IN THE CURRENT MAGAZINE

One morning in the spring of 2000, my mother threatened to throw me out of the house when I arrived home at 5:00 a.m. I ran away that night so I could continue acting out. I was 21. I had been attending college full-time and had two part-time jobs, but I dropped out of school and didn’t show up at work so I could act out.

While in prison, some of my fellows and I found that we all spoke fondly of one particular board game from our youth. After recounting past glories, we sought to obtain a copy of the game.

On July 26, 2007 at 5:00 p.m., I was arrested in a small Southern city for propositioning an undercover police officer in a city park. I never wanted to go to that city again and legally can never be in one of their parks again. Last night, however, business travel took me there briefly.

Recently, when our SA regional representative joined one of my regular face-to-face meetings, I shared how important my morning sobriety renewal phone meeting calls have been for my recovery.

One morning this past winter, during a depression, I was meditating downstairs in my bedroom while my wife was eating breakfast upstairs in the kitchen. She sneezed, and my initial reaction was annoyance (not the most spiritual reaction, but human enough).

I wanted it: a beautiful leather reclining chair and ottoman. Ads claim it as the most comfortable chair in the world. I’d tend to agree because a friend I was visiting offered me the use of his chair when I contracted a cold at his house.

Accepting God’s will for my life, when it conflicts with my own desires, is a difficult part of recovery for me. One of the things that helps me do this, however, is to remember that I’m incapable of properly running my own life. When I was in charge, things got messed up badly—and not just because of my addiction.

On occasion, I like to tell this story to newcomers who want to treat me as if my 40 years of sobriety and gray hair give me some great wisdom: I bought an old house and moved in without doing any repairs.

As is often the case, I was desperate when I crept in to my first SA meeting at the end of December in 2007. I was desperate for so much then: sobriety, recovery, a hug from my daughter, a night without tears, a glimmer of hope from my wife. Desperation became my buzzword.

I had never thought of myself as unstable, nor ever noticed anything particularly erratic about myself until about three weeks after I got sober. My first several meetings were somewhat numb experiences.