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Source: Jack S – From Louisville, Kentucky – Date Unknown.mp3 File: jack-s-from-louisville-kentucky-date-unknown.mp3 Duration: 01:12:52
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Thank you, Jim. I wouldn't say nothing bad about you. Sometimes the chairman, they get to picking on me because my name is Jack S., and then they get to picking on me a little bit before the meeting. Then they say they're going to take up all my time, and I only have five minutes, but that's not really hardly possible. I came here tonight to talk. Obviously, you knew when you got here, you weren't going to be the speaker, so you came to listen.
Should it happen that you're through before I am, go on home. Don't a damn thing I can tell you. It won't bother me a bit if you leave. I'll try to shut up when I'm through. A lot of people don't know how to do that, and sometimes I get carried away. But it's always wise that when you're through to stop talking. They had a long-winded speaker one time at a meeting I was at, and a guy went outside and lighted up a cigarette, and some fellow come by and said, and that guy in there through yet? The fellow said, hell, he was through an hour ago, but he's still talking. And we find that a whole lot of time. But we find a lot of things right here to be appreciative of, I'm sure. I was telling them before the meeting that I spoke at a place one time, and they had a kid about three months sober that chaired the meeting, and it was an extremely large meeting, and he was scared to death.
And he told me before the meeting, he said, I'll screw that up, because you're in hell. I told him, I don't know how to screw up an AA meeting. He did let me know, the only way I don't do it is you get up there drunk, and they throw you out, probably before it started. But he was real nervous about it, and finally the meeting was over. And when he went to close, he appreciated the people asking him to talk, and then with the greatest degree of sincerity, he said, I guess that when you get a dumb chairman, it makes the speaker look a whole lot better. I don't know who asked Jim to be the chairman, but I appreciate it. I certainly appreciate whoever was on that committee. Once I found that out, I realized there was no way to fail. My name is Jack S., and I am an alcoholic. Everybody, I come from down in old Kentucky, which is all right. Nothing wrong with that. It could be worse. Every time I come to Indiana, it relieves a lot of self-pity. I heard a guy say one time, a fellow over in Louisville using a Roto-Rooter discovered Indiana. I don't want to stick around to hear the rest of those stories, but it is nice to be here.
In fact, it's nice to be anywhere when you're around AA. I've been here before to talk at this meeting. I was trying to think today what year it was, but I don't recall. It was some time ago. And I think one of the greatest advantages of being sober is being invited back. You know, that's an experience that most of us don't have in the latter part of our drinking careers, to ever be invited back anywhere, unless it's back with the same brand of people, and then they only invite us on payday. When you run out of booze and run out of money, your friends disappear just about as fast as you can find them. Everything I say up here tonight is my own opinion. I'm required to tell you that. You're entitled to yours if you want to walk around wrong, but that's either here or there. I'll try not to lie, because they tell me if you get up here to the podium and start lying, all your hair will fall out. You know, everything you find around AA is a fact. Really, did you ever stop to think about that? If AA was built upon theories, how many of us would be here? Nobody. We are alcoholics who are little bullheaded people that have to be shown most things, and most of the things that we're shown, we have to see ourselves in what we see. So if we operated this program on a lot of theories, well, we'd all be drunk, everybody knows that. Everything you read around here is a fact. You see the 12 steps of AA written in the past tense, meaning that somebody has taken them and applied them to their life in order that they can live a better and a decent life. We've seen people try just about everything you can try with a jug, and everything we talk about is based upon what we've seen, not what we've heard. And I think because it is based entirely upon facts is a tremendous
[00:05:00]
reason of the success rate of this program. It's a common bond of people who have experienced suffering and heartaches, lived lives of degradation and despair time, and find the capabilities of being grateful for whatever it is that they may have this day. Because it's better than it was. And whatever stage of the game you're in, in the creative sobriety or the up the ladder of the AA program, that no matter what conditions that you fall under, it's better than it was. And I think the greatest thing in the world about that is that we've learned to depend on we. To me, probably the most important word in the entire AA program is the first word of the first step, where it says we. We came to believe. And it eliminates the I. And that's what got most of us in trouble. I. I can do most anything. And I can't do it, and I never could do it. An amazing thing as you look around AA to me is the fact that when you look at all of the people that are assembled in rooms at AA meetings, functions like this, you suddenly begin to realize that as individuals by themselves, they don't possess enough power to blow out a match. But when you put them together as we, they radiate more power than some nuclear energy plant. The power that's salvaging not only their own lives, but the lives of others. But the total destruction in my life was because of I. I knew most everything.
I could do most anything. And I didn't need you. I didn't need God, and I didn't need people. I'd do it. And if you didn't believe me, ask me. And finally, I think the first thing that ever was stripped out of my life was a belief in something that was spiritual. I didn't need to depend on that. Finally, and eventually, it was people, other people. I didn't need them. And I guess all of us cling to the very last essence of our lives that I can do it. I'll do it, and then I'll show you. And finally, I think the bottom in alcoholism is when you realize I can't do it. I have about had enough. I've tried hard enough, and I can't do it. Why I said away with some people, I don't have the slightest idea. I don't think anyone else does. I can laugh tonight at myself primarily because I thought I was so damn smart. You know, that's why alcoholics laugh, I believe. That's why I do. Every time I think of some of those stupid, idiotic things, surely they weren't funny. You know, I had a psychiatrist up at Lady Peace tell me one time, he thought we were a bunch of weirdos. I said, hell, you know, don't feel bad, so do we. What the hell if you're looking for an argument around an 8-0, go in and tell a man. They'll slap you on the back and offer you a cup of coffee and agree with you 100%. He's crazier than we are, though, so don't let that… We was having an anniversary of some kid in our program sober year, and he said, he saw that cake. He said, that's a silly little game you people play. I said, hell, man, you ought to see some of them we used to play. God, if you thought that one was silly. Of course, we like to thank our people when we have anniversaries in AA. The ability for the group as a whole to say thanks to some individual, what the hell's wrong with that? People work like hell to keep this program alive, and I think that at the end of a certain period of time, if we all want to gather together and thank those individuals, that's our business. And I don't think it's any silly little game. I think it's a sense of appreciation for what people do for AA. AA could never stand alone. It can't stand by itself no more than we can. It can't stand with people that have been sober all their lives since they got here, and it can't stand with people that get drunk in and out, in and out. It all plays a very intricate and important part that to the people in this room tonight that have maybe just started approaching AA a couple of months, or three months sober or something, it's very difficult to relate to somebody that's 50 years old and sober 17 years. It's very difficult to relate to anybody, maybe out of an age bracket at times. All we have to offer is experience, but the relationship of what you're going through now is there for anybody, for all people. We find ourselves in a position that sometimes there's a hurdle in our lives. We can hurdle it at times. Sometimes we look at it and analyze it, and we decide we have to go around it. And other times it needs to be hurdled, and we don't have the capabilities of getting over it. We turn and say, help me. And that's what AA is, and that's why it's so necessary for all of its people.
How many of us do you think would be sober tonight that came to AA that haven't had a drink like myself since I got here if everybody did that? You stop and think about that sometimes.
[00:10:00]
Supposing everybody that came to AA never took another drink. Why, hell, we'd all be drunk in six months. We'd sit around and say, I wonder if that's really true. You really believe that? Why, we'd get our thinking caps on, and all hell would break loose in a minute. You'd have 15,000 drunks in Indianapolis some Saturday night. But we know we can't drink because we watch people who try to drink, and they've taught us a valuable lesson.
An extended period of sobriety is based upon the experience of somebody else, right? And that holds true for the new guy coming to AA or the new gal. Sobriety depends upon the experience of others. Those of us who don't drink, don't drink because we've watched some of you try it. I've never seen any of you succeed. If you do, let me know. I'd like to go with you and watch sometime. I've been looking around for a long time. I've wore three pair of eyeglasses, and I'm into bifocals, and I ain't found that bastard yet.
He may be out there somewhere. I don't know. Possible. Possible. But the importance of AA is for all of us. No matter how long you've been here, no matter how many times you had to come back, no matter what the conditions are tonight, it's a necessary thing for all of us. And the experiences of everybody in this room as individuals is what holds us together collectively. I don't think anybody's any more important than anybody else. If you're new to this program, you're not a damn bit more important than I am. And if you're old to this program, you're not any more important than the new people. If it wasn't for the old ones and the new ones, we just couldn't make it. If we couldn't share what we found, if the enjoyment that we get out of just directing other people in the right way is all we do, you know, here's what I did. You try it. See if it works for you. And turn them around. Would it really, really be that rewarding?
Of course not. And everybody's just as important as anybody else. You cannot have my seat is what I'm trying to tell you. If they ever put a limit on the numbers of AA members, you'll have to go. That's all. I heard a guy say one night how much he loved everybody in AA. And he said, if anybody gets drunk tonight, I hope it's me. I love you so much. I thought you fool. If anybody has to get drunk this here tonight, I hope it's you.
I sure hope. But you can't have my seat. I'll try to find you one. And if you're new, I'll see if we can't get a chair for you. But you can't have mine. I love that story they used to tell about a life ship, a cruise ship that sunk, and the people had to get off the ship and into lifeboats. And one was coming around in front of the boat, and the captain saw it, and there was 13 people in it. And he hollered at them. He said, that boat will not stay afloat with 13 people in it. It'll hold 10 safely. And if three of you don't get out of there, you'll all die. That was a hell of a decision. Three people had to get out of that boat in the middle of the ocean. So one guy jumped up and he said, I'm an Englishman. God save the queen. And he jumped out of the boat. And another guy got up and he said, I'm a Frenchman. Viva la France.
And he jumped out of the boat. And the third guy got up and said, I'm a Texan. Remember the Alamo. And he grabbed some Mexican and threw him out of the boat. That's the way I feel about it. If it comes down to limited seats, you're going out to win the babies. All I can tell you, I'm not going anywhere. Things were too bad when I got here. I'm not about to give it up. I'm awful proud to say it. I mean that. And I can tell people today that I do the same thing today that I did when I came to AA and go every damn bit of it. Nothing's changed in my life except I've grown up a little bit and learned a whole lot. Learned every day and dearly love the experiences that I find around this program. When I was a youngster, I was like all other kids. You know, kids today seem like they got the market cornered on being hoodlums. I know why that is.
Most children have parents. I don't know whether you knew that or not. And daddy's not about to tell his little girl how he acted when he was at such and such an age. Unless he belongs to AA, they don't give a damn, he'll tell her. But basically, they're not. But you know, kids today don't have a market corner on being a hoodlum. I was a hoodlum a long time before they were. And I didn't see too much pot and grass and fields or uppers or downers, whatever the hell they call them. Back then, but there was ample amount of booze. And when I was a young kid, old enough to get out and do whatever it is you're not supposed to do, that's where I went.
And I had some fun while I was doing it. Now, that's about all I can tell you. And in those days, at that particular time in my life, it was fun. I'm one of those rare breed of cats that had a few good times. was a rare breed of cats that had a few good times drinking alcohol.
[00:15:01]
My mother and father taught me what I was supposed to do and what I was supposed to do like. I completely ignored them. I used to tell my father, I'm sowing my wild oats, and he said, yeah, and I'm in here praying for a crop failure. But it never did work that way, it never did. But nevertheless, when I got out to a corner in Louisville, and you know where I drank because surely you've seen the Kentucky Derby on television.
And right on the corner of 4th and Central is where Churchill down Drake's track is. I was born and raised around there, and I damn near died there. I still live there, that shows you haven't improved too much. I tell people I was born and raised because that's proper English for me. I said that one time in a meeting and my stepmother was trying to make a speaker out of me. And she said, don't use that kind of language, it's not correct to say you were born and reared.
She said, anything that's raised has absolutely no intelligent form of life. My father looked at her and said, leave that boy alone, he knows what the hell he's talking about. So I was, I was born and raised around there. Whenever I got old enough to go out there, whatever the hell it was, what difference did it make? I can't tell you tonight why. And I basically analyzed me for my own benefit and hopefully maybe the ability to share that with someone else.
But I don't know why in the hell, when they said, believe in God and go to church and pray, you know, and don't do this and don't do that, if you do, you're going to hell and all this crap. I don't know, maybe I listened. A lot of people listen at times, don't hear. And I don't, I don't think I heard, but when I got out there, what I found out there was just a little bit more exciting than what had been going on at home.
And I thought it was a very enjoyable atmosphere. I soon discovered girls were different than boys, and that's a, that's a lovely experience. I found out that you can drink booze and fit in anything where you don't fit. And I found out you can bet on those racehorses that run around a track and run up all your money and if you only got 10, you can make it into thousands, at least that's what everybody told me, which, you know, was a damn lie.
But it was exciting, right? And there I stood one day, somewhere, at some age, and I discovered booze, girls, and gambling. Alcohol, sex, and racehorses. Now any one of the damn three by themselves would kill you. And here I was out tackling them all at one time. And had a hell of a lot of fun doing it. And dearly loved it. And for a while it was fun. And the only repercussions from it was what I was catching at home.
Now the things that I heard at home was what your kids hear, or what you heard as a kid, or whatever it is, you know. My life's not any different than anybody else's life. If you want to know my life story, pick up a book on alcoholism. That's me. You know, that's me. I'm not any different than anybody else. I've never met an alcoholic different than me. Never met one. Never expect to. I've met alcoholics that were 15 years old, 16, 17, and 18.
I've met alcoholics that were 80 years old, and everywhere in between I've never met anybody different than me. I've met people whose lives were different than mine. I've met people that, you know, that had one wife and three children. And I've met people that had six wives and no kids. And I've met people that had six kids and no wives, you know. And their life didn't parallel to my life, you know.
There was no parallel in our lives. And I think that when you talk about alcoholism and people, well, you'll hear people from this podium sometime that you think they're your twin brother. Their life will so greatly parallel yours that it's almost unbelievable, but has nothing to do with the identification of alcoholism. I felt like all alcoholics feel at the stage of the game I was in in my life. That's why only alcoholics can recover from alcoholism.
Alcoholics cannot recover from alcoholism. I'm a firm believer, as much as I believe in anything, that there's people on this earth who are void of a conscience. Sixteen years ago, I would have said that was the most ignorant statement I had ever heard in my life, because a great friend of mine who was a psychiatrist, and now dead, and back then was a great advocate of AA. And when he talked about people without a conscience, I used to think that's weird.
Everybody's got a conscience. They haven't. I know today that they haven't. There's a lot of people that can do anything to anybody. It doesn't bother them. Believe me, if you've never met them, just believe me, there are people that way. Alcoholics are people that eventually alcohol causes them to become things they don't want to be. It causes them to do things that they don't want to do. It causes them to hurt, and hurt others when they don't want to hurt.
It denies them the opportunity to love, and only allows them the opportunity to be loved
[00:20:04]
within the degree that they can. I love you and will let you love me on a scale of ten, probably one. Not because I don't want to, it's just because I'm incapable. When alcohol began to take over my life, it took over. I became a slave to the chemical. It dictated to me where I would go, who I would go with, how long I would stay, what I would do when I got there. And when I wasn't that drunk or that crazy, I was a pretty nice kid.
When the damn stuff did to my mind what it does to all of our minds, my inhibitions were released, they were drug-affected, and I was liable to do most anything. I was a Jekyll and a Hyde if there ever was. I always began to really and truly believe it was not the chemical that was causing the problem. The stupidity that I laugh at about myself is that what began at that time in my life. Okay? You know, every time I'm in some kind of trouble, it's due to drinking.
I don't mean to insinuate that every time I drank, I got in trouble, but every time I was in some kind of trouble, it was due to drinking. Now, we all know that man is made up of four components, body, heart, mind, and soul. Many times, my body was in trouble physically, wrecked with pain, vomiting and all that goes with it. Many times, my body was well and my mind was greatly disturbed, but I think all during the course of my alcoholism, my heart and my soul were just about as sick as any human beings could possibly get.
But little did I realize at the time, I needed that damn stuff to survive and that's why alcoholics drink alcohol. Common sense factor, and I think that's what he talks about when he talks about insanity, the insanity of our reasoning. Not going out there and slapping a cop, although a lot of them deserve to be slapped. The insanity of our reasoning. The tremendous ability that all alcoholics seem to have to build up an alibi system for what they do, a denial system about what is actually going on in their life, and it has to be that way because I couldn't survive without the damn chemical.
When the atmosphere that I dearly loved, I couldn't turn it loose, and when I tried to control that chemical that let me stay on that plateau of enjoyment and fun, one day in my life I'd lost that. AA calls it an invisible line. I doubt very seriously that anybody can pinpoint the exact date and time, but it's the time in my life to where I could no longer control the chemical to enjoy the things that I was doing.
And I think if that is the beginning of addiction in the life of any human being, to sit down and openly profess to enjoy what you're doing, and then drink yourself into such a stupor and a state of mind that you can't even enjoy what the hell you're doing, whatever it is. If it's working or building a home or all the good things, or if it's running around all night long and all the bad things, you can't even enjoy what it is that you're doing because you have no control over the thing that allows you to comfortably fit in that society, and I reached that point somewhere in my life to where drinking was no longer fun.
It was a burden that I needed. When I tried not to drink the chemical, I found myself standing out there just a little bit wishy-washy in any phase of life, and I was always going to have just one, just one to be what I wanted to be, to feel like I wanted to feel. All I wanted was the one. But again, as I told you before, I stood out there alone. Some of them won many, many years ago, long before our time.
No man is an island. How true, and especially for us. The three basic faiths that alcoholics need to survive, faith in God, and people and themselves. And for many and many a year, I didn't have two of them. I believed for a long time I could do it, and finally that left me. When you stand out in that society with faith in nothing, baby, you're in for a long, bad road. You know, when you look back on it, if every time you're in trouble of some sort, mentally or whatever, why don't you stop drinking?
There wouldn't be such a thing as, hey, we wouldn't be here tonight, there'd be no alcoholics, there might be some we didn't know about, there would be no such thing as a chronic problem. Hey, every time I'm in trouble, drinking's connected with it, I think I'll stop drinking. But we can't to begin with, and we probably wouldn't if we could, so we have to set up some sort of a thing in our mind that justifies our behavior.
[00:25:01]
We have to sit down and begin to rationalize why we do these things, and naturally you never see anybody, whether they drink or not, stand out on the street corner punching themselves in the nose, right? Who in the hell ever blames themselves for anything? You know, when the whole world gets right, you can just see a street corner full of people standing there going, boom, boom, boom, boom, you idiot.
You don't see those kind of things. Not only in the field of alcoholism, hell, that's a cultural thing, you see everybody doing that. You can see the boss screw up to high heaven, he'll say, where's that damned office boy? You know, the hell, it's not built that way. But if we could learn to do those types of things, we wouldn't be here, but I couldn't and neither could you. And the thing of it was that I needed the chemical to survive the society and I lost control of the chemical.
And once you lose control of it, it's all downhill, you never regain the ability to control it, you can stop whenever you want to if you know something about it, or you can continue to drink as long as you want to. And any damn fool who thinks they can make somebody else stop drinking alcohol, they're out of their tree, they're out of their tree. The one great advantage that AA has, we can make people want to, we can communicate with a lot of people where a lot of other people can't, by a simple little method that says, I used to be like you are, I'm not anymore, I'll show you what I did if you want to see it.
And when things you encounter you don't understand, I'll help explain them. Or if you feel like you're going to fall, I'll help carry you. But I've been where you are. You neither have to stay there or go any lower, but you decide, right, you decide. That decision will be made by the individual and not by us. But I began to build that barrier up in front of me. I think they call it a glass wall. You can see through it, but you can't come in it.
You can watch the behavior and the antics and the self-destruction and the degradation of the people that you love the most, but you can't stop it. Alcoholics don't build that barrier in front of them to keep them into anything. They're not a damn bit interested in being locked into anything. It's built to keep you out. You can't come in and people still stand up and say, I have a right to drink if I want to.
I have a right to destroy myself if I want to. Then you ought to do something about trying to make people stop loving you. What God-given right does any human being on this earth have to say to a mother or a father, a husband, a wife, a brother, a sister? I sit back and watch me destroy myself and damn you and enjoy it while I'm doing it. Who gave us the right to treat other people that way, even if we didn't give a damn about ourselves?
Nobody, but I always thought I did. I'm not hurting anybody but me. My father screamed and my mother was dead at the time. I had one sister concerned. She hollered. They all holler the same thing. What the hell difference does it make who hollers? You know, I heard Father Charlie is a good friend of mine, a lot of you people know him. Some woman told him one night, you don't know what it's like, Father, you've never been married.
He said, young lady, have you ever had 12 nuns and a convent mad at you at the same time? What the hell difference does it make who's hollering? They're all hollering the same thing. Really, I'm serious. Sometimes it involves bread and food and rent and gas and light bills, and that might be a little bit different. But basically, they're all hollering the same thing. And when you stop and look back and analyze the thing, how idiotic it is for them to be hollering.
Because what they're hollering is what the guy's asking himself. You wake up some morning full of guilt and remorse and realize what a heel you really are, and lay there in bed because you haven't got enough nerve to go out and ask yourself, why? Why did I do this? How can I do that? You open the door and somebody's standing there. What the hell difference does it make who it is? Somebody's standing there and you know what they're going to do?
They're going to ask you the exact same question you just got through asking yourself. Just exactly. And you can't walk out that door and look them in the eyes because you're so damned ashamed, unless you find a half a pint you had hidden and didn't know it. And you take one drink out of it, and if it'll stay down, you just smile and you think, oh, hell, I ain't that bad. And you have another drink and you realize I'm just a little bit better than I thought I was.
And then you can kill the thing and let it soak in for a while and you jerk that bedroom door open and say, where is that bitch that caused all of this? The Greatest Gift Known to God or Man for Troubled Minds, and It Comes in a Little Bottle,
[00:30:09]
Comes in a Little Bottle, God what a gift it is to us to make everything okay, whatever it is that needs to be made okay, right? What the hell is the use of a big long drunk-a-log out of me? What did you need made okay? That's what it did for me. It made whatever needed to be okay, okay, and it would today, you know, it would today. When the butterflies are in my stomach and the world's turning around and the blood rushing to your head and you're all up tense and anxious and, well, you take a drink of that damn stuff and it'll go away, you'll be all right, I know that, I'm not a damn fool.
I was on an airplane here a while back, coming back from Jacksonville, Florida, couldn't land in Atlanta, the airport was fogged out. I don't know why it ever took off from Jacksonville, circled around that airport down here in Atlanta or whatever the hell they do for an hour and 15 minutes, you see airplanes going by. Man, them butterflies are in there and I'm wishing this thing's on the ground, you know, the captain come on the intercom, we apologize for the delay, have a drink on Delta.
The stewardess come down the aisle and it was her little cart and she said, would you like to have a drink? I said, yes, ma'am. And she said, what do we want? And I said, nothing. She said, I don't understand. I said, you wouldn't and it's a hell of a long story, there's no need to get into it. And she went on down the aisle, but what the hell, I'm not a fool, I know what that drink would have done for me, them butterflies would have been drownded, baby, you know, them viruses would have gone to sleep and everything would have been all right and them planes would have come by and I'd have waved, right?
And if they'd have given me another one, I'd have been up in the cockpit and about three of them, I'd have told Polly, go back there and sit down, I'll take care of things. And that would have been okay, I'd have been okay, at that time what needed to be made okay. And it'd have been all right if I'd have got off of the airplane and gone on about my business, but I wouldn't have got off the airplane and got on about my business, I'd have stopped in the bar and explained to the bartender what happened and then God knows where I'd have wound up.
I know I would have because I always did and I know I would have because I've watched some of you try it, thank you, I appreciate it, I really do, I really do, but I know what the damn stuff does for you. And when it ceased to be fun for me, it became purely a destructive habit and the degrees of destruction got worse and worse and worse and worse, they do for all people. I'm fortunate tonight to be alive and to be here with you because people who've done far less than I am are dead.
I wish to God I had the opportunity to say no when I was 18 or 19 years old. I am fortunate to get into a lot of treatment centers across the country to see people and things and I see a lot of the kids in the treatment centers today and I look at their hostility, you know, what's that old bastard doing in here? I know what they're thinking and I don't blame them, you know, I don't blame them and that's what I tell them, you know, there's absolutely no way that I can make somebody attach an amount of importance to something that somebody else is 30 or 35 years old in and don't you know that's the degree that brings people to AA.
How much importance do you attach to what you have or how much importance do you attach to life? How much importance do you attach to a job if it's an industry? How much importance do you attach to a wife or to a parent? How much importance do you attach to your future? When you're 18 or 19 years old or 20, it's hard as hell to get that importance attachment. That's why I have the greatest, oh God, the greatest admiration for the kids in AA today.
I look at them and I feel so damn insecure about myself because I realize there's somebody at a very young age has the capability of attaching an importance to a good way of life and God for so many years, none of us had that. A friend of mine, a very, very prominent attorney with a wife and three lovely children, drank and tried to quit, drank and tried to quit with a lucrative business. And finally, she said, I can't take any more, I'm leaving.
And he said, okay, you go ahead.
[00:35:00]
He said, you can have the house and the car and the money and everything that's in here. He said, the only thing I'm going to keep is my business account, the money that's in the law firm account. You can have the rest of it. And she turned around and she said, you mean to tell me that you're willing to give up your wife, your children, your home, your cars, and your money, that you're not willing to give up that bottle?
And he said, only when the words came out of her mouth was I able to attach the importance that damn bottle had to me. And he said, I sat there and I cried for about five minutes, and I got up and walked over and picked up the telephone and called AA. But he said, the thing that brought me to AA was the recognition of what I was willing to surrender for that bottle, and I was capable of attaching some importance to that.
And it's a blessing, and I'm sincere, of the admiration I have for the young people to be mature enough to attach that type of importance to their life. When sometimes it's even difficult for people that are 50, 55 years old, I would have loved to had the opportunity to tell AA no many, many years ago, but I never heard of it. My father was a severe disciplinarian in the sense of the word that he made a rule.
It was his house and his rules, if you don't like them, get out. And when I began to behave like an idiot, he said, hey, son, come here. My house, my rules, you don't obey them, you live up, shape up, or ship out, you know. And I said, I'll find my own pad. And he couldn't wait to get a bunch of Kroger bags and get things together and throw them out in the yard. And my father was just that way. My father was a dumb old man, didn't know anything, first time I was ever in jail.
Isn't it strange the difference of opinion you have for people when you're in trouble? That amuses me today. And that's one of the things that is funny to me today, too. A dumb old man, he don't know what's going on down that corner. There's booze and babes, and that old man sitting there on the porch, a dummy. That's my father. Then I got locked up. Amazing how he changed. Amazing. I dropped a dime and a phone from the jailhouse, and I said, Daddy, what do you want?
I said, I'm in jail. Oh, he said, I wouldn't worry too much about that if I had you. Why, he said, smart as you are. Why, he said, if you figure some way to get in there, you figure a way to get out and hung up. I was about 20 years old. When I got out, he said, if you ever enter again and only got a dime, don't waste it out here. And from that day on, he meant it. My father prayed every day in the world, he told me later, that God would help me find some way to help myself.
My father said I knew that God was not the answer for you in a sense of the word of clinging to something intangible at that present time. And that's not slandering God or being sacrilegious or anything, but I think you understand what I mean when my father could see that the clergy and the spiritual aspect of an intangible spirit was not a comforting factor to me at that time in my life. And I think he knew this because some monsignor in the Catholic Church, a lifelong friend of our family's, had tried to straighten me out.
He thought the solution to alcoholism was a pat on the head, a seat in the sanctuary, Bible in your hand, come back in an hour. Alcoholism don't work that way. He tried and tried and tried. He preached and preached and preached. He threatened and he warned. And then finally he gave up. That's why when I came into aid, people said, surrender, son. I said, it's my turn. Think about it in your own life, how many damn people gave up around you?
We give up. So when they come into aid and they say, surrender, you say, it's my turn, yeah. This priest gave up on me. I come staggering through that schoolyard one day and he saw me and shook his head after about a year of counseling. And he said, you're hopeless. He said, you and I are going to meet someday on the way to heaven. And he looked at me and he said, generally when you meet somebody, they're going one way and you're going the other.
Well, he didn't know what he was dealing with was the egotistical alcoholic. I was bewildered. And he turned and walked away towards that rectory and I looked at him and I thought, my God, I wonder what he's done.
[00:40:03]
He was a well thought of man. Well, what the hell, that's the way you feel. I was tried to, made to stop drinking. That's about what the hell it amounts to. All the people I encountered in my life tried to make me stop drinking, period. Open and shut case. And you can't make anybody stop drinking, anybody, especially somebody that's dependent upon the chemical to make things okay. I had the police department try to make me stop drinking, dumb cops.
I've been locked up at that corner, City Lobo, for drunken driving about seven times, drunken walking about four, drunken leaning twice, drunken crawling a couple of times. And I believe there's one charge down there where I looked like I was going to get drunk. Now that wouldn't be too bad, except the cop that was locking me up was the very drunk I was. But as John told me that Vic says, yeah, but I got the badge.
And the last time I was in a courtroom as a defendant, I've been in there a few times in my life, most of them just through a series of misunderstandings. But the last time I was in there, the lawyer that represented me, I was in there for public intoxication at that time. And the lawyer that represented me before the tribunal was the biggest drunk at City Lobo next to me and is dead from alcoholism.
The prosecuting attorney has been sober for a number of years, and he was the third biggest drunk in the courtroom that day. The cop that locked me up has been in AA for three years, he's bigger drunk than I was at that time. And the judge that was making all the decisions is still the biggest drunk in the city of Lowell. There was five drunks in that courtroom, and all he did was fine me, divide up the money by a fifth, I'm no damn good relative to him.
But hey, that idiot that comes to our AA meeting up in Lowell, he says, I had enough respect for the uniform to pour that out. Now you believe that? You believe in Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny and all those things. But they really, they were, they were all drunks, and I was the only one who got locked up. But I deteriorated damn rapidly. People I worked for tried to stop me from not drinking, the people I worked with tried to stop me from not drinking, and they couldn't understand that when I tried to stop me from not drinking, why everything wasn't all right.
You know, why is it that they're not all right when you're not drinking? Hell, I didn't know. I didn't know. And that's what AA teaches me. AA teaches me to make things okay without the bottle. AA teaches me that many times in my life, I'll have to depend upon God for things I don't understand and depend upon you for things that I don't understand that you can explain. That between me, you, and God, we can make things okay without the bottle.
Nobody ever told me that. And I deteriorated on down. And when I was 33 years old, I lost my job with the railroad. I never had a family. It's so sweet. I never had a wife and children. I never got married. I never had a desire to get married. I didn't know what the hell a man wanted with a wife. I couldn't. Well, I never am alive. They were about the most useless damn creatures on earth, especially the ones that I ran around with, the girls, anyway.
God, they were ugly to begin with. I used to go with a girl, and she was. She was ugly. She went home one night and began to undress, and she forgot to pull a blind down in her bedroom, and a peeping tom come up through the window. And when she got about half undressed, he reached in full blind now. Now, that's ugly. And most of the women I knew drank, and God, don't ever marry a drinking woman. Well, I think about that tonight.
I shudder. You know, just think of that. Get a hold of a half a pint, and got to go home and get somebody a half of it. I mean, that'll sway you, even thinking about that. So I never had one of those. Family left it all. My father gave up, my sister gave up, and they all gave up. When I was 33 years old, I was a wino in the city streets alone. I lived in a damned filthy alley. I lived in a damned filthy alley at 4th and Central, naturally. I'd sit back sometimes and oh, these geographical drunks, you know. Things weren't too good in Houston, so I went
[00:45:03]
to L.A. You know, they went to L.A., so I got back to New York. God, what a brave man, you know. Thirty feet in either direction was a hell of a distance for me, really. I know when I got sober, a guy wanted me to ride over to New Albany with him one night, and I said, all the way over there? I never got too far away from that 4th and Central. I don't know why, but I just never did. And I wound up living with all those winos back there. There was a wino haven then, Urban Renewals kind of got it. I took Hackman the last time he was up in Louisville and showed him that alley, how they modernized it. It'd be hard to be a wino back there then. But back then it wasn't. It was just a filthy old dirty alley with not a whole lot in it, you know. And kind of comical, in a way, some of the people you run into. It makes you laugh today, realize you were drunk, you know.
I was in a meeting here a while back with some industry people in Nashville, Tennessee, about 60 people there, and we were talking about alcoholism. That was the purpose of the meeting, for industrial people. And one guy got up and he said, can I ask you a very personal question? And I said, yes, sir. And he said, does it embarrass you coming down here and not knowing too many of us to tell people you're an alcoholic? And I looked at him and I said, why in the hell would it embarrass me? I'm the only guy in the joint that knows what the hell's wrong with him, you know. Right? I said, there's 45 of you people in here and I can look at you and tell none of you are wrapped too tight. Well, at the hell, at least I know what's wrong with me. They didn't. And don't you know some of them damn fools in there didn't think there was anything wrong with them? You know, weirdos, them people.
Them earth people are crazy if you talk to them long enough, you know. But nevertheless, I don't have any convictions about it at all that I'm an alcoholic. I'm a guy that can't handle booze. It handles me and I don't need to define anything any better than that. And when I tell you I'm an alcoholic, that's all I mean. There's no use in any details or nothing else. You can use all the terminology you want to, read all the medical books you want to, find anything else you want to. I'm a guy that can't handle booze. It handles me.
It's that simple. Goodbye. And that's what I'm telling you when I say I'm an alcoholic. You take a drink, you handle it. I don't. That's the difference. I never did, never could. I've watched other people who admittedly they couldn't try. Why should I? So that's the end of the game as far as I'm concerned. When I lived back in that alley, I was a damn drunken wino that owed everybody in the city of Louisville and was nuts from alcohol. And I'd been stripped of everything. Faith in God, people, and then myself. I knew I would always be a wino in an alley until I died. And why I didn't commit suicide, I don't know and don't care. I just didn't. But I didn't care if I lived or died. And I didn't live, I only existed. And the only thing I can tell you, my friend, if you've never drank in that far, I want you to believe that you can reach a point in your life to where alcohol doesn't do anything for you anymore. It will deaden your brain into a state of oblivion where you don't have to think. But that's all it does. It doesn't do any of those fantasy illusions of grandeur anymore. They're gone, baby. Gone forever. You don't think tomorrow is going to be better. You know damn good and well it's going to be like today. And all you hope is I get enough to where I don't have to think. I had never been right and never had the right to be right for the past five years, the day I landed in that alley.
I was always wrong because I was a drunk. You know, I hate to give that up. I think that alcoholics give that up when they're drinking, the right to be right. You come to AA, you got a right to be right and a right to be wrong. Not when you're drunk. Nobody believes a damn thing that you tell them. I think that's why a lot of my friends disappeared. I got just as disgusted with a lot of them as they did with me. I mean, if you tell the truth once a year, nobody believes it. You know, you go to the dentist and have all your teeth extracted and say, hey, I don't believe you. He's lying, he's off drunk. You know, you can say I lost a foot under a railroad train and only have one foot and they wouldn't believe you. You know, and it's just that way. It's just that bad. I had a little girl tell me a story one time where she walked in a beer joint and sat down in the booth and there was a little frog sitting in the booth. And then that little frog spoke to her. He said, hi. She said, you mean you can talk? He said, yes, ma'am. She said, I never heard a frog talk. Well, he said, I wasn't always a frog. He said, I used to be a very handsome young man. He said, an old witch put a curse on me. She said, well, my God, is there anything I can do to help you? He said, the only thing that will relieve the curse is for me to spend the night under the covers of a young maiden's bed. She said, well, that's no trouble. So she put that little frog in her purse and took it home with her.
And the next morning, her mother walked in the bedroom and there she lay in bed with a stark naked young man under her covers. And to this day, her mother don't believe
[00:50:02]
that story. They don't believe anything you tell them. I encountered a few clowns in the alley. I loved it. You know, there was a lot of them run up and down in through there, you know, that Wino Haven was something else. It was a hardware store. They threw out these big boxes, you know. Every time I'm asked to speak out of town somewhere, there's always a comment on the other end of the phone, you want a motel room or a box? But this hardware store would throw them out. And when you're living like that, you're getting anything you can find to stay out of the weather. You can even be a snob, Wino. I'm sincere about that. If you get there early and a guy throws out one of those big freezer boxes, you can lay down in those things. And you know, you can look out sometime and see some guy in a little console TV carton. Shit, it's standing there like a better neighborhood. Hell, you can look down on him. In this alley, there was a polterhouse across the alley, and a lot of Wino's used to get out of that polterhouse.
Well, they come out from under there and if the wind got in the right direction, you knew you were a better neighbor. But these cops used to ride up and down this alley. That's baffling to me today. Well, you see it today everywhere. But they send them to these academies, they train them, educate them, brilliant men. Get them out, give them a big blue uniform and a badge, buy or sell a flashlight and a gun. It's a big white car, and they drive up and down the street, and they're so proud. People out there getting raped and robbed, homes burglarized, banks robbed, and they're riding up and down alleys on Wino. A little scourging at times. And then they'll see a flock of them, and they'll jump out of that car, you know, that big five cell flashlight, and they shine your eyes. Then you know they've been trained at the academy because of their intellect and their vocabulary. They'll look down and say, what are you doing? And you look up and say, nothing. And they lock you up. I've often said I wish I knew something about alcoholism at the time. I would have loved for that clown to shine that light in my eyes and say, what are you doing? I'd have stuck my head out of one of those boxes and said, officer, I'm progressing. Back out I was quite rapidly.
A finance company come up to me in that alley one time. This guy was weirder than a cop, really. I borrowed some money from them. I don't guess any of y'all ever done anything like that. It's embarrassing me to tell you. Somebody has, anyway. They couldn't find me. For a long time, they couldn't find me. I owed about $500 for about a year, never paid them a nickel. And they were hunting me. And that confidential loan companies, they get real nasty sometimes, you know, and very unconfidential. They'll ride down alleys with them bullhorns, hollering, Jack S., where are you?
They blasted all over the car. But they couldn't find me for a long time. And finally, one day, somebody told them, you know, they came around and they finally put two or two together or some bartender or something here. This clown came pouring down rain one day. Very comfortable sitting inside this freezer box with about a four-day-old racing farm and a pint of wine. There's this guy peeping around through that alley. I saw him. He was a stranger in the crowd, you could tell that. He looked in there, and I guess he could see me through that little opening, that flap. He walked over and he knocked on my box.
I looked out there, and I kicked that flap open. He said, are you Jack S.? And I said, yes, sir. It didn't matter anymore. He said something that made me believe that he was worse shape than the cop. He said, I'm Mr. So-and-so from that finance company. He said, boy, if you don't start making some payments on this damn loan, you're going to be in a whole lot of trouble. Hey, I thought about that, and you help me think, will you? And write me or something. What the hell he have in mind?
I've offered, that place is gone now. I'd like to have gone back there and said to him, what were you going to do to me? What the hell could he have done? If he'd have hung me, I'd have been better off. But nevertheless, a guy from AA knew the personnel director on the old man railroad, and he came down to see him one day. And they got to talking, and he told him about me. And this guy said, well, maybe I can help him. And he said, don't he have to call you? And he said, not from what you've told me about him. You know, if he's got a dime, he's not going to waste it on me. So, you know, sometimes, and I
[00:55:03]
don't mean to be critical about this, I just find it humorous to myself when a guy gets up talking about a 12-step call that he's going to make next week. You know, how the hell did you do it? I'd like to know. Depending upon the circumstances, man, I've gone in saloons after guys, and then I've known other guys. I wouldn't get in the same neighborhood they were in. You know, depending upon the circumstances will depend upon what I'll do. And in this particular case, from what this man told him about me, he wasn't afraid to come to that alley. He knew my father. I didn't know him.
I never saw him for a month. But my father worked at the old man, and they sent for him. And he came down, and he told him, he said, let's go see him. Now, my father hadn't seen me in years. He didn't want to get involved with me again. I played emotional yo-yo with him long enough. I had him up and down, and up and down, and up and down. And you get tired of that after a while. You know, wives and fathers and brothers and sisters, they live on hope. That's all. That's all that keeps them there.
Sometimes with no place else to go, maybe. But they still stay with just a little bit of hope in their heart. But sometimes you get tired of believing you'll be all right and then knowing you won't. Believing you will and knowing you won't. Believing you will and knowing you won't. My father got tired. He said emotional yo-yo was enough. And I hadn't seen or heard from him for a year or better. Finally, he agreed to come. And they came out to this alley. And this man asked me if I'd let him help me. I didn't know him. I never saw him before in my life. It was sort of a weird feeling. My father wouldn't even look at me. He went off and set out somewhere else. And I asked the guy, you know, the obvious question, why would you want to help me? And he said something that really didn't make any sense then. He said, at one time in my life, I used to be like you are. And somebody helped me.
That doesn't make sense. One time in my life, I used to be like you are now. And somebody helped me. Tonight, I know what he meant. Then I didn't. Why would a very well distinguished, very well dressed and distinguished looking gentleman come to a wino alley? Why would a man who obviously had better things to do in the course of a day than be where he was, why would he come to begin with? And why would he want to help a perfect stranger, someone he had never seen before in his life? Why? Because he used to be like I was. And somebody helped him.
And that's why I said he was there. He said, I'll help you if you'll let me. And I was so sick, I'd have gone anywhere, you know. AA didn't mean anything to me. He told me that. What the hell does AA mean to a sick drunk? Nothing, you know. I mean, AA means something after you're not drunk, if it means anything at all. If you think I'm kidding, the next 12 steps, you go, I'll call you, go on, you've got some guy real drunk, tell him you're from BB. I'm serious. Just for the hell of it. I'm from BB, son, I'm going to help you. He don't give a damn where you're from.
If he's sick enough and you're going to help him, you could be from the double bar X, it'll be okay with him. And I said, I'll do anything. I'll do anything. Because I was so sick, I was tired of that. I couldn't take anymore. I'll do anything. So they loaded me up in a car and they took me up to a treatment center in Louisville called Our Lady of Beats Hospital where AA meds were held inside the hospital. And my father looked at me with such total disgust. And I remember when we got out of the car at the entrance to that hospital, he said to me, he said, you're going to do what this man tells you. He said, I know nothing about what he's about to do, but you're going to do what he tells you to do. Or he said, I'll kill you.
And I knew he meant it. And my father was not a violent man. But he told me later, he said, after seeing you, you would have been better off dead than what I saw that day. And he said, I believe at that time in my life, I probably would have. But they took me and put me in that treatment center and kept me there for a week and got me well. And that won't be against the law because after the alcoholic gets well, he's nasty. That'll make you take a pill in a hospital that you throw up once a day for about six weeks. And it'll let your mind and body kind of catch up together. But an alcoholic gets well, instead of going, a nurse passes by, he'll say, ma'am.
And he gets well, he'll say, hey, you. Because you got the same type of guy in there you always had. You take out a drunk to a treatment center and go back next week, what do you got? You got somebody that's not drunk. That's all. Just somebody that's not drunk. That's what they had with me at that time in my life. And then a nurse came in to me and she said, the first time I got involved with we, it had been I from that time all the way up.
Dialogue with We, it had been I from that time all the way up, and this nurse came in and she said, we are going to an AA meeting tonight, we are, and I said, what's an AA meeting? I didn't know why they wanted to meet you on that, I didn't even have an automobile,
[01:00:03]
you know, but she said it's Alcoholics Anonymous, and I said, are you insinuating that I'm an alcoholic? I didn't have any idea what one was, but I knew I wasn't, and she said, I'm not insinuating a damn thing. I said, well, young lady, I am not an alcoholic, and she looked at me and she said, if you're not one, there ain't any. By God, that hurts. So they made me go. I didn't want to go, and they made me go, and I went down a long hallway into a student nurse's classroom at that time.
I've seen that meeting go from 30 people in 1962 to last Tuesday night at that hospital it was 261 people at that hospital meeting. But anyway, this particular night, she had me by the ear. Down the hall we went. Now, my image of me, you see, that's one thing you've got to get really leveled. That's the reason for a good sponsor. If for no other reason, get you a real good sponsor and ask him or her what they think of you.
Now, and after they're through, if you like them, get you another sponsor, because if you like them, then you've got the wrong one. You need another one. Go get another one. But anyway, everybody has an image of themselves, right? Hell, we have tonight. You know, we'll always be till the day we die what we think we are, what you think I am, and what we really are. You know, you can't help that. The only thing is when it's inflated about nine miles high and filled with false pride, it's the most destructive thing known to God or man.
And here I went down that hallway. Now, not sick and well, still unemployed and broke. It looked awful. Oh, I was the awfulest looking thing that you've ever seen in your life, really. Swollen and yellow. It's hard to realize that. I know as pretty as I am tonight, but back then it was awful. You know? Who are you laughing at, Hank? Anyway, the image I had of me then was that, you know, I was still the swinger.
Isn't that crazy? That's the insanity he talks about. The insanity of our reasoning. The insanity of our reasoning. Whatever it's about, but that particular night it was about me. I'm the swinger, you know? Going to a damned A.A. meeting. Why, bring on the girls. Start up the music. Where's the bottle? You know, that's, here I am. You know, that was me, I thought. And they had me marching down a damned hall in an insane asylum going to an A.A. meeting.
You know? Now, what the hell, that's degrading to anybody of my stature. I don't know what in the hell my stature was at the time. You know? What I thought of me when I was depressed was one thing. What I thought of me when I was drunk was another. What I thought of me when I was sober and had to confront reality was the same guy with a wall in front of him. I don't care what you know about me, you're not going to get into me for me to tell you.
You see, my barrier's up. And I'll tell you something else about those barriers with alcoholics. There never lived a man on this earth who could knock one of them down. If that guy that's behind it won't chip away at it while you're chipping away in front of it, believe me, my friend, it will not come down. And I wasn't about to chip, and I wasn't about to let anybody in there. Madder than hell I went to that meeting.
And I'm down the hall with this big image of me, and there stood some old lady at the front door. Dear friend of mine today. She's old then. She is now. And I walked down that hall, and there she stood. She put her arm around me, and she said, Hi, honey. And I looked at her, and I'd heard stories about old women and young boys and things like that, you know. I mean, she's weird, you know. And I'm hunting for a bottle and the music, and she said, Honey, you want a cup of coffee and a cookie?
Jesus. So I just walked on by her and went and sat down, and some clown got up to discuss with me how much he drank and who give a damn, huh? And he got up and he talked and he rattled, and he went on, and I interrupted him. Wait just a minute, my friend. And I've used a few obscene interjections and what have you, and everybody's going, shh, shh. I made a perfect ass out of myself. You couldn't make a bigger fool out of yourself somewhere if you tried, and I tried like hell, I guess.
When he got through, I came away with a brilliant conclusion. Anybody who drank like he did ought to quit, you know, if he wasn't lying, you know. No association with me at all. What the hell can an AA speaker say? You stand up here for an hour or whatever and you talk, and what the hell could you tell people? I used to be a drunk.
[01:05:00]
I'm not anymore. I'll show you what I did if you want to see it. I couldn't live out there without the chemical. I can now. I'll show you what I did if you're interested and if you're not, go on. And sit down. That would be about the end of it, of all of our stories. But not this night. And I went outside that room and there stood that damned old woman again, right by the door, and she put her arm up around my shoulder again, and she said, Honey, you come back next week.
She said, We need you. You know, the way I acted in there, I looked at her and I thought, They ought to put her in a home somewhere, you know. And get rid of her once and for all, you know. What the hell? Society would have to be better. I went back because they made me not like the people. And I went back many, many more times. I was shipped out to an insane asylum in Hopkinsville, Kentucky, to spend 40 days, and I went to AA while I was there.
And after a while, I began not only to like the people, but I began maybe to believe just a little bit, just a little bit. I found out that I could not drink alcohol a day at a time if I wanted to, and that I could learn to change my philosophy about a whole lot of things. I learned if I would stay and hang around and listen a little bit, that soon I could find the faith in my capabilities to succeed in what it was I wanted to do.
And as long as they're within the limits of my capabilities and serve an honest desire, there's no problem for anybody in AA. You will always in the path of life meet people who are greater than you and lesser than you. You'll probably fit somewhere in between as long as you live. If your capabilities are 10,000 a year, you'll make the best of it. If it's 50, you'll make the best of it without envy or resentment for those who do.
Your God will be God, not money. Your friends will be friends like you. You will always find people like you are the people that you need to associate with. You soon begin to learn and love and trust people. You soon begin to realize that we admitted we were powerless over alcohol, that our lives had become unmanageable. Not that I admitted I was or that my life had become unmanageable. When I speak of living, I speak in the plural.
I know that there's an effort that has to be made by me and by you and by God, and it can be made as long as I don't drink. Some days will be hard and others will be harder. Some days will be easy and others will be easier. There's days that I can get over the hurdles, and there are days you'll have to help me over them. And there's days when we'll both stop and look at them and decide maybe the best decision is to go around them.
But whatever they are, we have the capabilities and the support of a philosophy and the people to make the hurdles. We have the great ability to live comfortably in society without the need of the chemical. We know that whatever it is today and whatever period of sobriety you're facing today, that it will be okay whatever needs to be made okay as long as we don't take the drink, as long as we turn to the people instead of the bottle, it will be okay because we can make it okay to the satisfaction of ourselves, to the satisfaction of others.
And for the past 16 1⁄2 years, my life's been okay. There's times I wanted to drink on Delta. There's times I wanted a good, cold, frosty mug of beer on the 4th of July when it was 100 degrees. There's times when people say, I've never lost the desire to stop drinking, and other people say it disappeared the day I came in. For me, it's been on a scale of something. A desire to drink, can that be answered yes or no?
If it can for you, beautiful. It can for me. Would a good, cold, frosted mug taste good when it's 110? You just finished cutting grass? You bet your sweet boots it would. Are you going to drink it? No. Would you like to have one? Yes. Can I get you one? No. On a scale of 10, it might get to 2 sometimes, maybe even 3, I don't know. But it never gets to 5, and it never gets out of balance. I always have it in the perspective of what it is and what it's for.
I always have the realization that what it can do to me, it can destroy the things that I've accomplished. It can destroy the peace and the serenity that I've achieved. It can destroy my friendship with you. It can destroy my communication with a power greater than I am. It can destroy everything that's good and decent in my life. But it can't destroy me if I don't pick it up.
[01:10:00]
It's impossible to destroy me if I remain grateful. I've never seen a grateful drunk. It's impossible to find a grateful alcoholic that's drinking. And if you have nothing more than to be grateful for, remember how it used to be. Just remember how it used to be. One eye looking back, one eye looking ahead. And about nine million eyes looking today at you to help. We'll help you get there, baby. And you can get wherever it is you want to go if you don't drink.
I close every talk I've ever made in the last few years with a story. A friend of mine over there from South Bend said he stole it. And I said, well, if you don't tell anybody, that's where I got it. Old Hack come up to me one night and he said, I enjoyed that story you told. Do you mind if I use it? And I said, absolutely not, Hack. If you ever say anything interesting, I'll use it. But up until now, I haven't used anything.
A man was walking down a cold and lonely road one night, and a snake was laying in the middle of the road. The snake would die in the cold weather. And he looked up at the man and he said, Mister, will you pick me up and put me under your coat and get me warm so I don't die? And the man looked at him and he said, no, of course not. He said, you're a poisonous reptile. If I put you under my coat and got you well and warm, surely you would bite me.
It's your nature to bite me. The snake said, I wouldn't bite you if you saved my life. The man thought about it for a while and picked the snake up and put him under his coat and got him warm and restored to health. And the snake bit him. He threw him out from under his coat and down on the road. He looked and the snake had a snickering little grin on its face. And the man said, I thought you promised not to bite if I got you well.
And the snake said, you knew what I was when you picked me up. Some day, somewhere, you might try to justify or rationalize under a certain set of conditions. But tell it to somebody else, not me. You knew what it was when you picked it up. Thank you for having me. Thank you.