Tom B – From Avon Lake, Ohio – Date Unknown

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Okay. My name is Tom B.. I'm an alcoholic. My home group is Friday Night Avon Lake. We're about 20 miles the other side of Cleveland. My sobriety date is July the 5th, 1962, which means I'm pulling from a lot of years and many, many things go through your mind. I'm glad I'm speaking first. Believe me, I usually don't speak and do leads or when we're both speaking at the same time. I learned a good lesson about that. Last time I, well, almost the last time we did this years ago, we went to Indiana and it was a dual lead. My wife spoke first and after she finished, the chairperson got up and said, we're going to take a 15, 20 minute break and then we'll hear the other side of the story. So I went out to have a smoke and I'm standing down by the lake and a young man come down and stood next to me.

He says, you know, I'm not familiar with Al-Anon, he says, but I'm an AA. He says, I never really realized the effect I had on my wife and family and how much it must have hurt them. He said, I just never thought of that. I said, well, thank you. I said, my wife will be glad to hear that. I'm glad she impressed you that much. He said, was that your wife? I said, yeah. He said, you rotten son of a bitch. That was it. Walked away. I said, the hell with this. I'm not going to, you're a loser before you start. Oh God. My wife's Al-Anon, so you understand when I tell you you're coming in, she says, now Tom, please, please keep some order in your lead. She's ever since you turned 75, last five years or so, she says, you're all over the place. She says, I think you're getting senile. She says, you talk about 40 years ago, you talk about yesterday, you talk about last week, you talk about the grandkids, you talk about the great grandkids.

She says, you're all over the map. She says, I can follow you. I lived it. But those people don't know us and they may not be able to follow you. I said, honey, I'm talking alcoholics. Believe me, babe, they're not wrapped too tight. We don't have problems following one another because people, it's not a language from their head. It's a language from the heart. We know each other feel. That's what makes it work. That's why age doesn't mean too much, unless you're talking about sex or fighting, but age don't mean too much. We communicate.

I could take a cup of coffee and sit at one of these picnic tables with any five Alkies in this room or any 10 Alkies in this room. And after two cups of coffee, we know each other a long time, people. Because when I say to another alcoholic, you know, when I come here, I was afraid and didn't even know what I was afraid of. I don't have to explain that. I don't have to explain that. You know, by the time I got here, dying looked easier than living.

I can remember waking up in Chicago in jail and not even remember driving there. What am I doing here? I wake up at home and the wife and kids are gone. The house is cold and you're broke and you're sick and you think, what the world, I did it again. You don't, I don't have to explain that to an Alkie. Yeah, been there, done that. You're in the right place, fella. You're in the right place. We qualify. God knows we, we're trying to go from the fun years to the sick years to the dying years. To let you know if you're new and we, I hope there's some new people here.

That you're not crazy. You're sick. You're sick and we have a way out. God almighty, if you want, we have, don't, don't complicate it. Simplicity is the best thing I know. If you want, we have, put your feet where we put ours. Just take people, you know, that, that, that are happy and you've been to their houses and, and, and you see their kids happy and you see their wife saying, I'll make some coffee and, and if you want that in your home, do what he does.

Don't go on head trips. I, I know people who are on head trips and wind up putting a gun in their mouth. Don't, don't do it. I was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York. My, my dad's an admitted alcoholic. So drinking was no big deal. When I was 16, I had a draft card saying I was 18 and you drank. That was, that was the social event of the week. You, the, the, the, my dad got paid on Friday in the shipyards

[00:04:59]

and we met at the neighborhood bar, had the fish fries, played shuffleboard.

[00:05:06]

Talk about how great it was in the old country. How great it was in Ireland. For crying out loud, half of them never seen Ireland. When I was that high, I knew something was wrong. What the hell they, they doing in South Brooklyn was no bargain. What they're doing in South Brooklyn, if Ireland's so great, I wouldn't leave. Big fight would always happen. Go back to the bar Saturday, talk about the great time we had Friday.

Sunday you went to church, Monday you went to work and wait till next Friday and did it all over again. That was it. That was the way it is. The only way I knew. Got in some trouble in early age, wound up in the service. Boy, you talk about you're a change. I never seen a live chicken in my life. I never seen a live cow in my life. Friday I went, they shipped me off to the service. Monday I was in San Antonio, Texas.

I thought I was on the moon. Look at these chickens and cows and holy, what the hell is this? I was supposed to be in the service for three years. Well, I, they had the Korean war, so they kept us another eight months and you get discharged, you go back home. I got cut in a bar fight in San Francisco and my dad told everybody in the neighborhood I was wounded in Korea. I was a neighborhood war hero. I walked in the neighborhood bar, I could go in the bar with a dollar on a Wednesday and drink till Sunday. Everybody buying me drinks. There's Tommy had a rough over there. One of the old timers come down and puts his arm around your shoulder. Gee, Tom, I heard you had a rough one. What happened? I said, well, the doctor said I shouldn't talk about it. What the hell are you going to tell him? I don't know where Korea is.

I couldn't find career on a map, but you're not going to make a liar out of dad. So you're going to go. I don't know any Alky that won't be what he has to be at the time. Never know, never remember. Alky has to think on his feet because he don't remember yesterday. Go to work and ask questions to find out what happened. I had a nurse tell me about alcoholics. My God, people, this is over 40 years ago, 45, six years ago. Funny how little things stick with you, isn't it?

My sponsor was a great believer in going up to hospitals and talking to patients. He says it was easier than going to that house and let them puke on your shoes. He liked hospitals. He called me one night. He says, Tommy, I'm tied up in Cleveland. He says, you'll have to go in to the meeting tonight at the hospital. We used to go up and he'd have a 15-minute talk and then we'd sit there and discuss it and leave. I said, well, okay, Jay. I said, I'll go up.

I was still about eight months, maybe, I don't know, less than a year, I think. But I remember going up to the second floor to West. You see, don't quote me because maybe somebody here can help me out, but I'm pretty sure you didn't, you weren't too welcome before hospitalization. I think the hospitalization came in in 58 or 59, in through there, I'm not sure, but they didn't have time to build alcoholic wards and have treatment centers. So in Lorraine, in 62, they put the alcoholics in with the mental patients to West. And that's how, that's where they detox you. So I went up to the second floor and the nurse sees me coming. She said, hello, Tommy, you here for the meeting? I said, yeah.

She said, I'll get the patients. And she walked down the hall and she tapped one guy and walked by a couple more, tapped another one. She goes down to the TV room, we're going to have an AA meeting. And I grabbed her, I said, how do you, how do you know who to tap and who not to tap? How do you, how do you separate the mental patients from the alcoholics? She said, oh, it's easy. I says, I, I says, I looked down that hall. I says, I can't tell any difference.

She said, you could if you were here three days, Tommy. I said, how's that? She says, well, we, we carry them all in. After three days, you see the ones walking down the hall, kind of quiet and sedating to themselves. I says, yeah. She says, they're the mental patients. You see the ones in the office telling us how to run the hospital? You got it. Quick forgetters, aren't we? I'm home maybe a year, people. I can't take on dates. I don't remember dates, but, and it's not a date trip anyway. It's a feeling trip.

I'll take it in my bottom as quick as I can. So we can get, we can get to the good stuff. The learning how to live sober. That was my biggest problem. I didn't know how to live sober.

[00:10:04]

I wasn't calm as miserable when I was not drinking. Everybody's telling me sober up, your life's going to be better. No, it's not. I'm miserable when I'm not drinking. My only place I'm comfortable or know how to deal with life is when I'm drinking. My dad grabs me one night. He says, Tom, he says, your mother's seen enough of this nonsense with me. This is the way you want to live your life. Do me a favor. Get out of the house. Get out into the world and grow up. I was going on two and three day drunks. I was running with a bad crowd and things weren't good. I was getting in a lot of jackpots.

That's okay, dad. So I packed my bags and I was going back out to California. I was discharged in Riverside, California. And I kind of liked it out there. They were living good. They had their own houses, no cold water flats, nice and backyards, swimming pools. I figured I wouldn't live like that. So I got on a bus to go to California and they had a rest stop in a town called Lorain, Ohio. And I seen the bars and I was going to have a couple of drinks in Lorain, Ohio.

That was 1952. I'm still in Lorain, Ohio. I could end qualifying right there. Whenever I drink, everything leaves. Buses, cars, clothes, wives, kids, everything leaves. Houses. I don't know what happens. Because when I have one drink, the only thing that's important to me is another drink. They call it alcoholism. I don't care what you call it. I'm allergic to booze. I take a shot in a beer right now and I can't tell you where I'll be at midnight tonight.

Wherever the booze takes me. Wherever the action is. And I don't care. There's no tomorrow. I'll tell you sooner or later, people, the price gets too high. The price just gets too high. The pain gets too great. Mentally, physically, in any way you want to name it. You try to quit and you can't. You can't. So I get off the bus and the bartender buys a drink. I buy a drink. This guy buys a drink. And three days later, I'm coming off a drunk and the bus is gone. Everything's gone.

So I called home. I said, Dad, I'm in this town. If you send me some go-dad, when I get out to the coast, I'll send it back a hundredfold. My dad had been talking to people in AA. Hey, I have this son that's nutting a jaybird when he drinks. How can I help him? Frank, do you want to help him? Yeah, don't help him. What the hell kind of advice is that? Let him wake up in enough jails that'll beat his head in against enough walls. Let him get to the point where he's sick and tired of being sick and tired.

Let him get to the point where for just a couple of seconds, he gets honest with himself and he says, maybe it's me. Then we'll break our backs to help him, Frank. But till then, let the clown finish his act. Now, I've done it. And I'm sure if you've been around, you've done it. You get a call from a wife or a mother or a husband. Please come talk to my son. Please come talk to my husband. You can help him. You can… I can't help him. Okay, put him on the phone.

He won't talk to you. He won't talk to you. But you'll go. You'll go. Break your heart. But keep you sober. Keep you sober trying to help people. But sometimes trying to help people that don't want to help, you're doing more harm. You're doing good. Let him finish his act. Catch him next morning. I never seen anybody with a fifth of blonde and a thousand dollars in their pocket. I want to quit drinking. I've never seen it. Catch him the next morning when he's broke and sick. The blonde's gone. The money's gone. Everything's gone.

Oh, God help me. Yeah. God help me now. Too late. My dad hangs up. I'm in a neighborhood bar. I hear they need chemical engineers at a chemical company. So I went and applied for the job. And I talked to a woman, Catholic lady that all her and I hit it right off. I told her I went to St. John's. I don't know where St. John's is, but I told her I went to St. John's. And I'll get my papers there. And oh, she hired me. And I got the job. I'm a chemical engineer. I can't spell chemical engineer.

We're sick. We're not dumb. Here I am, night shifted, at this chemical company mixing. We try to make a cord for a tire. I'll never forget it. While working, I met this young lady. She's with me today. God, the most beautiful thing I've ever seen still is. I always say that. Sometimes I get lucky. I say that. I won't get lucky now. I won't get lucky now. I make a joke of it. It's been a long time since I've been lucky, I'll tell you.

[00:15:07]

Oh, God. Anyway, I met this young lady, and she invited me to her house for dinner, and I met her mother, and her mother and I hit it off, God. Outgays know when they got a good thing. She was, poor thing was 18 years old. She didn't know up from down. I met her in November. I married her in December. Run off with her. I was going to take her back to New York. Run out of gas. Didn't have any money. Her father had to come get us. Oh, gee, what a mess that was.

But anyway, I'm working at this chemical company, and we're trying to make a strong cord for a tire. Just a sideline. I don't know where this stuff comes from, but when it comes, you get it. What difference does it make? We're not going anywhere. We're down here in the valley. We're not going anywhere. Well, I went shopping with her, and she was buying a cashmere sweater. And at that time, it was $35 for a cashmere sweater. That was a pretty big deal.

I pick up this sweater, and I say to her, boy, this looks like the same material that we're trying to change into a cord for a tire. So we have a Monday morning conference, and here comes their latest addition. I says, you people are going down the wrong road. I says, you should be making sweaters out of this stuff. I says, my God, you're throwing away dollars trying to find pennies. I says, make sweaters.

So they put me in charge to give me six engineers, six chemical engineers, and we made sweaters. Made a blue one and a pink one in all different colors, and we gave all the people sweaters. And the deal was, bring the sweater home and let your wife wear it or whoever, and we'll see what happens. And I brought one home, and I gave it to Glendalee. Here, Glendalee, here's a brand new cashmere sweater.

She put it on. Oh, God, it was beautiful. Oh, I love it, she says. It's so nice. So she washed it, and she dried it, and it melted. I lost a job, everything without it. Oh, God almighty. That's the story of my life. Every time I got something going, it melts. My father took me into Cleveland. He got me involved in a pipefitter apprenticeship, local 120 in Cleveland. Here I go from a chemical engineer to a pipefitter apprentice, and we didn't have any money, no place to live.

So we took a two-car garage, and we made a little honeymoon cottage. And the deal is, when Tommy gets to his fourth or fifth year and starts making a decent buck, we're going to buy our house in the suburbs, a little white picket fence, and we're going to live happily ever after. Four children, and seven years later, we're still in the cottage. And I'm a journeyman now, people, and I'm making a pretty good buck every time.

The more I make, the more I drink. I used to drink on Friday, Saturday, sober up Sunday, go to work Monday. Now it's Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, sober up Monday, go to work Tuesday. Get paid on Wednesday, never make Thursday. Never knew where to wake up. Wake up in the car, in the driveway, wake up in Chicago, New York, New Jersey, never knew where. Kitchen floor, I used to wake up on the kitchen floor a lot.

It was only a small place, and the kids were tucked in the bunk beds. I didn't want to wake anybody up, so I went to sleep in the kitchen. Actually, I slept on the couch, but I wound up on the floor. I don't know why. She'd come out in the morning, she'd tell me, I need some money for groceries. I don't have any money for groceries. So I do the only thing I know how to do at the time, I attack. Damn it.

I drank when I married you, I'm going to continue to drink it. If you don't like it, rah, rah, rah, rah, rah. You're not going to make me like that neighbor. I had a neighbor, I hated his guts. God, he, normal type of guy. Biggest thing in his life was his grass. Every Saturday morning, mowed it. Damn grass. You ever have a hangover and have some nut run along more under your bedroom window? It hurts.

I've been in a neighborhood bar, he'd come in. Give so-and-so a drink. He'd drink it and leave. I said, where are you going? He said, I have to go home. Supper is waiting. Can you imagine that? One drink, supper's waiting. I have one drink, I could care less if the Pope is waiting. Let him wait. Just keep him coming. That's the way it was. That's the way it still is if I try it again. I'm leaving you.

That was my big spiel. I'm leaving you. Where the hell am I going? I get my brown paper bag, I put my underwear in my toothbrush. She would cry.

[00:20:01]

Tommy, I didn't mean to upset you. What did I do? God almighty, people. No Alky in this room could take what he dished out. In all the rooms I've ever been in, I never met an Alky that could take what he dished out. I had my wife believe it was her fault I drank. When my wife was 26, she looked 60. Living with an alcoholic is not easy. We're like a cancer. It spreads throughout the whole family. It took me to AA.

They took her to that communist thing. Al-Anon, don't laugh. Your wife goes there. Your act's going right down the tube, fella. It's all over. Thank you, Al-Anon. My wife is over 70 now. She looks 26 to me. Thank you, Al-Anon. Gave her life back. Gave her brain back. Gave her eyes, cocky eyes back. God almighty. I go to one of my spiels. She says, stick it, B.. What the hell does that mean? Stick it, B..

I was on a deal for a while there. I was leading all over the country. It seemed like three, four times a month. I was running here, running in California. Running here, running there. I start getting a big head like, I'm Mr. AA. Look at me. Phone rings. She says, Billy Graham's residence. Boy, that ended that in a hurry. Chop your legs off. They don't know you. I know you, you sick son of a … Oh, God, people.

Where else in AA can you laugh at things like this? I'll tell you. Jump around. You've got to listen to this. This is our life today. It's the way it is, and it's good. That's the only reason I'm here, is to let you know the difference in drinking and sober living. People I live both ways, believe me, sober is better once you learn how. Once you learn how. And this is where you learn. This is where you learn.

Would you like to know how to never get in a real argument with your wife again? Or your husband? I'll tell you how you do that. This is the greatest secret I ever learned. A few years ago, we're out … My wife is a … She was in American Home Garden. She was in Ohio Magazine. My wife's a master gardener. And an herbalist. And she is … They come to our home in bus loads to see our gardens. She has all these different things.

Beautiful place. Well, I was trying to help her one time, and I cut the grass, and it looked like weeds to me. I cut the herb garden all up, because I thought it was weeds, so she don't let me do the weeds anymore. The cutting grass. I'm not allowed near them. But she can't have the yard without me, so I go down to the farms, and I get the cow manure. And I got my own compost pile, boy. I'm important.

I come down home, I put my boots on, get my hoe, and I pour the horse shit in with the dirt, and I mix it, boy. I'm good. I had a guy come over and say, you don't appreciate me, I'm sober three weeks, and they still don't treat me like they used to. I said, come on, let's go in the backyard. Take your report and come to my house. We'll mix some horse shit. We'll see how important you are. But anyway, I'm out mixing my manure.

She's over planting some weeds, and I have a neighbor, the greatest neighbor in the world, boy. He's 88 years old. He can't hear. He's senile, but he loves that lawnmower, boy. He has a lawnmower, doesn't have a muffler. No muffler. He comes and Arlene, his wife, comes out, and she's yelling and screaming, boy, get off the goddamn lawnmower you're. I'm Mother Brad. No, you're not gonna cut the hedges.

Put the lawnmower up. And it's like fucking yelling, screaming, and fighting. My wife comes over to me and she says, is that what we got to look forward to in a few years? I said, hey, don't knock it. I said, that's how people in their 80's make love. She's what? I said, that's how people in their 80's make love. She's all red and shaking. Roy, Roy's veins are up in his neck. He's all good. She's all, she's good deal, good deal.

So she's in the back of the road. Two weeks later, we're going down to Worcester, Ohio. Great big sign by Route 71. Road closed, bridge out two miles ahead. Go down 71, six miles. And I just keep going. She's, what are you doing? I said, that's for the tourists. I said, they send you around county roads.

[00:25:01]

I said, I'm sure one of the locals can show us a side street to go around. An hour later, we're out in the cornfields. I mean, we're lost. We're God knows where. And she starts, damn it, you never change. You're the same as you always were. You never follow instructions. You never read signs. I said, hey, I'm not going to make love in this car. She broke up. She broke up. She broke up. Now when I start, she says, is that foreplay?

So you've got to get some humor into your life. Without it, it's sad. I feel sorry for people who can't laugh at themselves. Let's begin the wisdom. I'll take you. So you're going to come here. God almighty, we can laugh at ourselves here. You tell the joke about a drunk when he's drinking, I'll punch your lights out. We come here, we tell jokes about ourselves, we laugh. We know, we come to realize we're not the center of the universe.

We come to realize there are more important things than us. What you do is important. What you do is important. I come home one night about four in the morning. My suitcase hit me right in the chest. She says, go, just go. Get out of our lives. I can't live this way anymore. God, we've got finance. I've got four truck and driving charges in five months. I've got finance companies suing me. Guaranteeing my pay.

It's a mess. Our life is a mess. So I was happy. I was going to go live the way I wanted to live. I'm going to go live on the Gold Coast. I'm going to get a Cadillac convertible. Oh, drink and dream, you screwy son of a gun. I'm a 25-year-old guy with a 12-year-old brain. Well, you don't live on the Gold Coast. You live at West 65th in Detroit. It's an $8 a week room. Detroit a hotel. Your big nights out are sitting in the local dives, peeling the labels off of beer bottles, list of poor me songs.

And when you want to see your kids, you want to see your kids when the bar's closed. And you drive out to Avon Lake in your car. We all got cars, don't we? Guys in construction usually have two cars. They have a family car that they take their wives and kids out to dinner and vacations. And then they have an old beat-up picker, pickup truck, or I had a 41 Plymouth. Ball tires and no ignition key. That was my work car.

That's the only car we had. I remember one night I'm out drinking. I lose the keys. My brother-in-law says, don't worry, I'll fix it. He's an electrician. He goes under dash, pulls out all the wires. Puts a clothespin on three wires. The car started. So that's how I used to start the car. Get up in the morning, put the clothespin on the three wires. I'd be going down Clifton Boulevard, bumping a bump of traffic doing 50 miles an hour.

Hit a bump, the clothespin falls, and the car stops. I'd be looking for the damn clothespin with the hangover. That hurts. And I thought that was normal. You didn't spend money on cars or keys. Oh, God. We separated a year and a half. I called her up. I says, Glenn, I says, listen, I haven't had a drink in three weeks, and I'm fed up living like this, and I want to see you and the kids. I says, I'd like to take you on a picnic Sunday.

She says, you haven't drank in three weeks? I says, that's right, she's okay. So I went out and picked the kids up. And I brought baseball gloves and picnic baskets. I did the things that I thought normal fathers do. You take your kids on a picnic. Who teaches you how to be a father? Who teaches you how to be a man? I did this for three weeks in a row, and she thought I was a changed man who was going to try again.

Fresh start. God, we're good at fresh starts, aren't we? Always fresh starts. And we borrowed money off of people we knew when we bought a little cottage on land contract. And I remember standing on the porch when we moved in, and I says, Glenn, I promise you I'm never going to drink again. Now, people, I'm not blowing smoke. I'm not trying to con anybody. I'm telling you this from the bottom of my heart.

I'm not going to drink anymore. I don't want to live that way anymore. I want to live like other people. I'm making as much money when I'm working as anybody in the neighborhood. And they're going to Florida for two weeks in the wintertime, and their kids are going to school with holes in their shoes. There's something wrong. We can't afford to go to Akron. Always broke. Always robbing Petey to pay Paul.

Always in pressure, pressure, pressure. Thirty days later, the house payments started coming in. And I said, Glenn,

[00:30:00]

I'm not going to drink anymore. I'm not going to drink anymore. I'm not going to drink anymore. I'm not going to drink anymore. That don't happen. While I'm nursing a hangover, comes my bread and butter. My bread and butter's an electrician friend of mine that I introduced to my wife's sister, and they got married. Oh, God, you should see my father-in-law now. He's a raven maniac. He comes home on weekends with shotguns looking for us.

He comes up, and he don't look too good. He says, Tom, I got problems. I says, what do you mean you got problems? He says, well, I got a drunken driving charge. I gotta go before Jensen next week. I says, I don't wanna hear it, Bob. I says, I'm paying off the last one on time payments. Up in Avon. I says, don't tell me about it. Yeah, he says, I'm being sued for divorce. I says, I know. He says, how do you know?

I says, I got my papers this morning, too. Jensen was a friend of the family's. He called both the wives in. He says, look, I'll give you two divorces for the price of one. Get rid of both those losers. While we're talking, the wife comes out. Talking to the bread and butter. Still do. Get along great. He's got over 40 years. Two guys that drank together that didn't have a dime. A couple of years ago, we got in his 40-foot motorhome.

His diesel pusher or whatever the hell he had. We went out to Oregon and Arizona. We took a nine-week trip and just traveled all over the country. Things we used to talk about. We're gonna do someday in a bar that you never do. Now we do them. Now we do them. Tells us about a group of people that meet at a local church. They were talking to the minister and they must be doing something right because they don't drink and they're putting their lives together.

He said, you think if I go to that club, she'll hold off on the divorce? She says, I don't know, Bob. That'd be up to her. But you and her get along great when you don't drink. It might be worth a shot. I says, how about me? I says, I'll go. I'll go. The Girl Scouts, the Boy Scouts, I don't want a divorce. She says, they don't make anything help people like you. You're crazy. Went in the house. Friday night, we went to our, quote, first AA meeting.

I'm 28, he's 26. Who the hell can tell you anything when you're 28 years old? You've been at two county fairs. You've been around the block. You know, you're streetwise. You know all the answers. Two things I do know is I don't like or trust people. Everybody's a phony. Everybody's out for what they can get. And I'm going to sucker you before you sucker me. You live in the streets, you think like the streets.

I didn't know there were people like I met here. I didn't know there were people who put their hand out to help you. I didn't know there were people that got their, one of their greatest joys out of watching a new man stay sober. Do you know that? Brings happiness and joy into their life when they see a new man making it. Why do you think we get up here? Why do you think I'm up here? Why do you think they build these tents and build this place and mow the lawn and make the food to let you know how, it's their way of saying, thank you, God, for sobriety.

Let me help somebody else. Let me show them what it can be. Let me show them what life can be. Let me show them what life can be. That's why we do it. And it helps us from going back because any one of us can go back. I've seen people with 30 years think they didn't need meetings anymore and they throw their world by the tail and now they got it whipped and they stopped in for one. Three weeks later, they've blown their brains out.

Fifty-three, sixty-three people in my group, small Avon Lake Friday since I've been around, are dead now. Thought they could drink again. We're not playing games, people. This is life and death. Don't ever think it isn't. It's life and death. It's a miserable way to go. Or better yet, you don't die and you live like a zombie. Friday night, we're going to this AA meeting. I walk in the doors of this swinging church.

It's a cafeteria-type room in Avon Lake. I look around the room. There's 20 or 30 people there. My God, they're all old. And dressed nice. They're all dressed nice. They're all dressed nice. My God, they're all old. And dressed nice. I thought I was at a PTA meeting. Look at them. Where the hell did they ever drink? Guys there with their wives, talking to their wives.

[00:35:01]

Who the hell talks to their wife? My wife and I don't talk. We can't spend five minutes together without being in each other's throat. One guy breaks away from five or six of them having coffee. He's got to be 105 years old. He comes running over. He puts out his hand. He says, welcome. It's so good to see you young fellas. This program works, fellas. I haven't had a drink in 16 years. 16 years. My legs got weak.

My brother-in-law says, you got to be awful thirsty, mister. Who the hell ever heard of not drinking for 16 years? I beg you, don't talk years. Talk days, hours, and minutes because that's how you're going to do it. And sometimes you're going to hang on by your fingernails. But I guarantee it's worth it. I guarantee it's worth it. I promise you, you'll get a new brain. You'll look at things entirely different.

You'll look at the world entirely different. You'll look at people entirely different. And you'll feel entirely different because you're a different person. Because the old one dies. As long as we come here and take our medicine. He started telling us about this great life we're going to find. I thought, oh my God. Here I am in a Protestant church listening to this, some kind of cult. That's not me, mister.

Him. He's getting divorced. And he got a drunken driving charge. I come to help him. Took Bob over to corn. I went over. Got a half a cup of coffee. And they're telling jokes about drunken driving charges. Jokes. People, there's nothing funny about a drunken driving charge. I thought I was in Looney Tune land listening to these people laughing about drunken driving charges. Then they announced the lead.

Oh boy, here's the Messiah. Here's the guy who's going to touch us on the head and make us all well. My brother-in-law and I, we got up and sat way on the side. Well, hunkies don't join things. I'm looking you over. And I'm not too impressed. Guy gets up here with a brand new suit and a white shirt and tie. God, he looks so cute. And he had a little cake. One candle. It was his first anniversary. It was his first lead.

He stands up here and he says, looks at his wife. He says, hi, honey. I love you. She stands up and says, I love you too. My brother-in-law poked me. My brother-in-law poked me. He says, what the hell are we doing here? I said, I don't know. My wife's home lighting candles. Dear God, let him die. We'll get the insurance. That's where we were. There was no I love you in our house. Second thing I hear, isn't it great to be sober?

I got up this morning and I could smell the flowers. My brother-in-law said, don't poke me again. Don't poke me again. He says, God, I couldn't wait. Will you people please get done? I want to get the hell out of here. You know what I got out of that meeting? If I come here for a year, you're going to give me a cake. I'm going to smell flowers. You'll go, what the hell kind of world you live in? I got problems, Phil.

I can't get a job. They're shutting off the gas. I haven't even got money to go to work and put gas in the car. I got a wife divorced me. I'm going to jail next week. And I come here for help, and you're telling me I'm going to smell flowers? You can go pound salt. I start towards the door as quick as I could. And at the door was Big John, John M. Maybe 50 years old, 6 foot 3, about 220, good shape, good shape.

Don't take his eyes off me. I figure, oh, that's how it works. In order to drink tonight, you've got to pass John, and he looks in pretty good shape. I got near John. He put out his hand. He says, hello, young fellow. I says, hello. And they don't let go of your hand. Don't let go. Told my whole story in five minutes. From drunken driving to divorces to losing jobs to sleeping in the streets. Did you know I know that?

I says, yeah, my wife told you. He says, no, no. He says, that's where I was. There's people in here that come out of straps. There's people in here come out of hospitals. People in here come out of prisons. People in here come out of $500,000 homes on the lake, living like zombies. But you do yourself a favor, young fellow. You bring the body here, and the mind will catch up. Bring the body here, the mind will catch up.

How do you explain eyes? How do you explain to a new person eyes? What impressed me? His eyes. He had strong eyes. He knew where he was, where he was going, and what he was doing. How do you get that strength? Seemed comfortable in his own skin.

[00:40:01]

How do you get that? People talk to you and not at you. If you're an outlier, you know what I'm talking about. All my life, I got people talking at me. Why can't you drink like so-and-so? Why can't you be like so-and-so? Like you're some kind of moral degenerate. These people talk to me. And I got the feeling they like you. Know why? Because they look past the wall. They look past the wall. They know what's going on underneath, because they were where you are.

That's why it works. That's why it works. They know you don't want to be there, but you don't know any way out. We do. Put your feet where we put ours. Keep it simple. Put your feet where we put ours. And put your knees where we put ours. Watch what happens. Watch what happens. John introduced me to two other men. Same thing, good eyes. On the way home, I said, what do you think, Bob? He said, I'm too young.

I got too much living to do. I said, Bob, I met some guys I like. Damn it, I'm going to find out what they got. I met three guys I like there. He's not me. He says, I know where to go if I get in trouble. Eighteen months, they put him in a white coat. Laid in straps. I come back to your meetings, and I listen to you, what I call your success stories. Yeah, I drank wine. I slept in the streets. I lost a wife.

I lost a business. The kids don't talk to me. Nothing happened. Almost died. I come in AA. I'm sober six months. I got six Cadillacs now. I sit out there and say bullshit. I leave the meeting. I go home, and the wife says, hi, honey, how'd the meeting go? What do you mean, how'd the meeting go? I'm sober. What more do you want? Good AA. Solid AA. Keep the kids quiet. You know, if the kids make noise, I'll get nervous and drink.

And I got to have breakfast. You better have breakfast on the table in the morning, or it'll be your fault if I drink. Oh, do us a favor. Go get drunk for crying out loud. Just get out of our… Meetings, meetings. 90 days, 90… I don't know. I don't know. We went to meetings, period. You get in the car. I thought the first step was get in the car. If you would have asked me what's the first step of AA, I would have said get in the car.

Then I had the Irish guy say, what's the second step? I said, what? He says, get out of the car. The hell? That's what you do. You get in the car. Pull in your driveway. Beep, beep. Get in the car. I remember one night, I waited, and the guy come in the house, and I says, I can't go tonight. I got to stay home with the wife and kids. That's about four months. And my daughter was four years old. She come running out.

She says, here's your clothes, Daddy. Please go, Daddy. And I said, here's your clothes, Daddy. Please go, Daddy. We love it when you go. Take my daddy to those meetings. Go to meeting. Meeting, meeting. God almighty. Things home are not good, people. I was sleeping on the couch. I could have been a priest. Crying out loud. There was no respect. There was no love. There was no nothing. No trust. We were together for survival.

We couldn't afford a divorce. If we could afford a divorce, we would have been divorced. I go to a meeting. Oh, God almighty. See, so many things, and you just don't have time. You just don't have time. After four months, I decide that my problem isn't booze. It's money. It's money. It's money. If I had enough money to do the things I want to do and pay the bills and drink the way I want to drink, I'd be fine.

So I heard about a job in South Dakota, and out I went. 712s we were working, and as a result of a good apprenticeship, they put me in charge of the Titan II fuel systems. Made a lot of money. Anytime somebody worked, I got paid. As superintendent, I got paid. No place to live. There were 2,000 guys out there. But one of the local men said, Tom, there's a ranch, a 300-acre ranch for a lease. The husband passed away, and the wife's going to live with her daughter, and you can rent the place.

I said, I'll take it. Sight unseen, I'll take it. Used to be a chicken ranch. Right at the base of Bear Butte Mountain, if any of you are familiar with that area near Rapid City, near Sturgis. Called the wife. I says, come on out. I says, the kids are going to love it. I says, you can hunt deer right on the property. Rabbits, rabbits the size of kangaroos. here right on the property, rabbits, rabbits the size of kangaroos out there, I got a hunched pheasant with a single shot .22 rifle, that's how many damn things there were, she's your

[00:45:04]

drink and I says no, she's okay we'll be out, Tommy gets out of school in June and we'll be out, things are going so good I stopped in for a shot and a beer just cause everything was so great and that was the beginning of everything I heard that happened to other people that never happened to me, it's like a grease slide people, like a grease slide, she come out in June, she stayed till Christmas, once the cops called to come in and get me in town I was in jail and she started in and hit a whiteout, went off the road, she got out of the car to try to get some help, she couldn't see, her eyes froze shut, a fuel oil truck found her on the road, if a fuel oil truck don't find my wife, my wife and kids are dead, I'm in jail, I don't know from nothing, that's how we lived, twice that happened, I come home, I come home one time and there's a note at the table, took all I can take, we're gone, I lost the job cause I couldn't make it to work, so I'm back welding, I throw the hood down, I hear Christmas carols in February, guy says to me, Tommy says, I'm going home, why don't you come with me, I get to the back door in Avon Lake and she says I don't want the kids to see you, I don't want to see you, just get out of our lives, I'll send the papers to your mother's home in New York, I get to New York, I'm too sick to work, I had a ticket to go to work, I couldn't go to work, I was too sick, I stopped in for a couple of drinks, now you're sleeping in the subways, airways, hallways, sleep in any damn place you can, used to say I never drink wine, you'll drink any damn thing you get your hands on, you get sick enough, I wake up one night, or day, I don't know, it's dark and I'm in a dark hallway on Coney Island Avenue and I hear a woman sobbing, God Almighty, never heard anything like it since or before, it's my mother, my God son, you're breaking my heart, will you please go get help, please, I said mom, I'm fine, she says fine, you look like death warmed over, you're killing me, that's drinking living, 30 year old guy, his mother, same guy, let me show you a sober living, same guy, gets in AA, always was a good mechanic but he didn't know the business end of the business, but in AA he meets people that do know the business end, he meets lawyers and attorneys and estimators and they teach him what to read and teach him what to study and he goes in the business with his two sons, mechanical piping, in a matter of less than two years we got 29 guys working for us and I'm making more money than I ever made in my life, not big to some people but to me it was big, I get down, I'm sober about 10 or 12 years, I get down to visit my sponsor in Florida, Fort Myers, he retired, he moved down to Fort Myers, down there, it was 78 degrees, as can you imagine this, 78 degrees, my mom and dad are up in New York freezing, he's Tommy, there's a place for sale around the corner, I went around the corner and I bought it, went to New York, got my mom and dad, took him down to Florida, my mother's in the kitchen crying, but they're tears of joy, look what Tommy did, oh Tommy, she's calling her brothers and friends, she'll have everybody in Brooklyn, in Florida for crazy, but that's the difference, AA did it, not Tommy, without AA, Tommy couldn't have bought her a toothpick, thank you AA, thank you God, you think getting things a good way, do you start giving, you don't know what life's all about till you start giving, my God, everything you give you swell up, thank you God, just good for you, I used to think my problem was money, always worried about money, my God, Social Security's gonna go broke, I'm gonna be blah, blah, blah, I come here, you teach me how to live, I got enough money to live the rest of my life, if I die tomorrow, but that's, you don't worry about it anymore, hell with it, you do what you're supposed to do, then they're taken care of, I leave that hallway, I was gonna commit suicide, death looked easier than living, I get down to the 3rd Avenue L, and I'm gonna jump, and I look down, and I see those great big boulders at the bottom where that steel goes down, and I had a spiritual awakening, something said, Tommy suppose you hit the rocks and don't die, oh God, that's gonna hurt, that's gonna hurt bad, I don't want to hurt, I don't know why any out he wants to hurt, finally my wife sends me money to come home, cuz she was

[00:50:06]

trying to raise four kids, back in nursing training, working as a waitress, and trying to raise kids, it's a rough go people, if I got home, maybe I go to work and help around, I get home, I sweat it out for five days on a couch, I shake apart, go down the hall, they hide me in the mill for three days, I get a check, I stop in the cash, and have a drink, and wake up in jail, I went home wrecked the house, blackout, broke furniture, it's a mess, wake up, my brother-in-law walks in the jail, and looks at me, and even him, I gotta put up my wall, we can't let people in, I can't let you know I'm afraid, that's Bob, can you imagine I'm in jail again, he's gonna imagine you're in jail again, and he laughed at me, I used to drink with, of course I can imagine you're in jail again, you're nuts, you're just like me, just like me, you're an alcoholic, you're just like me, underneath with so much alike, it's frightening, Tommy, I haven't had a drink in eight days, I got out of detox, got out of straps, I go to two meetings a day, if they don't send you away, I'll take you to a meeting tonight, they put me on probation, and I went home, and he come with another man, and they took me to Lorraine St. Mary's, I can't tell you a thing about the lead, I remember sitting at a table, and inside I'm screaming, dear God, I'm not like these people, I have to drink God, if I don't drink, I'll crack, I gotta drink, I don't know how they do it, but I gotta, please help me, a man sits down, how you doing young fella, I says fine, fine, always fine, can't let you in, on the way home, the man had become my sponsor, shook hands with another man, he said I'll see you next week, I said how do you know that, how do you know you're gonna see him next week, how do you know you're gonna be sober next week, I don't even know if I can make it home tonight, he's back off and come with me, and we went to a drugstore, we got vitamin B, karo syrup, orange juice, and honey, went to my kitchen table, he poured out the vitamin B pills, mixed the honey and the orange juice, he said take them and drink that, you talk about a third step, turn your life over to power, I turned my life over to him, he had the good eyes, and he talked to me, not at me, and whatever he was sober 12 years, and whatever he wanted me to do, I was gonna do, cuz he had the secret, 10 after 12, he's have a drink today, I says no, he says you got it, I said got what, he's you got the program, he says there's more, you're not ready, he says I'll see you at 8 o'clock in the morning, he's you realize you're gonna have 1 third of today in, I beg you keep it simple, you know what 48 years has took me, taken me to, you wanna know my whole program, I get up in the morning, I say dear God, run the head, I'll move the feet, that's it, you run the head God, I'll move the feet, you let me run the head, I'll screw up a pre-lunch, as long as I can remember that, I'm fine, I got so much faith in this program, and it's God, I found that nothing can, nothing can hurt, nothing can hurt me, as long as he runs the head, I gotta do my part, I gotta move the feet, Moe Jody used to say if you want potatoes, you can pray all you want, but you better get a hole, get a hole, oh God, 8 o'clock in the morning, the man was at my door, took me down to Stella Maris, got me a shot of vitamin B, we went to two discussion groups, and we started the meetings again, the meetings, the meetings, the meetings, constantly meetings, stepping on the couch, go to a meeting one night, they say, any anniversaries, and somebody said, Tom sober year, everybody clapped, ring, boy, I gotta hit that thing, I'm driving home, this guy says, hey Tom, are you still on the couch, I said, oh yeah, how come, well, there's nothing left, as soon as we get out of debt and probably get divorced, you put her on the couch for crying out loud, you work, what the hell are you doing on the couch, damn right, okay, I'll tell her that tonight, other guy says, you're still broke, I says, yeah, I'm still broke, you've been giving us 40 hour a week checks for a year, and you're still broke, yeah, the hell's the matter with you, she's probably on dope, she don't know how to handle money, you better handle the money, damn right, I'll tell her that, I'm the only one in the car, there's nobody else in the car, I have conversations with crazy people, you should see me, oh, Tommy, you're gonna leave out in Las Vegas next week, why don't you bring about five grand, stay out there a week or two, you'll probably win 50, oh yeah, that's a great idea, dumb son of a, still crazy, still sick, I'll be sick the day you put

[00:55:07]

me in a box, I walk in the house and she's sitting in the living room reading them communist books, that's all she ever does, read them damn books, there's no game rules, from now on, you sleep on the couch, she looks, and from now on, I'm gonna handle the money, whoa, that's what they say, whoa, what do you mean, whoa, do you know what today is, do I know what today is, go out in the kitchen, look at the calendar, around the kitchen, great big red circle, Tom sober, one year, two days, still crazy, comes out, she says, you know, I used to think our problem was booze, I used to think you rot and rave because the booze made you crazy, but you haven't had a drink in a year, Tommy, I know that, you're still a self-centered, selfish baby, I want my maple, I gotta get rid of you, Tommy, I gotta divorce you, for my sanity and for the kids' sanity, I gotta divorce you, I'm fed up with being your whipping post, I went to a meeting, I grabbed you all the time, you lied to me, you told me things were gonna be different, they're not different, no, they said, you're gonna be different, then you make things better, when you're gonna grow up, I went to a meeting, I was sober about 15 months, people, a guy got up here, he was sober 6 years, and him and the wife and two kids were going on a vacation, she was sitting in the audience, looking at him like he was some kind of a movie star, and he had the same job for 6 years, they just got a new apartment, they got a new refrigerator, they were still in debt, still had problems, but they were working their way out, they were going on their first family vacation in Wattsboro Lake, Tennessee, with a houseboat, and I sat out there and I said, when is my life gonna get like that, when are my kids gonna be with me, when does it get good, when does not drinking stop being a fight, he said, take it home, now you hear a lot of people take it home, I'm not saying take it home, because I think I'm a marriage counselor, you'll hear old timers tell you, take it home, because we know it's easier to stay sober when things at home are good, when you're sleeping in your own bed and the kids are jumping on you saying they love you, it's easier to stay sober, when there's an out for dinner once in a while and a show, it's easier, it's got to be payoffs, it's got to be better than the other way, you wouldn't do it, it's better, I sat down with a bunch of old timers, I said, don't tell me to do something, now tell me how, how do you take the program home, how do you do that, when was the last time you said thanks for a nice supper, what do you mean thanks for a nice supper, I bought the food, when was the last time you called up and said, honey, don't cook tonight, I'm taking you, no, never, I might have been sober 14 months, but I never thought of anybody but me, me, me, me, selfish, scented, son of a, guys grabbed me by the shoulders, Tommy, can I talk to you over there a minute, I thought he needed some advice, I said, yeah, sure, you, dumb son, when are you going to grow up, a little over a year ago you were sleeping in the weeds, did you forget that, now you have a warm bed, you have a few pennies in your pocket, you have a job, you have a wife, you have your kids, you have more blessings you'll ever deserve, when are you going to learn how to say thank you, God, for the things you have, stop moaning, groaning about the things you want, we have four absolute B., one of them is unselfishness, put it in your life, think of somebody else at once, if you think you can, try it, ain't walked away, because I got to do something, I got to do something, I don't know what the hell I got to do, yo, yo, yo, don't know from nothing, I stop at a Lawson's store, I buy a box of chocolate covered cherries, $1.89, can you imagine that big deal, huh, $1.89 and a card that you give somebody that was in the hospital, thanks for being there when I needed you, love, Tom, yo, yo, yo, from the street, I'm going to be a lover, I get to the back door of the house, I don't even have, she's in the living room, I don't even have the guts to give it to her, I put it on the kitchen table, I walked in the living room, I says, Glenn, can I have a couple of minutes of your time, can you imagine, talking to her like she had a brain, we call it making amends, first time I thought of somebody else, I says, Glenn, I heard a guy talk tonight, damn it, I want to be like him, do you know they're going on vacation, honey, I want us to go on vacations, and they got decent clothes, Patients. And they got decent clothes, and they're living good. And I say, yeah, they got problems like we have, but they're working through it, and things are going good for them. And I want that for us. I'm going to change, Glenn. If I don't change, I'll leave.

[01:00:03]

But if I do, we might make it and have a hell of a life. She smiled. She said, who led the meeting? Jesus. So I make some coffee. She went out in the kitchen, and within two minutes, I heard her crying. I went out in the kitchen. She had the card and the candy, and Joe Hardgal lost it. Tears like the damned. We sat at the kitchen table, and we talked till 3 o'clock in the morning. Can you imagine? Because I listened. For the first time I listened, yeah, you have a brain. Yeah, you have feelings. I didn't drink to hurt your feelings. Got out the bills. Ten a week in this one, 20 a week in that one, 30 a week in this one.

I got home about 16, 17 months, and she says, hey, B., see that 30 bucks on the kitchen table? I says, yeah. She says, that's ours. That's our $30, B.. I took the kids in our new used station wagon, and we went out to Sandusky, Ohio on Route 250 to the Perkins Pancake House they used to be. I got a big booth, and my four-year-old daughter and my three sons, and here's people who wouldn't be in the same room with me. Sat in this booth, and my daughter come around, and she says, Daddy, can I have some more strawberries?

I says, Corrine, you can be a strawberry. My daughter kisses me and says, I love you, that's my AA, here and now, people. Not the here and now. Here and now. My sons run to the car, because they want to get in the front and be with me. Kids that wouldn't be in the same room with me now want to be with me. That's my AA. Our first vacation, Wattsboro Lake, Tennessee. Took the kids down there. My daughter was driving this, what was it, about 40 feet, this motorhome? Here she is driving the motorhome. We're out on the islands out there, down there. It starts. I get a call about midnight from my sponsor. He says, pick me up, it's about time you did some 12-step work. I'll wrap this up, tell you what happens when you forget yourself. When they say the easiest way to stay sober is help another drunk, they know what they're talking about. We go to a house, a little summer cottage.

Mighty two kids, four, six years old, sneakers and underwear. This is wintertime. They're crying and cold. She's up at the kitchen sink with a bruise on her face. He's in on the couch like a lump. She says, my husband's dead. He asked me to call and he died. I go in the living room and I pick him up. I shake him and listen for a breath, listen, nothing. How's you, son? Why'd you have to die on my first 12-step call? What am I going to tell the guys Friday night? I went to help a drunk and he's dead. I'm back out in the kitchen and I says, hey Bill, this guy here, does he have anything in the house to drink? She said, a bottle of wine. He went in the sink and gave him the wine.

He walked in the living room with a glass, hit them together and says, hey buddy, want a drink? He sat right up, gave him a glass of wine. He drank it halfway down and he took the glass and this guy's eyes opened that wide. He filled it again and gave it to him. That's what impresses a drunk. Wow, you guys are all right. Damn right. Want to go to a party with us? Yeah. Bayview Hospital, down the ramp.

I had to give him a shower. I gave him a shower because my sponsor said give him a shower. Give him a shower. I didn't want to give him a shower, but I gave him a shower. I get home five at night. Five in the morning. I go to work. I get home at five at night. I don't even want to eat. I'm going to take a shower and go to bed. I'm going into the bedroom. The phone rings. It's the old-timer. He says, did you stop and see the new man?

I said, no, I didn't stop and see the new man. We'll go down and see the new man. I said, I work. I'm not retired. I'm going to bed. He said, no, you're not. You're going down to see the new man. I said, no, I'm not. I don't like the new man. It has nothing to do with liking or not liking. He's going to be there five days. You go down there. I says, Bill, I don't know what to tell him. He says, who the hell says you got to tell him anything?

Can you sit by his bed and bring him some cigarettes and let him know somebody cares enough to be there? Can you do that? I stopped. I bought some cigarettes. I went to the hospital. I walked into his room. Here he is. Hi, how you doing? You all right? They treating you all right? There's no secret to sponsorship. Just remember how you felt when you were where he is. Don't talk to him from up here. Talk to him from where you were.

He understands that. I said, I bet you don't know where you are or how you got here. He said, how do you know that?

[01:05:06]

I said, because I woke up in jail about a year and a half ago, and I didn't know how I got there. You know? You know. Now you got sponsorship. You didn't read. You didn't have a friend that did it. You didn't hear that. You were there, and you found a way out. We got tight instantly. Every day I went to see him. I got out of the hospital. I took him to meetings, meetings. My sponsor was putting groceries in his home so the kids could eat. You don't hear about those things.

Meetings, meetings, meetings, meetings. I pick him up. Three months or so, he gets in my car. I'm his sponsor. He says, did you read the 24-hour book today? I says, no, I didn't read the 24-hour book today. Oh, that 24-hour book is great. Oh, so I went and I bought a 24-hour book. I read yesterday, tomorrow, next month. Wait till he asks me about this damn book tomorrow. I'll know all about this book. Five months, gets in my car. He says, fifth chapter blows your mind, don't it? I bought a big book.

I hope to God you get into it long before I did, people. Please do. But I could read. I read this power. If you would have gave me the big book because I hear this, keep you sober. I read this power. By the time I got to this one, I could not tell you what was in that one. I had scrambled legs for a brain. I got AA in church basements, cars, kitchens, and all-night restaurants, and going down and listening to Sister Ignatia talk to new people.

And everything come from here, not here. Feel. Feel. I know the fear. You don't have to be there. You don't have to stay there. Eight months, I get a call from this guy's wife, and she's crying. She says, Tommy, can you please come down the house? I said, I'll break his legs, that son of a gun's drinking. That's what I thought. After all I did. See, when you knew, you'd think you were doing it. Keep you sober.

I got down there, a screen door slams. A woman takes my hands, puts them behind my back, and kisses me on the cheek, and she says, God bless you, Tom B., and God bless AA. Two kids come. Uncle Tom, Uncle Tom. Now I'm Uncle Tom. Pull me into a house. This guy's standing next to the bed. The bed has slips, and dresses, and Levi's, and sneakers, two bicycles, refrigerator full of food. They went Christmas shopping in June. He borrowed $1,200 from the credit union, and that family went out. And you want to see AA? Watch a six-year-old kid with a new pair of pants jumping up and down saying, look what my daddy got me.

Looking at his daddy like he's Superman. That's my AA. The results of the 12 steps. The results of it. He's crying. I start tearing up. I'm not a hugger. I don't like hugging, but I hugged him. And I left, because I didn't want to see me crying. I got in the car, and that's when the first time it hit me when I found a God that I understand. Dear God, I says, I love this. You keep putting me where you want me, God. I'll move the feet. You just keep telling me what to say and what to do. I'll do it. I'm at home. I said, my God, honey, you should see those kids. She says, yeah, and I've never seen you so happy. You want to get happy? Forget yourself.

The man and the people who put this together are happy, because they weren't thinking about themselves when they're putting up the tent. They're thinking, gee, if it rains, we got to have people under. They're worried about. You're learning how to. What you do is more important than you. Anybody gets up here and speaks, the only thing he's thinking of or she's thinking of is, I hope there's a new person that just grabs it. Not thinking of who we're impressing or whatever. No, I hope somebody takes something home. That's what you're hoping.

You get through another day. One day. That's all. 23 years. My life is great. My business is good. My daughter goes to work. She comes in the program. She had three years. She goes to work for an advertising agency. They give her the Coca-Cola account. She's traveling all over the country. My two sons are in business with me. Things are going great. My other son's building homes. He's doing great. I'm going around the country telling everybody about this great God. Wonderful God.

Wonderful AA. Things couldn't be better. Isn't it great? My daughter comes home. She said, Daddy, my next assignment is in Florida, and I don't want anybody touching my antiques. Company trucks, load them up, bring them to Florida. Give her the little barn convertible, and the wife and I take it south of Miami somewhere. Beautiful place. God. Gates and there's swimming pools and old people and young people.

[01:10:09]

Cooks breakfast. Gives us letters telling us how beautiful her life is and how wonderful we are and how much she loves us. I drive home. We go and visit my sponsor. We visit my mom and dad, and we go home. Ten days later, a cop knocks on the door. He says, Mrs. B., I hate to tell you this, but your daughter was murdered. Now we'll see about what you believe. Now we'll see about this wonderful God and this wonderful life. Because I don't know what you would do, but I know what I'd do. I went out in the backyard. I said, God, you can go to hell. You let things like this happen. God gets blamed for a lot of things. He says, don't do it. But you let this happen? You let my daughter get murdered by some drug addict who needed money for drugs and robbed her? And she wakes up and he kills her? You let that happen?

I'm going to go to Florida. I'm going to find somebody. I'm going to blow his goddamn head off. Then I'm going to try to find you, and if you're there, I'll blow your head off. And I start. I cut off all spiritual contacts. I would be at a meeting. The only reason I didn't drink is my daughter loved my sobriety so much, I didn't have the heart to drink. All I could think of was killing somebody. And in three years, they find them. I'm from here to you, away from them, and two detectives with me, and I got my pipe shaved down to a razor, but I can't get at them because I'm a cop. One detective from New York says, Tommy, don't do anything foolish. I'll have to shoot you. He's let us handle it. I get home, and the only thing I'm thinking about is I got to get at them. I'll go to Florida, start an AA group, go to the jail, and when he comes to that meeting, I'll kill him. You get sick. Eat you up like a cancer. Go from 200 to 130. You get in a car to go to work, and you forget where you are. You're just crying. In three years, you're in the kitchen. Your wife comes in. You can't remember her name, and you don't know why you're in the kitchen. The only thing you say is, get out. I don't want you near me. She goes and gets your son, who had five years of sobriety at that time, and a friend of his. They're both over 300 pounds. Come to the house. My son says, Dad, just because you're sober 23 years don't mean you can't crack up. Come with me. We're going to the hospital. We're in the doctor's. He says, how are you feeling, Mr. B.? I said, I don't care if I live or die. Never say that to a doctor. They want to put you in a little room. I put my dad in any room. They call a family physician.

They put me in a St. John's. I got people for 10 days. I got people coming in from all over the country telling me, you got to pray for him. You got to forgive him. Forgive him. I'll kill him. Then I'll forgive him. Nothing's working. I go home for a weekend. I see my daughter's picture. I crack up again. Back in the hospital. Show you how strong this program is. Let me show you what you're dealing with here. My son walks in the room. He's got five years of sobriety. He says, Dad, these people may help you physically. They may help you mentally. But I'm going to help you spiritually, Daddy, in this program. As you take your God, your program, and stick it, get the hell out of here with it. I says, he killed my daughter. My son picks me up. He's, where'd you get that sick God? Don't blame my God for killing my sister. My God don't kill.

Let's take a look at the people in AA come back from the dead. Is that a killing God? Look in the eyes of the kids, of the children of Alki's that are well again. Look at my kids, Daddy. Is that a killing God? My God cried. My God cried when my sister was murdered. Not only did he cry for my sister, he cried for the young man that killed her, because that's his son, Dad. I don't know where you got that sick God, but why don't you take and borrow mine for a while? He'll make you well, Dad. I don't know why it happens.

Someday maybe I will, but till then, he'll make you well, Dad. Stick with him. My son sponsored me for three years. He was like a mother hen. We'd be at business meetings and they ask about the job schedules. I would light my pipe. My son would answer all the questions. Nobody even knew I was sick. You don't know I'm sick now, do you? For those of you who lost children or loved ones, please talk to them. I spent more time with my daughter now than I did when she was here. I talk to her every day. I don't hear her voice, but I get her thoughts.

Like now, sit down, Wendy. That's what she's saying. Sit down, Wendy. You're talking too long. Thank you, people.