Hi, everybody. Decent thing for me to do after all the nice things that were pretty said was to die, probably. Well, I didn’t prepare anything exactly. I got some old notes here. I figure, well, what the hell are you trying here if I get killed on the way up here? Look at the time I wasted. But I don’t think that those of us in AA ever have to prepare anything. We’ve been there. We’ve been on both sides of the road. And it’s times like this that I had wished God had put a window in my heart so that you see how grateful and happy I am to be here at your fourth anniversary. To me, it’s a great tribute to any one person that is asked to talk at a anniversary meeting. I think there is something special in each of our lives because I’m sure that those of you that have come through this, too, from the start and have had the tough times and the good times along the way have known what a tough struggle it is. And at times, you felt like giving up, no doubt about it.

But if I can remember back a little bit, that I was just glancing at in chapter two of the Big Book, there is a solution for you and I. Any time that we ever think that there isn’t, we better go back and pick up the Big Book because we will find the answer there if we look for it. It’s entirely up to you and me to get out of this thing just what we want. If you’re new here, believe me, we’d like to welcome you to the finest way of life on this earth because you can accept or reject. It’s entirely up to you. If you like what we got and you want it, it’s for you for free. There’s no charge. There’s no price tag on this thing. It can’t be bought. And most of the people that’s in it can’t be bought. Now, when we were drinking and sitting on the barstool alongside of some of you same people, we could be bought then. We’d sell our souls for a drink of whiskey. Oh, many times. We’ve all done it. Maybe you haven’t in your way of thinking.

But I think if we take a soul-searching inventory, we will find that we have because I think that there’s some place in the Bible that says man will destroy himself. What is the alcoholic doing when he drinks but destroying himself? The slow torture. I know of these, where these torture chambers and everything that they have. Well, I don’t think there’s any more torture than the torture that the alcoholic goes through. I don’t think there’s anything worse than the hangover, the sickness that the alcoholic has. And believe me, it is a sickness. It’s, uh, very, very many emotions to it. The alcoholic’s emotions are like a mixed-up ball of steel wool. When we’re sober and throw a little whiskey into it, then, brother, we really get off. We really get mixed up. We’ll get mad. We’ll get crying, or we’ll be trying to make love at the same time. You talk about a mix-up of emotions. Brother, we got them, believe me on that.