Clarence S. from Cleveland, OH

Was one of the very first who came before all of us. He will have achieved 29 years of continuous sobriety next February. Almost my age of 39. Which makes him the oldest living member of AA in length of sobriety. He was the first member of AA in Cleveland, Ohio, helped organize the 1st AA group in Cleveland, and or rather did organize the 1st AA group in Cleveland, helped organize many others.

And that was actually the first AA group as they broke away from the Oxford group, which, in studying the history of our great program, you know that there was a forerunner of AA, was the Oxford group, and Clarence was the person who broke away from the Oxford group and started the first group of AA as we know it now. He's one of the first forty members of Alcoholics Anonymous. He's one of the men who helped write the book. So if there's any of you here who wanna rewrite the book, he's the fellow to see. And his story is one of the stories in the book from which all of us have gone great hope and great strength, and that wonderful warm feeling of a new life.

And he's got a very hearty laugh, and I'm sure that we're going to be delighted with, an excellent message tonight. So without any further ado, it is my pleasure to introduce all the way now from Saint Petersburg, Florida, one of our grand champions of our wonderful program, Clarence. Yes. Clarence? Well, thank you very much.

I'm very anxious to hear what this fellow's got to say. Well, first of all, I do wish to thank the committee for inviting me here. I have never been to Northern California. In fact, I have never had any connection with any AA function here in California, except one meeting I went to about 6 years ago in San Diego with Jim Burwell. And it's really a pleasure, and I'm having a real blast here.

And I've made some wonderful new friends, I met some old ones here. It's It's one thing about AA, when you get around, stick around here, no matter where you go, you're gonna run into someone you know. You can't get away with anything anymore. Yeah. Old friends of mine from Cleveland, Dewey Speeces, and Johnny Hilliard's, and then some folks from down in Florida, the Lilliantals.

Some of them are all here, friends of mine. Doesn't make any difference where we go. We have them. Why, I do thank you for inviting me here to take part in this wonderful program. As you heard, my name is Clarence Snyder.

And I come from St. Petersburg. For the benefit of anyone here who belongs to the press, the radio, or the films, that name Snyder is spelled s n y d e r. I have always been about as anonymous as a barber pole. I never seem to be able to hide anything anyway, so I have nothing to hide from anyone.

So much for that. You know, looking over a crowd like this, it's it's really a thrill, and I never seem to get over it. I'm invited by people to come around and talk to various meetings, various places, and this always gives me a tremendous thrill. And I look at a crowd like this, they're all dressed up and all shined up, look wonderful. Wonderful looking crowd.

And when I look at a crowd such as this, I always think of one of my favorite Rummy stories. I'm not much at telling Rummy, at telling stories at all, but I do have a few which I enjoy. And I think one of my favorites is a story about Jerry the town drunk. I might call him Vern maybe, but his name really was Jerry. And this fellow had been drunk as long as anyone in town could remember.

And he was always dirty, disheveled, unshaven, and his hind end was out of his britches, and his bare feet were on the ground. He's always drunk, many, many years. This went on and on and on, and eventually the day came when Jerry finally turned up his toes and died. We all do, he did. And this created a problem in the town.

They had to have a burial for him. So someone had to take responsibility for it, and someone did. So they went around to the village barber and he offered to shave him and clean him up. 1 of the tailors fixed him up a suit. Someone gave him a shirt and a necktie.

And they got him all spruced up, got his hair cut and shaved, and the whole thing. And the undertaker, the local undertaker, offered to bury him. And then they had to find a preacher to preach the funeral sermon. And they had a little job doing that, but they finally got one. So the funeral was held and the whole town turned out to attend this funeral.

And this preacher got up, and he just didn't know quite what to say. So he got up and he said, well, friends, he says, we're gathered here together to to the last rites of Jerry. He says, we all knew him, we knew him for what he was. He says, I don't know just what to say about him, I don't know just how to begin or what I might say, but he says, there's one thing I'd like you all to do. He says I'd like everyone here to come up and take a look at Jerry and see how good he looks since he quit drinking.

This morning, or this afternoon rather, this morning to me I never got up till 11 o'clock. I was listening to doctor Lund make his talk here, and he, during his talk, he made several references to miracles. I always like to talk about the miracle of AA. And this is a miracle, and I think every person here is a miracle, and a result of a miracle. I think about the time how I arrived in this fellowship.

As you heard during my introduction, I came to this fellowship before it was known as AA. There was no AA, but I came to it. It says Rummy like. And the mathematical chances of my being here are so remote, they couldn't be figured by any one of these new fandangled machines they have. I wanna tell you something about how I got here.

And from that point on, maybe I can talk something about this program, talk about my ideas of it. Someone mentioned to me they have a clock up here. I don't know how to tell time. I intend to spend the first hour and 45 minutes talking about myself, and then I will talk for another hour about the program. But we're not going anywhere any play anyway.

Why? Here's what happened to me. Many years ago, I wound up a hopeless, helpless alcoholic. I was married to a gal and her family, And this was some family, believe me. They used to have family conferences, and I was never invited to them.

I was generally the subject under consideration. Several times, they threw me bodily out of my own home. This actually happened to me. So finally the day came that they gave me my very, very last chance to stay home. And this was predicated upon the idea that I should go to work for my wife's brother.

Well, let me say this right at the beginning. I have always been against work. Being sober all these years has not changed that attitude either. However, this brother-in-law had a truck. He had one of these long distance outfits.

He ran merchandise between Cleveland and New York City. And I was supposed to hire on as his helper. Well I have never ridden on a truck, let alone drive 1, and the very thought of it was petrifying. But I had to go along with this gag, because it was either that or I'm out of the nest. So I agreed to do this.

By this time, I might add, all of my clothes had been sold. Everything of value that I owned was gone. And all my earthly possessions consisted of a shirt, pair of trousers, a pair of shoes, a hat, and a sweater. This was my wardrobe. And I started out on this trip with my brother-in-law, and it was the beginning of winter.

Everything happens to me in the lousiest of weather. And this was no exception. We started for New York, and he didn't know it, but I had a dollar and some cents secreted around my person in change. I had a little doe. And he drove, and drove, and drove.

But he finally, to make a long story short, the following night, we got to Albany, New York. And he gave out. He couldn't drive anymore. So he was gonna take a nap. He had one of those sleeper cabs, where one sleeps on the seat, the other fellow sleeps up above.

He had fixed this place up above for me, and cleaned it up nice, and put a curtain in the window even. It was nice. Cleaned blankets, everything. And I looked behind and see that big thing following down that trailer, and I was really petrified at this thing. Twenty some tons of merchandise in it.

So I had to spend the time up there, but when he count out I got away him. I told him, well, we're in Albany, this is the capital of New York. I wanna go down to you to capital buildings. The dear boy went to sleep, and I went my merry way. I can still remember two events of that thing.

The first place I got into it was too rich for my blood. And I ran down the street and I got into a place that was more fitting to a man of my estate. And I found an angel in there, and I was throwing him in like this. And away I went before anyone knew I was gone. I started back with a truck and of course I hadn't had a drink for several days.

And boy, this stuff hit me all at once. And when I got in the truck and climbing up, I stepped on his face. Well, to make a long story short, that was the end of my job. I hadn't even started on it yet. He drove me into New York City, drove down to the waterfront, and he threw me out.

He left me there. Says this is the end of the line, he drove his sister and told her what he'd done, but that no good so and so. He had another sister in New York, in Yonkers. I knew where she lived because when I was married, we went there on our honeymoon. This was a very Clannish family, as I mentioned.

And so I went out to see Virginia. Virginia had visited us many, many times, and lived with us many, many times. And I thought Virginia certainly owed me a favor, so I went out and thought maybe I might get some help from her. I can only remember that she used to live up on top of a hill, but I didn't go up on a hill, I went down a hill. And I got in that Italian neighborhood down there, and I got mixed up with a lot of very interesting people, slappin' a lot of day go red.

And you know what happened. The only thing I remember, I got up to her place, and I can remember one thing. I was rolling around on the floor with her 2 kids, and I was boiled. And she took a dim view of this, and she put me in her car and drove me down in New York to the waterfront where her brother had thrown me out, and she did likewise. Now get the picture.

I was 100 of miles away from home. I didn't have one friend in the world. I shall never forget this feeling. I didn't have one friend, one person in this world who cared whether I was alive or dead. I didn't have a dime to my name.

No clothes, no wardrobe, no nothing, and I didn't know where to go. And I'm in New York. Well, I existed in New York for a long time. I know it was a good long time because how long I can't tell you, but I know the calendar went around because it was lousy weather again when I got back to Cleveland. I didn't keep track of time, I wasn't goin' any place, But I had I kept out of trouble there.

I'm not going into the story of what I did in New York, but there's a lot of interesting things happened to me while I was there. The main thing that happened was this, and I know nothing about this. After my visit to Virginia's home in Yonkers, one day she had the family doctor out there, about one of the kids I guess, and they got to talking about drinking. This seems to be a favorite subject in most societies. And she told her family doctor about this drunken brother-in-law of hers, who used to be such such a swell guy once and what a drunken bum he is now, and told her about my visit there.

This doctor says, you know that's odd. He says, I had a drunken brother-in-law like that once myself. And he met some kind of a cult. And he spends all of his time trying to sober up drunks, and he's staying sober doing that. And this doctor further told Virginia, he says, you know there's a doctor, a medical doctor down in Akron, Ohio who spends all of his time sobering up drunks, And if your brother-in-law ever gets back there to Cleveland, you might send him down to Akron, maybe this doctor can fix him.

This is taking place all beknown to me. People are always doing things behind my back. Eventually I got back to Cleveland, and I tried to get in the nest, and the little woman met me on the front porch. And I remember that it was lousy weather and there was snow on the ground. The one thing I can remember about is she still had the screen doors up.

And I pointed out that she needed a man about the house to take care of details like that, but she said she didn't need one that badly. So but I didn't get in. But she told me about this doctor in Akron, and asked me if I'd like to go down and meet him. Well there was nothing I could lose by going down and meeting this doctor who was fixing drunks, so I told her I'd be glad to. So she was a kind soul.

She took me down to the bus depot, and she bought me a one way ticket to Akron and put me on a bus. And that's how I met my sponsor, doctor Bob. Eventually doc put me in a hospital, a city hospital in Akron, Ohio. And that's how I came to this fellowship. A little history about this.

This was not known as a a at that time. This was a meeting of the Oxford Movement. I spent a week in that hospital. And I'll tell you a few things how I was in that day. I weighed a £130.

I don't know when I had eaten, but I know I had been drunk for a number of years. I was not a periodic drinker, I was drunk all the time. And when I wound up in that hospital this was something. I can remember when I went down there, Doc had told me to meet him there one morning, and I went down there, And here's what happened to me. I got into Akron that morning that he that I promised I'd come down, and I walked out the city hospital from that bus depot, and it was zero weather in February, And when I walked into that hospital, got into that lobby, I passed out, count out.

And I didn't, I came to, I was up in a room and there's a lot of activity around. People were very busy. I seemed to be the object of curiosity. There were all kinds of people there, and nurses, and other people. I don't know who they all were.

But I came to, and do you know the first thing I saw when I came to? Over on that windowsill was a bottle of rub, as a rubby dub. And I thought, oh boy, I came down here to quit drinking, but I had a horror of ever getting DTs. And I had seen fellas, and fellas I had drank with, and several of them died. And I didn't want those things.

And being an everyday drinker, I didn't get DTs because I never gave them a chance to get in there and play with me. And I thought, here I'm quitting. This is when I'm gonna be in trouble. And if I should happen to hear the bells ringing or anything like that, there is my answer in that rub right on the windowsill. And I knew there'd be a bottle of that Althea in every, probably in every room on that floor.

So this gave me courage. The nurse came along, she had a tray with 2 things on it, a big slug of booze and a big slug of something else, which was pyraldaide. And she says, mister Snyder, mister, I hadn't been called that a long time, I still remember this. She says, we have some medicine for you. She says, you take this nice big drink of whiskey, and then you can take this medicine afterward and you're gonna be fine.

So I got on my hind legs and I informed that gal that I came down there to quit drinking, not to drink any of her booze. I looked had my eye on that bottle all the time when talking to her. But I never drank that, I didn't take that sober enough drink, I didn't take those knockout drops, and I've never had a drink to this day. I never touched their alcohol. But what happened to me?

What happened? Why can a man, or any person, be drunk all these years, and be obsessed with the idea of drinking, and all of a sudden like that quit? Why is this? Never asked yourself this question, why do people walk into this group after they've had a life of debauchery, and drunkenness, disgrace, hurt, injury, and just like that everything changes. Everything changes.

Why? There's a reason for this. It certainly isn't because we understand this program or we've absorbed it or are working it. I don't believe that at all. But I'll probably go into that a little later.

Here's what happened to me. I'm in that hospital for a week. After I'm in there a couple days, men start coming in to see me, the men who had preceded me in this way of life. All the alcoholics came in. Now the Oxford movement was not made up of alcoholics.

The alcoholics were in the minority. There are mostly other people who are trying to learn to live a good type of life according to Christian principles. And, the alcoholics are in there by sufferance more than anything else. But the sufferance more than anything else. But the the people in the Oxford group accepted the alcoholics as a challenge.

They thought they could fix anybody. They got along finally, got into these Alky's. They even had to change the name of the Oxford group by the time the Alky's got through with them. They call it moral rearmament now. So I got over this thing, and these fellas come in and tell me their stories.

I was in there a week. Every man came in there, he wound up his talk to me by saying, that telling me that he had the answer to my drinking problem, but none of them would give me that answer. They wouldn't tell me what it was. I was expecting some kind of an operation or something. I was in the hospital under the care of a medical doctor.

It's logical to believe. So they wouldn't tell me what this answer was. So I'm in there a week. I didn't eat all the time. I was in there, I can remember this, because the last day I was in there, Paul Stanley came in.

Paul's dead now, that's all those fellows are. They're all gone. And Paul was to talk. You never see you think you've heard guys that can run off at the mouth. This guy really could go.

Paul had been raised a Catholic, and he got mixed up in Christian Science somewhere along the line. Then he got into unity, and he got into some kind of Buddhism deal, and then he wound up in the Oxford group. And if you don't think that this guy had something to say, you're crazy. He came in at breakfast time, and he ate my breakfast for me. He was still there at lunch and he got my lunch.

I did get the dessert. There was peaches for dessert. I got the peaches. He got the rest of it. And along about 4 or 5 o'clock in the afternoon, doc came in, doc Smith, doctor Bob to you.

And Paul left. He missed my supper. But doc, here's what happened to me. Doc had been in every day, and this day he came in and he sat on the foot of my bed, and any of you folks whoever had the great pleasure of meeting my sponsor will remember him as a very tall, angular man, and he had fingers on him his long. And I swear he could look holes right through you.

He could do this. He had a penetrating gaze. I was half scared of the guy myself. Anyway, he came and sat on the foot of my bed a very most unprofessional posture, and he looked at me a few minutes. And he said to me this, I can still remember this so well.

He says, well, young fellow, he says, what do you think of this by now? He used to call me young fellow all the time. Never anything but young fellow unless he was disturbed with me, then he'd call me Clarence. But when he called me Clarence, I'm in trouble. But when he called me young fella, I'm in good grace with him.

So he said, young fella, what do you think of this by now? I says, I think this is wonderful. All these fellows come to see me, they don't know me from a Baylor Haven. They're all telling me their stories, I know their rummies. But they all tell me one thing, doc.

I'm puzzled. They all tell me they have the answer to my problem. But nobody tells me what this answer is. What do I have to do? What are you going to do to me?

He looked at me, he says, well, he says, young fellow, we don't know about you. You. We're not too sure about you. You're pretty young. We don't know if you're ready yet.

Not already yet. A £130 I hadn't worked in 3 years. I was absolutely unemployable. You want you want me to tell you how unemployable I was? I never thought about this till I was talking about it one time so people were laughing about it.

They thought it was hilarious. I didn't figure it, never realized it was so silly. But you know, when I was drinking, all these jug buddies of mine were on WPA. This was way back. And they were getting $18 a week on WPA.

And do you know they wouldn't take me? I couldn't make it. I couldn't even stand there and hold a flag. I have nursed a resentment toward Roosevelt ever since. Yes, sir.

Alright. And you know something else? My wife was always very interested in my going to work. And you know what her job was? She was head of the mail department in a an employment agency, and she couldn't get me a job.

Of all people who were interested, and she'd lie, like anything, to get me any place. She she couldn't make it even. I was strictly unemployable. I was sick. I weighed a £130.

I was whipped. I was done. So Doc sits there and tells me he don't know if I'm ready yet. I didn't think I was gonna get into this deal at all. What did I have to do to get ready?

He said to me, he says, all these young fellows he'd had before, and I was 35 years old then. Now figure real fast, I'll tell you real quick, I'll be 64 in December. So he said all these young fellows we had before were all screw balls. They're all nuts. And, they couldn't do anything with them.

They belonged in an asylum. So they weren't too sure about me. I had to convince them that I'd had enough, And I want to do something about this. And apparently I did convince him. So he says, all right young fella, I'll give you the answer to this thing.

Boy, I was relieved then. I says, fine. He says, get out of that bed. Yeah, what what for? He says, get on your knees.

Says, why are you going on my knees? Said, you're gonna pray. I said, who's gonna pray? Said, you're gonna pray. I says, I don't know anything about praying.

He says, well I don't suppose you do, he says, but I'll pray and you can repeat what I say after me and that'll do for this time. So out of the bed, out of my bones, out of the floor of that hospital, I felt like a fool. But it didn't kill me. As you can see, I'm still here. And he uttered a prayer.

I don't know what it was, I couldn't tell you. But I repeated it after him. And after I'd concluded why he shook hands at me, he said, young fella, you're gonna be all right. See? And he carried me to a meeting that night.

And this was the meeting of the Oxford group. I can still remember, first meeting, some of the details of that meeting. The format of our meeting was entirely different than it is today. It was in a home. It was in the home of T.

Henry Williams. They were not alcoholics. Most people there were not. It was a beautiful home, oriental rugs on the floor, grand piano, and a lot of knickknacks and antiques around, and beautiful things in the home. I can remember that because I'd made a metal note of some of the smaller things.

And, well, future reference. You know? So, anyway, I didn't take anything, not that I didn't think about it. But I attended this meeting, and it kind of frightened me, one thing's kind of frightened me there, that I wasn't prepared for. I met these men who had come to visit me in a hospital, but there was a lot of ladies there, a lot of women.

They scared me, they don't anymore. I got over that, that's one blessing of AA. But this did frighten me a bit at the time. Everyone was seemed to be related or something. They all havinced a good time and some of them got pretty sentimental, and some of them got pretty emotional during the meeting.

But I knew what these men were doing, and I couldn't figure out what all these women were doing around there. And I only concluded the worst. So I start picking out which ones I thought were running places and what ones were working. This is the way a ramil work. I don't know.

I'm wrong on every score. But that was my first meeting, and I went to meetings every Wednesday night in Akron, Ohio for 15 months. I missed 2 of them in that time when I couldn't get through on account of weather. And I went down there all weekends to be with those people. They were the only friends I had.

After all these these years of drinking, I had lost every friend I had. Nobody cared one thing about me, family or otherwise. And these were the first people who ever loved me. I just couldn't keep away from them. I've been around here a good many years.

I still don't keep away from these people. And I hope I never shall. One thing that bugs me is how a person can come to this great fellowship, receive the blessings, till he gets here, and then walks away and leaves it. This is something, something to be considered. I never did.

I was trained differently in AA, and I think the people who came in around that time and shortly after I came in were trained differently, because they still go and they still have enthusiasm for this. I am still an amateur in this fellowship. I have never become a pro. And as an amateur, I reserve the right to criticize any bloody thing I want to in AA, and I do. AA is different than it used to be, and it has to be different, I suppose.

I don't say all these differences are good. Some of them stink, but some of them are good. I don't go along with a lot of this jazz that they have in AA today Because I think it's killing people. I think AA is a very simple thing. And this miracle of AA, why?

Ask yourself sometime, why are you here? Why were you chosen to be here? Why was I chosen to be here? When down through the ages of 1000 and 1000 and 1000 of years of history, there has been alcoholism. Think about this.

Alcoholism, you read about it in the Bible. You read about it in the very first book of the Bible in Genesis. Read about Noah, how potted he got. He, who else but a rummy would ever pull a stunt to Noah fold? Who would ever think of that?

And why didn't he swat one of those flies? There's some terrific Rummy stories in the Bible. Terrific rummy stories. Gee, I I love to talk about some of these stories. They did me so much good when I came in.

We didn't have this big book that we have now. We didn't have this literature. We didn't have these meeting places. We didn't have all this that we have today. So we had to formulate our plan through reading things from the good book.

And I'd read these stories and they'd read them to me, and they're they're great stories. And I'd always be a character in this story, usually the hero. Read that story. You know that one of the greatest Rami stories in the world is the story of the Jericho Road, the Good Samaritan. Just think of that story.

Let's talk about that a minute just for fun. I hadn't intended to, but I I have to do this. Here's a fella laying there. He'd been rolled, and beat up, and robbed. They even took his clothes, everything.

He's lying there drunk. How do I know he's drunk? Well, this priest comes along and he smells them. He turned over and went on the other side of the road and went by. Didn't wanna be around them.

It's no affair ahead. Some drunk got rogue, so what? He shouldn't have been getting drunk in the first place. So he ignores the guy. A Levite comes along, he does likewise.

This poor stiff, he's laying there all beat up and bleeding. He crosses the road, goes on the other side. So along comes this other fellow, this Good Samaritan, they call him. You know who he was? He was a traveling salesman.

He was, and he was a Rummy. He was a first member of AA. And I'll tell you why I snow this. This fella, he comes along and he sees this poor stiff laying there. What does he do?

He goes over there, he binds up his wounds, cleans them up a little bit, and he put him on his form of conveyance, whatever it was, and he took him to an inn. Now here's how I know that this guy was a Rummy, and I know this other fellow was too. Both of them were. He puts this fellow in this inn, and he says to this innkeeper, he says, here's some money. See, he wouldn't give it to the drunk, he'd give it to the innkeeper.

He says, here's some money. Take care of this guy. And now here's how I know he's a traveling salesman. He says, if you need any more, when I come back through again, I'll pay you whatever is due. So he's a private celebrity, traveling that territory, and he picks this guy up, and he wouldn't trust him with the dough.

So this is a AA call, pure and simple. Great A story. One of the greatest stories in, AA stories in the Bible is that story of the prodigal son. Terrific story. Just look at that kid.

You know what he did? In those days, the boys, of course, they inherited what was coming to him from the old man when he died. They split the inheritance up when the old man died. But this kid, he's a rummy. He couldn't wait.

Does this sound familiar? He couldn't wait till the old man died. He wants his right now. Just like every rummy, you can't wait till tomorrow for anything. It has to be done yesterday already.

So he wants it right now. So he aggravates the old man till the old man gives him his portion of the inheritance, and away he goes. And what did he do? Does this sound familiar? He says he went out into a fire land, and he blew the whole bundle in riotous living.

Doesn't it say that's a good book? Sure did. So he blew the whole bundle. What happened to him? What happened to us?

He wound up out there working for some guy. He's in there working on a farm, there's a famine hits, and he can't get anything to eat, and he says, I would eat of the husks of the hogs. He has nothing. He says, my father and all of them have plenty back where I came from, but here I am desolate. He here's what he said.

He kept he came to his extremity just like you and I did. But here's what's important. What he's saying? He said just what you and I said. He says, I will arise and go to my father.

Okay? And that's what he did. But he arose. He didn't lay there. He arose.

And he went to his father, and what happened? Did his father wait for him? No. It says in the good story there, it says, his father saw him coming afar off and he ran to meet him, and he fell upon his neck and kissed him. He says, my son who is dead is alive.

He says, let us have music, kill the fatted calf, let us rejoice. So what happened? The Al Anon's coming on this now. He said they had a party. They have all this music playing, and the other brother he'd stay home all this time, the Al Anon guy, minding his business, doing what the old man told him to do.

No imagination. No fun. But he was a dutiful son, And he minded his own business and did what he's supposed to do. So here's what he does. He gets his nose out of joint.

He says, what goes on here? All the music, what's this for? The old man says, my son, who was dead, has come back. He's alive. The kid says how come you never had a blast for me like that?

Isn't that the way life is? I like to hear what the old man told him. You read it. Okay. This is these are great Rami's stories.

How did I ever get off on that? I was talking about alcoholism, and the age of it, and how long it's been going on. You read about it ancient history and mythology, all the way down. And you and I, out of all these millions of people, a few thousand of us have had this privilege of being introduced to this tremendous fellowship. There must be a reason.

If you can't find any other reason for it why not be very thankful for that? Don't ever, don't ever, ever fail to be thankful. This thing of forgetting to be thankful makes more people go back into a life that they had before than anything else. Now, this program of ours is absolutely foolproof. If we accept this program as it is, and apply it, it's easy.

If this program is not easy for you, take my word for for it. You are doing it wrong. Does that sound simple enough to you? Now I'll tell you why. You heard a lot of dissertations about this program, and Barbara read the program the night of 12 steps, and we've all listened to it.

We've read it. We probably recited them. Every person seems to have in AA anymore today their own idea about this way this program should be worked. Well believe me, if we had this many ideas we'd be in worse shape than we are now. There's only one way to work this program.

I would like to give you my conception about what this program means, why it's written the way it is, and what it's supposed to do, and what you and I are supposed to do. Now I say this, I make this statement as a person who was here before we had this 12 step program. So it ought to have a little more, perhaps, weight or authority to it, because I helped write this program. Now I'm not waving any flags about this. I just this is one of these historical things just when I just happened to be at the right place at the right time.

And I was in on the writing of this program, so I do have some definite ideas about these steps. And I hear some people, all people ask you, what, When should I take these steps? When should I take the first one? Do I have to take them in rotation? Do I have to read the steps?

It tells very plainly. Let me tell you what I think about these steps and what they mean and what they're intended to do. And I hope it will help some of you folks if you need this type of thing. I only talk about fundamentals in AA. I'd, I'm, I never did get to be too modern in AA.

I don't run for any offices. I am not a politician and I don't give a hoot for any politics in AA. I'm a guy that believes in fundamentals and I stick pretty close to them and I've I'm probably the happiest guy in AA. I don't have any headaches. And nobody can argue me out of what I I'm just too thick headed to be modern.

So let me tell you what I think about this program, and maybe you can stay sober 29 years and have fun doing it. I have no use for a guy staying sober and being miserable about it. That isn't the way to do it. Have fun. I'm younger now than I was 29 years ago.

I can guarantee you. Because I can do things today I couldn't do then. I know this. Now. Originally we started in the Oxford group.

Bill Wilson was an Oxford grouper. Ebby Thatcher took him in the Oxford group in New York. Doc Smith, Oxford Grouper in Akron. He'd been going to the Oxford Group 2 years and a half before he ever met Bill Wilson. But he was drunk every night.

It's a big difference. When Bill was approached by Evie Thatcher, back in 35 sometime, or 34. Please turn the tape over. Thatcher, back in 35 sometime, or 34, Bill stayed sober. He got to Akron, you've read that story, and he met doc through various means.

He finally got together with doc, and doc only got drunk once after Bill talked to him. But Doc got interested, and got enthused, and got working on alcoholics in the Oxford Movement in Akron, Ohio. And being a medical doctor, he had access to the City Hospital in Akron. He was on the staff there, and he used to wheedle his drunks into Akron under under, some pretenses. I know that he didn't put any of them in for alcoholism.

I know my diagnosis was acute gastritis. And I suppose I had that too. But I that's what was on my chart. And, doc had that advantage. He could put fellas out of circulation and put them in a hospital, and sober them up safely.

So the AA went along very well in the Akron area, in the Oxford group. It didn't go too hot in New York for a long time. And, Doc was a spiritually motivated man. He was a medical doctor, a man of science, but he was very spiritually motivated, Doc was. He would continuously quote scripture.

He had things that he would answer, you'd ask him questions, he'd answer them in scripture to you. One of doc's favorites, and I I think it's one of mine, is he used to say we talk about these first things first, you know. He'd say, seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you. This is where our first things first came from. Doc used to use this a lot.

Well, they The Oxford Movement, we were born in that, and the Oxford Movement were a bunch of people trying to live good lives according to spiritual principles. And, what they called it was life changing. When we wrote our program of AA, this was a life changing program. This was not a sobriety program. You don't see the word sobriety in our program.

You show me where it is in the 12 steps and I'll eat the magazine. See? This is a life changing program, and in order to change a person's life there has to be some things evident. The first thing has to be evident is the need for a change. So, I claim that our program is divided into 4 phases.

So the need is in the first step, where we admit. Our 4 phases in our program are this way. They're admission, submission, restitution, and construction. The first step, we admitted we were powerless over alcohol, that our lives had become unmanageable. That's our first step.

That's the admission. Okay, we got a place to start, so what? If we're gonna change our lives, and we're, our life is unmanageable, we have to turn our will and our life over to the care of God. So the second through the 7th steps are the steps of submission. Let me read these 2nd through 7th steps.

Second one says, we came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity. We came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity. Some people quarrel about that sanity bit. I'm glad that that's in there, boy. That takes me off the hook.

I'd hate to think that some of the things I did when I was drinking, I did the acts of a sane man. So, I came to believe it. Why did I come to believe it? I came to believe it because of the example of these other men. They told me their stories.