The 1st Atlantic Summer Roundup in Moncton, NB

and may I know your weight introduces Baker for this evening I know a lot of your you know John personally and like and maybe as I have but I you know John was give me a little jab at tonight at the supper table he was Hey you know you didn't think you'd be sitting here tonight having dinner with me in as high class restaurant it's going to be up there chaired by needing

the night you went home to tell your wife that your shame to talk because I was an Indian office almost turn other people what we lived like a reservation

that was the truth I I tell you I was a pony Jeez I I you know to go along with my bush problem I I yeah I guess that goes with it and then but he's not I wanted as big meeting at in this little town and near where we used to live in Massachusetts

and I came home and that night and I told my wife I should change guess what

I'm an Indian I see an Indian tonight he

which is nice did you did you talk to but did you tell me what you were made

told that India let anybody know that I know that Indian

I want people know like any yeah but he's a hero

however I believe that I was a different kind of Indian you know

high class you know what whatever you read about in a newspaper or a or a book that they gave an impression that Anne was great you know of a good high steel worker that's like tonight it was a run a bagel

at our church are and this lady come in and she says to me

I would like a taxi should I I'm really not up to playing this game so I said okay I'll call you a taxi ladies I called a taxi well for the tax you got there we got into nationalities and and so I like doesn't work and I got all the time I was a construction worker

and I saw the Indians should you or your work so you must be one of those brave men that go way up on his high steel and work and I said No lady that's another tribe

I

not only did the chicken fried

windows

but we don't take anymore jobs time I would really like to do with my friend and your friend John

thank you Ben

I'm John and I'm an alcoholic

and good to be here

I cool I say in my own reservation last week

working on the alcohol and drug and

the views program

and I was thinking how while I was sitting there

how my life has changed

and it sometimes you know it's like

it's like a dream

that I guess I'm the last person in the world would have ever believed that guy one day I could get out in front of a few hundred people and be grateful about it

where I got sober in Syracuse New York

yeah it was an understanding that the bureau of course over

three months and you were supposed to get up and speak

well I said to myself you would never get me up there

and I remember when I got sober three months I walked into a meeting late

and at this meeting they used to have a big post and I used to sit in the back

and every meeting I go to I would go late

because I I never I've always felt so sensitive that I never talk with English and I had no education and somehow I develop some kind of imaginary idea that those who get up here had some kind of a special talent in

choosing the right words I guess what happened how it happened might might first be carrying a white lady judge

and here I am I'm twenty eight years old

I have been skips for seven years

and now I'm not living in an animation that's that's where I was when someone came to see me one night another bomb will got sober in salvation army

he walked into a mission one night and he says to me

I am a member of Alcoholics Anonymous

I said good for you

I have never made one before

I came here he said ask you

if you want to go to a meeting I said no

gosh the only meetings I've gone to this follow

by the name of Tom will run a rescue mission if you attended one of these religious services

he would always allow you to stream on a dormitory without or bombs so I have attended

you up Tom's religious services

but tonight I had a bad

well this Wallace said at this meeting

did they have copy and doughnuts and they're free

well I said why didn't you say so

and here I am I'm twenty eight years old no I am not too well

I needed a hair cut and I suffered from wine storage

and I needed to be sober about six weeks

so at my face would clear up

and I you know I've never been married never owned a car I couldn't read and write and I'm gonna make sure I'm supposed to pay a thirty five cents tonight and I'm behind three weeks right

you know I

I have financial problems

and I'm listening to these lady judge

and she's telling a story about her father being a judge

huh our husband is a doctor and a director to a General Hospital

and I'm sitting there saying to myself

as soon as I get my doughnuts

I'm getting the hell out of here

but did you notice said that god works through people

this man who stood at the door when I came to a

what a lawyer so over thirteen years and Annie's job was to shake hands to the people who are coming to that meeting and of course when he seen me grab my hand and he said that he was happy to see me

and I don't know if I was happy she met all

but on my way out

you probably knew like most of us know later on

that I couldn't see myself with lady judge

good I felt

I didn't belong there

whatever it was she he he put his arms around me and that he says to me

before you leave I want you to meet some of my friends

and probably the most amazing thing about his own business up coming to a

I have not changed in

want to drink

and whatever magic that we do have here which I myself don't understand

whatever it was that brought me back to the streets the door seven years was removed from the

and about the only thing that was removed from me

and I came back because I like the way he's friends treated me

I like people who like Dr really cared

about me

and he touched me

and of course coming back it's where it's been where I have been fortunate because I I needed to learn things about me that I didn't know anything about one was that I didn't know that I was an alcoholic

when they talked about first drink somehow I understood because I have always known that once I could bring I never could stop

what I didn't know was that there were people

somewheres

we're staying sober a long time and I have never known that

because alcoholism to me which is something like very private

and when I'm not drinking

it's very difficult for me to

because I I I listened to speakers I have been listening to speakers for thirty two years

and everybody got up since the day I came to a I can identify it because I'm the same way when I'm sober I I I remember my first speaker bush at night and I understood

was a fellow by the name of Harry J. who was a secretary in central group

and Sundays you would invite me to his home

his wife Helen knee had two daughters

and he would bring me back to the mission

an average spoke one night and every talked about something I have known all my life and that is loneliness

you know what I cracked launders ridge reserved only to a bomb maybe it may be someone who have no education are maybe an Indian never fading in life

I never talked to Harry who is an officer in a bank

who has a nice home wife Helen and two daughters would talk about things that I felt laying on the floor in the mission with forty other bombs

I don't think I understood

really what he was saying but what I felt watch for the first time in my life is over that I wasn't alone

because my illness somehow told me every time I stop drinking John Davies nobody like you

absolutely nobody and you're no good

you know Jack said that judge told me that the Fayette park in Syracuse what's pretty decent people

and I agreed with him

and I want you to know order carries no force kind of a second

then when you say yes I am no good

you know there's something there's different Steve someone said it

and I really believe

okay I wasn't okay thank you see my problem and where I have been fortunate

data

I needed to learn how to live and in Syracuse New York

every meeting you're going to get would read the fifth chapter and chapter you know it talks about a program of recovery

but there were no step meetings and I couldn't read and write and I didn't know what they were talking about

so here I am in my fifty years sobriety

I'm now thirty three years old

I'm working on salvation army under proper sixteen dollars a week

and I have a passion my pockets telling me

that I could come home at eleven o'clock and like this topic

you know because you know the first two years in a it was good

it was good because I was meeting new people

we're going out after the meeting and have lunches and helping people but slowly but surely getting stand I felt alone

when I walk in the streets came back

I was lonely walking in the streets

I was born in a meetings

I felt

I go to a meeting and people say are you do John I gotta say yes because when you're so over five years you're not supposed to be lonely

and you're not supposed to feel scared

you're supposed to be like other people get up and to talk about

buying a new car

going to school getting divorced and married again and the more

at least they're doing something

so I did what I've always done when when I feel this way I guess

we've been looking back now

I had to learn how to be honest with myself and with my feelings

and and because I didn't have a program to program says the key that opens the door to a program of recovery eighteen believing at and now believing it's the only thing that will start to make you honest and accept the truth about who you are and there is no principle is affected I'm next the truth is behind it

but how do you tell anyone I'm so over five years and I'm lonely

and I'm scared

when you're not supposed to be by this time

but I did what I've always did and what most of us do I suppose

when we feel we don't get along I left very pleased we are

brought

I didn't know where I was going and I really didn't care

and I arrived in Marlboro mass at one thirty at night

the town that I have never been before

and in the main street there is a pop house called hotel

and I stayed there

and next night I went to D. Saturday night meeting

and I met a fellow by the name of Paul who owned a restaurant

he said to me John starting a new group in Worcester Monday night would you like to go I said sure

so I walked into my first step meeting

and what they did in Worcester and still doing it today what to read the first few pages of this that

and then they would separate themselves to twelve and each table and then everyone would start to express your ideas your insights there believes as do what particular step me through them and they're

at the age of thirty three I've heard for the first time what our co founder talked about what we read tonight

step

are recovering

but I didn't understand it I've never heard his words before and I didn't like it

I mean I I didn't say to myself Gee I find something I can wait till I come back I said I don't like this meeting

no and I go back yeah and they were talking about it I should be restored to sanity

I didn't like at all I

I've been around long enough bite each time that I felt that some should be restored

but I won one of

so I wouldn't go back

I would love Paul would set me would you like to go to Worcester I would goal and now I remember sitting there one night and bill Wilson said alaka Holla that means me

all alcoholics she says are self centered in extreme

I said that's not fair

I'm just a poor Indians who never had a chance

you know it and it's not for you you are you don't have a home you don't have a job you don't have a girl you don't you don't have an education you're lonely and you go for a meeting for help and someone calls you names

I I go back to my opening meeting because I can open meetings if I say well you know I don't have a home and worry about

just go to meetings and don't bring

I like that because I didn't like work

I don't have a car one way of Bobby just go to meetings and on

if I tell someone you know I need a girl I'm ****

don't worry about it you're going to be

not that I'm self centered the next three

I mean thirty three years

I was able to blame everything to everybody now get pointed finger at me and I don't understand it and I don't like it and I wouldn't go back

but you know they say that god works through people and sometimes you know a very strange way because of all the people in the world

you wouldn't imagine that one day a priest tonight would get together

you know just like you would never imagine that dish bomb with the long hair and wine storage and dirty one day a lawyer put his arms around him I mean the world just don't

live like that you know I mean I've never met people like that I met father Fred

is now eighty years old so over thirty years

John he says to me

I I go to institutions and I was wondering if you come with me I need someone to travel with me I said sure I said but don't ask me to speak because I don't talk of English and I don't have an education

well check on worry about it and I thought that meant no

very intelligent to me

and so we travel

we go to different institutions and potter Fred is a good speaker he got words union needs you know and wanted wanted patients we went to was in Walpole prison which is the maximum prison killers

and one Saturday afternoon at two o'clock father Fred get up in the session to these killers

I brought a speaker with me

and I knew there was nobody else

I looked around anyway

now what do you say to killers

I mean I'm just as good role bomb and I had a terrible time make fifty nine cents per quart of wine

I mean I'm I'm not a killer

I don't even consider killing anyone

there were times and I'm sure

you felt the same way in my younger days when you know when when I drank I had a feeling that I could lick anyone

and that's a very dangerous spinning

and Syracuse New York area by room to call Smitty that's where all the New York Indian spring comic Matt Kenyon I don't drinking smoothies

the cosmic Max in New York Indians don't communicate too well

but when I feel good sometimes like making someone

I go to so many

and I would drink there and I looked around and I'll find someone who looks like I didn't like

and I would stare at him

for a long time

make a movie you know

that's what I need to make a movie

then I would go over there and I would said to him you know I you look like somebody I don't like and and I would hit him

and they would call the cops

and I and I have never Robert half brother would cost I used to wish I could put one of them down

but they always tend to three about

because that's where New York Indians drink that's why different two three cockpit incentive because me but one day they send this big fat cop are buying cell

and I figured I'd take care of him and boy is

human I was rationing and I got a very good hold on his fans and I pulled

but he still factor these pants came first

the next morning you brought into the courtroom

and he stands there holding his pants like this

judge said jockey cost me John because I've been there

is that what's the problem I said nothing on I want to do is put him down but he still fat

and judge guard he was an Alki I didn't know

so we started to laugh

people in the courtroom started to laugh so I laughed too

until I got treatment they were all still laughing

but you don't stand up in Walpole prison and killed his killers all your cares pops

but I suppose I'm the last person in the world dial whatever I said when I get up

who knows

who knows if someone came to me that day in St John you will hang in there and one day you received a call from Mountain

you know I have a sister who lives in reservation in the Mariah

go back

she comes over and visit us my wife and I could stomach time

last summer she was telling me how how well we were when my father was alive and that was news to me because I don't remember that

and she said that my father of course made a living and in in making moccasins by the dozen to a lumber company and ax handles and baskets and snowshoes and he would trade everything

and my sister said that in our house we had one room full of which food

and my sister's idea of being wealthy

is to have one room full with food

and thank god he still believes that

but I'm not from

what do you call a a dysfunctional home

everybody today comes from a dysfunctional home

I tell the kids down home that the only reason you come from a dysfunctional home it's because your in it

but I'm from a troubled home

and

my family took six after my father died and they're all died we D. be seven of them including my twin brothers

and I think when we talk about

fears

and not being able to share them

I can look back after my mother died at the age of thirteen and she died with AB

I I developed the what I call today a very unhealthy feeling

that I was not

I wanted because most people felt I had TV

now this is of course not true

accepted what's true to me

and that is a part of my illness that I must come to learn to see the truth one day

you know because bill Wilson said we will not wish to shut the door in our past not nor to pass whatever deprives us from the spirit of being free are being affected as human beings

but it was real to me

you know I live in is all empty house with a dot in between two mattresses

for almost a year

and I had fears because and here's a quick close my life I couldn't sleep

that's where fear affects me it makes me feel insecure

it makes me feel scared

and that's the way I felt then and I guess there's nothing wrong to feel that way

the problem is when you don't share

and it seems to me that even when I lived in skates

no I have never met a bomb

he said to me John this morning I'm lonely

our this morning I'm afraid

this morning I need love which seems to have a problem with doors human things about half

no and I didn't know that I left home because I felt I wasn't one

I was

the law over fourteen years old when I arrived in Patten Maine in C. C. cap

and I met the follow up by the name of been Lancaster

who is in charge and I was with him for four years washing dishes and

when I was eighteen I left lumber camp hi I wanted to go back home to my people but I thought the war was on

and I I contact if I could join the army and if I get a price I could I could go home

so I went to Quebec City and going to the Canadian hampered three not the cards right I'm not a not a patriotic type of person you know I knew then that this country was hours before it was yours

I figured it was your problem and not mine

I was hoping maybe I can win a medal without getting hurt

I'm a very sensitive person and

I get hurt easily and I don't suffer well

what I didn't know what that if you don't have an education in Canadian Army it wouldn't allow you to go on training

so I wound up washing dishes

now this is the problem where problem starts for a person like me

the book talks about a man without a face

if the person who cannot live with himself we cannot because face represents the truth

and

one who does not have faith will seek approval look tell lies about yourself just to fit in

but you know nobody can fit in with a lot

no matter how good you are

because it's not people

that removes you

it is you remove yourself

you know

they say when you don't have to wait you will settle for less

all people without faith sat up for nights

we don't wait you never make a decision based on whatever experience or knowledge thank you half

for you based on fear

you know I look back when I was eighteen years old here I am I want to be something you know

I don't know why but I want to go home to my people with a unique form on so they can say Jesus he's grown

if something

but something happened

when I wash dishes you told me that

I was nothing

that's what he told me

and I would go home

and I wouldn't go out with the girls who might say what do you do in your service

you know I was and I didn't drink and I didn't smoke I was and I find a friend who is from Ontario name is Joe and it is not in a you should be

but we didn't drank together we're second hello Rick we always talk about doing great things one day someone said to us that in St Lawrence street in Montreal if you go over there with money you can pick the girls registry

you don't have to worry about rejection you don't have to like you

all you need is money

and that was good news for Joe and I we we talk about it for about six months

one day will do that

and one day we went and we found a girl

we stood there

and we stood there

and we stood there longer than most girls did

I didn't know I needed to drink

I didn't know I needed a drink

I just wrote what people would say bye to sixty

my what I say

anyway we got our discharge together and he says to me what do you say we each body by suit we did and we went to does have you ever drink it after all we went to Blue Ridge cafe in the second floor and they had a a forty orchestra playing if you're walking in this beautiful girl standing there singing practically with no clothes on

and I think that's where I received my first spiritual awakening

and then I did it bring and you know the story about drinking

I don't know I don't know if I drank because I felt uncomfortable being in India

or because I washed dishes in Canadian Army

R. because I couldn't talk with inflation I don't believe that because you know I've been still retired two years that I have met a lot of sick people

I mean I met some people are really screwed up and some new poor **** don't even own up to drink

I mean it probably make you an alcoholic there would be an out

you know maybe delayed the judge was right I never understood lady judge she used to say

but it's a mental obsession that proceeds to first drink and once you take a drink now is covered with a physical compulsion

and I used to say oh really right

I wish to buy hatter disease or something like that

the book talks about an alcoholic suffers from the obsession of mine

maybe that is true

maybe when I walk in there thirty two years ago somebody somewhere just to read out to me

with all the problems I had and I had fears I might get it wrong but I never once wanted to drink

all the troubles I had changed and never never once I thought it would be a good idea for me to go out and get drunk

you know and it's not didn't happen to me along

I mean we're not one hundred twenty countries

Terry some magic that god lives year

you know and and it's here and this is what happened to me and the second thing the book talks about that I am a type of person that once I take a drink I experienced a physical abnormal reaction that non social drinkers don't

and what it means to me I suppose that all the years that I have been coming here and everything that I have learned and everything and I have friends that if I watch to take a drink

all that stuff you have talked me wouldn't do me a damn bit of good and you know you see people who go back

you know

but what keeps me sober east is getting down on your knuckles and asking

you know and it kept me sober long before I believe I knew anything about it but I didn't because I was simply tell

in a

not get back to drinking I'd love to drink

every once in awhile you know somebody will get up there is it you know I never had a good time drinking

well you know under poor **** he's

you've got to feel sorry for

thirty years you drink and you never had a good time

and I look at him not when I say you're not doing so well sober

Bader Martin said you've you're happy you forgot to tell your face

I like to get close to people Gary some magic about drinking that I could put his arm around someone and say you know I like you

I like the idea of falling in love

about twice a month

eleven o'clock at night I'm looking at would one I

but it's no longer a nice here we to

incoming you're all beautiful she is and she is because alcohol affects your vision

the next morning you look at her

and usually only Christ

you were so cute last night

I can't wait to get drunk again

not to me makes sense

and I loved it

and when I was going through that you don't come to me it's a John you're drinking too much Hey I'm enjoying myself

you know some you never heard some speakers said reunited like when I. drinking I woke up with people that I didn't want to be with that's why I drink

to be with that type of the people I enjoyed during

but all at once something happened to us

and you know they say you have to be ready and I tried it in my days there were no treatment centers so every once in awhile a bomb would say to me John you look sick why don't you take a plate

and you know one of them tells you you look sick you're sick

so I would see a priest and supposed to be a Catholic and and I would go to confession because that's what he wanted me to do and the message was of course trying to be decent person and I know how to be decent

I really do I was brought up to me to be talked

what is right and wrong

the problem lies with me after a week or two weeks for being patient I am so lonely

you know and I don't know whether that came from I was only when I was not watching Deason

in

and I felt I didn't fit in

you know I couldn't sleep I have all the spheres I felt different and you know nothing changed and then I would get drunk and I said to myself you know damn good and Tom wood said to me animation

there's a followed by the name of coming

Billy Graham by name of Billy Graham coming through our memo released at this man helps a lot of people you're going to listen to so I go to war memorial for couple of weeks and I listen to Billy Graham and and I got sober buddy let

and I got drunk

and it's very confusing

it really is I remember I was in a mission one night this fall I get up he said he was a bomb just like us

you said right in this mission he said he accepted Christ as his personal savior and James Penney said you never drank you got married he bought a home you work nights and he said he has a new station wagon and any changes to any of you but I'm speaking to the same thing all you have to do is move forward so I move forward and I know nothing about Christ

you know I spent four years in a lumber camp and I used to listen to those lumberjacks talking about him

by the time they finish with him you wouldn't believe me

but here I am I kneel down and you know next to me said I would say the next morning the judge said that defeated park

it's pretty decent people

so what happens to father Fred

I said to him

because I've been over to staff meeting and you're talking about being restored to sanity and it hurt me

I checked the father Fred what do you think about this business of being restored to sanity

always check please John you don't think you understand the step by step what is that step change you comfortably I said potter I've done that you never worked for did you hear what I said I want a confession I listened to Billy Graham accepted correct and every damn time I wound up with a judge

you know he has a one track mind

and I said

look I'm sick not stupid

I don't get mixed up with that

is that that's not what the steps at cedar

yeah I think

well how do you believe

five different states in the book he shares are unique it's an open mind that's how everybody believes you open your mind

to become a teacher

you don't have to you know all the self centered person is a person who does not have an open mind you know what our co founder says the chief activator of all our problems come from a self centered peer

do you notice helpcenter person a person cannot have a relationship

terrible terrible relationship because it's not a person who gives anything is not a person who willing to understand anything it's not a person willing to accept anything if the person wants something

want something

thank

I'm not like that you know he even understands me I'm a nice person

I just never learned how to fit it

you know and if if if I had if I had a nice girl someone that I really love not just any

because I had a new girl before didn't help

someone that I really care nice home good job money in the car then maybe I wouldn't feel that way inside

what is your dad bill Wilson talks about an alcoholic how we rationalize

I'll be testifying he said that through the years he has developed layers and layers and layers of self justification

you know what that means to me at the age of thirty three John your problem is because you're not in you your problem is

it's not because you're in India

it has nothing to do where you can talk with English or not it has nothing to do whether you have an education or not

it's not the car here in India

it had nothing to do where you can talk with English or not it has nothing to do whether you have an education or not

your problem mate I am not

you know I protect that by rationalizing and justifying and you know

when you talk about a spiritual awakening

ritual is waking represents the new state of consciousness

you learn to see something that by yourself you could have never seen

new state of consciousness the book calls it a gift

again

you know and on my way home from the bus to Marlboro sixteen miles I said it for the first time in my life John you're thirty three years old

you don't have a home you never been married you don't have an education we don't have a wife you don't have a car body Fred said

we all have to start from where we are with what we have and you know what I said I think I will

I didn't know what the hell I was gonna go but I was going to do is sign

guess what happened every morning I go to do a restaurant owned policy director I want the next morning and Paul says to me Rita was the waiters if you want to know if you could paint her house I said sure I used to change people's new church when I was drunk

she said he said to me she wants an estimate want to go over there and give an estimate so I went over to see Rita use big houses funeral home now

I went in there I walked around three times I went in there and I should read up a classic three hundred dollars

he gave me a job right away because under contractors wanted twelve to fourteen hundred dollars

just because you're trying to meet you make sense