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Source: DICOBE-00541 – Jack S – WEST VIRGINIA STATE CONF – 1978-06-16.mp3 File: dicobe-00541-jack-s-west-virginia-state-conf-1978-06-16.mp3 Duration: 01:13:23
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Thank you, Jim. First of all, I'd like to say that I'm Jack S., an alcoholic. I come from Louisville, Kentucky, and I'm not a professional. I was the biggest drunk on the Louisville and Nashville Railroad for a number of years. The president of the Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company, he thought that alcoholism was costing the L&N Railroad a lot of money and maybe they could do something about it. He felt like probably the best person to ask what to do with some drunk, and due to my reputation, he thought of me immediately, and I tell people that have drinking problems that work for the L&N what I did to get sober, and outside of that, I don't know anything else about it. I know what happened to me, and I know what I did for me with your help, and that's all I know about it.
I wasn't that greatly impressed with my wife the first time I met her. I don't know what the hell brought that on with you. He promised not to pick on me tonight. By the way, while I'm thinking about it, I want you all to first understand one thing. I came here tonight intending to talk. I'm sure you came in here with the intention of listening. If you should happen to get through before I do, feel free to leave.
And having Perk sitting down here in front of me with that damn clock hanging around his neck, he'll have absolutely no impression on me whatsoever. So you either send him home or take it off or whatever. You know, around AA, some things that happen in the program I think are quite humorous. I wasn't going to tell this until he made that crack about me. I was up in Seymour, Indiana not long ago at a friend of mine's anniversary in AA and was to give a lead there.
When I went in, there was a young boy who was about three months to birthday, and he was to be the chairman of the meeting. And he was a nervous wreck. There was about 150 people there, I guess, and I'm serious, he was nervous. And he said, I guess I'll screw that meeting up. And I said, well, you know, it's really hard to do, to mess up an AA meeting. It's brilliant, it's something else, we can't really do that.
So anyway, he shook through it, and when it was over and about to close, he said to the people with a tremendous degree of sincerity, he said that he hoped he'd done well. But he said, I guess when you get a chairman like me, it makes the speaker look better. I'd like to thank this committee for getting Jim to… I hope you have a better impression of me next time around. And it's good to be here to see some of my old friends. I see a lot of people from Ohio and Indiana I know, and of course I've known Lita for some time and certainly enjoyed her talk.
Dee was one of the first speakers at our Al-Anon conventions that began in Louisville, Kentucky. We enjoyed her, and I certainly admire the kids that were there this afternoon. I know what a struggle it is to have an opportunity to see my old friend Perk again. Perk has been blessed by God since I came into his life. I went down to Evansville one year to a tri-state meeting, and I didn't know Perk, but we'd come to find out we were a mutual friend in Madisonville, Kentucky.
And Perk was on the program up there, and I went to listen and got there a day early, so we went over to a meeting in Madisonville, or Evansville, Indiana, and when we walked in the club, they asked me to give the lead, so Perk got to hear me. Then while we was at the convention, for some reason, we still don't know, I don't think they know, the guy that was supposed to talk Sunday morning didn't show up.
I don't think they've ever heard from that guy. They wrote him a letter and never got it back or anything. Really, he never came. I don't think anybody knows what happened to him. I guess we got an idea, you know.
[00:05:01]
But they came in the dining room and asked me to give a lead, and Perk had known me three days and got to hear me twice, and I understand he hasn't had a drink since. I don't know whether that had anything to do with it or not. You got two clowns sitting over in the corner from Lexington, Kentucky, Alec and Don. They're friends of mine. I'll tell you how I know that. A few months ago, they asked me to come to Lexington and talk at one of their breakfasts, and I said, okay, I'll be there, and I told Don I'll drive up Sunday morning.
He said, no, come Saturday, go to a meeting with us. We'll get you a room over at one of the motels. And I said, okay. So we went up Saturday, got a room, and went to a meeting with them. So Sunday morning, I went into the breakfast, and I gave the clerk at the desk my motel key, and he presented me with a bill. I said, well, Don said he's going to take care of that, and he said, well, he didn't say anything about it.
So I went back and asked Don about it, and Don said, you worry about all them little things, hell. He said, hell, you've been around a lot of other things like that, Bobby, and we'll take care of it. I didn't worry more about it, and when the meeting was over, I left and went back to Louisville. About four days later, I got a letter down at the office from this motel, dunning me for that damn bill.
And I called his wife and told her about it, and so he goes over to the motel the next day, and he said, did that fellow S. from Louisville, did he pay you off? The guy said, no, I never paid him. He said, that's about three times he's done that, too. You get to meet a hell of a lot of nice people around here. I've never been to West Virginia. My first trip to the glorious state, I've heard a little bit about it.
A fellow was telling me down home, he came up here one winter to West Virginia, he was ice fishing. One of the lakes around here somewhere, and he said he came up and he cut a hole in ice, and he was fishing down there and he like froze to death about an hour and never got a bite. He said a fellow drove up and he looked at his car and he had a West Virginia license plate on it, and he cut a hole in the ice and he dropped his line down in the water and pulled out a hell of a big fish.
Put the line back in the water and he pulled out another fish. So he thought he'd ask him what the hell he was doing, you know, he wasn't having any luck at all. So he said to the guy, he said, how come you catch these fish so quick, what's your secret to that? The guy said, I've never had that. He said, what? He said, I've never had that. The guy said, what the hell are you talking about? And he said, that fellow from West Virginia, he went, did you have to keep your worms warm?
I don't know if there's any truth in that or not. Now that may be true or not, I don't know, he told me. But I'm glad to be here and I was glad to see you committee. I've always said they've got about three classes of people around there. You'll have people in AA that'll make things happen. And I think your committee here has done that. You'll have people that'll be only too glad to sit around and watch things happen.
Then you've always got the class of people that'll sit around and wonder what happened. I'm sure that all of them fall into some category like that. I wasn't the first alcoholic in the continent of the United States, and you all well know that many people have been here before I. But I've heard somewhere along the line that the first alcoholic in this country was Christopher Columbus. Now I don't know that anybody knew that he drank.
But I do know they knew he was an alcoholic. And they know that for very obvious reasons. The first thing he did was he left home and he didn't know where he was going. When he got here, he didn't know where he was. And when he got back, he didn't know where he'd been. He said he'd done all of it on somebody else's money. I think right away that proves to me that he was just like us, or most of us anyway.
I'm not the worst alcoholic in the country. I've heard of a guy one time that was so bad that when he called AA, they wouldn't tell him where the meetings were. So I'm sure that he was worse off than I was. I'd like for you to know that everything I say here tonight is my own opinion. You have a right to disagree with it, and I don't care if you like to be wrong. You know it's perfectly all right with me.
It doesn't bother me in the least. But that I do enjoy coming and meeting and having the opportunity to meet with a whole lot of people. Jim and Donna asked me when I first got here to go over to the TV station and do a little segment with that TV man over there, and I think it's good.
[00:10:01]
It's educational and informative to people. They cut it a little bit short. And he asked me about that Goofy Rand report over there, about the research they were doing in alcoholism. You know half of these dummies think that we sit around and pine our hearts away because we can't drink booze. Isn't that sad? I've had a drink today and then, haven't really missed it all that much, if you want to know the truth about it.
But I told him we didn't comment too much on those type of things. If you leave them to die, they'll die. Who in the hell cares about research anyway? Those dummies that do it, they don't know anything about us drunks. We know we can't drink. We've proven that. Who gives a damn why? You know, and those researchers are crazy anyway. We got a guy at the University of Louisville who's a brilliant man doing research in alcoholism.
I don't pay a hell of a lot of attention to him because at one time I heard he was doing research on grasshoppers. And they tell me that the guy took a grasshopper into the laboratory and he set him on a table and he hit the table and he said, Jump! And the grasshopper jumped. And he cut his two front legs off and set him back on the table and he hit the table and said, Jump! And the grasshopper jumped the best he could with two legs and he picked him up and cut his other two legs off and set him back on the table and hit the table and he said, Jump!
And the grasshopper didn't move. And he went back into his classroom and wrote his thesis and he came to the very conclusion that if you cut all four legs off of a grasshopper, they can't hear. And that's about the truth with some of these damned researchers. I hope that whatever I say here tonight that you don't misinterpret it. You know, I think sometimes that people in AA have a tremendous tendency to pick on speakers.
You hear what that guy said? You know. And really and truly it's only in a literal sense I think that most of us talk. Some guy comes along and says there's no must in AA. And then some fellow gets up and says, 117 times in the big book. What the hell? You know, when you jump out of an airplane and they suggest you pull a ripcord, I don't guess you have to. And I think in the sense of suggested steps in AA, that's probably the way they're suggested, you know.
Jump son, we strongly suggest you pull the ripcord, but I don't guess there's a damn thing says he has to. And probably the same way in there. And many, many times things that are said by people are greatly misunderstood. I think a classic example of that I heard one time was a young lady was standing at a bus stop one morning and she looked at a fellow standing and she said, boy, you had a bad night, didn't you?
And he said, what do you mean? She said, your collar's on backwards. He said, young lady, I happen to be a Catholic priest. He said, we wear our collars that way. And she said, oh. He said, what do you do for a living? She said, I'm a prostitute. They got on the bus and went on their merry way and the next morning they were back at the bus stop and the priest looked at the young lady and she came up and he said, young lady, he said, I want you to know that I prayed for you all night last night.
Well, she said, Father, that wasn't necessary. If you'd called me, I'd have come right over. I'll have to assume that was misunderstood. My father and mother never raised me to be an alcoholic. I don't think. At least they've never let me in on that information. They're both deceased now, but they never told me that some night they were sitting around somewhere and decided they would go to bed and have an alcoholic.
But it seemed like it just turned out that way. And I was given all the advantages as a child not to be. I wonder if that's good sometime, huh? You know, I've got a priest friend of mine in Louisville who's in our program, you know, and I said, Father, maybe we ought to start raising all our children atheists. I just never heard a guy get up on a podium and says, I come from a home full of atheists.
It's like all these damn drunks are from good Christian homes. I don't know if I have any influence on them or not, but my father taught me to believe in whatever it is you're supposed to believe. And my father gave me the basic things you give to children. I'm an authority on children. I don't have any. And I think that makes us an authority on them. Tomorrow's Father's Day, as I understand, I won't get anything.
I don't have any children, I think. But anyway, my father gave me a sense of values, you know, right and wrong and this is it. Hey, a sense of value, you know, right and wrong, and this is it, and that's that, and there, boy, go get it, you know, and that's about all a parent really has to do, and he turned me loose into that outside world out there, and I found a lot of things out there he hadn't told me about.
[00:15:10]
I went to a corner, Fourth and Central in Louisville, Kentucky, and if you don't know where that is, you've probably seen it on television, because it's the corner where the Churchill Downs Racetrack is, and they run the Kentucky Derby there every year, and it's quite a famous corner, and I walked out there one day at the age of 14, 15, 16, somewhere in there and took a look around, and damn it was different than what he told me about.
I found girls out there that were just a little bit different than the ones I'd met in eighth grade at Holy Name. I found booze out there, people to drink it and atmosphere with it, racehorses and gambling and a little bit of everything you want to find in life. Why I decided that was better than what I had, I don't know. Why I decided to choose that way, I don't know, care less. I only know that I did. And at a very early age, I discovered alcohol, sex, and gambling. All at the same time, fell in love with all of them, attacked them vigorously.
Any one of the damn three by themselves would kill you. And I was involved in all of them at once, you know, and fell in love with it, fell in love with it. And for a while it was fun, for a while it was fun, and I enjoyed it, and I caught hell from my parents about the way I was acting, the road I was taking, and all the things that people catch hell for, I caught hell for. But nevertheless, I enjoyed it. Now if I was an alcoholic at that time in my life, I'm sure it must have been something from a physical standpoint. I don't really ever remember having any kind of dependency whatsoever on booze. I just loved the environment, and I liked what went on, and drinking was fun at that time.
Now, to me, alcoholism begins when the fun stops, you know. Fun without consequences is social drinking to me. Drinking with consequences is the beginning of alcoholism. And I think you have to learn to separate that if you're new or if you're young. I'm not coming back to any more of these damned meetings. I don't have any fun when I'm not drinking. Have you ever heard that? I had a kid in Louisville tell me that some time ago, and I threatened to throw him out. And I think that we should have taken into consideration of barring the guy that brought him, you know, because there ain't no place for people to have fun when they're drinking. There ain't no place for people to cease to be fun.
So I told the boy, I said, you are, I agree, you're in the wrong place, get out. Come back when the fun stops. But before you go, you know, I love those stories, don't you, about girls and saloons and, you know, all in the back, in the booth, in the dark, you know, and listening. I know they're damned lies, but I love to listen to them anyway. So I asked him to fill me in on all this fun he was having. Hell, he was crazier than I was. He got locked up, his wife left him, puked on a new suit, wrecked his car and lost his job. And he was having fun drinking. I told him, he's in hell of a shape to ever cease being fun. But after a while, it began to cause me problems and was not fun.
Now, I think with all alcoholics, you know, and sometimes maybe you shouldn't say that and perhaps I shouldn't either, but sometimes in all of our lives, the problems begin that we wouldn't have if it wasn't for drinking. And to me, to me, that tells us something. Now, alcoholism has a beginning and it has an end, you know. For us, hopefully, and at least we know for today, that it has ended here, you know. And for some people, it has ended in the cemetery. For some people, it has ended with incarceration. For some people, it has ended in insane asylums.
But it has a beginning and it has an end. And the only thing that's good about being young and approaching an early age, you can catch it in the beginning and stop its progression. And you just don't have to go through all the hell that somebody did that went through 30 or 35 years of it, you know. But it began to cause me problems. I went to work for the Louisville National Railroad at the age of 20 as an electrician apprentice. And at the age of 21 years old, I was in trouble with drinking alcohol from all faces, from everybody. It began to interfere with my work. I never was married until I came in today. I admire Lita and some of those courageous people that pick up all those husbands and wives along the way, you know.
And I've reached that damn stage now where going to Japan or helping that gal with the babies don't even interest me, you know. But I never had a desire to get married. I think I know why, you know. I didn't then, but perhaps I do. I thought wives were useless creatures. I didn't know what the hell you were supposed to do with them if I wasn't already doing.
[00:20:04]
And most of them that I knew were just ugly as hell. And I made a remark in AA one night that you didn't marry the kind of women I run around with. And that old sponsor of mine, he jumped up and he said, nor did they marry you, boy. So it was six of one and a half, a dozen of the other, but all of them drank. I don't want to be married to no drinking woman. I think about that tonight and it just sends chills up my spine.
Think about it. Married to a drinking woman. Get a hold of a half a pint of whiskey and got to go and give somebody half of it. That would tear me up tonight. And they were sort of beastly creatures. But I remember this one particularly. She went home one night and she was undressing in her bedroom and didn't pull the blind down. And a peepin' Tom came up to the window. And he was sittin' there at the window watchin' her and when she got about half undressed, he reached in and pulled the blind down.
But all this drinking career of mine, I was single. And I had a few people after me about the progression that I was making. My father was after me. My father used to scream all those constructive criticisms that all people scream. He screamed the same thing that wives scream. He screamed the same thing that mothers scream. They ask you all these ridiculous questions as to why. Why do you do these things? Why are you this way? Hell, if I knew, I wouldn't have been that way more than likely. But why ask me all of the obvious questions that I'm constantly asking myself? As many an industry says, we give you 30 chances.
An alcoholic doesn't need chances. He needs help and he needs some kind of information about the disease of alcoholism. I certainly got none. I got all these whys and how come, you know. And if you loved me, probably the classic of them all, you know, as if there was a dominant love factor in the field of alcoholism, you know, as if an alcoholic was capable of loving something. He's not even capable of loving himself. He's not even capable of allowing someone to love him. That without a drink, I was nothing. And with a drink, I was less. And it gets to be one hell of a rat race. And I think they call it a merry-go-round. God, it is. You know, it's ups and downs and hills and valleys and torment. And I guess just every once in a while in your life, you run into some clown that probably allows you to survive.
But my boss was asking me the same question that my father was, and I was progressively getting worse, you know. Now, the stages in what happened to me I don't really think has that much to do with alcoholism. I've never personally met an alcoholic I can't identify with. I've never really met an alcoholic that came here for any other reason than the one I came for. And I think the identification of alcoholism, as far as I'm concerned to you, it's a blanket that covers us all. Probably the comparison of life stories would be tremendously different. You'll hear speakers sometimes that your life and his life will parallel each other from the beginning to the end.
There might be a closer sort of an identification process there because of the tremendous parallel of your lives. But I don't really think that has much to do with alcoholism in a sense of the word of the way I was feeling and the problems that it was causing and all of these clowns that I ran into that knew nothing about it. I had a Catholic priest who was after me, and he was going to save my soul, and he was a friend of our family's, and he thought the solution to alcoholism was a pat on the head, a seat in the sanctuary, a Bible in your hand, come back in an hour. And alcoholism, you know, it just doesn't work that way.
And finally, one day, he surrendered. And I love to remember the people who surrendered to me because when I came to A, that old man said, Surrender, boy! And I jumped up and said, My turn. Man, I've put a lot of good ones down in my lifetime. And especially this Catholic priest. I went staggering through the holy name schoolyard one day, taking up both sides of the yard, and he looked at me and he just shook his head. And he said, You're hopeless. You are absolutely hopeless. And he said, You know, when you and I die, we will meet on the way to heaven.
And then he looked at me and he said, You know, generally when you meet somebody, they're going one way and you're going the other. And he turned and walked off. And I was dumbfounded. I stopped and watched him as he walked away, and I thought, My God, I wonder what he's done. Hell, he was such a well thought of man. But that's just about how idiotic you get, you know. And I think at this time in my life, I surrendered to the thing that I think most of us really love to possess is the right to be right. You know, that's one of the tremendous disadvantages of being a drunk.
[00:25:09]
You surrender your right to be right. You're always wrong, irregardless of even if you're right, because you're a drunk. You know, nobody believes a damn thing you tell them. You could go to the dentist tomorrow and have 79 teeth extracted, run into work and say, Look, good. You know, they say, Boy, you know, you're an awful drunk. They just don't believe you. And it hurts. We've got a girl down here in Louisville who's been sober about 12 years, and about 14 years ago, she was sitting in a saloon one night, and there was a little frog in the booth. And that little frog talked to her. He said, Hello. And she said, My God, you can talk? And he said, Yes. He said, I wasn't always a frog. He said, An old witch put a spell on me.
She said, Is there anything I can do to help you? He said, The only thing that will relieve the spell is for me to sleep under the covers of a young maiden. So she saw absolutely nothing wrong with that, and she put the little frog in her purse and took it home with her. Well, the next morning, her mother walked into the bedroom, and there that girl lay with this naked young man beside her in the bed. And to this day, her mother don't believe that story. To this day, she don't believe that story.
And it's hell to give up that right to be right once in a while. I finally got so bad with my alcoholism, and nothing interrupted it. I just went from bad to worse, you know. I'm in the book, you know. Open the book, page one, close the page, whatever book you're reading, I'm in it. I'm there every page, you know. I started out slowly, progressed rapidly, went downhill, and wound up on my butt, you know, on skid row. In the meantime, my mother had died, my father had disowned me, the L&N Railroad had ran me off, and I went from a home with my father to a home with my sister who was going to straighten me out until she threw me out.
I didn't mind leaving there. Her children made me awfully nervous, and that's why I drank at that time in my life. My father hollering at me, that's why I drank. My boss picking on me, that's why I drank. If it wasn't for them, I wouldn't even drink the damn stuff, you know. If it wasn't for this, that, them, these, and those, we wouldn't drink, you know. People just don't understand that. But nevertheless, I left there, and I went into an apartment, and I didn't pay my rent, and I went into a rooming house, and I didn't pay my rent, and I went into a boarding house and didn't pay my rent, and I went into the streets. And all of that took a time from I was 22 years old, I guess, until I was 33. And it was all a downhill drag. And I wound up with nothing, void of everything that's good and decent in life.
I had no faith in God, I had no faith in people, and I finally lost the very thing that seems to correct alcoholism. I lost faith in myself. I reached a point in my life to where alcohol did absolutely nothing for me, and believe me, if you've never been there, that's a terrible feeling. When you're down and out, your back's to the wall, and the world's going to hell, you can take a drink of that stuff, and it goes, boom! I'm ready for them now, you know. I misfit, I fit. Where are you? Is there something you'd like to know about anything? You know, I knew it then.
But alcohol finally got to the point that you could drink all you wanted to, and it did nothing for you. You knew where you were a failure, you would die a failure. Everybody had tried, you'd encountered everything known to God and man to recover from this terrible problem, and nothing seemed to help the work. Churches, hospitals, doctors, police department judges, supervisors and family, everybody with the same constructive criticism, the same idiotic questions, why, why, why, why, why. Now, it's hard as hell to walk around in life with faith in nothing. Faith is the very thing that opens the door of communication, the only thing.
The strongest emotion in the human body known to man is fear. The only thing known to overcome fear is faith. The only thing that allows us to have rapport, to communicate, is the faith that we have in each other, that our only concern is for your welfare. And if I'm concerned about yours, mine will survive because of you. You know, how beautiful it is to look at somebody and say, I love you, not for what you are.
Not for what you are, but for what I am when I'm with you, that by my concern for you allows me to survive.
[00:30:07]
I'll share with you what I have, but I can't pay my debt because I'd get back two-fold of what I'm willing to share. Observation alone will pay that to me, but not having faith in anything, not having any way in the world to communicate or overcome fear, it becomes one of the most hideous, tormented states of mind known to a human being on this earth, and why I did not take my own life I don't know.
Leda said something last night that I'd never heard before and never thought of, and maybe it's the reason why, that every time the bad one wanted to kill himself, the good one said, don't. And maybe something in the back of my mind or the dictates of a conscience kept saying, hang on, hang on, hang on, I don't really know. But you can't live or survive in this world without faith in something. Do you know most alcoholics need three basic faiths? One's in themselves, one's in other people, and one's in God.
Most alcoholics surrender faith in God first. They surrender faith in other people secondly. And finally and lastly what goes is faith in themselves, and they stand void in a vacuum, faith in nothing. And ironically, and isn't God patient with us? He'll wait his turn as a rule. Because we come to AA and it says have faith in yourself, my friend. Believe that you have the capabilities of doing what they say.
Trust us. We've done it before you. You develop that faith in yourself, faith in other people, and soon faith in a God that you can understand. And it's a remarkable thing. I think one of the most beautiful stories I ever heard about faith was there were three Catholic nuns one time out driving a car down an old dirt road and they'd run out of gas. And he went up to this farmer and he said, do you have any gas? And he said, sister, I have a 55-gallon drum.
But he said, I'm a little embarrassed to a lady in your position to tell you this. The only thing I have to put it in is a slop jar. And he said, if you don't mind carrying this slop jar down to the road, I'll give you the gas. Because she didn't have much of a choice, so she took it. And she was standing down there at the car with this amber colored fluid in a slop jar, pouring it in her gas tank.
And some drunk come by. And he looked at her. He walked over and he said, sister, he said, I don't know a damn thing about the Catholic religion, but I sure admire your faith. And that's important. That's important. Probably the things that allow a Wino to survive, and I finally went into the city streets. That's the only place you have to go. I've been to jail numerous times, as Jim can tell you or anybody can tell you, because you live on the streets and you're open to the police department.
You have no place to go. My father would not only not let me in his house, he would not even let me in his neighborhood. My father would do nothing to promote my alcoholism. He didn't know that's what he was doing, but that's what he was doing. I was one of those big two-fisted tough drunks. Bring on the girls. Bring them on. Bring on the booze. Let the party begin. Here I am, until I got in trouble.
And people would say something about, you're embarrassing your father. Why that old blah, blah, blah. Until I got in jail. And you drop the dime in the phone and you say, daddy. You know. And the first time I was ever in jail, I did that, you know, and he said, what do you want? And I said, I'm in jail. So what? Well, I thought you might come down and get me out. Oh, he said, I wouldn't worry too much about that if I was you.
Why, he said, as smart as you are, if you figure out some way to get in, you'll figure some way to get out. And hung the damn phone up. And told me when I got out, if I was ever in there again with a dime, don't waste it on him. From that day on, he never promoted my alcoholism. Never. When I went to live in this alley at 4th and Central, back then it was sort of a skid row haven. There was a poultry house on one corner and a couple saloons on another.
And urban renewals kind of modernized it a little bit now. It was difficult to live back there, but there was an old junk car. There was a big hardware store there, still there, Scobie's Hardware Store. It's an enormous place. They sell appliances and everything, you know. And the back of their store is down this alley, and they'd throw out all these boxes and things like that.
[00:35:01]
You know, a hell of a shelter haven when you don't have any place else to go. But in all that, they accomplish a lot of things for you, really. I think all people need somebody to look down on. You know, you can be a snob wino. Really, I'm sincere about that. If you'd get there early in the morning and get one of these big freezer boxes, you could lay down in those things, those cardboard cartons, these freezers and things come in.
You can lay down in them. And you'd find some poor drunk that'd come along with a TV console box, you could, you know. Well, it was damn near like a better neighborhood. And across the street there was a poultry house and was winos in under there, and you knew you were better than they were. I don't know if the wind was blowing that way. I was a policeman. Fighter's not the proper term. I don't remember if I argued with them.
Disagree with everything they said. I have very little use for most of them today that are sadistic, and there are some. There are some damn good policemen, but there are some that are not. I think they're a little weird at times, you know. And West Winos were trying to survive in that alley by stealing, begging, bar, whatever. To get drunk, to get knocked out, you know. That you don't have to think.
That thinking process of a wino is the most horrible thing in the world. You know, you can't drink a gallon and know you're going to be vice president tomorrow like you could before. You know, I'll quit this job and show them, you know. I'll build this $100,000 house on a hill with four Cadillacs in the driveway and won't invite her up. You know, all that crap that booze does for you. It doesn't do all that anymore.
You just get enough to where you don't have to think. It just puts you into oblivion and blank your mind at what you've become. And it's a struggle to obtain all of that, you know. And really, I don't know that you hurt or bother anybody that much, but the thing that always kind of provoked me was these policemen. And I'd argue with them anyway. There's a mailbox on the corner of 4th and Central by that drugstore, and I'd lean on it when I was drinking.
It was a really good place to steady yourself, you know. We used to call it the U.S. Bar. And I'd been locked up for everything around that corner. I was locked up for drunken driving, drunken walking, drunken leaning, drunken crawling. And I think one time I was arrested because I looked like I was going to get drunk. But anyway, these cops would come up, you know, and they'd say, go home. You know, who the hell do they think they are?
Okay, Jack, get off of the corner, go on home, which meant back in the alley, you know. Well, you'd have to explain to these people that, come here, you know. You see that? United States government, right? Belongs to us taxpayers. I'll lean on my part. Get off of the mailbox, you know. And you don't move. Then he says to you, I'll give you 30 seconds to get off of the mailbox, and I'll take you to 6th and Jefferson, where the Crossbar Hotel is.
And you explain to him then about the political influence you have at the courthouse. And I assure you that if you run me downtown, I will beat you back out here. Well, most of the time they accept that type of a challenge. And he'd run me downtown and beat me back about six days or seven days. But they train all these policemen in these academies, you know, brilliantly educated men. Give them a big blue suit and a shiny badge.
Gun and a stick. Five cell flashlight and a big automobile. You know, and there's people out here in the city every day getting raped and robbed and mugged and home burglarized, and they're riding down alleys hunting winos, and I haven't figured that out yet. And you can tell that their training's not really all that great when you encounter some of them, you know, because it will be midnight at times and they ride down that alley and they'll come out of that car and they shine that big five cell flashlight in your eyes, you know, if you're in one of those cartons or in one of those old cars, you know, and they'll say, what are you doing?
And, you know, you're just as intelligent as they are. And you say, nothing. And they lock you up. I've often wished that I had known something about alcoholism when that clown rode down that alley some night and he threw that light in my eyes and he's, what are you doing? You know, and I could have stuck my head out that box and said, officer, I'm progressing. By God, I was. Quite rapidly. Quite rapidly.
Maybe that's the only thing that keeps you going sometimes, you know. You realize, you know, man, I ain't wrapped too tight, but I'm a drunk. You know, what the hell's his excuse? I borrowed some money from a finance company.
[00:40:06]
I can damn near tell those that have. Completely slipped my mind to pay them. You know, those things kind of escape you at times, you know. But I got this money on a signature only by having this clown call some guy at the old man who was a personal friend of mine. And, man, when he got through telling that guy about me, he thought I owned the company. And he let me have 500 bucks, I think it was, or 600, on signature only.
And after they take out all this coming to them, I think I had five and a quarter or 475 or something. And I borrowed this in January of 1962. And in July of 1962, I totally slipped my mind about paying them. And they were hunting me. That friendly, confidential loan company can become very unfriendly and lack confidence when you miss a payment, you know. We won't let anybody know about this until you miss a payment.
Then they got one of those amplifiers on the cars. They were riding down the street. Jack S., where are you? But they couldn't find me. And that tore the hell out of us, you know. Back where I was living, there wasn't any P.O. boxes or anything, you know. And they'd call my sister's house. And she said, I don't know where that farmer is, and I don't care. Hang up, you know. My father threatened to sue them if they didn't quit bothering him.
So they sent out a posse. And they were determined to find me. And I don't know, some bartender around there gave it away. But I remember this day particularly, and it was raining and sort of cold. And I was inside one of these boxes. And it was upright, and the flap was closed. And I had a three-day-old racing form and a pint of wine. And just comfortable as hell, letting the world go by, you know.
And I saw this guy rooting around in that alley, and he was a stranger. I didn't know what the hell he was, you know. So finally he kept looking around, looking around. I guess he could see through the crack in that flap that there was somebody in there. So he walked over there very cautiously. And he knocked on my box. And I shoved that flap open to see who it was. And he said, Are you Jack S.?
And by then it really didn't matter. And I said, Yes, sir. He said something then that has me baffled to this day. I wish the hell that place was still there. I'd like to go back and find that guy. He said, I'm Mr. So-and-so from the finance company. And he said, You got this money in January. It's August. You haven't made a payment. And he said, I'm going to tell you something, boy. He said, If you don't start making some payments on this damn loan, you're going to be in a whole lot of trouble.
In my wildest imagination, I can't think of what he had in mind. I swear to God, I can't think of what he had in mind. I'd love to know just what it was he had planned for me. That's a career of 11 years of alcoholism, 11 years of alcoholism. A guy from Alcoholics Anonymous knew the director of personnel on the L&N Railroad. And he was working in the Kentucky State Commission on Alcoholism. And he was going from Louisville to Frankfurt to change jobs.
And he stopped by to see this man. This man told him about me. And he said, Maybe I can help him. He said, I thought he had to call you. And he said, Well, from what you tell me about him, I doubt very seriously if he's got a dime. And if he has, I don't think he would call me. But he said, Maybe I can do something to help him. My father worked in the personnel department at the L&N. Of course, this made it twice as embarrassing to him, my own actions.
But they sent for my father. And after much discussion, they agreed to come and see if he could help. So they came out to the alley I lived in. And my father was horrified to look. I hadn't seen him in months and months and months. And he just told me later that he could not believe it was me. You know, I was swollen, bloated and dehydrated and yellow and green. Twenty years ahead of my time, I had long hair and a beard.
You know, that's strange. I'm a barn loser, you know. I could buy a suit with two pair of pants and burn a hole in the coat. And here I was laying back there in that alley with a long hair and a beard. And these girls would walk by me and throw up. And nowadays, they look at some guy and they go, Oh! A hell of a difference. But anyway, he was just horrified at the way that I looked. And he never said a word to me.
And this man came over and he talked to me. He could tell he was out of place. I was so sick I cared about nothing. It didn't matter to me where he was from. I guess he told me I didn't care. I just didn't care. You reach a point in your life to where you just don't care. Nothing matters. Nothing matters. You know, if this is all there is, you know, what the hell? What the hell? And you know there's no relief because you've tried everything.
[00:45:01]
Why you don't do away with yourself, I don't really know. But you don't care. So he said, I'd like to help you, if you'll let me. And it was very important that I let him, as it's very important with all alcoholics. I've never helped anybody that didn't want to be helped, and I've never helped anybody that wouldn't let me help them. He said, at one time in my life, I used to be like you are now, very difficult to believe.
That's why I want to help you, because you see, somebody helped me. You know, we're not used to dealing with people like that in our lifetimes. We do something for you, pay me, baby. Or if I do something for you, I expect payment, expected, demanded at times, I guess. But let me help you, my friend, because at one time in my life, I was like you are now, and somebody helped me, and that's all I want. Difficult to understand.
I said, I'll do anything you say. I don't care. I don't care. Well, unbeknowingly to me at that particular time, due to my father's work in the personnel department and the interest of the director of personnel on the L&N railroad, I wasn't fired from the L&N. They had granted me a leave of absence. I didn't even know this, cared less. But I still had medical insurance and life insurance that my father had made the payments on the premiums.
And I believe to this day that that's why they did it, so he could make the premium payments. You know, and he said often, many times before he died, that he knew damned well he'd collect the life before he ever used the medical, you know. But I had insurance, so they took me to a hospital in Louisville, Kentucky, and they poured me in the front door of Our Lady of Peace Hospital on the 21st day of August of 1962.
And from that day till this minute, I haven't needed to drink alcohol to survive comfortably in society. I won't tell you that I haven't wanted to drink, and I've often said and will believe for me that drinking, a desire to drink is measured on something. You can't say yes or no to it. Maybe you can. I can't, you know. Have you lost the desire to drink? To what degree, you know? To what degree? 110 degrees the 4th of July, you're cutting the grass, and some guy comes up and says, Boy, wouldn't one of them big coal mugs taste good?
You say, Yeah, you know. Hell yeah, it tastes good. I'm a drunk, not a fool or a liar. You going to drink it? No. I'm not going to drink it. So in that extent, you know, I'm flying from Jacksonville, Florida, while back to Atlanta, Georgia, in an airplane. It can't land. Fog on the ground. Why they took off, I don't know. Flying up there for an hour and 45 minutes, around in a circle, planes passing you on each side, you know.
You've been there, I guess, a lot of you. Only time you ever see another airplane in the sky when you're circling that field. And the stewardess apologizes for the delay and said, Have a drink on Delta. And she'd come down the aisle, and she said, Would you like to have a drink? And I said, Yes, ma'am. What can I get you? Nothing. She said, I don't understand. I said, You probably wouldn't, and it's a long story, just forget it.
Man, them butterflies in your belly, and you know, you're looking up at her and say, You going to get this damn thing down? And do I remember what that booze would have done? You damn right I remember. Would I like to have gotten rid of what was going on in here? Hell yes. But I knew there was something else beyond that. They'd have probably got resentful as hell if I'd have took three drinks and wanted to fly the plane.
You're better off just leaving it alone. I told her I'd like to have one, but didn't want it. Now I'm sure to this day she thinks there's a weirdo back there. But I went into this hospital, and like all alcoholics, I got well that's dangerous as hell. You ought to give alcoholics pills that make them puke for about six months. Your body gets well and your mind's sick. That's the whole point of AA. And a nurse come along and she said, Well, we're going to an AA meeting tonight.
And I said, Who? And she said, You. And I said, What's an AA meeting? Alcoholics Anonymous. What's that got to do with me? I said, I am not an alcoholic. She said, If you're not one, there ain't any. Now, hell, that hurts. And I gave her all the excuses in the world not to go out. And I finally got to the granddaddy of them all. I don't know anybody back there. She said, You know me, and I'm going.
And so that night, by the ear, I walked down a corridor with that nurse.
[00:50:01]
And God love her, she's led many an alcoholic down that corridor. And she was a member of the Al-Anon family groups, and I can't say enough about them. I get so damn sick and tired sometimes of AA people listening to them bitch about things they don't know anything about. They're non-supportive of Al-Anon. They don't know a damn thing about it. And they've got the very height of egotism because they think all in the hell their wives have got to do is go to an Al-Anon meeting and talk about them.
And you believe me when I tell you they've got enough damn problems to talk about without even bringing you into it. And if it wasn't for you, they wouldn't be there to begin with. But I think we're very gracious people, you know. We shared our program with them up here, didn't we? We're pretty damn willing to share our disease with them too, wasn't we? But I think it's so supportive to somebody say, don't you go crazy because he is.
You let that clown react to alcohol all he wants to, but don't you react to the alcoholic. Don't you disturb your mind because of him. Try to release him with love. You'll find that very incapable to do on your own. I couldn't turn loose of alcohol by myself. Why in the hell should somebody be able to turn loose of a loved one by themselves? And Al-Anon says, let us help you release with love. Survive yourself.
If God's intent for him is death, don't die with him inwardly. And I think it's pathetic sometimes the attitude around in regards to those areas. If you don't like that, I don't give a damn. But anyways, this nurse was in Al-Anon. She drug a lot of us back there. You know, I had an image of myself. Perk, turn that damn watch around. If you all are through, go on. I don't care. I'm serious. But I had an image of me.
And that's what AA says. AA says, honestly evaluate yourself. And they say, if you want to confess, do it to God, to yourself, to another individual. It don't have to be a public confession of some kind. But they do really say, honestly evaluate yourself. Take a good look at you and see what the hell you are. That hurts, baby, but you better do it. You better do it. But I had an evaluation of me at that time.
Now, it was an honest one. Because the only reason I was in that hospital was my nerves. Right? Did you ever go in an insane asylum and look at all the gratification that the patients get by signing themselves in? Isn't that crazy? You'd have some nut standing in a drunk warden. He'd say, I signed myself in here. I don't care. I don't know what the hell it does for them, but boy, it helps. You know.
What are you in here for? My nerves are on the verge of collapse, you know. But I signed myself in. I'm a big two-fisted swinging drinker, you know. Because I'm well again. Hell, they had me, you know. That's the thing about alcoholism. I had put the plug in the jug and had not drinking alcohol. I haven't had a drink of alcohol in almost 16 years. Hadn't had a bit of problem with it. But I had alcoholism.
If I'd have got over that, they'd have called it alcohol-wasm. But I had alcoholism. And that's what I was going down to the meeting with. My alcoholism. And I was going down there and everyone tried to change me. I didn't know it at the time, but that's what was going to happen. But I went down there with my image of me. You know. Bring on the chicks. You know. Where are the babies and the booze? You know.
Bring the music and start the party. I'm here. You know. I'm ready to go. That was me. You know. A swinger. Well, I was in for the shock of my life. There was some… I called her an old lady. She gives me hell. There was some old lady, gray-haired lady, standing there at the door. You know. And she put her arm around my shoulder. She said, Hi, honey. And I thought, you know. I've seen her kind before.
Look at them things for young boys. You know. And it made me realize she was weirder than ever. She said, Honey, would you like a cup of coffee and a cookie? I thought, Jesus. You know. What the hell have I got into here? So I went on in the room. And I sat down. And some guy got up and said he was an alcoholic.
[00:55:00]
And I thought, that's a big deal. I couldn't have cared less. Then some idiot got up like I'm doing tonight. And he started telling me about how much he drank. And I couldn't care to use it. You know. But I didn't think he was telling it exactly right. Or like it ought to be. So I began to interrupt him. I began to tell him what I thought. You know. And I began to tell him why they made me come down here.
You know. He went right on talking. You know. They go, shh, shh, shh. I'd get back up again. So finally the meeting was over. And I left. And there stood that damned old woman. And I knew she was crazier than I was. I'd been in that room one solid hour. Made a perfect ass out of myself. And when I left, she said, Honey, you come back next week. We need you. I thought, my God. And I came away with a brilliant conclusion.
After listening to that guy. If he really drank like he said he did, he should have quit. My God, anybody that drinks like that ought to stop. The insanity of the alcoholic reasoning. You know. We laugh about that tonight. And I laugh about it too. But you know the sad part about it. When you really stop to think. I honestly, to God, believe that. The insanity of the alcoholic reasoning. I honestly, to God, believe that.
And so I went back. They made me go back. And I went back. And I run into an old man that God set down in front of me. At least he said God put him there. I don't know who put him there. He was there every week anyway, you know. And he became my sponsor. And I hated his guts. Yeah, I'm serious about this. And I believe this to be true. If you're new to this program. And you got a sponsor. And you like him.
You got the wrong one. Get rid of him. Get rid of him. Why do men begin to tell me things that I'll sort of punch him in his nose for? I walked in that room one night. And I said, Hillary, I've been thinking. He said, cut it out. Well, I said, I haven't told you what I was thinking about it. He said, I don't give a damn. Stop it. I said, they got a sign on the wall right here that says, think. He said, you ignore that.
And they didn't put that up there for you. You've been thinking for 33 years. He said, look where in the hell you wound up. Say, and shut up. I went back to him one night. And I was always crying. Nothing was going right. Everybody was picking on me. We're sensitive people. Sensitive as hell. And perfectionist on top of it. And you put a sensitive perfectionist out in society, you've got a hell of a mess.
And I said, you know, I don't really, I don't really believe that I'm an alcoholic. After three months. He said, I am so. I'm not going to tell you what he said. Because I try not to do that. And while I'm on that subject too. It gripes the hell out of me to come to some AA meetings anymore. And listen to some of the language that's being used in this podium. And to hear people get up and say, I can't help it, that's the way that I am.
As if there's no way to change. We preach and profess to believe that AA is a spiritual program. And sometimes we allow people to take this podium and use gutter language you wouldn't hear in a barroom of a Bowery. And I personally think it's a damn shame. And if those of you who do find it necessary to use that kind of trash in your leads. If you'll let me know where you're speaking at next, I'll be damn sure not to be there.
I won't tell you what he said. He said, turned around to me and he said, how much money you got in your pocket? Disgusted as hell with me. And I said, I don't know. I saw he was angry and mad. And I said, I don't know how much. He said, get it out. And I was afraid of him. And I reached in my pocket and I think I came out with two dollars and a half or two and a quarter, whatever I had. And he turned around to a fellow there at the meeting, a good friend of mine today.
And he said, Gene, how much is a quart of whiskey? And Gene said, God, I don't know. He said, I guess somewhere around six dollars. And that old man reached in his pocket and came out with four dollars. He shoved it in my hand and tightened my fist around it. He said, get the hell out of here. He said, get the hell out of here. And I'll tell you, I have never experienced anything since sober. It horrified me. Horrified me.
[01:00:00]
And I said, no, you know, I'm kidding. He said, I'm tired of listening to you. Take it and get out. I don't know of any other way to find out if you're an alcoholic or not. If you don't know about what's happened to you all through your life, and you don't care. If you only open up the book of life, look at Jack S.. If that doesn't tell you enough yet, get the hell out of here and find out if you're an alcoholic.
And I don't know of any other way. Now, get. Take the damn six dollars, buy you a cord, go back where you come from. And if you live long enough, come back and let me know. Now, get the hell out of here. Man, I won't go. I was scared. I mean, I was scared. And I said, no, you know, he said, then shut up. You've been given a golden opportunity to find a program and people that will allow you to survive life with its ups and downs and hills and valleys.
And you're raising hell because you got it. On your way home, stop at the cemetery and look at some of those people and see if they'll trade with you. But he said, sit down and shut up. I'm tired of listening to you. And I sat down, I shut up and I listened. You know, and I said to him one night, what do I do? He said, you don't drink alcohol. You go to meetings and you apply the steps and that works for most people.
And it has for me. It has for the last 16 years almost for me. I began to believe what they said. I'm like all people. I came to end stages. I came, came to and came to believe. I did what they told me. I did what he told me. And I learned to love that old man before he died. I learned to believe that I could do what you said I could. I learned to love you. I'm nothing without you. You know, surrendering and alcoholism is like surrendering in a war.
The war is over. The country surrenders. You know, the first thing they do, they clear away the debris and begin to rebuild. And that's what AA says. Surrender, clear out the garbage, begin to rebuild. With one thing different, by having taken the first step of Alcoholics Anonymous, I have admitted to you that I am powerless as an individual, which simply means I do not possess the power to arrest or control what's wrong with me.
I don't have it. Within me, it's not. That's all. I am totally void of power. And if it is to be stopped, arrested, or whatever, I have to reach out for that power, which is in complete contradiction to what all alcoholics have done all of their life. They begin to build glass walls or cages or whatever you want to call them around themselves from the beginning of the drinking. Not to keep themselves in anything, not as a prisoner to the alcoholic, but to keep you out.
And now somebody comes along and says, Let us in. That the corrective measures for this thing comes from outside of you, a power that you do not possess, consisting of people and God. And you better take it. And I said, some day, somewhere, huh? Come in, my friend. I accept. I surrendered to alcoholism and did what you told me. And from there on in, that's all I've done. I haven't had a drink in that length of time, and I've survived quite well with it.
I brought something with me tonight. I hate speakers that read. You ever go to a damn meeting and some guy says, I want to tell you what it says in this book. And he opens the book, starts reading. I tell you, I'll kill him, you know. I'm going to read you something. I took this to Indianapolis with me a few months ago, and there was one fellow there. It was about a hundred people there, I guess. And there was a guy there, and he was taping it on a cassette.
And I don't know. I found this, and I liked it. And I wanted to share it with him. So I read it, and that poor guy with the cassette, he was hounded for tapes. And I got 250 letters wanting copies of it or something. So evidently, they enjoyed it, whether you do or not. Maybe some of you have heard it or read it or whatever. But I just, I really enjoyed it, and I wanted to share it with you. And I thought that maybe if you might even buy a tape because it was on it.
Bear with me, if you will. I'd like to tell you the story of a very famous American, a man whose life's work has touched every one of us. In the National Library is the original of this letter that I'm about to read. This letter was written by one friend to another, describing the last few days on earth of this very talented man. January the 10th, 1864, New York City.
[01:05:01]
Dear Jerry, Early one cold winter morning I received a message saying that our friend had met with an accident. I dressed hurriedly and went to number 15 on the Bowery, in the lowest part of the city, to the old, cheap, vermin-infested rooming house where Steve lived. I found him lying on the floor in a hall, blood oozing from a cut in his throat which he had slashed himself, and a bad bruise on his forehead where he had fallen.
Steve lay there on the floor, naked and suffering horribly. I found he had wonderful, big brown eyes, as you will recall. And when he looked up and begged for a drink, I was going to get him one, but before I could get it for him, a doctor who had been sent for arrived and forbid me to. I decided that the doctor was not a very good one, and I went to a bar and got Steve a big drink of rum which I gave him.
And it seemed to help him a lot. All the time I was caring for him, he seemed terribly weak, and his eyelids kept fluttering. Then he started screaming and crying and fighting off imaginary things that he was seeing. I shall never forget it. I called a police wagon and took him to Bellevue Hospital. I registered him as a laborer and a Cherokee patient. What a terrible comedown for a man who had once been as famous as Steve had been.
I went back to the hospital the following day to see him. When he was rational, he told me that nothing had been done for him and that he was dying. He kept begging for rum all of the time, and when I went back again the day after to see him, they told me, Your friend is dead. They had sent his body down into the marg of the nameless dead. I went down into the gloomy marg to look for it, and there was an old man sitting there smoking a pipe.
I told him what I wanted, and he said, Look for him over there, pointing the way with his pipe stem to show me a row of dirty pine boxes. I went around peering into the coffins until I found Steve's body. It was taken care of by an undertaker and removed from Bellevue. The next day his brother Morrison and Steve's widow arrived, and when Jeannie entered the room where her husband's body was lying, she fell on her knees beside it and remained there weeping for a long time.
I know that all of you have surmised this man who died so miserably on that cold, dismal winter's day was Stephen Collins Foster, the greatest songwriter our country has ever known. He is often referred to as America's troubadour. His talent and genius have never been equal and will never be surpassed. Every one of us here have played or sung his songs. He has attained international fame and is the only musician in America's Hall of Fame.
Who but an inspired genius could have written my old Kentucky home, old Susanna, the old folks at home, way down upon the Suwannee River, and the words and music to 180 such songs. Stephen Foster died in this alcoholic hell when he was only 38 years old. He had married at 20, had two children, both girls, but his drinking had driven his family away from him after only five years of married life. He always longed for his wife and children, and he wrote America's most beautiful ballad, I Dream of Jeannie with a Light Brown Hair.
He wrote it as a gift to his wife, but instead he sold it for a few pitiful dollars to satisfy his mad desire for alcohol. Mrs. Foster never heard this song until some years after Steve's death. And as this wonderful music and beautiful words fell upon her ears for the first time, she burst into tears because she knew that this was her husband's undying tribute of love that he had for her. This man had made a fortune for himself and others.
His songs were bringing happiness to millions. He had the praise of the entire world for his talent, and yet he died with only two personal possessions to his name. One of these was 38 cents, one for each year of his life, and the other thing in his room was a slip of paper bearing these words, Dear Friends and Gentle Hearts. This was undoubtedly the theme for the song which remains unwritten and unsung.
[01:10:01]
Stephen Foster died leaving America a rich heritage of song. It is beyond the realm of speculation what this heritage could have been had he lived a normal lifespan unshackled by alcohol. How fortunate are we to live in this more enlightened earth. We who suffer from the same incurable disease that so horribly killed this beloved America can now find a solution to our problem. How arrogant and egotistical would I be to think that I could succeed against this killer that has ruined much better men than I?
If men such as Stephen Foster and thousands of other men of exceptional ability died as a result of alcoholism, wouldn't I be mighty stupid to think that I could succeed by my own efforts where they had failed? That's the reason I need AA. That's the reason I need the help of men and women of AA. And that's the reason I need the help of God. Before you I was nothing. Today I'm better. I'll close my talk as I close every talk by a story that I heard and I ask you never to forget it.
A man walked down a cold, lonely, and miserable road one night, bitter cold. And a snake was laying in the middle of the road. The snake was dying, as all snakes will, from cold weather. And when the man passed him, the snake looked at him and spoke. And he asked the man to put him under his coat and warm him so he wouldn't die. And the man thought for a minute and he says, I can't. You're a poisonous snake.
Surely if I was to place you under my coat and warm you you would bite me when you were restored to health. After you saved my life. The man thought for a while and picked the snake up and put him under his coat. Got him warm and restored to health. The snake bit him. The man grabbed him, threw him out from under his coat and back onto the road. And as he looked down, the snake had a snickering grin on his face.
And the man said, You promised if I saved your life you wouldn't bite me. And the snake smiled and said, It was when you picked me up. Some day, somewhere, under a given set of circumstances and maybe under certain conditions rationalization again may approach your mind that maybe, just maybe I ain't. Maybe, maybe I can. You justify all you care to to yourself, to God, and to other people. But it would be a very difficult thing for me to understand that after what you and I have been through you knew what it was when you picked it up.
Thank you for having me. Thank you, Jack, for a wonderful message. And on behalf of the committee we'd like to present you with a little memento. Thank you for this and thank you for chairing.