Uh, the, uh, Nevada song, but we thought people might think we’re a little weird, so we didn’t do that. But at this time, we’ll get on with the meeting. I’d like to introduce Dottie from, uh, North Hollywood. I’m an alcoholic, and my name is Dottie Shore. Hi. Hi. Wow. Lot of you guys out there, aren’t there? How many alcoholics out there tonight? All right. How many Al-Anons? All right. Any Alateens out there? How many civilians are out there? First, I wanna be sure and thank the committee for the privilege, and believe me, it’s a deep privilege for me to be here. And I wanna especially thank Becky. She is my hostess, and I’ve done a lot of speaking around the country, and I found no one that’s been nicer to me than she has. Who.. Is somebody trying to talk over me? It’s my turn. Shut up. Becky actually has gone above and beyond the call of duty to take care of me, and I wanna really acknowledge her. She’s been darling.

You know, people in Oregon love me, and I think it’s ’cause I love Oregon so much. I’ve done a tremendous amount of speaking and leading of retreats around the Portland area, and I led one up here. This is the first time I’ve spoken in Eugene, and I’m so pleased, and I thank you from the bottom of my heart. You know, it still amazes me that people ask me to speak and pay my way. For years they used to say, “For God’s sake, Dottie, shut up.” You get sober, and now they pay you to come up and speak. You know? Everything changes. It’s really wonderful. You know, when you’ve been around the program for a little while, and you hear the steps read over and over and over, and you hear the 12 traditions read over and over and over, if you’re not careful, you go someplace in your mind. Now, I’m not self-obsessed. You understand that, don’t you? But I’m usually thinking about me. And a couple years ago, um, they had read the whole 12 steps, and I hadn’t heard one word, and I– kind of scared me.

I thought, “Hey, you know, that’s what got you sober.” So I kinda made a vow to myself that night that I would close my eyes, and I would listen. And if you love the steps and the traditions like I do, you read them well, and you put a different emphasis on a word maybe that I hadn’t thought of. So the first night that I made this vow, I closed my eyes, and I was to hear someone read, “The only requirement for AA membership is a desire to stop stinking.” Oh, I thought that was very interesting. Later, I heard someone say, “Animosity is the spiritual foundation of our tradition.” And the leader said, “We’ll now have Joe read the 12 positions of Alcoholics Anonymous.” Please know I’m not making fun of anyone, but the thing I love is that they keep right on reading. They don’t even know they’ve said these things. And I’ll probably say something up here tonight that I, I probably shouldn’t say.