, you know, something I would gladly skipped out on back in the day. And, I tell you what, I, I had no reason to be a bad kid.

Absolutely none. I had all the attention I ever needed. I was well loved, well taken care of, had a little white dog, you know, lived in a nice house. Just there was no reason for me to be a screw up. But no matter what I got, I didn't feel like I've had enough.

You know, you give me an inch, I wanted a mile. Give me a nice car, I wanted a nicer car. I just nothing was ever good enough and growing up that way I I had to play in the band and that's not what the cool guys do so obviously that's why I had to do it and, I had to in the fall when all the guys would be up playing football out in front of the house, right in front of my house I might add, had to be inside practicing piano lessons. And, you know, those aren't things cool things for guys to do. I wanted to be cool.

I wanted to be like my dad. I wanted to dig in the dirt and drive trucks and tear down houses and, you know, wreck stuff. And, that's what I wanted to be. I don't wanna play the piano. I, you know, in school, I did, I did absolutely everything I could to get by by the bare minimum.

And, going through elementary school and getting into grade school, obviously, we've talked about my feelings. I had a lot of them. I had the opportunity to drink. And, you know, I know I had drank at an early age. My grandpas both drank heavily.

Were they alcoholic? Possibly. Were they not? You know, I don't know. It's not for me to decide.

I know that my grandpa Olaf, used to drink booze given to him by guys in the prohibition. You know? They they'd be cruising along, bootlegging booze on a dirt road, get stuck in the middle of the night, he'd pull them out with a team of horses. That's how long ago it was. And they'd give them a couple of 5ths and be on their way, you know, and in talking with my mom, I think maybe he was an alcoholic.

My grandpa Norman was the kind of guy that, when the bar closed at 1 o'clock, he'd grab everybody in the bar, take them home, and play piano, and keep the party going till the wee hours of the morning. And, you know, one of them alcoholics with flair. And, hi honey I'm home just me and the fellas gonna play a little piano music, you know, 85 guys walk in and, you know, Now to me that sounds like a good time but normal people don't they don't dig that. You know so there was alcoholism in my family. I firmly believe that.

My my mom and dad and my perfect sister are not alcoholic so I think that's why they were blessed with me and, when I finally found alcohol in my early teens, it was like nothing I'd ever had before. Because no matter how goofy I felt, no matter how stupid I felt, no matter how much less than you I felt, when I was drinking none of that mattered. Absolutely none of it, it didn't matter that I threw up in your car because in school on Monday everybody was going to be talking about Simmons threw up in so and so's car And it didn't matter it was negative attention and I could never ride in the car again. Everybody was talking about me. And, for you alcoholics out there that's a moral victory They're talking about me.

And I tell you what, I drank as much as I could, as often as I could in high school. Just I just had a blast, you know, because I studied real hard enough to get d minuses because then you could still play sports and, you know basketball, football, whatever. I did have a minor snag in high school. One of my teachers was just brutal. She taught sex education and alcohol and drug information or something like that, I wasn't paying attention, and she was my mom and Or who's that boob in the back sleeping during class?

Alcohol class? That was her son. And, so mom and I had a little friction there obviously because I was right and she didn't understand. And, high school, looking back at it, no. Drinking was fun, but, it was all about to end.

I, I graduated by, like, 2 points or one point, something like that, from my last day of classes, my last class English and, I knocked heads with that teacher too come to think of it because she didn't see it my way and, I graduated high school. I had to check my box when I got my diploma to make sure they'd signed it but I graduated high school. And, I had big plans for my life. Real big plans, you know. Oh, yeah.

Mom taught career counseling too, so people could be doctors and lawyers and such And I just put bartender down on mine. That's all I wanted. What a job. And, when people leave high school and they got big plans and I had big plans. I needed to get rich.

I needed to have a car, a wife, girlfriends, and, I said that out loud, didn't I? I had lots of things I needed to do, none of which included college but mom said I had to go And, so I went because it kept mom happy. And, I got to college and I decided that once I was there, it wasn't so bad that I could probably make this work because there's lots of people there that was partying, having a good time, and I was studying, which is something I hadn't done before, and about the 3rd day of studying and partying, 3rd day of the semester actually, I decided to say screw the studying and I just went to partying and that's what I did for the next 2 semesters of college. I just had a good time and you know college starts in August. By October I'm getting letters from people 300 miles away asking me how much I drink, what am I up to, why am I smoking dope, things like that.

And people I hadn't seen in 5, 6 months are writing me these letters, and I'm wondering how they hear about it. And, all I was doing is having a good time. Because when I can drink alcohol and take the edge off of my life, I can be a part of everybody's life. I can hear what you got to say. I can talk about whatever you wanna talk about.

I can blend in wherever I'm at. And that's what I was doing in college. I was having a good time because when I can kill that bad feeling inside of me that I have about me, I'm okay. Even if it's only for a half hour a night, my god, when I wake up the next day hungover, I'm gonna shoot for that half hour a night again because for that half hour, it's okay to be me. And, end of October, I get these letters, a young lady went and talked to my mom and said I think Jeff's, you know, gonna drink himself to death.

What are you gonna do with him? And at this time in my life, I've been drinking hard and heavy for probably 2 years. And, just to just to let you know the impact, not on my life of what drinking have hard and heavy for 2 years did to me, it was such a strain on my mother that she doesn't remember a year and a half of her life because the emotion was so strong watching her son kill himself and not know it that she doesn't remember a year and a half of her life. I don't know if she does to this day, you know, it's alcoholism affects everybody and it for me at that time, I couldn't conceive that what I was doing to me was hurting anybody else. All I could see was, hey, this is how I have a good time.

If you felt like me, then you'd understand. So end of October, I get sent to an alcohol evaluation. Now I'm a little paranoid about my alcohol evaluation, so I call the day before and ask them, Is there any way you can hold me, put me in cuffs, little assless pajamas, any of that when I come in for my evaluation? And the lady's like, no. Okay.

Sweet. I'll be in tomorrow. And, so I did what every good alcoholic does. I had a pre evaluation party and, so I had a pretty good one on. And I went into my evaluation.

And now this thing lasted like 3 hours. And I don't know about you but if you get to talk about yourself for 3 hours and you're alcoholic that's okay and so I sit through this evaluation and, 3 hours later, this gal has been rating the whole time. And one of the last questions she asked me, she says, mister Simmons, let me get this straight. You drank this many 12 ounce beers every day for the last 6 months. And I looked at her and I said, baby, I drink pounders.

I think she had to rewrite the whole damn thing, you know. I'm paying for it. Do your job. And, I went home from there and had my post evaluation party. And, you know, the last thing she told me was I can't tell you you're alcoholic, but I see some red flags.

Any alcoholics in the room had red flags? Raise of hands. Yeah. I had red flags. Now if you're alcoholic like me, red flags don't mean diddly squat to you.

I got red flags. I'm going drinking. See you later. And that's what I did. And it didn't change a thing about my life.

I made it to the end of the semester, you know, because you had to have an end of semester party and packed my bags and went home and drank for Christmas. And when I come back, I, I had every intention yet again in my life because by this time, some things that happened, you know, some rather stupid things that I've done when I was drinking. I did so many stupid things when I was drinking that I pretended that I was blacked out when I did them. Somebody come up and say, man, you know what you did last night? And I knew damn well what I did last night.

I'm like, no man, what do I do? You know? I was blacked out. A little side note, my friend Gerald is in the audience tonight. He's a prototype alcoholic and Gerald and I were drinking in Canada one night and we actually had a designated driver, I think he was probably smoking dope or something but he was designated and he's driving.

We get to the border and I'm poured into the passenger seat and Gerald's passed out in the back seat and Bertha the security guard comes up to the window and says you boys been drinking And, I said that would be me. And Mitch said, no, man. It's all good. You know? And she was gonna let us go until Gerald pops up in the back seat, sees the badge, and starts screaming about his civil rights being infringed upon.

I'm sure some of you can relate to the next part. Strip search. Woo. She was not very attractive. Anyway, let's go down to better things.

Things like that don't happen to normal people. They don't get strip searched at the border just going out for a couple beers because that's what happens to me. When somebody calls me up and says, hey, let's go have a couple beers, I could end up in Minot or I could end up in Florida. I'm not too sure which is gonna be which, but I'll just go anyway. What the hell?

And that's where my drinking went. Now you mix in them stupid little mishaps and unfortunate misunderstandings or whatever you wanna call them. Some of the actions I'm taking, when I realize them in the morning, I'm starting to become uncomfortable with myself. I'm starting to become ashamed of the things I've done. And in order to combat that, I do the one thing alcoholics can do, I drink more.

And when I continue to drink more, my life continues to get worse. I make it to, it would have been the spring of 94, and, I start wrecking vehicles, 3 5 weeks. And get a pretty good body shop to wreck 3 5 weeks all being the same vehicle and about the the third time when they spatulaed me off an oak tree and minut, mom and dad had had enough, you know, they didn't know what to do with me. They they felt like they couldn't help me so they did the only thing parents could do, they sent me to treatment. And they gave me options you know either you can go to treatment or we can get you committed to treatment but those are your options and I went to treatment right after they spatulaed me off the tree And I dropped out of school.

The dean of students wasn't sorry to see me leave. She thought that'd be alright, probably be better for her students if I wasn't there. And off to treatment I went. Now when I get to treatment and I've been taken off the sauce, so to speak, and it wasn't by my own doing, I'm not real receptive to that. I don't wanna be there.

I can't understand why anybody would wanna take away from me the one thing that makes me feel good. So I've got a resentment. I'm just a little unhappy about being there, and I'm managing to take that out on all the other patients. They start whining about drinking, and I'd drop the hammer on them. What the hell do you know about drinking, you wuss?

You know, some guy that's 50 years old and been there 15 times. I've been there for 2 days, you know, and that that's the way I was. The one thing treatment did get me other than like an $8,000 big book, that's right new guys, if you come to the meeting they only cost $6. It got me to Alcoholics Anonymous. Now my first meeting in Minot was nothing like what you see here.

It was about the size of this podium stand, there was 12 of us in the room, The smoke was about this far from the floor, and they were talking about kicking the dog and beating the wife and getting divorced. And, now granted my life isn't going real good, but that doesn't sound like it's a whole lot better. And when I see that, I'm not gonna say as a, a a newly trying to recover alcoholic, gee, those guys got it good. I wanna hang out with them. What I say to myself is, if life's gonna suck that much not drinking, I might as well go drink and end it all.

That's the kind of that's what alcoholism says to me. What happened is, I started trying to sober up in the in the in the spring of 94, and it took me until December 94 to get it straight. I found out that taking speed or, no dose by the bottle is considered addictive. You can't even buy near beer by the case but I was trying and my last drink on December 24, 94 was communion wine. That's not a real flashy way for an alcoholic like me to go out.

I'm going out in the ball of flames, baby. I'm taking people with me. Now there I was at the rail drinking communion wine. But that's my sobriety date because I know from that day to this I've not had a drop of alcohol in my system and I don't care how big a wuss I sound like. I haven't had a drop of alcohol in my system.

So December 25, 94, I'd like to tell you that I stepped out into the road of recovery and I started helping new guys and going to meetings 7 days a week and talking to my sponsor and just generally being a good guy but that comes a little later. You gotta mess some stuff up first. So, when I started going to AA in spring of 94, the Minut Thursday night group found me. I didn't find them. I wasn't looking for them.

I didn't want anything to do with them, but they found me. My ride home, which home was 20 miles from treatment, said, hey. Let's go to that minor Thursday night group. And I said, that sounds like a really bad idea. Let's go home and watch TV.

And he said, well, you can walk home if you want, but I'm going to the meeting. So by some act of god, I consider it now. I I went to my first active meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous. And, I'd like to tell you that something magical and wonderful happened at that very first meeting. For me it didn't.

All I found was guys that were willing to spend time with me and hang out. They didn't want any of my money. They didn't want me to buy them booze. They didn't want anything from me. All they wanted to do was hang out and have a good time.

And fellowship, oh, fellowship was a little rough. Fellowship on Friday night, there weren't any girls at fellowship. And now when you're a slovenly alcoholic like myself, you're looking for chicks. Hey, baby. How you doing?

There weren't any of them there which meant that I had to pay attention to them guys or try to and all they did was hang out with me Ask me how I'm doing. How was work today? Work sucked. You know, I gave the typical new guy answer. How are you doing, Jeff?

Fine. What did you do today? It worked? You know, I was a jackass. They just kept hanging out with me.

And eventually, one of them, every time he's seen me, Simmons, who's your sponsor? Why haven't you got a sponsor yet? Blah blah blah blah. This went on for, like, 4 or 5 months. Finally, I said, Gerard, if it makes you happy, you be my sponsor.

How do you like that? And he said, oh, I like that. Let's go. And away we went. I had my very first sponsor, and, he told me things I didn't wanna hear, so I told him to get lost.

And I found a sponsor that I like, that I thought could give me answers I wanted to hear. And, he did that and pretty soon he was gone because I couldn't respect him and eventually I found a sponsor that wasn't intimidated by me, wasn't didn't think I was very funny, you know, he he just Simmons do it and quit whining. Well, that gets my attention when somebody tells me to quit whining. It's one of my favorite pastimes. And Travis asked for mine, it became my sponsor.

And, he got me through my first year and a half of sobriety. He, he told me not to get a girlfriend so I got one. He told me to spend 3 nights a week at her place and 4 nights a week at my place so I spent 7 nights a week at her place and right about the time I was going to get a year of sobriety or to be a year of sobriety little Callie Ray came along and now at the time that didn't seem like a real good thing because I had no conception of being responsible, being a dad, being accountable to anybody And I tell you what, when you're working a 4.75 an hour job, 40 hours a week, running parts, in an apartment you can't live in with a girlfriend that you can't stand because your emotions are so out of whack, that's a pretty heavy load. And what happened for me at that time is I quit going to AA. I didn't go to 3 meetings a week because I had this girl to take care of and had a job to do, and I had bills to pay, and things start piling up.

And, the pain of life got so bad around 2 years of sobriety that, I didn't know where I could go. I didn't know if I could stay here and get sober and be happy, and I didn't know if I should go back to drinking. I just I did not know. I know if I go back to drinking, I'm gonna die. If I stay here, I'm gonna off myself.

Those are the exact feelings I had in almost 2 years of sobriety. And, I tell you what, good things happen to you when you have intense pain in your life because that's the only time for me as an alcoholic I can respond. When the heat is on and the pressure is building, when there's intense pain, I can respond. And, you know what wasn't the clouds parting or nothing, I just had enough one night and Jeff v. Standing at the pot machine at the meeting and I ambushed him.

Hey, Jeff. I know this really sick guy needs a sponsor. Are you interested? Of course, Jeff wheeled and said, yeah. Where is he at?

And I said, right here, man. I'm dying. Take me away. And, now the reason I did that is because I rode go karts with Jeff and played golf with him. He was pretty fun to hang out with.

What I got was a sponsor. I got somebody who isn't at least bit interested in how I feel. They wanna know how they can help me. He knows when to tell me to shut up. He knows when to tell me to take an action.

He knows how to handle me because my ego and my pride get involved and you mix in a little emotion, I'm a time mom waiting to go off. My sponsor knows how to handle me when I need to be handled. And, when he started sponsoring me, he had to start simple. Okay, Jeff. How about you go to a home group consistently?

I don't know how long that lasted but I had to start going to Thursday night consistently. I had to be there early. It took him 6 months, but he got me to wear a suit and a tie to the meeting. That was a pretty big hurdle. I think my mom was resentful about that actually because she'd been trying for 20 some years and she couldn't do it.

And And he started working with me. He started taking he started taking a participation in my sobriety because it kept him sober. And, when he start when I see what his life was doing, I've seen him getting married and getting a good job and working with the guys and he was having a good time, That's what I did. My sponsor led by example. He showed me how to do it.

He didn't say, Simmons, you go do that over there and then turn and go the other direction. He said, come on. This is what we're doing, and this is how we're gonna do it. And I tell you what, when I could learn to listen to that guy and take his suggestions and give up my give up myself, things started to happen. When he got me into the steps, my life started to change.

And, I tell you what, because of Jeff being my sponsor, I'm sober today. Now we're about 3 years of sobriety there, and I'm 8 years sober now. So there's a 5 year span there where I got lots of time to mess things up. And, that's exactly what I did. Because when my life starts to get better as a recovering alcoholic and I get God in my life and I get the steps in my life and I get actions in my life, when my life starts to get better and god's driving the you know, if god's driving the car and we're going to Bismarck and he's driving 55, we're gonna get there safe when god's driving.

He's not gonna pass anybody stupid on the shoulder, you know, he's taking his time, listening to some mellow music. Well, that's all good and well for a while, but I can't take sitting like that. So I gotta shove God over and say, come on, God. Let me drive this thing. I know it'll do a 110.

You know, and God never leaves. He just kind of smiles and gets in the back seat and away we go and I'm driving. And I tell you what, when I take the wheel of my life, I end up in the ditch 95% of the time because pretty soon I'm driving and then I see a girl go by and I'm looking over my shoulder and I'm doing a 110 and down through the ditch. Or I see a job I like down through the ditch or money. That's always a good one.

And, that's what happened to me at 4 years of sobriety. I was in the middle of the steps. I had a good job, making lots of money. Cali's mom and I had kinda patched things up. Things were going good, so I decided to drive for a while.

And I tell you what, the year 98 just about killed me again because I decided to run my life. Because I just gotta drive, man. I gotta have the steering wheel in my hands. My nature, my instinct is for me to run the show. If you don't listen and do it the way I think you should, we'd all be just fine.

That's the attitude I come to Alcoholics Anonymous with, the one I carry with me today but because of the actions of Alcoholics Anonymous, I just got to keep my mouth shut sometimes and hang on and go with you guys In 98, when I got the money and blah blah blah, all that stuff, I decided that AA was kinda cutting into my money making time and time with my daughter and her mom and, I shied away from Alcoholics Anonymous You know, I I was around, you know, I'd show up and shake some hands and pretend I was wonderful but, inside I just didn't feel good And at the time, I had no idea why. I just it's the way life is. Don't know why. Carry on. Be tough.

And, in this I got laid off from my job in like December 7, 98 and spent 3 weeks with Cali's mom and it took her that long to kick me out of the house, 3 whole weeks with me doing nothing. And, I went for another month and a half after that of not seeing my daughter, not really going to meetings, just doing my own thing before the emotion of life the emotion and the pain of life finally caught up with me again. And I called my sponsor 2 o'clock in the afternoon on a Tuesday. You know, he should have been at his job or somewhere, and I was was at that point where I don't know what I'm gonna do, but I gotta do something. And then my sponsor picks up the phone, and I emotionally puke on him.

She left me and kicked me out and blah blah blah, you know, all the time never seeing my own actions, just seeing what she had done to me. You know, how dare she wrong me? I'm a nice guy. No. Really, I am.

What Jeff did for me then is he got me going in the steps. He got me going into actions. I don't know if he did it on purpose or not, but he put Kelvin in my life. And, Jeff was in Fargo and Kelvin was in my and I hung on to Kelvin and Terry like a security blanket for the next 4 months, 5 months until I moved to Fargo. If Kelvin was in a meeting, I was at a meeting.

If Kelvin was at home trying to spend time with his wife, I was on his couch. If Kelvin was trying to be romantic with his wife, I was on the phone. Calvin, what's up? Simmons call later. He'd hang up on me.

So I'd sit by the phone. Oh, he'll answer next time. And, during all this time I'm learning or I'm actually resenting what has happened to me in my life. I am a sober recovering member of Alcoholics Anonymous trying to do the right thing and look what's happened to me because for all my emotion, all the things that drive me, I can't see my wrongs. I can't see how I treated that woman.

I can't see how I shunned a because it got in the way of making money. I can't see any of that. All I can see is how I got wronged. And what happened for me in May of 99 is I couldn't take life and mine it anymore. Kelvin moved away probably to get rid of get rid of me and, he moved to Fargo and my sponsor was here with Chad b and they were starting a meeting and, with nowhere left to go in Minot, I came to Fargo.

I came to Fargo a lot of options and I got here and I wasn't comfortable here. The meeting was cool but that was a couple hours on Tuesday. The other 6 and a half days of the week, I had to spend with myself. I had to try and take the actions. I went without a job, you know, because that might get in the way and, I didn't have a real good time the 1st 6 months I was in Fargo because I just run around feeling sorry for myself.

I got a roommate when I got here. I called like the day before I moved on they said yeah Zack's got like 3 weeks move in with him and, found out a little later he had like 20 minutes when I got there. He used to think he was so sneaky. He'd, he didn't have to be to class till 11 and I'd work from, like, 7 to noon. I'd get up in the morning and wake Zach up just to help help him have a real good day, you know, getting up at 6:30.

And, I'd come home from noon, at noon from work, and there'd be Zach laying in bed and I'd be like, dude, what are you doing? Oh, man. I had to take a nap after class, you know, he didn't go to that class for 6 months. So Zach and I are living together, I'm really resenting the fact that I can't live with my little girl. I'm not real comfortable in Fargo and the only thing the only thing keeping me here is because this is I know this is my only chance is to be here.

This is it. This is my only chance. That and my sponsor on the phone, and this was daily. Simmons, just stay another day. Just stay another day.

And, you know when Jeff gave me an answer I didn't like during that time, I do what every good alcoholic man does, I call home. Mom. You know, and I'd emotionally throw up on her and then she'd feel bad and, that's my kind of sickness. I can't feel terrible by myself. I gotta drag people in with me.

And, somewhere along the line through Jeff's patience and the actions of the people in the northern plains group and I say you people because it wasn't me, my life started to get better again. I was back in the steps, and guys were taking me where I needed to be. Simmons, we're going to a roundup. Let's go. It wasn't even an option.

I just had to go. Now this isn't a guy with 3 weeks running around not knowing what to do, taking directions from a sponsor. This is a guy with 5 years running around because the emotional life was so great because the pain of my the the result of my actions hurt so bad. I just had to listen and go. And, slowly but surely, my life started to get better again.

And, I tell you what, that takes me up to the point of the Northern Plains group actually blowing up. I mean you know what these guys started with their meeting with 25 people the 1st week four and a half years ago and and look what it is now. Look at the look at the lives it has affected the people's the lives that have changed because of the Northern Plains group. I can look through the audience tonight and see people that came in while I've been here and see how their life has changed and then more importantly I can see how their life has affected my life how they've helped me how they've shown me how to do the next right thing You know, I've got 3 in the audience tonight that, I owe my life to because there's days when I get home and I wanna sit on the couch and feel sorry for Jeff because, you know, somebody chewed my butt today or something. And, one of them will call with one of the most inane questions you can imagine.

Simmons, there was this girl in the drive thru and she looked at me. I'm not gonna name any names but no, I won't. You know, those guys are trusting me with questions in their life. Now that's not something that Jeff is an alcoholic coming into Alcoholics Anonymous. Nobody wanted me to touch their life in any kind of way, you know, because when I get done, when my alcoholic tornado hits the ground, things blow up.

Things get people get wrecked. People get hurt. And, those guys are trusting me with their life today, you know. That's a pretty big responsibility. Things that have happened good in my life, mom and dad let me back in the house today.

They're actually excited when I come there, you know. There was a point in time when, I'm pretty sure they didn't really want me around because they didn't know what was gonna happen. They didn't know how I was gonna act. I've had the opportunity today to, to make my amends to my mom and dad, And, that's something I didn't think I could ever do. I didn't think I could ever admit the wrongs I committed to those people because I never realized how much I was loved until I got here.

And you people taught me love. You taught me how to love other people and to love yourself. And then that gets me right here, you know. Now this is the part where I'm gonna get emotional, but you all understand. My little girl today is 7 years old and she's in the 2nd grade and, she's 300 miles away.

And every time I get in that car to drive to Mankato, Minnesota, that first hour I'm resentful. What have I done to deserve to have to drive down there to see her? And that's not the point because when I get there, I get that big old hug from my little girl and I know that she loves me. For all the crap I've done, for all the ways that I've affected her life, she just loves me. She's just happy to see daddy because she knows we're gonna go do cannonballs in the swimming pool and we're gonna order pizza and stay up later than we should and she's just happy to see her daddy, you know.

I can remember a point in time when, when that wasn't possible, when I couldn't love her the way she needed to be loved Because all in all, my alcoholism will cloud me, will cloud my vision, my perception of everybody in my life. Absolutely everybody in my life. Did I just can't see it. I can't see because of the way I feel about myself, why should I be loved? You know, because of the things I've done, the places I've been, why should I be loved?

But the longer I stay here, I can see that I am. You know, I've I've been in some guys' weddings. That's that doesn't happen to alcoholics like me. You know, it's a pretty big honor. I was a godfather for a for a friend at his son's baptism a few months ago or a month ago.

And, that that was insane. I I never even met his son, but he's been sober 9 years and, he asked me to do that. And it was it was a powerful weekend. I just I can't really can't explain it. It's above and beyond me.

The things Alcoholics Anonymous has given me are immeasurable you know, like I said I got my little girl, I got my mom and dad, I've got you guys. I got my sponsor to kick me in the cheeks when I need to be kicked in the cheeks. I got my sponsees to keep life pretty humorous And, you know, all in all today, if I look back at 8 years ago, I got it pretty good today. I got some things that I don't deserve. I'm in a spot that I really can't conceive and I can't take the credit for myself.

As much as I like to take credit when I do something bright, I can't take credit for this. It's been the people and the love in these rooms in Alcoholics Anonymous that have made my life what it is today. You know, tomorrow it isn't gonna be a bed of roses, it will not. I suffered from that delusion for a long long time, life's gonna be a bed of roses now that I'm sober and such a good guy and, it isn't the way it's gonna be. You know, life is gonna be life.

All I've got is a ticket back to the game, and, I appreciate that. You know, you guys gave me that. You gave me a life back, and you taught me how to love. I thank you for the honor to, to speak at the Tuesday night meeting, The best home group in the world. And that's all I got.

Thank you.