Mary Pearl T. from North Little Rock, AR speaking the Alaskan Inside Passage Cruise

Tradition 3. Just trying to keep it on time, you know. 2 or more persons, when gathered together for mutual benefit, may call themselves a relationship. The only basic requirements for a good marriage or relationship are a mutual desire to be in the relationship and willingness to make it work. One person alone cannot make a relationship work.

How many times have you tried to make something work that just didn't go work? No matter what you do, you've gotta both be willing to be there. You've gotta both be willing to work on a relationship. I got I just I sit there and laughed hysterically when Donald Trump got on TV and he said, if you have to work on a relationship, there's something wrong with it. I thought, that explains your problems, Donald.

Now I'm telling you, you've got to work on something for it to be you know, that's just like if you own a home. If you just go sit and live in that home and don't ever do any maintenance to that home, that home will fall down around your ears. And the same thing is true with a relationship. You've got to put something in it, you know? J.

D. And I will be married 32 years this year. We have had to put a lot in. You know, we had a lot to overcome. You know, it's easier to start a new relationship than it is to work on a broken one.

A broken one is much harder because you got a lot of history there to have to deal with, you know, and things in old tapes and stuff to have to get rid of, you know. But I find it works. But now willingness, you've got to be willing to grow and you've got to allow that person to grow at their own pace and some are going to grow faster than others. Some will be slower, you know. But the willingness without action is just a fantasy on your part.

You know, you say, I'm willing to do this and I'm willing to do that. But if you're not taking the action, that willingness is just a little story you've got ripping around in your head. It's not doing anything, you know. It's like if I wanna go to Alaska, I gotta get my butt up here on a boat or somehow to get up here. I can just sit in my living room all day long thinking about going to Alaska and it ain't getting me there.

You know, I gotta take an action. And sometimes I find that in our relationship, we sort of swap back and forth with our degree of willingness. Some days I'm more willing. Some days I'm just not willing, you know. Some days I am just so into self that it's all about me and I'm not willing to work on a relationship that day.

I don't have I don't have that as a conscious thought, but if you look at my actions, you'll see it. There it is, you know. She's not willing to work on the relationship this day. And, sometimes it's like you get up and you know you're not in a good spot. You just know you're not doing pretty well today.

You don't feel spiritually connected. That's one of your first things you'll notice. And you feel out of sorts and everything is annoying to you. You know, it's like sort of being in an exaggerated PMS. The girls know and the guys should if you've lived with 1.

Sensitive bitch, I think is the term that you would use. Okay? And when we're in one of those kind of things, you know, I usually say, hey, you know, I'm not in a good place today. You know, I'm not in a really good place. So just remember, you know, today, don't put a lot of stuff on me today because I'm just not able to deal with it very well today.

You know? And that's communicating where I'm at. That's telling somebody, hey, I'm not so don't expect a hell of a lot from me today. But remember, all things come to pass. And if you don't have a bunch of stuff put on you, that deal will pass.

But the more it's put on you when you're in one of those can't handle it things, the more irritable, restless, and discontent you'll become. Now I've stayed in a relationship for many reasons other than I wanted to be there. And I bet you, you have too. Felt trapped maybe? A little trapped in a relationship?

Had fear of emotional or financial security? Confusion. Not knowing what to do. There's a lot of people that go into a relationship, don't have a clue what they you know, I'm here. I just I don't know why I'm here, but I just I'm here.

And then there's the materialism. I've got somebody that's got a lot of money and I can have all the things I want and I like my things. I like my things. And then there's pity, not love. Feeling sorry for that person, you know.

He needs me. He needs me. And pride, not willing to admit you made a mistake. This is not the deal. You know?

And the funny thing about it is I remember when, JD and I first got married, you know, or when we first met even, the the new relationship. Isn't it wonderful? Somebody says, what's he like? Oh, God. You know, he's so handsome.

He's so sweet. He's so wonderful. He's just perfect. Okay? And you're looking at his potential.

Because see, somewhere lurking, you know that you know how he does this. It's annoying, but I can I can work on that? And what have you, you know. But after your marriage or commitment, you know, the first thing you good about is changing them changing them. You get the piece of paper, it says, you may change him now, you know.

I mean, that's somehow or another. You know, it's real funny. But when you're living together or when you're dating or whatever, it's a little different than when you sign the paper on the dotted line. It's like you own one another or something at that point. I don't know what happened, you know.

It's just JD said I sold him a bad bill of goods. He said, you were nice and sweet and you went along with everything. And I said, yes, but that's before now we've got to be responsible because, you know, we we we got married. We we got we got to handle things here now. You've got to stop that drinking.

You've got to stop this and that. And, you know, these bad habits, you know, you you I mean, we're married now. And he goes, oh. You know, I mean, it's like somehow and and, you know, and I didn't realize that I was trying to change him, make him do all the adjustments. It just appeared to me in my self centeredness that he was the only one that needed change.

I mean, after all, I mean, you can see I was surprised, you know. My mother said to me when I got married, she says, that's your bed, you lie in it, you know. So I wouldn't admit I made a mistake for nothing after that. That's the reason I lived in that first marriage for 8 years. I knew it was over after the honeymoon, but I stayed in there for 8 years because I didn't want to give her the satisfaction of being right.

You know, that's miserable. And you know, sometimes it's just easier to stay with the known than it is to jump into the unknown. Sometimes you'll stay just for that because it's easier. You know what you gotta do. But when the knowing of the unknown, when that, you know, when the fear of the unknown is not as great as the fear of what you know you got to put up with, then you'll make a change.

You'll take a chance and do something different. I had, things that kill relationships, fear, dishonesty, especially about your feelings. When you're dishonest with each other about your feelings and you have these hurt feelings or these anger feelings or whatever and they'll say, what's wrong? You'll say, nothing. Nothing.

It's being dishonest instead of saying how you feel. Obsessions ruin relationships. You know, those obsessions, those things, you know, that need you know, my thing, I had that need for attention, that first relationship. I needed attention so desperately. I found it in night clubs.

My husband played in a band and while he would play the band, I would play the room. You know, I I you know, I I just I had that thing for excitement and for attention. Mental unfaithfulness. Mental unfaithfulness will ruin a relationship. It makes you very unhappy with what you have at home.

Because in your mental deal, your fantasy about someone else, they are going to be perfect. They're going to do things the way you want them to do. They're gonna be the way you want them to be. They're gonna look the way you want them to look and then you'll start comparing the person you're living with to the fantasy person. And the more you do that, the more discontent you become with what you have at home.

Been there, done that one. Avoidance, being unavailable, blocking them out. Blocking them out. Being unavailable physically and emotionally, just being unavailable and then the control, you know. I always loved the attitude in the bedroom.

It was the dog yummy theory. You're good, you get some. You're bad, you don't get some. You know, you know, sex was a dog yummy. You know, give them a milk bone.

What the heck? You know, it wasn't a part of the relationship. It wasn't an intimacy thing. It was just sex. Then there was abuse, Physical, verbal, and punishment.

You know, the punishments, how we got even with one another. You know, the little sick sadistic things that we do to get even with one another when we would get angry, not knowing how to do that. My first husband, I told him, I said, if you ever hit me, that's it. That's it. I will not put up with that.

And then he did. And did I leave? No. I didn't. Why didn't I leave?

Well, I could've given you all the reasons I used at the time. I was in a foreign country and but the bottom line was I didn't wanna go back home and tell the old girl she's right. And then there was, you know, why did he hit you? I don't think there's a reason to hit people. I've done it, but I don't think, you know, when when I look at it through a little more sanity now.

But at the time, I called him a name that he took very, very offensive. It wasn't a big deal. I had heard the words. I had just never said them before. Some of it didn't seem like a bad deal to me, you know, but he took it really personally like I talked about his mother.

I didn't even dream that's what it was about. You know, I mean, I'm a young woman. How did I know? We were in the military. You heard lots of words.

You didn't know what were. And, he said, don't you call me that. Well, don't tell me what I can do. I said, son of a bitch. And he said, I'm warning you.

Don't you say that to me again. Son bitch, son bitch, son bitch. And boy, I mean, he just get all off and he knocked me flat in the floor. And I'm laying down there, I looked up every day, son bitch. See, I'm the kind you'd have to kill, you know.

And so I said, you know it takes a big man to hit a woman, don't it? And I said, but you gotta sleep sometime. And when you do, you may wake up with an ice pick in your head. And so he moved out to the plotline. And the thing of it was, that was not an idle threat because I was mad.

And now but see, I wouldn't shed a tear. He didn't realize my mother physically abused me as a child. She abused me many, many times. And the way you got her was you didn't cry. So see, I was not but you got even.

You got even. Do things to get even. I had the disease of more, you know. I love my favorite, explanation of disease of more is the the drunk who walks into the bar and he sees a sign, oh, you can drink for a dollar. And he says, I owe $2 worth.

You know? I mean, but that's the way I live my life. You know, that's how I live, you know. And I lived in a world of fantasy and denial, you know. That's like the the the priest and the rabbi.

They all and Elenon, they all died and went to hell. And they're down there and discussing the situation. And, Rabbi and the priest were talking about and the priest says, what did you do to get to be sent to hell? He said, it was pork. He said, what do you mean?

He said, well, the next door neighbors fix pork chops one night, invited me over. I ate pork, got the taste of pork, and you know I'm Jewish. I'm not supposed to eat pork. So that that's what happened. I know that's why I'm here.

And he said, why are you here? And the priest said, well, it was sort of the same thing. It was next door neighbor's daughter. You know. And so he said, I just never could get a hold on that celibacy thing, you know?

And he said, to the Al Anon, he said, why are you here? And she said, what do you mean? He said, what did you do to get sent to hell? And she said, well, it's not hot and I'm not here. That's the way we are, you know.

This can't be happening, you know. This kind of thing can't be happening, you know. And I had spiritual bankruptcy. That'll ruin a relationship. Another thing that really ruins relationships is bitching.

That nagging, that incessant. This is one of the things I hated the worst in living at home with my mama. My mama never had a positive thing to say. And then one day, you look in the mirror and guess what? You become your mama.

You know, it's like you can you pick out every bad thing in the world. You can't find anything good that's going on. I remember saying to my mama one time, I said, mama, could you tell me something good that's happening in your life? Not a darn thing. I said, thank you.

You know? But it's it's there's another little story I love and it's about this little woman that entered the convent to become a nun. And they had to take a vow of silence. And so for 10 years, she wasn't allowed to say a word and then the mother of the spirit calls her in and she said, you've been a very good, faithful nun, praying, doing everything you should. We're gonna allow you to say 2 words.

And she said, bed's hard. And she said, that's right. The beds are hard here. Go and pray. So 10 years later, they bring her back.

So you're allowed 2 more words and she said, food stinks. And they said, that's right. Go back and pray. And so the caller back at the next 10 years, she said, I quit. And then mother superior says, well, thank God you haven't done anything but bitch since you've been here.

Story of my life. Selfishness, it's what I want. It's about me. It's more. Mine, mine, mine, like the little kid, you know.

And the self centeredness says it's all about me. And the self seeking is what's in it for me. Those are things that destroyed my relationship. But the things that helped to heal those relationships were learning to have a sense of humor. You know, developing a sense of humor.

Now for those of you who might have known me when I was a kid growing up, I was sort of the class clown because that was the the persona that I used to let you know that I was okay and that was how I tried to get people to like me. But a lot of times, the person who's laughing the most is hurt the most on the inside and they're crying the most. And what that is is the cry for attention. Look at me. Love me.

Look at me. Love me. That's not a sense of humor. That's a desperate need. That's a desperate need.

But there's a difference, you know, in having a sense of humor. And so when I got in the program, I asked God every morning, you know, please help me. Help me not to be so intense about things today. Help me to have a sense of humor. And then that no matter what happens this day, God, help me to deal with it in a manner in which that, you know, it doesn't leave a lasting scar if I can.

Well, one of the first things that happened, that 1st year or so in sobriety, Jamie and I, went out to his mother's. It was around Christmas time. And his mother had this really, really long driveway and it wasn't paved. It was just a little gravel down the yard thing. And if you got off of the gravel, then you would sink up in the yard because it had just rained.

And so JD said he was tired that night and, of course, funny. So we drive in and he said, I want you to drive. I said, alright. So I drove and we were in, pickup. And when we got there, they weren't home.

And so he said, okay. Now I'm a really good driver forward. I am a lousy backup. I really am, you know. I I would love to envy people that can go in 60 miles an hour, you know, go 4 blocks.

I just I would give anything to be I mean, in the movies, I'm just, oh, God. Would that be wonderful? But I'm doing it like, like this. And so I did my little like that and I was off and sunk to the axle. Sunk to the axle.

And JD jumped out of the truck and he ran around and he looked at I mean, it doesn't take a little giant to feel the truck go down. I mean, you know you're there, you know. But the observation team was out and he ran around there and then he began to and he called me everything but a human being. And I had made decision that morning that nothing was gonna happen was gonna ruin my day. And I went back around and I got out and I looked at it and I said, well, that didn't work.

Now, would you like to call a wrecker? And he looked and he started laughing. He said, I guess that didn't work. Now see, before I would have been the martyr. How could you say that to me?

I would have cut him back, you know, done the whole thing. And it was only by the grace of God. That's what I believe that day that God showed me that you can deal with it a different way. I didn't have to take it. You know, I mean, I knew I couldn't back up.

He knew I couldn't back up. You know? But I I did the best I could and the best I could got me off. But that was one of my greatest gifts that year at Christmas was not to have a rotten attitude because I hated the holidays. It seemed to me every holiday, JD was in jail or something was going bad and, you know, you had to use your whole Christmas bonus to take care of fines and stuff like that.

So I did not look forward to Christmastime at all. But that year, I had a good Christmas and life kept happening but I had a good Christmas, you know. Another thing, that I found is like, my sister. Now I don't know how many of y'all know but, your November 30, 1999, my sister had renal failure. And, her whole body shut down and she died in the car with me.

And I rushed her to a hospital and they were able to revive her, but she has massive brain damage. She has anoxic brain injury, very little memory at all. And, what she has is really confused. But I've had to develop a sense of humor in dealing with her and she has to have 24 hour care. We, we have lots of problems with Dorothy.

It's like being in Mother Hell Part 2. Her personality has changed. She's more like my mother, which is not a good thing. You know, we always promised each other if we saw us getting like mother, we'd kill one another. And, you know, it's like, the people I love just don't stay dead.

You know, it's like, I drowned JD, he's back. Dorothy died, she's back. You know, it's what's wrong with my family that they can't die and stay dead? And Dorothy said to me, she says, would you promise me if I die in the car with you again that you'll let me stay dead? And I said, Dorothy, if you die in the car with me again, I will drive around for a minimum of 6 to 8 hours till you are stiff as a damn poker.

She said, good. I said, yes. Take her with me to the grocery store and she's like a 5 year old. She sees all these things that she wants and she'll put them all in the cart. And when we get to the checkout, I just don't check them out.

And she'll jump up and she'll say, you're so mean to me. You're so mean. And I'll say, that's right. That's the reason mother calls me Meany Pearl. I am and I try to go to the same checker every time.

You know, because they they do look at you a little strange. But, you know, that's another thing. I have had to deal with that with a sense of humor because people do have a tendency to look at people who are handicapped or retarded or whatever and, that's sad, you know. You won't know if you haven't had to do the deal. You just don't know.

You have to learn to make sincere amends, you know. In other words, you're gonna have to be wrong sometimes, you know. And by being making sincere amends, that helps heal damaged relationship. The first time that I made an amends to JD was because I thought he had stolen my cigarettes and so I had screamed all over him. And, you know how it would be if you were drinking and somebody, when you got up the next morning, somebody drank your booze overnight.

Well, JD decided that he had quit drinking, he had quit smoking, and he just quit buying. And so I got up and I didn't have my cigarettes and it just irritated me no end. So I accused him of stealing them and I cussed him out. We had a big fight and he left and went to my mother's. And, he loved the enemy, you know.

They'd go over there and gang up against me, you know. Mama loved him. She cared for me, but she loved JD because JD would agree with everything she said and I fought her about everything. That's the reason we couldn't get along. We were too much alike.

But anyway, one of the all nine girls called and she said, what are you doing? I told her about my litany here, about my cigarettes were gone. She said, do you not have any more money? And I said, well, yes, I got money. She said, how far away is the store?

I said, well, neighborhood grocery, 2 or 3 blocks away. She said, why don't you go get you some cigarette? Well, that's too simple. You say, he bought her I mean, he stole my cigarette. So he should have to be the one.

She said, he's not doing without the cigarette. And she says, and besides that, you owe him and a man. And I said, what? She said, you owe him amends? I said, he stole my damn cigarettes and I owe an amends here?

She said, yes. You owe the amends because you're the one who cussed him out and threw the fit. How important was it? It? Was it worth that?

You know, how many times do we throw fits over such little stuff? When you think about that, maybe the one thing that is really gonna start that tear in your relationship that's gonna get bigger and bigger because, you know, it's not usually big things. It's the fleas and ticks of life that drive you crazy. You can handle a big crisis, but it's that everyday that destroys more happiness and and the closeness between people. And, so I went over and JD was out in my mother's back field mowing the grass.

He squared off when he saw me coming. And, I I went over there and I said to him, you know, you know, I was wrong. And he said, what? And I said, I was wrong. He said, what?

I said, I was wrong. He goes, oh, my God. And then all of a sudden tears began to form in his eyes. And I said, what? He said, do you realize you have never admitted you were wrong before?

I said, that is a lie from the pit of hell. And you know how your mind will go like you're searching, searching, searching, searching, searching, searching, searching. And he goes, not found. Because I'm gonna tell him, don't you remember when And I realized I had never admitted I was wrong. That when we had an argument, he always had to apologize or I would have carried it to the end of the time because I couldn't be wrong.

I felt so low. I couldn't be wrong. My self esteem would not let me be wrong. And I just felt so bad about that. And I said, well, I was wrong, and I'm sorry, and I won't fuss at you again about it.

And, you know, that started a healing in our relationship when I could be wrong. And it's no big deal. I can be wrong all the time now. In fact, it's sort of nice. You know, you don't have to be so darn responsible.

You know? And then you have to use forgiveness. You know. Put the past in the past. It's called a living amend, you know.

Leaving the past. Don't keep saying, Yeah. This is just like, you know. Because see, I did that to him one afternoon. I said, you know, this is just like when such and such and such and such.

And he looked at me and he said, wrong husband. Forgot, you know, forgot. And I I have to be willing to keep on working and doing, not being lazy. You know, sometimes we're just lazy about holding up our part of the relationship, you know. And the more I work on my spiritual condition with God, the more my relationship with other people gets in line because when I'm in good condition with God, what you do doesn't really bother me so much.

But when I'm not in good condition, if my spiritual condition is all anything, you'd you even look funny, you know. What she mean by that? Did you see that eyebrow went up? Wonder what she was talking about my I know she was look at her. Is there something wrong with my you know, you just get totally paranoid, you know.

You know, you're not much, but you're all you think about, you know, that kind of thing. Tradition 4. Each partner should be autonomous, except in matters affecting the other partner, the family or relationship, or society as a whole. Now autonomy means I have the freedom to do whatever I want to But with that freedom comes the responsibility for any action I take. Now, will what I'm gonna do make my partner angry?

I don't know. Depends on where he's at. You know? That's not gotta bother you know, there's certain things that I know. You know the buttons that your people have.

The buttons that you can push. You know those things. Stay away from those. But I when I think about taking an action of some kind, and I'll say, well, let me run this past somebody else. Run it past my sponsors.

Somebody else that knows me. You know, get a little input out of the between your ears type. You know, anything up here, you will cosign. Anything here is always a good idea. You ever notice that?

Sometimes when you hear yourself say it out loud, you know then it's not a good idea. But it sounded so good up here. What happened there? You know? My sponsor says, your thinking's broken so don't use it so much.

You know, and that's true. I need to run it. And the most dangerous thing you can ever hear an Al Anon or an AA to me say is I've been thinking. I've been thinking, you know. And I said, oh, that's dangerous, you know.

Because I don't know about your head, but I have committees that meet in my head. And we discuss stuff and we cosign stuff, you know. You know, that's just like the the summer of the dry drunk. Here I was, you know. JD, you know, he he had quit drinking.

He wasn't in AA. I was still crazy as in March here too. No treatment for any disease going on at our house. And I was miserable. Absolutely miserable.

It was all his fault. Always all his fault. And that's when it occurred to me, you see I had thought for years years if he would quit drinking I'll be okay. Well, guess what? He's not drinking.

I'm not okay. Now what's going on? Well, it's him. It wasn't the drinking. It's just him.

You know, he he needs to go. You know, well, why don't we just divorce him? Well, you can't divorce him. What do you mean you can't divorce him? Well, you know, you've already divorced 1.

If you have to divorce another one, then there might, you know, where's the common thread here, you know? Don't wanna go there, you know? Well, I don't wanna be a divorcee again either. That wasn't a great fun thing. But now, if he were to die, you could be a widow.

Now, widow sounds good. It's honorable at least, you know. It's not like being divorced. It's not like being a loser, you know. You can be a widow, a little merry widow.

But he's not dying. That's no big deal. We can handle that. Well, what do you mean? Well, just think about it.

It's justifiable homicide no matter how you look at it. Oh, yeah. Justifiable homicide. I mean, that's it. You know?

I mean, it's just there it is. You know? Well, what do you want to do? Well, I want to take an ice stick, stab him in the neck and watch him drip. Oh, God.

Is that wonderful or what? He's almost having an orgasm thinking about that. But, wait a minute. Let's back over him with the car. Squish him up in the tires.

Make a note, buy new tires. You know, this is how the thinking's going. It sounds good. Makes sense to me. Why?

Because it's all going on up here. I didn't have anybody to talk to. I didn't have anybody to tell anything to. And it sounded it gave me light at the end of the tunnel. There was a way out of the hell that I was in.

And so I grasped onto that, not having anything else. And so as the time went on, I saw in the paper where a lady had killed her husband and they had put her away anyway. And I'm thinking, I should have been on that jury. Nobody would have got her put away. If I'd have been there, I would have been the holdout.

She would have walked, you know, because that was tacky. Tacky for them to convict a woman who'd live when drunk. I mean, my god. But that meant we had to have another meeting. So we all got together.

We got to thinking about it, you know. And I would dream about it. And all of a sudden, one night, it was if an alcoholic were to pass out in the bathtub and drown, who would know? It was a group conscience. We all liked it, you know.

And the thing about it is what you think on long enough, you will act upon, unfortunately or fortunately. It depends. If it's good stuff and you think about it, you act upon it. But when it's not good stuff, you know, you still will act upon that, at least I do. And so that was the kind of thinking.

So now here I'm gonna take an autonomous action, aren't I? Yes, I am. You know, and so the bottom line was, you know, I tried attempted murder. You know, it's nothing that I'm proud about because I have been to the prisons and there are people there for doing a lot less than I've done. You know?

And I don't know why that that wasn't my thing. I don't know why I didn't get there. Why other but I feel like there's people there doing time for me. Doing time for me. To be autonomous, you have to know who and what you are.

If you're going to really and first of all, nice morning. We'll all adjourn to the bingo lounge. Like I said before my higher power, I'm a child of God. And I'm God's kid. I'm more than just a wife or a mother or a sister or a friend or a neighbor, but I'm a child of God.

And I need to learn what a child of God does and what a child of God doesn't, you know. And my actions are can be destructive when my character defects take over. You know, that's what ruins your actions is your character defects, You know? I've had these, little autonomous actions all along. After we had that decision making about the truck and the sports car, I mean, when we made that one, one day I was driving that truck that that nobody liked and I went tearing down the the road and as I passed the dealership, the station wagon called to me from off the lot.

Murphy. Murphy. Over here, Murphy. And there was this giant red station wagon with the wood trim and everything on it, you know. And I went, oh.

And I went tearing home, you know. And I told JD about this one. I do say I'm not riding in a damn hearse. I am not riding in a bus. He said, I don't want a big old car that's that.

So I go to work. I come home the next day as I'm coming past Murphy! Murphy! And so I tear into the lot. And I walk over to the car and I lay my hands on it.

And the and the the salesman comes out and he says, would you like to drive this car? I said, no. I want to buy this car. And he said, you don't need to drive it. No.

It called to me. It's my car. I've just laid hands on it. Here's what I'm paying. If I can have it for the same payment I'm making, I will take this car with me right now.

He said, what you paying? I told him, now this truck is almost paid for. We're going there. So now we have another 3 years. And I drive in with the very vehicle that he didn't want.

It was an autonomous action. I loved it though, I will have to say. But I kept it 21 years. It was a very good car. I love that station wagon.

And a bunch of you have ridden in that car many times. But you know the that was so funny when I finally bought the next car and, the car salesperson was a lady, and she wanted to buy my car because it was in such good shape. Except it was just old, old, old, and you can't find parts for them hardly. But she's, her husband took it to use at work. And one day someone came into there and says, who's driving the red station wagon?

And he said, I am. And they said, I was raised in that car. Can I eat my lunch out there? And one of the kids who had gone to Alatine and then in Al Anon was working here. I thought it was sort of funny.

Another thing that can be destructive was, me in the mall. I had this thing about buying stuff made me feel good. And, buying stuff that I couldn't afford and could impress you with made me feel better. You know, I don't know why I was like that, but I just had to do that. It was like, you know, I came, I saw, I conquered.

I was like MacArthur, you know, charge. You know what I mean? Just, you know, They used to tease me and say my charge cards were like o c b papers. To get them apart, I had to go blow them. You know, they were so thin from use.

You know? That's the thing you roll cigarettes with, OCD papers. Okay. Okay. I'm dating myself here.

Yeah. Yes. I see that, you know. Well, I'm old for God's sake. Think about rolling marijuana.

Zigzags. Zigzags. Okay. I'm not a dope smoker. I'm a, you know, I'm a dope collector.

But I found that there was a way to cure myself of this. And, that was taking things back. You know, it got to the point where, I would buy stuff. I'd still go to the mall and buy stuff. And then when I get it home and then I'd go, I don't know why I have this, you know.

The next day it's like it seemed like a good idea at the time. I saw it. I wanted it. I wanted it. I needed it.

I got it. I brought it home. What the hell am I gonna do with it? And so what I used to do was give it away so I didn't have to look at it. But you still have to pay for it when you do that.

But you see, if you take something back, that means you're telling the story you made a mistake. You know? And so I would go and I would have to take these things back. And it got to a point there for a while, the salesperson when they would sell it, they they were working on commission, you know. And they got to they knew me and they'd say, do you really want this?

Because we don't wanna have to reverse it out tomorrow. You know, it's a lot more hassle to have to take something back. But even to this day it does not bother me to take things back when I've done that. I had a couch that I bought. Now I had been looking for a particular kind of couch for a long time.

And when I went to the most expensive store in Little Rock, they had the style of the couch I wanted. Not the fabric, but they showed me all these wonderful swatches. And I picked the fabric that was crushed velvet print from Belgium. And I did this on my lunch hour. And I had a girl that worked with me with me.

And, I ordered the couch to be made at the factory, special order. And we left the store and she said, how much is that going to cost? And I said, if you have to ask, you can't afford it. And I couldn't. Well, the couch was supposed to be there in 90 days.

But long time ago, they had a longshoreman strike up in New York, and my fabric was on the boat. So I went 6 months without a couch. It was real nice Christmas that year sitting in the floor, having people over and that kind of thing. And when the couch finally got there, you know, here's an $1800 couch and we're talking 1976. Yes.

It was a wonderful couch. That Clayton Marcus couch was a wonderful couch. And today it's sitting in the Wolf Street Center in Little Rock in the old timers room because I just couldn't part with it any other way. Because JD, I had kept it all these years and it's been recovered because you can't wear it out. You're good cows.

But, JD decided this last year that, he wanted more togetherness. Now we each had our chairs, and the couch was for company. And he said, you know, he said, I I want I I almost lost you. And he said, I want us to be closer. And he said, I want us to get that couch that has the recliners.

And so we could put the dogs in the middle, and we could sit there together and hold hand and have our dogs there with us. And so we got the couch. The only problem was our dogs didn't make it. We lost both of our babies this year. But we have the couch.

And the funny thing now is, I'm small enough, I can sit in his lap in the chair. You know, that's, you know, they just things things change, you know. You know your mind works very, very fast. Beware of your mind. I was talking to a girl I sponsored.

She said, just a minute. Someone's at the door. She went to the door, was back at the phone. I know not more than 30, 40 seconds at the most. And here's what happened while she was gone.

I'm hungry. Boy, wouldn't a bacon and tomato sandwich be good? But you can't have a bacon and tomato sandwich. Why? Well, you've cleaned your stove.

And you know, bacon spatters. And once you clean the stove, you don't ever wanna use it again. You know, it's so hard to get that damn spattered grease off the stove. What you need is a microwave. You're right.

45 seconds, I have bought, justified, and talked myself into a microwave oven. Didn't have one. You know. And so I told her, I said thank God you're back. I just bought a microwave.

She said, how? And I said, that was amazing. And she said, well, I said, how fast our mind works. I had never really thought about how fast our mind works. But when I was relating that to her, when you realize what a short span, how you can go from from this point to that point, that is amazing.