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Tom Iver, an alcoholic. >> Helped her up. She's younger than me.

I had to get up here by myself. Great to see everybody. I'm a member of the primary purpose group of AA and in Southern Pines.

Delighted to be here. My sobriety today is Groundhog Day 1957. And uh thank you very much.

I really appreciate Lorraine being here with 46 years keeping me from being the oldest rat in the barn. And that's a good feeling. It's so I feel like a security blanket having somebody here.

I am delighted to be here and uh and congratulations on a good conference. Thanks for the great work that's been done, obviously been done. Uh this is a kind of conference that I like a great deal because it gets right down to the fundamentals of Alcoholics Anonymous.

The uh theme of it, you know, the with the steps, traditions, and the and the concept very much at the heart and soul of of what we're about. I like that. I I like the fact that it's been a conference with a lot of content, a lot of uh we had workshops or panels on uh just about every area of service.

We could we missed a couple, but but most areas of services had had active panels going on. Had a chance to get into two of them and they were really good. So, uh and it's a good loose warm bunch of folk.

Uh I went out kind of working the crowd a little bit while ago. I just wanted to sort of feel like who was here. Sometimes when you get up in front of one of these crowds, it looks like a bunch of enemies.

You say, "Well, what have I done to these folk?" You So, I like to just get out and mix it up a little bit and uh and and sort of feel at home and feel connected and and uh and I surely do. And I'm just happy to be here. I I want to tell you uh as much as I can of my story.

I would tell it all, but I'm afraid y'all will quit. Uh, I have a kind of a kind of a system I've developed in in trying to talk to folks in aa I like to quit just a few minutes before you do. You ever you ever been talking and you just sort of see the curtain drop?

You know, you keep on talking if you want to, but you're done now. So, I kind of look for signs. you know, the first sign of a glaze, man, I say, "Whoa, let's get out of dodge, you know." So, so I'll be looking for that.

I'll quit. I don't care. It's midstroke.

I mean, I'll I'll head out for the airplane. So, I I am just delighted to be here and I've appreciated very much being here and getting a good look at um you I thought Chicago was made up of an airport and a hotel. That's it's all I'd ever seen of it.

And uh this time I came in on uh Friday and Mike put work over me and turned me over to uh to uh to uh be Julia. And uh so I I spent the afternoon Friday on the way to the hotel with a good-looking woman in her husband's convertible with his permission touring Chicago. And what a what a beautiful beautiful thing.

I'd never really taken the time to just kind of take a look at uh the things that make up this city. And uh I think I'm going to move up here next week. I of course wife won't come, but I'm coming anyway.

I think uh so thanks for all the all of the courtesy and consideration. I met a lot of folks. Got to see a bunch of old friends.

Now I'm going to talk about drinking whiskey and stuff. Uh they I I really want to talk about some stuff tonight. So, I'm going to I'm going to hurry.

It won't sound like it to you. I'm from North Carolina, but but but I'm going to be going hard as I can go. And it'll sound like slow motion, but it ain't uh I I'm a guy that I I don't know.

I'm no expert on anything. Certainly no expert on alcoholism, no expert on aa um much anything else. uh if you leave here tonight any smarter than you came in, it won't be my fault.

It it'll be thanks to your dinner companions or something. And uh so what I want to do just share with you a little bit. I I want to just share one thing that I've come to believe in AA that sort of forms the foundation for what what we do in AA and what I like to think about when I'm talking.

I I I like to keep it fresh in my mind what we're dealing with here and that's alcoholism. Alcoholism is a killer illness. Absolutely a killer illness.

Uh I understand and I believe that 95% of folks who have alcoholism die of that condition never effectively knowing that there's a way out. 95% of the people in the world die and and uh usually very very much. Most folks die at a fairly early age.

said 52 is the average life expectancy of a of a still practicing alcoholic. Interesting to me that when I came in the program all those years ago, the life expectancy was 52 years. And now with all the research and advanced uh training and development of stuff that we've done over the years, it's 52.

We're dealing with a tough tough illness. It doesn't yield readily. Those of us, I believe, who are fortunate enough to grab this brass ring called recovery and hang on to it are among the luckiest people on God's green earth because it is a tremendously difficult illness.

I'll join you. I'll join you. And it's a it's it's a predatory type of an illness.

It's it's an illness that can knock you out in a heartbeat. And it's something about it. You I know that when I say I'm an alcoholic, I'm also acknowledging that I have the mind of a chronic alcoholic and it isn't going to change from that.

That's what it is. And the only defense that I have from the fatal nature of this illness is the practice of spiritual principles that keep my defenses in place. And all I have to do to revisit alcoholism is let up on that and let my spiritual condition deteriorate.

And what at this point would seem unthinkable to me would become very normal. So it's a tough feeling. I tell you what, just one little quick story about that about what happens in terms of that mental obsession is like our book says that that the mind of a guy like me can and does turn at times irresistibly to the thought of a drink.

When I first started hearing that aa that sounded like some pretty strong language. I didn't know how strong it was till I experienced that. First time I ever ran into an a real life barking obsession.

I'd been sober three and a half years. I was very active in the program, as active as I know how to be. And I had to make a trip on a on a plane.

Nothing radically different about that. It was a jet. I'd never been on a jet.

They just invented those things, I think, or they did it while I was drunk. I I didn't know a plane could fly without a propeller. Here we went.

I might have been a little excited about that, but not much. You know, nothing radically different. Took off and you know how it is, man.

You You don't even get leveled off where they start hustling that hooch, you know. And so that day, I was sitting near the front of the plane. They got the buggy out and they started pushing it up the aisle announcing what they had on it.

Now, I'd heard that lots of times, but you know what I mean when I say I heard it? I heard it. And all at once, the spiritual giant was absolutely overwhelmed with an obsession to drink.

Now, I'm not talking about goofy thinking like, "Well, maybe you're not really an alcoholic. Maybe you overreacted and came here too quickly." I No, didn't enter the mind. No goofy stuff like you're 30,000 ft in the air.

Who would know? Didn't enter my mind. Or, "Wouldn't a drink be nice?" never entered my mind.

I sat there and went from spiritual giant to an absolute shivering wreck of an alcoholic. Knew I was going to drink. And fellow alcoholics, I didn't want to drink.

I didn't want to drink. I knew I was going to. Took a dollar bill out of my pocket, stuck it in my shirt pocket, and I'm sitting there sweating bullets.

And I thought, my god, what do you do? Well, what do you do in a situation like call your sponsor? Good luck.

catch a meeting, drop by the club. I tell you what I believe you do. You're either prepared or dead meat.

One or the other. Because that's alcoholism. That's the dilemma of alcoholism.

What I did, I got through it. Tell you that now. But what I did was what I'd heard in a remember your last drunk.

That helped a little. But bad memories aren't enough. Bad memories won't do it.

And then I remember what folks said, when you're right up against it and you don't know what to do, pray. When I walked into Alcoholics Anonymous, I didn't even know the Our Father, but I'd learned to pray and believe with all my heart that the prayer would work. So, I said the simplest, most profound prayer man's ever uttered.

I said, "God, help me." It was gone as quickly as it came. Now, that wasn't the last one, but that's the dilemma of alcoholism. It requires very little provocation.

It just seems to happen sometimes. when all I have to do is let that little bit of a defense down and here we go. So, I believe that I believe very much what John said when he finished that countdown and I'd say it to all of us.

We are dealing with a tremendously formidable illness, but thank God this program is stronger. It's stronger in every possible way. Thank you very much.

Was that good? Is that good enough to get a drink of water? You reckon?

>> Thank you very much, Jack. Thank you. I used to be very bad to drink.

So, that's what I'm talking about. I'm talking about a condition and even though it's been a long, long time, I have absolutely no illusions. I've gone to funerals of folks senior to me for whom this illness came knocking against.

So I take absolutely nothing for granted. I don't know exactly why I'm an alcoholic. I think the most important thing that I know about alcoholism is the fact that I have it.

I have absolutely no question in my mind I have it. And where it came from, I couldn't care less. I've read a lot of stuff, heard a lot of stuff, all kind of theories about alcoholism.

Some I like better than others. There's one that says that we tend to be alcoholic because we seem to be overly endowed with skills and abilities far beyond average people. That's a Well, that's a nice theory, you know, that there's something about the alcoholic mind that the brain's just too big for the head, you know, and all kind of theories about that fantastic alcoholic mind.

And I've heard them discussed for years, but only in Alcoholics Anonymous. Ain't nobody at UI studying that incredible mind. But that's a good one.

Yeah, I kind of like that. That we're just sort of creative people. We just burst and want to explode.

Be like Vince go and and uh cut off her ear with that creative. Well, I don't know about all that. It's nice.

Fact is, I don't know. I know this. I believe that I was a sitting duck for alcoholism.

I was a sitting duck anyway for for for using alcohol more than the average cat. Uh it's simply I won't go into a whole bunch of causation, but but what I mean when I say as a sitting duck, I think I was a guy that was just set up so that when booze came, I didn't need to learn to use it. It just fit my life as naturally as breathing because that stuff did something for me.

I was a kind of a miserable kid. I was a guy that was a study in conflict. I and what I mean by that was that what you see wasn't what you got.

I was studying conflict. I was one guy on the inside quite another on the outside. On the inside I was a guy who was fearful, a guy who was anxious, a guy who was extremely isolated.

I was not somebody who could readily connect with other people. On the outside, I looked like a loud leader type of guy that was always starting something. Wasn't that kind of guy.

I was a guy who on the outside when in my good moments looked like a winner. On the inside I was a loser because I had a remarkable ability to screw up stuff on a regular basis no matter how good. So I was a guy who was a study in contrast and uh a lot of conflict and so when I started to drink the magic happened for me no mystery about it.

That stuff did something important. I loved it. I would have needed examination if I had not continued to drink.

Man, that stuff was wonderful. I never had anything worked as well for me as booze. Sure beat psychiatry and was a lot cheaper.

And uh and so I just took to it. I was not an instant alcoholic, not a born alcoholic, not an alcoholic at all. I was a guy who found marvelous freedom and release and relief to the kind of uncomfortable life that I had.

And and I just fell in love with that way of life. Fell in love with booze. Uh Silk Work said we drink essentially because the effect produced by alcohol.

Amen. Silk work. That's exactly what I loved that feeling.

I loved what it did for me. And I loved the places people drank. I just love I've been just itching to get to that jazz.

There's jazz going on somewhere in Chicago right now. And uh now when I was drinking, I would I would have been there. That was like a magnet to me.

still is. I still want to get down there because that that kind of environment. I don't know.

It just sort of has a a seductive quality to me. And and so I just love that. I love the place.

I love the people who drank. And so I just fell in that. It became a way of life to me.

And I was a guy who wanted the endless party. I I never wanted to quit. I was always the last guy to give it up.

And I'll let you in on a little secret. as as as ugly as it might have looked to an observer, looked awfully good to me. And if I had been able to continue it, no matter how bad it looked, I would be doing it tonight.

Now, I don't mean that I'm yearning because I've learned you can listen to jazz sober and hear it. Actually, hear what's going on. So, so if I went or go, it it'll be uh it it'll be sober.

But that thing just had that kind of a of of a magic appeal. And so that that's all it was. And the only reason I stopped drinking is because I couldn't stop drinking.

I developed alcoholism. And why? I don't know.

I understand that if 10 people take a drink, nine of them going about their business. Have no appreciable difficulty with it. And they drink if they want to and don't if they don't want to.

I I don't understand those nine. They don't understand me because I was the odd man out. There was something happened to me that didn't happen to other folk.

I don't know why. Don't care why. I just know that it did.

And something happened my 18th year where we refer to it in the program as crossing a line from from whatever kind of drinking whether it's wild celebrational, recreational, party drinking, heavy drinking, whatever. cross a line into uncontrolled drinking or alcoholism. And that's what happened to me when I was 18 years old.

Had not a clue that it had happened. Had not a clue till I was sober for a good while. Looked back and then I could see that the undeniable fact was that it was as if the curtain closed on act one, opened on act two, and it was a different deal.

Now, I had no awareness whatsoever. I don't think anything's changed so much in how much I drank. I drank about as much as I could before I was alcoholic.

I've been so drunk I couldn't lay on the floor, man. And and uh you can't do much better than that, alcoholic or not. I couldn't even bring and and and but so nothing happened in in those terms about getting drunk or even getting in moderate trouble.

But but the thing that happened was I got so that I could not predict how much I drank or when I would stop. Now, I didn't analyze that at the time. never really seriously thought about that till I was sober.

But that clearly was my pattern that I had no clue what would happen. I knew what I intended to happen. I intended to stop by, have a couple of drinks, loosen up, shoot some pool, go on home, do do my chores, and then wind up almost invariably closing the joint and and winding up in bizarre situations.

I I was a guy who had rather chronic difficulties with blackouts. I had a a a remarkable ability to wake up in strange places often with strange people and uh gets a little testy if you do that on a regular basis that yeah I got so I used to wake up come too and I wouldn't open my eyes immediately you know because a lot of times if you open your eyes too quick there'll be some yo-yo standing there asking you tremendously difficult questions like who are you? And I I said, "Well, I'm not sure what I might have told him.

I You have to think about that." Or or about as bad. What are you doing here? And you don't even know where you are.

You know, so I got So I would wake up and not show any evidence of it. You and uh listen for the clues. You if I heard metal clanging, I knew it's okay.

I I've never been put in one of those places by accident. I thought it was, but I never heard anybody say, "I made a mistake." Man, we shouldn't have put you in here. They always put me I can spot one a mile away.

I don't know what it look, but they put a policeman right on the front row. That but that was the kind of stuff that happened. And so I that's the way my life became.

And and now now I had absolutely no awareness of what was going on. You I I don't know. I've never heard anybody else describe this very much, but it was certainly true with me that I don't think until I got into Alcoholics Anonymous I ever made a direct connection between the first drink and what happened.

I've never woke up in jail and said, "Geez, I should not have started drinking." Never. I don't ever I've never had that consciously had that thought. To me, when I would come to in some bizarre circumstance, my response would always be remarkably similar.

It it would be something like coming to taking a look at the at the latest wreckage of the past and experience what Bill wrote about. I used to think it was a little little exaggerated the way he described pitiful, incomprehensible demoralization until I saw clearly what my life had become. And that's exactly what I would experience when I would wake up and there I am failed again and on the rocks again.

And and so what would follow would be that kind of moral whipping. You've done it again. You've done it again.

You're no good. You're worthless. You have no responsibility.

You have no discipline. You have no character. And that is honest to God what I believed.

I did not believe it had to do with alcohol doing something different with me than it did with other people. Never remember having that thought. And then would cons would would follow the options.

And some of you may have experienced some of this. I'm sure you have. It's think of the options.

You look at that thing. I look at this life that looks like a worthless sack of nothing. and then look at well what I do first always but why don't you just end it why don't you just end it everybody would be better off including you or if not that why don't you just keep going just disappear just ride off into the sunset and don't bother people anymore just go away or do I suck it up and make up another bunch of lies and go back and try to start again, pitiful, incomprehensible demoralization.

And that was characteristic of of of of my drinking. What alcoholism started, you know, my my uh my alcoholism started in a in a it it was a compact sort of a thing in a way. My serious drinking, let's see, it's 9:00 and I started at 10 minutes till that was close, you know.

My alcoholism in in order to see it in in in in a real clear panoramic view was a short period of time relatively speaking. I started serious drinking at 16. Had what I hope and pray was my last drink eight years later at 24.

And in those ensuing eight years between those two points absolutely destroyed everything I ever touched. At the end of that period, I couldn't think of one human being who wouldn't have been better off if they'd never seen me. Not one.

Could not think of one worthy thing that I had done that I could point to with pride. Never had a job for as much as a year in my life except the army. And I didn't want to keep that one.

Every time I'd quit, they'd come get me and put me in jail, you know. And uh then they got tired of that game and threw me out when they wouldn't let me quit, but they threw me out with an undesirable discharge. 20-year-old guy.

And and so when I looked at that life, it was I mean, I was not just somebody who had intermittent difficulties. I was a guy who was life went down the tube in a hurry. Some of us are just that kind.

We tend to be basket cases from day one and get worse. And and so that's what I was. And in eight years, I uh I I I went through a whole bunch of stuff with constant kinds of difficulties, jails, hospitals, psych wards, just stuff.

And uh and then then uh I wound up just north of here, just up the lake from uh here. Uh when I got thrown out of the military, I just kind of migrated up there like a wild goose or something. I just I didn't mean to go.

I just wound up up there. And and so I uh I I hit I hit my some of my roughest going in Detroit and and a beautiful little uh resort just north of Detroit called Flint. And if you haven't been, you just owe it to yourself to go one time.

If you can't go there, you might try the mountains of Afghanistan. It'd be about Well, that's where I wound up. Yeah.

And uh yeah, at one point Flint was named the worst city in the United States in which to live. And you know, when you don't have much to be proud of, you always look for something. And when I saw that rating, I felt a little sense of pride.

You know, at least I made them put it on the list a little bit. I contributed that. Well, that's just where I wound down.

And and and so I wound up. I went up there. I started working at General Motors till my reputation got in front of me.

And if anybody bought a 53 or four 54 Buick, I I'm sorry. I I was not well at the time. I And that but I I bombed there.

My reputation did get in front of me. I wound up in Flint, Michigan, of all things, unemployed, darn near unemployable. And I' I wish I could tell you there was some real real nice end to this story.

There isn't. Uh I I wound up I used to say that that the last couple of years I lived by my wits, but that's a little bit euphemistic for what I what I was doing. Uh wits was not exactly it.

I live by my lack of character. Uh you can believe that I'm not proud of it by any stretch of the imagination. But I started to live a way of life that I honestly didn't know existed when I grew up in Mayberry down in North Carolina.

Yeah. I I did not know people did like that. But it's amazing what happens when you incrementally fall apart, eh?

When you just sort of go a notch at a time, because what happened every time I would hit the wall, crash, start over, I would ratchet down a notch. Ratchet down a notch. And what at one time would have been unthinkable became the only normal thing for me.

Took me a long time when I got sober to start thinking in something less than substandard terms. took me a long time to to uh relate to first class and and so but that that's how I wound up. You that thing of just wasn't wits.

I I live by using people, taking advantage of folks, hustling, buming in in Flint, if you've ever been there. Uh it's it's not really criminal activity. It's the food chain to uh do things that some folks call criminal.

It's a case of either roll or bolled, one or the other. And whoever's friskiest on a given day is the one that drinks. And so sometimes I was frisky and sometimes I was the frisky.

But but that's just the way it worked. I wasn't reared to do that. I'm not proud of that.

I'm not proud of conniving and hustling and using people. I'm not proud of selling my blood five bucks a throat. But that's what guys like me did.

I I never want to forget that period of my life when I wandered the face of this earth with no place I could comfortably call home. Don't want to forget that. Somebody mentioned today about the loneliness of this condition.

God, is that ever true? That has little to do with the nearness or distance of other people. It isn't about other people.

It's about an extreme isolation and inability to connect with the world around. living in that great pit of despair and and in my early 20s looking at myself in the mirror want to gag at what I saw when the only thing I could think was geez you'd be better off if it were just done those are thrilling thoughts for a guy on the way to the party but that's what it was and I never want to forget that grim reality and and it would be nice if I could tell you that one fine day I had enough and call for help somebody threw a rope but it didn't work that way good many of you in here are well aware that Um, mine was to be one of those stories that that contain what I know that practically every person in this world has in this room for sure has feared doing. Mo I never met many alcoholics, particularly those who've who've had blackouts or or even blacks or not who hasn't lived in fear of doing something that couldn't be undone to somebody else.

Most alcoholics don't want to hurt folk. It's hard to tell that, but deep down most alcoholics pretty decent folk and don't want to hurt people. And I was no different.

I knew I was capable of anything. But I I was I was not a predatory person. I wasn't somebody wanted to hurt folk.

And I always had a fear that I would do something horrible that couldn't be undone. And like everybody else, I was the kind of guy that would wake up and panic. I'd go look outside if I had a car to see if it was there, to see if it was in one piece or if there's blood on it.

and then breathe a sigh of relief and go do it again. And that was my life. That was just routine.

And one morning I woke up in jail, novelty there. I mean, that was a routine deal. As I woke up, the jailer came by and I knew him quite well.

And uh I said, "Hey, when can I get out?" He would normally say 10:00. That day he said, "I hope never." And and I had not a clue what he was talking about. And then not him, but some of the other guys in there told me the night before I'd been driving somebody's car down the main street of the city and had run down and killed two people in a in a blackout blind drunk right right down the main street.

And uh absolutely no awareness of that then, now or ever. But no doubt that that's what happened. you know, with a guy like me, you know, me w me driving down or even walking down a street was a dangerous act because it was like firing a loaded weapon down the street, it was just a matter of whether it hit or not.

And so it when that when I learned that, you know, my response was u you heard Bo describe the other side of that. The um my response was that's a strange thing about the mind. It won't take in what it can't handle.

That explains a lot of behavior to me. It won't take it in if it can't handle it. And my response was just to push that away and then gradually accept the truth.

The only time I' ever been in jail didn't try to get out. And then somebody contact one of the policeman there I think learned that I had family in in North Carolina. I don't know how.

They didn't ask me. I wouldn't have told them. I don't think I didn't want to get out of jail.

I it I that's the only time I I'd ever felt that way. I I was afraid to get it. wasn't afraid to drink.

I I just was afraid to face anybody. I couldn't face anybody. I was deeply ashamed to be breathing.

When two fine young folks know no longer were because of me. And so they somebody learned about the family. They contacted him, told them I had a guy up there in a lot of trouble.

And my folks had a mother and sister in North Carolina. They came and uh and got I didn't know how to tell them I didn't want to get out. And uh so they got an attorney.

I was charged with manslaughter. They got me released on bond and uh I knew I would never drink again. My god, how could you?

How could you after something like that? Anybody will tell you if it gets bad enough you won't drink. Well, don't you believe that?

If you're talking about alcoholism, the more logical question is how would you not drink after something like that? I didn't have a clue. I just know that a day and a half later, I got I walked the streets and was doing whatever I could try to do to to just just I don't know, just wander.

And uh and then about middle of the day, I started to drink from July to November of 56. I drank truly like nobody I've ever seen. And it there was no no mystery about what I was doing.

I I was doing what they call psychop what do you call it? This pathological drinking, you know, ju just I was trying to drink myself to death and that anybody could have seen that. And uh and then the 19th of November of 56 was actually the date of my last drink.

And uh I hope it was my last drink. I pray that it was my last drink. It has been so far.

I finished a bottle of gin. Had about that much in in a bottle of gin. And I finished it.

Went down to court. I knew that I wouldn't be back. And um had no absolutely no illusions about it.

And and when I went into court, my attorney I had never heard the plea. I'd always been in the drunk line and just plead guilty to whatever they said. And uh my attorney said, "Stand, there's a plea called stand mute." And I thought, "My god, what an eloquent plea." Hey, stand mute because what else could you say?

I'm not even witness. Somebody had to tell me what I'd done. And uh it was obvious that I had and and so and so that was a plea I entered.

I was found guilty, of course, and sentenced to u to 5 to 15 years in the Michigan State Penitentiary. Now, I knew what that meant. I I I was, as you gather, I wasn't a hot house flower, but but I was I had never done any serious, you you I'd always been in drunk tanks or county jails or pea farms or stockades in the military, something like that.

It all just sort of lightweight, you know, 30-day sentences or whatever. And u this I knew was a different ball game. I' I'd been on the street with a lot of guys that were in and out of that joint and I knew if there were guys like that in there, it was no place to be.

And and so when they passed that sentence, I think it was really telling to me that I had an instinctive reaction of fear. I guess anybody would. But at the same time, the most real sense of relief I'd ever known because I knew it was over.

It was over. And I'm not talking about optimism or hope or there'll be a new day. I'm talking about it's over.

it's done. And um I next day I walked into I was led into that prison on a chain with five other guys. And uh I knew absolutely without any question I'd never come back out.

I knew that. And I'm absolutely convinced had it not been for the program that you and I celebrate tonight, I would not have walked back out. If I'd have gone in there and tried to live in that jungle with my street behavior, it' eat me alive.

I don't have any illusions about that. And and so I walked into that place and didn't care. I was absolutely resigned to that fate and had absolutely no concern about walking out.

I just all I wanted to do was disappear. I snapped back into isolation as severely as I've ever known. And u I didn't engage in conversation with people.

I sat like a guy catatonic state almost. I just never engaged in any kind of dialogue with people. I just sit and and read anything to keep from thinking and uh one day amazing to me about how the turning point comes that starts to make I've had many turning points.

Most of them I've turned the wrong way, but I've had a lot of them in shaping the new life that that have been monumentally important. But while and they might have seemed petty at the time, like the thing that started the ball rolling in a new direction for me, although I had no clue about that, but one day a guy called me out for an interview that worked there, a fellow that uh fell named Martin, and he he called me out and he did a little I know now it was a standard social work interview with a lot of crazy questions. And I'm sure I gave him a lot of of alcoholic answers and probably lied like a dog.

But it's a funny thing about that. They I've never had but one diagnosis in my life. It sounded different.

Sometime folks say you're a drunk or you're no good or you're a bum or you're alcoholic or whatever. I'd heard that all my life. And and from there people would say like why don't you quit drinking, you know, or something like that.

I never could think of a good reason to quit drinking. I mean drunk was bad enough. sober was unbearable.

I never saw anybody that didn't drink that didn't look like they didn't drink. They just looked miserable. Looked like they were just in pain or something.

And uh I never had any burning desire to be sober for for Well, this guy made the same diagnosis. Said, "Man, you've had a lot of trouble with booze." Then he said something I'd never heard before. He said, "We have an AA group here." I don't know if he said Alcoholics Anonymous or not, but but he said, "We have an AA group here.

I think you ought to go. And it was just conversational like that. It wasn't putting a noose on me and dragging me and capturing me or anything like we do so much often now.

Just sort of say, you hungry, go over there. They got groceries, you know. And that's about that's about what he said.

If you got a drink, Rob, they fix it. Go over there. And uh then I got a little note from him a few days later about that big.

He didn't want to waste paper. He got a little piece of paper about that big. Said you can start your first meeting February 2nd of 57.

And uh now I didn't want to join alcoholics. No, I'm a 24 year old guy. I mean, how's a guy going to be an alcoholic at 24?

I geez, I knew some, but none of them like me. I mean, I was a guy with enormous potential. I had one guy tell me that one time, and I never forgot it.

I I had a thousand tell me I was about the most worthless sucker they'd ever seen. But I remember that one who said, "Boy, you really got something." And uh so that's what I remembered and and so I didn't want to join a and the only reason I believed the only reason that I that I even went was that I don't know if you've ever been to this point or not but I was so beaten so absolutely beaten that I had no fight. I just had no fight.

And I think I just wandered in. They told me the Russian army I'd have probably gone over there just about as willingly. And u so I was just there.

It looked like I was on thorazine. I just kind of shuffled along, you know, and and walked walked in and uh had my name on my shirt. The guy said, "Ivester." I Yeah.

He said, "Sit down." And I sat down, listened to my first meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous. And and another huge turning point. Thank God for that first meeting that I walked into.

Uh thank God it was into a group that was well ordered and purposeful and structured and and even though it was in a maximum custody penitentiary, it was as fine an AA group as I've ever attended my life, including my home group right now. And thank God for that. Thank God it wasn't some little gaggle of folks sitting around talking about nothing.

It was really a well-ordered purposeful kind of a thing. And u and I didn't feel that that day, man. I felt like I was in a foreign land.

I sat down in there 300 people and and felt as as out of place as any place I've ever been in my life. Ran much like this, read a lot of stuff. We didn't count anything.

They did count us, but but they didn't count how long we had and they uh got through with all the reading and stuff, introduced the speaker, and a guy, hope Chicago folk aren't offended, but this guy, it wasn't his name, but the only name he ever went by was Shai, Chi. And uh he was a guy, marvelous man. He he got nicknamed Shai because he loved this city.

And before he got sober now, he he'd been in that prison one time and been out for a long time. And uh during his criminal career, he used to come to the Windy City and do a lot of crime down here. He loved to rob stuff in Chicago.

And uh so he was named Shy. That was the only name anybody ever ever called him. And he spoke that day.

And he told a story. And I swear to God, I'd heard drunks tell stories, but not their own. And that I I was sitting there shocked.

I What on earth would a guy come in here look nice from far back in the room, but if you got close, he didn't look too good. He he was a had on that blue preaching suit and he was up there just to that message and and I thought, my god, he was like a geek in a circus or something. I It just I couldn't imagine why he was doing that.

It just made no sense to me talking to 300 hairylegged convicts about stuff like that. I wouldn't have told nobody. And uh now I didn't identify with him.

He was as different from me as anybody I ever met. I came to love him better than Peter loved the Lord. He he became my first real sponsor.

And uh but it surely wasn't that day. I'll guarantee you that. Yeah.

I sat there dumbfounded at the whole deal. And but I'll always be grateful for that guy because he he was one of those people that was absolutely endowed or practiced or whatever with the magic of enthusiasm. He was the most enthusiastic guy you have ever seen in your life.

When he would tell his story, he was so excited you'd get excited with him. And he was just one of those people that made you feel good to be around. And there's absolutely now there was a mystery in my mind the next week when I came back but there isn't today.

The one thing that brought me back to that next meeting was the spirit of that guy cuz I was like it was like a magnet almost. Hey I was I was sort of drawn in to that thing. Couldn't have told anybody why I was there.

Nobody asked. I just walked in, sat down, and u for several months, I don't think I've ever felt more out of place anywhere in my in my life than I did in Alcoholics Anom. You know, 24 years old, as Lraine can tell you, we're not coming off the production line very readily back in in those days.

And a 24 year old sitting there, I was the youngest guy in the whole joint. And certainly the youngest one in that most of the guys in that group had had drunk more years than I was years old. And I I felt like a pure wimp there compared to some of those folk.

And and I I didn't believe I really truly did not believe I was alcoholic. I said I was because I hated to be the only one out of 300 that was something else. And so they all said they were and I said, "Yeah, me too." You know, but it didn't mean a thing.

It was just a word. And I kept going back. I've always been a reader.

I I read everything we we had. We don't wasn't much. We only had 12 p publications count pamphlets back then.

And uh I read all that stuff. I was a little nervous when I was first getting sober and and uh so I read a lot of stuff. I've always been a fairly decent listener.

I I'd listen to people. I'd listen to discussions and all that kind of stuff. But it was always them.

You know, I was like the guy watching the baseball game through a knot hole. You know, it it was a big big barrier between me and the rest of the world. And but at the same time, there was stuff happening.

I was starting to get impressions, starting to get feelings, starting to feel some sense of once in a while I would hear something that I guess would make sense, you know, and so there was stuff going on even though I didn't know it. And I'll tell you where another major turning point I'm I'm going to go fast can, but I ain't quite finished. In fact, I got a long way to go, but I'll tell I'll get there in a hurry.

The uh another major turning point. Yeah, I'm I'm when I look at that at what formed it. What was it that took an absolutely it wasn't a guiltridden guy.

It was a guy under a mountain of guilt. You know, when I was sitting in Alcoholics Anonymous, it wasn't just that I was resistant because I didn't believe I was alcoholic or that I was too young or too smart or too much potential. I felt so unworthy that I felt ashamed to be there sucking up decent air with people that I didn't deserve.

Yeah. I felt enormously ashamed to to be anywhere and particularly in some place where folks are talking about hope and help. So it was a huge huge hurdle to get past that kind of stuff.

It took a a lot of stuff and and the things that really influenced that Shai certainly the guy who spoke at that first meeting my first sponsor was a a tremendous force in that. That group that I belong to was an excellent group. An excellent group that did a good job of helping people understand our primary purpose.

understand that Alcoholics Anonymous is not some kind of witchcraft where fortunate few people have to get the lucky straw. Not that at all. That that is where I learned the the the I didn't know exactly what it meant, but I heard the term design for living.

And that what we have here truly is a design for living. It doesn't make too much about deserving, character, motivation, sincerity. If I will do the things that are laid out in the 200 words of the design for living called 12 steps, I'll have a new life.

And I know that to be true. I know that. And so I'll be ever grateful for that group and for not only how they they help me to find my way into the program.

But it's amazing to me about, you know, that in the promise talks about intuitively knowing how to handle situations. I will always be amazed at that group that I belong to, 300 convicts, of how those guys would sort of sense what I needed when I needed it and nudge me or push me at the right time. Amazing to me about the sensitivity of folk in this program and and so there were a lot of things that that entered in the good feeling of belonging that started to occur when I started to get physically involved.

But it it as I described in the beginning, we're dealing with a tough illness and there's a place in the book in Doc's opinion where it's Joe could tell you where it talks about fraud emotional appeal not being sufficient to deal with an illness as serious as ours and I couldn't believe that more couldn't and frame appeal to me are those feel-good things like you know what we're doing here tonight now in all honesty this is kind of a Friday thing it's a c it's fundamental and it's well grounded in things, but this is not the fundamental stuff. This is a celebration. Bo used that term.

It's a celebration. We come here to sort of share with each other the good news. Hey guys, isn't this wonderful?

We get pumped up a little bit. Go fight some more. And and uh but that's it.

Those feel good things. Fellowship is kind of a froy thing. Uh activity is a froy frozy thing.

And and so I was a guy going through a lot of that kind of stuff. And and I don't pan that. It's just that I don't oversell the importance of that because it got me through for a while.

But I'll tell you where the real deep water started to come for me. It was in uh yeah, I I was sort of mechanically going through the steps academically, you know, with sort of hearing the words and starting to understand what they meant. And and a real turning point one day was that I was not totally ignorant of the steps.

I was just ignorant of how they worked in my life because they weren't working. and uh the uh went to meeting guy spent the entire meeting talking about the fourep nothing else. He got through with it and I went back to my sale.

I said, "Okay, I'm going to try that." And I'd been doing a little thinking about how such a nice guy got in such a mess. And I meant to write a story about that, you know, about how such a nice fella wound up like this. And and uh I wrote about two lines of what I had in mind.

And then with no intent whatsoever, all at once, I mean, I hit the wall. the the charade was over and with absolutely no intention, two lines of what I had in mind and with no planning, no forethought whatsoever. It was just almost one motion I went from that and opened up and started to pour out my heart.

It was not a well-defined inventory with columns and and evaluation stuff like that. But when I got through with that, I had three pages of hopeless looking scribble nobody could read, but nobody was supposed to read that. When I got through with that, what I had just done was the most important day's work I have ever done in my life, including the next inventory, which was far more thoughtful.

But it had no more value than that one. Because when I got through, I knew at a cellular level that I was alcoholic. Not the young guy, not the whiz kid, not the tragic case.

I was alcoholic. Absolutely no question. Our book says in one place that we learned that we had to fully concede to our innermost selves that we were alcoholic.

First step in recovery. I love that word concede because that's not a public word. That's a private word.

I told you I was an alcoholic when I started out and I am. That's not what that's about. That sort of communication.

You're one, I am two. Let's talk. Concede means that I accept at a cellular level that there's been a good fight, but I lost.

And I accept at the core of my being that I'm a guy who can't drink. I'm not somebody who's wised up and said sober's better than that. I'm a guy who can't drink.

Surrender. Hey, Bo. Surrender.

What a powerful experience. Personally, I know of nobody that I've ever met who's got long-term productive sobriety that hasn't experienced surrender. This program is built on surrender, not achievement or attainment.

And that was a huge turning point. That day, I knew I was alcoholic. I have never doubted it to this day.

That day on that plane, I had no doubts that I was alcoholic. Thank God for that. And that's the vital importance of surrender because it makes you see the long picture and not the short term.

It makes you see the real consequences and not the short-term relief. It helps you to understand the powerful concept of hang on. Hang on no matter how tough it gets.

I've been to days in my sobriety when it was so dark that I thought, my God, I can't take one more day, but I'm dealing with my life. I'm not dealing with social inconvenience. And that's what happened that day.

Fundamental grounding that I'm alcoholic. I'm beat. That day, I became a real member of Alcoholics Anonymous.

Now, nobody knew that. Didn't tell anybody. Didn't have to tell anybody.

Didn't sign anything. This is the easiest fellowship in the world to join. If you want to join, you in if you say you are.

Don't have to get Bennett's approval or nothing else. You just in. It's also easy to quit.

All you got to do quit or take a drink, whichever comes first, and then it's history. So, it's it and and and and that day I became a real member. And from that day to this, I have never gone to a meeting of alcoholics and I was without knowing 100% why I was there.

Not once. I don't go to bad meetings. I mean, I go to some that are trying very hard to be bad meetings, but I don't go to bad meetings.

I'm going to get a hold of somebody. We're going to have a meeting somewhere. I don't care if it's in a corner, man.

We're going to do something. So, I don't go to Yeah. I I've been a guy on a purpose.

I'm a guy on a mission. And Alcoholics Anonymous is a place where I need to be for my life, not some little social club to drop in on. So that was tremendously important and and then u I'll just visit step just a minute then we'll get out of jail and then we'll start to dance you pretty quick the uh it's it's a very important point that those first three steps are a foundation that's about a finding a relationship with a power and then those next four the way I like to look at them four through seven are about this whole business of understanding what I'm talking about when I say I'm an alcoholic you know when I got through that four step I understood it as an alcoholic.

But I also understood some other stuff or at least started to. I started to understand something about defects of character. I started to understand something about what is it that drives my life?

What is it that gives me a mind that irresistibly turns thought of a drink? You what is it that makes me behave like a pure total idiot doing the same thing over and over? And defects of character are powerful propellants in this thing called life.

And so I started to understand that a little bit. And and in and in five, I learned the true value. Yeah.

When I admitted to another person, particularly that first person on this planet that I ever let see me ever. And what a tremendous step that was toward freedom, putting a little crack in that wall of self-centered isolation that had imprisoned me forever. And then six and seven, I just want to touch just a minute because and I'm not preaching.

It'll sound like it, but I'm not. just sharing. Yeah, maybe when I'm working with people, one of the things, yeah, I'm sort of concerned about where we lose people in the program who seem to be trying, who seem to be doing something.

You think about that. If you're working with somebody, you're trying to get through the steps and they seem to be conscientiously trying and you lose them, take a look where you lose them. Take a look where you lose them.

And I'm beginning to believe that it's in the area of six and seven. You know that it's one thing to admit powerlessness and it's one thing to study my naval and look at the causation and all this stuff and it's one to examine my life. But then when we get to six and seven, the name of the game changes and it becomes for me things like well do you want to get well or don't you?

Do you want to do something or don't you? Do you want to be rid of these things that own you or do you want to keep them? And it very realistically to me became decision time where I decide if I really and truly want a new life.

It's the place where I think the nature of the activity called Alcoholics Anonymous starts to change. You there seems to me like there was a place where and it looks like sort of a breakthrough place where Alcoholics Anonymous is a place to go get what I need and then get on with my life. I go in there like it's a first aid station or I go in there like it's a service station, get a tuneup and then I get on back out and start living.

If Alcoholics Anonymous never becomes a place that goes beyond that, I think it's only a matter of time till I start experiencing a little bit of AA overload. Where I sit to thinking everything I hear is repetitious. Oh, I've heard that guy before.

Oh, we're on that step again. You know, where I see aa as a place to go get what I need. And there's a transition that occurs where I start to be ready for a new life to appear.

And I think it's in that six and seven where I need to start taking this on as a way of life. I start to be a free man. And six and seven are the staging area for the steps that to me have a lot to do with with freedom.

In fact, they have everything to do with freedom. And that 8 through 12 are are the steps that have to do with restoration. They have to do with making me a free man.

They have to do with letting me take my place in this world where I identify those folk I've harmed, identify those warped and damaged relationships, and start to look at how to deal with them. My belief is this. I believe that until I go back and make right those wrongs, till I go back and mend those warped and distorted relationships, I will never be a free man.

I will drag those anchors with me forever. And that's what amends are about. They're the surgery of Alcoholics Anonymous where I start digging out those things, those behaviors, those actions that are directly tied to those defects of character.

Now, that gets a little heavy, but that is truly where I think the freedom comes from. When I start understanding that defects on me and that as I start to develop and take the actions of restoration in the steps, freedom will come. Now you hear this said a lot that that a is a journey not a destination.

You hear it all the time. Let me tell you that a different way. In all these years, I have never consciously solved one single problem in alcohol.

Not a one. I don't want to discourage anybody, but I've never sat in a meeting and said, "Eureka, I got it. Now understand." Never.

It's never been my experience. What I find is that there's a gradual transition that sort of occurs in six and seven and moves on out flowers and and eight and so forth where you know to me defect defects and and shortcomings in six and seven. It's like defects are my actions.

That's how you see what my defects look like is by my actions. Shortcomings is what you don't see. And so I like to look at it as like two sides of a coin.

Now, I've never solved one of those. I've never solved a single one. And I'll let you on a little secret.

I ain't working on any of them. Because what I found literally is that when I work on them, they get worse. When when I take the steps that make a difference, an amazing thing happens.

I get to looking for them one day and they go away. They go away. Again, just a quick illustration.

I keep saying quick and you I'm watching your eyes now. You're not glazed just yet. Are you working on it?

But I I you got you there yet. Let me give you one little illustration that here. You hear a lot of talk about relation.

I've never talked about this, I don't think. But let me just talk about a minute. But talk about sex.

That'll get your attention. How many times you you hear us talking about relationships and what a horrible thing it is to work on and how we got to do all this stuff here. Now, I was always I was a guy who always had I didn't have particularly trouble with relationships.

I had an a neurotic need for relationships. I was somebody thought he had to be connected to somebody or else my life was just nothing, you know. And so, I had this absolutely obsessive need.

I had to have somebody. What a tremendous freedom it was for me when I realized I didn't have to have anybody. Strange thing when I realized I don't have to have somebody, then I can have somebody.

When I got to have somebody, I run them off. strange thing and and and an amazing thing happened to me when I started looking at inventory. I I won't go too far with this, but just enough to tease your imagination.

Think about it. You know, my mother was on the list. You know, my mother's a wonderful person.

She was a big doineering type of woman, very impressive woman, strong woman. And u at the same time, she was somebody who had a real she her problem she overdid it. She she would she would smother me with it instead of just mother.

she's mother and she's a wonderful person but I was scared of her. I was angry at her and I was fearful of her and so I grew up in that kind of a household and most of my life I grew up in a household that was dominated with women. It was full of women.

Well, that caused me to have just a little bit of tilt to starboard in terms of how I related to women because I had that kind of approach avoidance thing. You know, I loved them but not going to get too close. And I never had a single relationship that I didn't have an ace in the hole.

You know what I mean? I never had an honest to God committed relationship in my life until in fact I married the first one I ever had and we just finished 34 years of marriage. Yeah.

But those I don't know if she'd applaud or not. She's trying to keep up with this train now. We have a great time.

But there's something significant to me in that is that when I started looking at the amends to my mother, I started to recognize something that when I grew up in that maternally invol dominated environment, I developed a kind of a strange peculiar relationship to female. And my problem with female wasn't that I was over sexed or undersexed. It was that I didn't know how to have a committed relationship that had real meaning to it.

And when I finally got that clear and was able to make a committed relationship, I tell you something, it was the most beautiful day of my life when I was able to do that. And so that's what I'm talking about. It probably doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

But that business of dealing with defects so that I can become a free man is tremendously important. If I don't get past the point thinking it's just paying debts and apologizing, I may not get down to the cause and conditions that make me free. And so that's tremendously important surgery that occurs in those steps for me.

I heard Bill Wilson say one time to uh point to you because you friend of mine's mother used to work with him. It it I heard him say one time that Alcoholics Anonymous is not some furative hiding place for drunks that can go and hide out and do things in secret. That's not what what Alcoholics is.

Certainly it provides that. But he said, "The real function of Alcoholics Anonymous is to restore us to our rightful place in this world, to our rightful place in society." And how true that is. How true that is.

But it doesn't happen just by not drinking. It happens by getting rid of those things that block me from freedom. What the promise is to me is that if I will do these things and take these actions, the day will come when I'll be able to walk the streets of this earth and look any person that I see in the eye.

Never could do that before. Today, that's a reality for me that I be able to say to anybody, including you, my life's an open book. Ask me anything you wish.

Now, that's freedom, folks. That's freedom and that's what that process is about and that's the thing that happened now that that happened to me an institution and I and I started to come alive. I started to experience new life.

I started to experience you know it's an amazing thing in a maximum custody penitentiary with nothing that's humanizing in nature. I experienced the first freedom I ever knew in my life. The first happiness the first pure unadulterated joy.

The first feelings of selfworth. The first feelings of purpose. first feelings of real accomplishment was in an environment where that shouldn't occur.

But it's the power of this program. And when I talk about the power of alcohol economics, I mean that this dude turned me on to living and I got started living, finished two years at Michigan State. They well I didn't go to Michigan State.

They sent it to me on television, but I finished two years and uh then I finally got out. They told me I could leave if if I would agree to go to North Carolina. So I said, "Okay, I'll go." And so I I did and uh and then and then I just sort of hit the ground running.

I I I I'll just talk about this one one one thing and then quit because I people will get on my case for uh I'm as free right now as I'll ever be. But but I know that a lot of people in this program sort of vacasillate about whether there's real hope or whether, you know, there can really be life. Uh, I will assure you there's nobody in this room who has who has experienced anywhere anywhere beyond where I've been at at the point of despair and hopelessness and wondering if there's a future of any kind.

And so, in that interest, let me just tell you that when I left the penitentiary, I left like many people. I I had small dreams, nothing big. I just wanted to find a place where I could call home.

I wanted to be I wanted to be free physically. I was free in every other way, but I wanted to be free. I wanted to be able to find a job and make a decent living.

I wanted to be able to to to have a friend. I never knew if I ever would have one. I wanted to be a citizen of a town.

That's not much to ask. I'd never been a citizen. What I did was put them on the worst city list.

I never contributed anything to a to a to a community. Wanted to be part of a family. You know, the simple little things that you usually take for granted.

And I'm here to tell you, dreams come true. Dreams come true. And God knows how much more.

Thank God nobody let me write my ticket for what would happen because when I hit the ground, I just took off like a runaway train. I'm still going that way. And uh amazing things happened.

The second week I was out, some guys asked me to go over to a prison to an AA meeting. I I said, "Man, they're not going to let me in a prison. They may not let me out." And uh they said, "Ah, come on." And so I went and two months after I was out, here it is.

Two months after I walked out of Maximum Custody Penitentiary, I was named outside sponsor of that place and I just walked out of one of them. What a marvelous affirmation. About the same time, a pro supervisor came to me one day and he said, "Tom, you really acting out of anything and it worry me.

I thought you going to tell me to slow down." And he said, "Wouldn't it help you if you could drive?" And I said, "Yes, sir, but I can't." As if he didn't know. And u he said, "Let me check that out." And a little while later, he called me and asked me to meet him up at the Sears store where the driver's license agency was. And this story is absolutely true.

Sister drove me up there. I went in, walked back. My guy was sitting there with a fellow who turned out to be the agent.

We visited a while and talked. I don't know about what, but it wasn't about driving. And we just visited.

When we got through, the guy handed me a driver's license. He didn't even ask me if I could drive. >> >> No test, road, written, verbal, nothing.

Didn't even pay for it. That can't be legal. Yeah.

I've had a lot of people tell me that I must have been well connected politically. Yeah. You bet.

You bet. Yeah. Sheriff and I were intimates.

You can be sure of that. I What I truly believe is that when God's got work for us to do, the walls come down. And I don't care what they are.

DCM. Five months after I was out, two years after I was out, I got a phone call one day from the state capital, asked for Mr. Iverish.

I got on the phone. The guy identified himself. He'd visited the AA group I sponsored one time, one time.

And uh he said, "Mr. Iver, we're expanding the rehabilitation program in our prison system, and we were wondering if you would consider accepting a position." And now that had never been done with an ex-convict in history in history. and and and I first thing I said was, "Do you know who you're talking to?" And he said, "Oh, yeah.

We've checked you out." And uh then surely they had. And and I knew that that would never happen. But lo and behold, I was employed as a as a rehab officer in the um in the in the prison system of North Carolina.

And uh marvelous career. I I went through that and an amazing thing happens when you do good work, you start getting pushed up, you know, and and I really went up further than I ever intended to. I I didn't I just wanted to wrestle with the guys.

I didn't want to run nothing. And but there's a real hunger for leadership and I and so I got kind of pushed into management and then and one day the head of our system now I'm the first ex-con in history ever hired anything and uh the guy asked me to come by that ran the system and and uh he said Tom I'd like for you to take an assignment. I said what?

He would normally want me to pinch head for him somewhere. And he said, "I'd like for you to take over an institution as warden." And I said, "Boy, Scott, when I got off the floor, I mean, I was even even though I was in there, I mean, you know, he talking about being the man." And uh I didn't want to be the man. I you know, I wanted to duke it out with the guys.

And uh I said, "Boss, I don't know about that." And and uh I said, "Will you give me some time to think about it?" He said, "Oh, sure. Take five minutes." And uh and I took five minutes. prayed hard and went back in did it and for the next 20 years that's what I did headed institution my my uh my mo was u it wasn't expressed thing but I'm I'm not a status guy status quo type of guy you I'm somebody I'm a developer I I like to make things happen I like to plow new ground and and so my uh my mo for the next 20 years was developing new facilities and had the opportunity to do some remarkably important things for me and it was a great career I stayed 39 years and then found I was the oldest guy in the system and I never wanted to be that.

And uh and so I finally quit and and the day I the day I became unemployed I was hired for no salary to be the state chair of Alcoholics Anonymous in corrections for North Carolina. So my retirement was a strange one. All I did was move from one side of the fence to the other and uh quit getting paid.

Now I pay good job and uh and I am truly a rewarded guy. I and so it's been it's just an unbelievable thing. I I sometimes even to this day even though I did it for 39 years I look back and say man you couldn't have had a life like that.

But it was it was truly something an absolutely great career. And I I'm a I'm just an average guy living in a little old town. I'm a I'm a very very active member of Alcoholics Anonymous.

I didn't used to be. I still am. I'm involved in every level of service in Alcoholics Anonymous.

And it's not because I'm a dedicated idiot. I've just learned that these are the things that light the fire. These are the things that fire the imagination.

And for whatever it's worth, I'll just leave you with this thought. Except for Lraine, I'm the oldest rat in this barn. And in working on my 46th year of sobriety, I'm having truly the best year I've ever had.

I've never had more enthusiasm. I've never had more imagination. I've never had more fire.

I've never had more creative energy in my entire life. I absolutely love what we're doing. I love the sense of doing something.

And and if you're not feeling that way, for God's sakes, man, lay back your ears, jump in this dude, and give it everything you got. >> >> Thank you for listening to Sober Sunrise. If you enjoyed today's episode, please give it a thumbs up as it will help share the message.

Until next time, have a great day.