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Source: Jody S. – New York Intergroup Anniversary Dinner Opening and Recovery Share (Date Unknown).mp3 File: jody-s-new-york-intergroup-anniversary-dinner-opening-and-recovery-share-date-unknown.mp3 Duration: 00:17:13
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Mr. Chairman, it is my privilege, on behalf of the New York Intergroup Association, to welcome you all here tonight. Now, all day long, we've been asked, members of the dinner committee and myself, how many people are going to be at Bill's dinner? Well, we have the answer for you now. There are 2,454 people here. Which I think is marvelous. It's the biggest party in town, I'm sure. Just to prove that AA is indeed worldwide, we have many visitors and guests, not only on the national level, but we do have friends here from Puerto Rico, Australia, Trinidad.
And Bill, I know, has received many wires from people all over the world who are unable to be with us tonight. To open tonight's meeting, I would like to ask Father Joe to give the invocation. [unclear] we beseech Thee, O Lord, our actions by Thy holy inspirations, and carry them on by Thy gracious assistance, that every prayer and work of ours may always begin with Thee, and through Thee be happily ended.
Through Christ our Lord. Amen. Thank you, Father Joe. I would like to read, as our 12th tradition does say, Anonymity is the spiritual foundation of our traditions, ever reminding us to place principles before personalities. In keeping with this tradition, we ask that you respect the names of any person you hear tonight, or any person that you recognize in this room tonight. Sitting out amongst you are many people who are wearing white badges, and I'd like to tell you a little about them.
They are members of your dinner committee, and it has been their responsibility to handle the mailings, to help with the decorating of this room, to select our guest speakers for tonight, and to fill up this ballroom. And I think they've done a great job, and I'd like to ask them all if they would please stand and take a very well-deserved bow. Applause. And now it is my privilege to introduce to you the very special people who are sitting here on the dais with us.
I'd like to start, first I'd like to ask that you hold your applause please until I've finished. I'd like to start on the extreme left of the dais, Martha N., who is a member of the dinner committee, and it was her very unglamorous job to handle all the clerical work that goes with putting a dinner like this together. On Martha's right is Bruce K. Now here's the man who handled all the ticket requests, the table assignments, and has kept the books, I hope.
On Bruce's right is Tommy McD. Tommy is the recent addition to the intergroup staff, and I think she has the most infectious smile in town. Tommy. Now next to Tommy is Jack W., and Jack has the very imposing title of president of the New York Intergroup Association Steering Committee. But many of you I know will remember Jack when he made his singing debut here at the dinner last year. On Jack's right is Doris H. Doris is Executive Secretary of the Intergroup Association.
I don't have the time to list all her many responsibilities. We all know about them here on the local level. She does a marvelous job of keeping the place in order, and she's been great with us on the dinner committee. We can't thank her enough. We've heard from the gentleman on Doris' right, however I'd like to tell you a little about Father Joe Father Joe is a member of the program. When I asked him which group he belonged to, he said, I belong to two because my work keeps me in two boroughs, and he's not taking any chances. He's a member of a Manhattan group and a North Queens group.
[00:04:59]
To Father Joe’s right is Marge D. Marge is from Ashburnham, Massachusetts, and she is one of our guest speakers this evening.
[00:05:11]
I know we're looking forward to hearing from her. Now Marge's right is Bob S. Now if there's anyone in this room who can and very frequently takes his inventory, it's me, because he's my husband. Now we'd like to go over to the right of the dais, and I'd like to ask Jane E. to stand. Jane is a member of the intergroup staff, and we know she's always on the job because I know I receive my weekly bulletin, and it's also Jane's responsibility to keep the lifeline of intergroup open, our 12-step book, which keeps group information and individual information in it.
Next to Jane is her husband, Chuck E. Chick, as he is known, is a member of the program of the Murray Hill group. And on Chick's left is Marge B. Marge is the wife of the co-chairman of this dinner, but she is also a member of the, and I want to get this right, of the Al-Anon Brick Church group of East Orange, New Jersey, and on Marge's left is Bill B., your co-chairman, and his job was really quite simple.
All he had to do was be everywhere and do everything immediately, and besides that, he had to encourage, counsel, and guide me, and I'd like to take this time, if I may, to thank Bill for all he has done. I cannot thank him enough. On Bill's left is Mrs. Bill N., and Dottie is the wife of our guest speaker this evening. Our next gentleman is Bill N., who is a member of the Whitestone College Point group and one of our guest speakers tonight.
On Bill's left is Mrs. Syme, who is, I know, a staunch advocator and friend of AA. Next to her is her husband, Reverend Alexander Syme. Reverend Syme is no stranger to our midst. I know he did a great deal for the AA groups in the Bronx. He's now located in Baldwin and has continued to carry on and to be a friend of our program. Our next two guests I'd like to introduce together, ladies and gentlemen, Lois and Bill W.
Thank you. For Alcoholics Anonymous, we have two types of meetings. One is our closed meeting, which is the workshop and for alcoholics only. Our other meeting is an open meeting, in which we have a leader and three speakers. Tonight, we will have an open meeting. And as is generally done at all our meetings, closed or open, I would now like to open this meeting with the reading of the preamble. Alcoholics Anonymous is a fellowship of men and women who share their experience, strength, and hope with each other, that they may solve their common problems and help others to recover from alcoholism.
The only requirement for membership is a desire to stop drinking. There are no dues or fees for AA membership. We are self-supporting through our own contributions. AA is not allied with any sect, denomination, politics, organization, or institution. It does not wish to engage in any controversy, neither endorses nor opposes any causes. Our primary purpose is to stay sober and to help other alcoholics to achieve sobriety.
[00:10:01]
As the leader for this open meeting tonight, I would like to very briefly qualify. My name is Jody S., and I am an alcoholic. I don't recall looking in retrospect at my background that I would have any inkling that I would later in life have any problem with alcoholism. However, some two years after graduating from school, I found myself in a job in a new field. I was in on the ground floor. The job involved a great deal of promotional work, entertaining, traveling, and drinking.
And I thought at first that it was part of this gracious way of living that I had my luncheon cocktails, my afternoon drinks, and my wine with dinner. And my drinking during this next five-year period was very slow. My progression was very slow. And I had no idea whatever what was happening to me. As a matter of fact, my way of thinking went something like this. At one time, I was allied, this particular organization was allied to the medical profession, and we were doing a research study on alcoholics.
And the doctors decided that it would be a change of pace for these particular patients we were working with if I were to take them on a day's outing. And I thought this was a grand idea. And all 20 of us got into the Red Cross lorry, and off we went to Yankee Stadium to a ball game. Now, it was a hot day, the game was slow, and I thought nothing of saying to them, what do you say, fellas, let's have a couple of drinks. Now, here I was, part of a medical team, a therapeutic team.
I had no inkling of the first drink or what it would do, and I was helping these alcoholics by giving them a drink. But this is the way I thought, and I certainly didn't believe I had any problem. I thought drinking was part of the normal daily living. Now, for the next five years, our organization started to grow, started to grow in staff and in scope, and with it was my drinking. My drinking was also starting to grow, it was starting to progress. And soon there were warning signs.
Now, there were no barroom escapades, there were no lost weekends, but the warning signs were up. I would sneak drinking at home where it wasn't necessary, I would sneak drinking on the job. My excuses for my peculiar behavior were becoming more elaborate, and my business trips were becoming totally centered around drinking. And I think the first inkling I ever had that there might possibly be something wrong was when I discovered myself coming back on a trip from the Midwest, and I had to change planes, and I was in the bar, naturally, at the airport, and I had to shake so bad, just like I am now, except I'm sober, that I couldn't pick up the drink, and I knew that something had to be done then.
And by the time the plane landed in New York, my problem was solved, and I had solved it, because I knew that with some willpower and with some control that this situation could be put under arrest. And I tried, I tried very desperately, and it seemed to get worse instead of better. There was no willpower, there was no control that I could possibly have that would help me now. And I found myself one day, and it seems as with many of us, there is always that one day, the one day where we want everything to go just right, and so did I.
Because this was the day that this very organization I started with, and it was a dream that was coming true, we were moving into our own headquarters, things were going beautifully, we were going to have a grand opening. I think every VIP in this city and allied professions had been invited to the opening, and it was a memorable one. I know because I was a spectacle of it. My drinking started in the morning and it didn't finish until evening, early evening.
And you can imagine the remorse and the guilt that I felt when I went to intergroup that night. Now they suggested I go to meetings, and they suggested that I go that night, and I did. And I heard at the meetings, and I heard at successive meetings, that sobriety was to be the most important thing in my life. And I believed it. And I went for a couple of months believing this, until one night at a meeting, I found something that was much more important. And three weeks later, we were married. Now, here we were, newcomer with newcomer. We didn't have any hope or any strength to share, and for the next two years, the only thing we ever shared were the bottles.
[00:15:27]
And I won't go into details about those two years. I don't think you have to stretch your imagination to know what they were like. But eventually, my husband did realize, to him, sobriety was the most important thing. And he went back to AA, and he became very active. And never underestimate the power of example, because that's what happened to me. I saw what was happening to him, and I wanted that.
And I think it's only through the grace of my higher power that, again, I had just a glimmer of self-honesty, because I discovered that I couldn't stop drinking on my own. I couldn't do it my way. I discovered I wasn't a part-time alcoholic, that halfway measures had availed me nothing. And I realized then that I had to be willing. I had to be willing to be honest, and I had to be willing to try and work on the steps to recovery that this program offers.
I think that one of the important steps in our recovery, one of the important things we have to do, as I've written in the preamble, Alcoholics Anonymous is a fellowship of men and women who share their experience, strength, and hope with each other. And to do just that this evening, I'd like to introduce our first speaker from the Whitestone College Point Group, Bill N..