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Source: Gene B. & Jak B – Houston Tx 1959 – Reel 0805-55B – Date Unknown.mp3 File: gene-b-and-jak-b-houston-tx-1959-reel-0805-55b-date-unknown.mp3 Duration: 00:54:29
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So I'll turn the meeting now over to Father Mack. I am Father Mack and a member of Alcoholics Anonymous. And when Pat Fee asked me a week ago if I'd be responsible for the program, I never knew, boys, it was going to turn out like this. They say, ask and you shall receive, and I asked, and I'm very happy, and I know you are, with what we got. In order that the program may go on, and as much time be allotted to them as possible, our speaker is Mr. Gene B.
I can't tell you how happy I am to be here this evening. This is a wonderful, wonderful group, believe me. We had the privilege of meeting Father Mack today, and I must tell you this little story. My friend Jack called me into the room today and he said, I have someone for you to meet. And I looked up and I saw the man of cloth standing there, and he said, he's here to check up on you as to why you haven't been to church since you've been on the road.
And I started to hum and haw, and I had a few excuses in the back of my head that came automatically, and Father said, and there's another question I want to ask, are you having any trouble? And that's all the further he had to go, and I said, my God, he's one of us. What a relief. I thought I was just going to, you know, get taken over the coast for not going to church, and I found out that he's an AA, and that's wonderful.
I'll be very brief. I'm only going to start in about halfway through my life tonight. Usually I start when I was born. But I had the usual problems. You know, lately there is a trend where we come from. People get up and they say I had an unforgiving mother. That's why I'm an alcoholic. Or I hated my brother, or some silly thing like that. Well, I was an only child. I had a doting mother. I got married way too young, and I had children before I knew what it was all about.
I had everything. But the main thing was that I couldn't handle booze. That's what it all boils down to. No matter how far you go back, you just can't drink, period. Where the dividing line happened from the time I stopped being a social drinker and became an alcoholic, I can't actually tell you, but I do pinpoint it in one respect. I was living in Chicago, and I was doing a lot of soap operas at the time over radio, and one of my biggest sponsors was Procter & Gamble.
Now, I had a big responsibility to Procter & Gamble, and there were many mornings that I woke up and I did not feel very well, to put it mildly. So this one morning I got up, and suddenly a drunken rationalization came to my mind. As only an alcoholic can, I suddenly said to myself, this is not fair to Procter & Gamble, that I should go down and try to do their shows feeling as I do. So I think I'll have a drink.
So actually, my first drink in the morning was taken for a good old P&G. And I went along rationalizing that for a long time. I might say to you ladies in the audience that remember the heyday of the soap opera that, believe me, we could have gotten some of those operations through the Dr. Brent performed a lot quicker if we could have just held him up to the microphone long enough to use the cell phone.
Now Perkins hadn't sold any lumber out of that lumber yard for 30 years, but those were great days in Chicago. Everybody drank. I left Chicago. I was married at the time. I had four children, and my wife had suddenly screamed at me in passing when she was a very neurotic woman. Not stable at all. And drunken bum was one of her favorite little things she called me. And she decided that she wanted to go to California.
Well, I couldn't think of anything better for her to do than get out of there anyway. So she took the children and went to California, and I set up a bachelor establishment in Chicago. Now there are just an awful lot of things that I did drunk that I don't like to remember, but I do like to remember that little part where I was alone in Chicago. Some of us have laughter memories anyway. Anyway, I wrote her and told her that I was cutting down on my liquor, and I was coming to the coast.
I didn't get any answer from her. Probably excited about my coming and all that. And I got off the train, and three days later she sued me for divorce, which was a pretty miserable thing to do to someone who had been as kind to her as I had up to that point.
[00:05:03]
But she did, and there again I was on the loose. I met my present wife to catch you up on my marital status, or the one I'm married to now. I don't know, that's not a good way to put it, is it? My wife. To show you how, how, what liquor will do for you. The first date I had with her, I told her I'd take her to the Coconut Grove Dancing. And she bought a new outfit, and we ended up on the shores of Malibu looking at an old tired seal in a tank.
The second date I told her I'd take her to the Ambassador, and she got another new outfit, and we ended up in a western theater throwing popcorn at the actors on the screen. The third date I took her to dinner, and after many drinks I leaned over across the table and gave her a peck on the cheek. And a friend of mine happened to be walking by, and he said, well, I didn't know you knew her that well, if I had a car.
I said, know her that well? Why, I know this girl. If I had a car, I'd whip her off to Mexico and marry her tonight. He had a car. I'll just go to show you what liquor will do if you don't watch it. I went from bad to worse. Let me tell you, I went to a doctor because I was very nervous and needed something. And the doctor examined me, and he said, you're in great shape. You're in wonderful shape. How old are you? And I said, 38.
He said, good. If you live till you're 40, I'll pay your funeral expenses. Scary to death, wasn't it? I went right out and got drunk. I took my whorl with a psychiatrist. And he called my wife later and said, if this man comes to me three times a week at $25 a visit for a year, I think we might be able to pull him out. Scary to death? I got drunk real quick. Because we're all funny. All AA's are rather odd.
I mean, O-D-D odd. For instance, if you were all sitting in this room, and you all started out that door, and every night you went out that door, there was a man with a baseball bat there, and he'd hit you on the head. Eventually, you would start going out that door, right? Not an AA, that door. An alcoholic will go that door, and if the man isn't there, you wait for him. We just don't want to quit.
We just don't want to give up. Because it's such a lot of fun to get sick every morning. I wonder sometimes if all of us realize the miracle, the real miracle of AA. This in itself tonight is a miracle. But let me tell you about one or two or three that happened in my life that I recognize as miracles in my life and my way of thinking. I had been on a five-day drunk. My wife had taken the keys to the car, and I was in my room.
I had reached what I consider the bottom of my mental barrel, because in my way of thinking there are two barrels, a physical barrel and a mental barrel. Physical barrel you learn to live in. Everybody gets sick every morning. This is easy. But when you hit the bottom of the mental barrel, then there's only one way to go, and that's up. And I woke up this one morning, and there I was. And without a moment's hesitation, I walked into the living room and said to Nancy, give me the keys to the car.
And she, without a moment's hesitation, reached in the drawer and handed me the keys. Why? She didn't know then. She didn't know that perhaps at that very moment she had been touched by a power that a hand had rested on her shoulder and said, let him go. He's all right. I woke up that afternoon. That was miracle one. I woke up that afternoon under an oxygen mask, and three men were looking at me that I had never seen before in my life.
Three men, complete strangers. And one of them looked at me and smiled and said, hi, Gene, we're from AA. We want to help. If you don't think that wasn't a miracle, for the first time a hand had been stretched out to me, a drunk that nobody wanted. And there was a helping hand, the fellowship of AA, which is another miracle. It has to be. Those men had to come with a great purpose and a great feeling in their hearts.
[00:10:01]
Those were miracles. The only time, as I look back on it now, and it's since I have been in AA, the only time that I have ever failed in anything I wanted to do was when I got in my own way, when I started back again running the show. And we all do it. You know, this is a strange thing. We get along, going fine, and pretty soon that I am comes in, and then I did, and aren't I wonderful, and then whoppo, down we go again.
And we get up on our feet and say, I beg your pardon, sir, what are the next orders? And then you get to go someplace. I sobered up, and three months after I sobered up, I lost everything I had in the way of work. This didn't really make an awful lot of sense, because I was doing what everybody wanted me to do, and yet it didn't work. And I rankled under. And I went back to doing something that I had done 25 years before, and I rankled under that until I came home one day, and another miracle happened.
When I walked into my wife and said, I have come to a great conclusion. I think I am doing maybe what I am cut out to do and what I'm supposed to do at this time in my life. And 24 hours later, the phone rang, and things began to move. I had gotten out of my own way. I had accepted what I was supposed to do at that time, and at that very moment, the way opened. I'm a great believer and a firm believer in my, I have come to this so late in life, it's like the man who first discovered the Christmas tree, but prayer is my life.
And I don't mean the kind that you get down on your knees and say, please, God, I would like John Jones in the corner of Fifth and Main tomorrow at noon so I can sell him $50,000 worth of insurance. Thank you. I don't mean that kind. I mean the kind that says, whatever it is, thy will be done. Let me have the courage and the wisdom to accept what is next for me in my life. This is a big order, and it's a hard thing to follow, but it's worthwhile.
I was very lucky. I didn't hit any old ladies with baby carriages. I didn't steal any money, except out of my wife's purse, which all of us did. That doesn't count. I didn't go to jail. Well, I did once, but it was not my fault. I was out on what we call the Sunset Strip out in Hollywood, and I was with a man who was very drunk. And he had the license to the car, and I didn't have a license, and I was afraid to drive, so we worked out what we considered a very equitable arrangement.
I worked the pedals and he steered. They frown on that sort of thing on the coast. And I ended up in the roost, and I did a pretty typical alcoholic thing. They gave me a nickel to call somebody, and who do you suppose I called? Admiral Ross McIntyre, the president's personal physician in the White House. There was no sense of my going to anybody but right to the top. Admiral McIntyre was busy and did not get back to me, and a kindly policeman came along and said, Dear God, don't you know anybody in town?
And I got out. I said I hadn't been in jail, but I'll guarantee you that each and every one of you have been in jail. You've been in a jail of your own making. It's a jail that you built bottle by bottle and drink by drink. And you stashed the key in a bottle and you hid the bottle and you didn't know where you put it and you didn't know how to get out. But thank God A.A. is the magic key that opens all jails that you build for yourself or for your loved ones.
I'd like to close with one little thought. I had a baby not too long ago who came to me after about four or five weeks and he said, I'm having trouble. I can't pray. I said, well, I don't know quite what to tell you. I mean, what do you mean you can't pray? He said, I don't know what to say. I don't know a prayer. I said, well, you don't have to know a formal prayer just say whatever you want to say.
I'm pretty sure you'll understand. So he went away and he came back and he said, I'm still having trouble, but I think I've solved the problem. I've written a prayer. And I said, well, wonderful. That's great. And he showed it to me and I've kept it with me forever and ever and I hope I never lose it. It's a paraphrase of one that you all know, but to me it means a great deal. But to me, it means a great deal, because it was written by him, and because it means so much to me personally, and this is the way it went.
[00:15:07]
Now I lay me down to sleep, knowing all good things will keep, and when at last I shall awake, I pray that God my hand will take. Thank you. Thank you very much, Gene. I don't know whether the next man is kin to the last one or not, because the last initial sounds the same way. But at any rate, we're certainly very glad to have you, and I'd like to present to you the MC of Q4D, Mr. Jack B. Thank you.
Thank you very much, Father. That was the worst introduction I ever had. I am now going to stop all the anonymity in Houston, Texas, right now. I am afraid there might be some questions, and there may be somebody out here who don't have a television set. And my name is John Wesley B., B-A-I-L-E-Y, Queenford A, NBC, KPRC, 1 to 130, on the National Broadcasting Company. Is that clear? Yeah. That's like a fellow I was talking to up in Seattle, Washington, and we were working on a real thick citizen up there.
And we had to get him that day, or the next day. We leave in town, and I talked to this fellow on the phone I hadn't met, and said, so-and-so needs a little help. Can you get over there? He said, I'll be over there. I'll ride him side saddle. I've been waiting for him. And I said, well, now, I won't tell him who you are. I'll respect your anonymity. And he said, why? And I said, well, I don't know.
He said, the book or somebody told me you ain't supposed to tell who you are if you're drunk or something. And he said, got everybody in Seattle to know my name when I was drunk. Let them know it now when I'm sober. So I'll tell you that I want to be sure you understand who I am. Can you hear back there? My God, because tonight we're going to stamp out all drinking in the Houston area. We're marching.
And there'll not even be light wines and beer, and we've got to close a lot of these clubs around here. That's the humility part of the speech. I would like to qualify, just one second, seriously, to all the people that are here, the newcomers, the regular members, the shoppers, the one that wanted to come to the meeting to find out what it was like for their brother. I think we all did a little of that, but I seriously would like to say that anything I say tonight, or the way I say it, please believe me, I'm in no way making light of Alcoholics Anonymous, the work that's been done, or the cause.
It was a matter of life or death in my case, and that's as close as I care to come, thank you. So it's extremely serious with me, but I cannot find in my heart anything sad about the fact that I'm a member of Alcoholics Anonymous. I not only am glad I am, I am proud that I am a member of Alcoholics Anonymous. And that I would like to say for all the people who have never heard this sermon on demon rum.
Now, I have chosen for my subject… Was that what you said? Well, you see, I'm not up on this Episcopal stuff, I happen to be a Methodist. And we're not against you others, that's all right, all those fringe area people have got to go, that's good. I think we're surrounded. I would like to, as a subject, say what I like about Alcoholics Anonymous. And if I were in any other business, probably, I would say I like everything about it and sit down.
But with a captive audience like this, and a banker from way down south, and all you people who were kind enough to come out to the services tonight, I think I'll go a little farther, okay? Everything I do like about it. I have not found a joker in it yet, and I've been in quite a while. And the more I'm in it, the happier I get. And the more I'm in it, the happier I get, and the more I like it.
[00:20:01]
It wears well. Now, one of the very first things I liked about Alcoholics Anonymous and its principles is that I found out that I wasn't the village nitwit or the weak-willed old man that couldn't handle it, that that flit had nothing to do really with it, that I was a sick man. And it's a real pleasure to sit here in these meetings like you are, and to stand here, bleating out like I am, and know that we're sick.
Thank God I found out, or I was sicker than a goat and would never get well. And everybody out here is laughing about it. You're damn sick, you're pretty near dead. It's the truth. It's the truth. Now, that's not from the Alcoholics Anonymous people, that's from the John Hopstein, the John, the guys in Baltimore, the Yale Clinic. They figured it out for us. And I like that. Now, you see, in our business, we like to get what we call top billing.
And we alcoholics got pretty good billing. We're number three. We're about as sick as we can get and still be here. We like to laugh about it. And that's good. That was good. I liked that right away. I didn't want to have some, you know, any little silly thing. I wanted to be awful. And from what I hear, I was. But you know, it was a beautiful thing to know that there's only two others ahead of us.
This is true. There's cancer, and there's heart, and there's us. Well, you know what they're doing for cancer? The research is tremendous. They're making great strides in it. They're doing all the good they possibly can and as fast as they can. You know what happens when you get a heart attack? You go right to bed. You got to lay there six weeks, eight weeks, three months. Can't lift a book. They bring it to you.
Cold and all, but you got to use it. You got to use it. By the time they get it there, you're sorry you asked anyway, but everything is bad about that. Then pretty soon a doctor visits a long time, sends you those big bills. One day you come back there with a long face and say, well, now that's all I can do for you. You're in bad shape. You'll never be much good again. Don't run up the stairs. Back down.
Don't ever do anything heavy. Don't ever have any more fun. Oh, God, don't dance. Don't chase the neighbor's wife. Don't do anything. And maybe you'll live. Thank you and goodbye. That's all you get from him. And then here we are with the third worst thing in the world. We got next to them, and you got to call some other nut. And you say, what's the matter with me? And they say, I don't know. I'm trying to find out what the hell's the matter with me.
And they talk to you a while, and they say, well, if you want to call me up, go ahead. If you don't, that's all right, too. I may call you. And then you walk around, and you wonder what he said, and he wonders what he said, too. You're so confused with this thing for six, seven weeks, you stay sober just wondering what they're doing to you. And then you get kind of mad, and you think, well, if this ding-a-ling can make it, I sure can.
He's crazy as a cuckoo, won't tell me anything. And you think all they're going to do is tell them what a great drunk they were. Well, you're so damn mad for two days, because you did as bad of things as he did. And if you bring it up, he'll lie to you, and that's just the way it starts, I guess. And, you know, you can go around this meeting or any other meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous, and you can say, what makes AA work?
And the guy'll say, well, what do you mean? Well, what makes it work? And he'll start, well, he's got a book, you know. Three dollars and a half book there, and they've got the meetings and everything. And you'll say, I know all that, but what really makes Alcoholics Anonymous work? And he'll say, why don't you ask Ed, he's been on a year longer. Well, that's wonderful, they don't dare elect a president.
Who'd trust him? Steal the money, go get drunk, probably, you know. You don't have anything, nothing, there's no reason for it. Except that everybody here wants it more than anything else in this world. And the only way you're going to get it is in one of these Vesper services like we're having tonight.
[00:25:01]
You know, our business is talking to audiences. And every day I often think, boy, I'd like to have an AA bunch in this show instead of the people that are here, because they're all looking for a washing machine. They're all looking for something. And you can all but see those hands. And you go to an AA meeting and everybody's here, all of us are here because we wanted it. Because we wanted it, we're all looking for something.
And the pitiful thing of it is, everybody that you've ever talked to that's had to slip, they got busy and they couldn't go to meetings. They say, I just don't know what happened. I just, you know, I don't know why, I just got drunk. Well, you never heard anybody that said, well, I don't know what happened. I just walked in a candy store. Never say that. They just say, I don't know. But time after time, they forget to get this insurance in this happy way.
Now, another thing I liked about AA when I first got on was the fact that there were no big double domes, no scientific people, no social workers, no people with a bunch of theories that said, you know, this that we have planned would be good for them. Wasn't that a relief? It was a bunch of, you know what, back in the East that couldn't handle it either, and he got the hospital, for the same reason a lot of us were there, and he fooling around, talking to people, and he went to Akron and he met another guy, and they got going on it, and they got it by helping each other.
And they said, look, it works. And Dr. Silkworth took a little hold of it, and he says, you know, I think it's a therapy. It's a thing. And these drunks worked it out. And it's still going. It's not a theory. It's a practical thing. If you follow the simple principles in the Alcoholics Anonymous book and keep it simple, you can't miss. If you want it and you're honest with yourself, and when you say, I want it, you mean it.
It's the simplest thing in the world. If we don't keep it simple, away we go again, and your sponsor will have to get a book and a butterfly net and a half a pint and come out after you once more. It's a simple thing. Now, I spoke of the excellent billing we get in the sick department. Would you like for me to dwell lightly on the cuckoo department? Our billing in the loony bin department, my dear friends, is much better.
Number two. We just about made the booby hatch. Pretty close. Number one is this very violent social disease that starts with S. And I have a small hunch if people were sober, they wouldn't have caught that, so. The whole point is, the whole point is that if you're an alcoholic and you've got an alcoholic problem, you're not fooling with anything simple. It's nothing to get the cutes with. And you've seen a lot of these jokers stand up.
Oh, God, you have to go to those meetings. What the hell's the matter with you? Walk right into a post, as they're telling you. Huh? Social drinkers, indeed. God. The chair was rocky. I didn't mean to fall off and disgrace everybody. Listen to me. I'm not making fun of social drinkers, and don't you. We must nurse them, friends. We must be careful. We must lead them gently down the highways and byways of alcoholism, or where the hell are we going to get the new members?
Don't scare them. Leave them nice. We need them. It's a wonderful feeling when you've been on AA for a little while just to go to these cocktail parties where they're laughing it up with the lampshades on their head. They drop the pants, you know, dance with the pickle in their pants. Everything is great. And you can see their wives saying, It's about time to go home. No, isn't it? And off they go.
They're really living. I like to stand around and watch them. You just stand back and, you know, just say to yourself, Go ahead, buddy. I'll wait. Thank goodness somebody did it for us. Thank goodness somebody did it for us. The thing I like about Alcoholics Anonymous, I had been in this town about two minutes, and there was a call. And it wasn't a lady who wanted a washing machine, or with a deserving grandmother with a broken coccyx.
It was a fella who says, You belong to the… You belong to the… …and you can have a lot of fun that way too, and say, I don't know what you mean,
[00:30:04]
you give me a whole pitch on the phone. You get one already, you've got a friend every place and in every corner of the world, and a real friend. No hocus pocus. Here's a guy who wants to know if there's anything you can do for him. Here's a guy who says, I never met you. I heard about you, a big windbag from the west coast. I don't want to take it to your damn show, but I do know where there's a nice place you can get a cup of coffee.
And I want to talk to you if you want to talk. If you don't hang up, forget it. I knew this was a friend. There isn't a place in the world you can't find a real honest-to-goodness friend in this organization of Alcoholics Anonymous. I was a great joiner. And I was forced into some things. My wife decided by her heart one time that I should join the Rotary Club to meet some new folks. It had never leaked through to her evidently that there was a few in Rotary that had at that jug.
And they, bless their old hearts, were hitting that flit at noon. And that was the kind of people I was looking for. Because in the morning, there was very few of us out. By noon, they were either so brave or so shaky they had to. So I joined the Rotary Club. And you know, they're more anonymous than Alcoholics Anonymous. If you call anybody by the last name there, they'll find you and give it to the kids fund.
Or cut off your tie. Or some other kind of comical thing like that. But they have badges. And they're called Rotary Wheels. And on it was this old Jack B. M.C. And each badge was numbered at the Hollywood Rotary Club. A very valuable thing to them. And you're supposed to put it in the rack as you leave the Rotary meeting. And you maybe not believe this, but it's as true as I'm standing here. When I got my badge, my number was 86.
Both in Houston and Detroit. That needs explaining. Out in our neck of the woods is when you're drunk and you come in and order a drink, they 86 you. That means you don't get a drink. I had taken care of that on the way in. But I explained to all my friends in the saloon that I was now a Rotarian. Now, I'm not in any way making fun of the Rotary Club. They do a tremendous amount of good. They're a wonderful bunch of guys.
But in Rotary, in any of those clubs, they will give you a pretty quick hustle in the back room. You know that. They'll say, I don't want to say anything in front of the gang, but here's my car. I got a used car lot. Thank you. Another guy will do this. I joined the Masons. I'm not sure one of them reached up under my apron. They're after something every time. Every organization is after something.
But this whole organization of Alcoholics Anonymous is built on giving. You cannot stay sober and happily so on Alcoholics Anonymous unless you give. So many people say, well, I can't do this, or I'm scared to speak, or I don't like the 12-step, or I don't do this. I was very concerned when I first got on because I'm no good at that 12-stepping. Now, if you've got somebody here in Houston you really hate and they drink, send me and I'll kill them.
I don't know why it is. I'm the kiss of death. I got two suicides and a natural death to my credit, and I was a little worried about that. Actually, I spoke to a fellow that you've all heard of, Chuck C. He's been down here at a lot of conferences. His maiden name is Chamberlain. And if you ever hear of him in this area, don't you miss, he's got a batch of good news for you if you're an AA. But I talked to him and he said, well, the trouble with you is that you just think if anybody mentions Alcoholics Anonymous, they're probably the greatest person that ever lived, and you fall in love with them, and you get them drunk, and they don't get any better, and you think you're doing a good job and nursing them along.
He said, get away from them. You'll ruin them. He said, don't worry so much about them. Remember one thing. If they're drunk and they're not ready, it takes as long as it takes. Well, I wanted to give them the message the first day and have it over with and sign them up, you know, to get their birthday letter and all that stuff. But a lot of them weren't quite ready when I brought the message. And he told me a thing I'll never forget.
He said, don't worry yourself sick about them. Remember this. A drunk full of alcohol will never spoil. Well, let them lay there.
[00:35:02]
I look over this audience and I see some very beautiful ladies here, no doubt some of them are members of our colony. You think I ever got a call to go on a young… No, I get them dirty old men. Another thing we don't realize is just by our own sobriety how much 12-step work we do. Everybody we come in contact with, especially at first, knows something's wrong with it, that there's been a big change, and it's a prideful thing.
It was in my case, and I like that about Alcoholics Anonymous right off the bat when people come up and say, how are you? You look all right, instead of, oh my God, you again. The self-respect that you get, I like that. I knew you knew something was wrong. And I like the fact that there was something I could do about it. I like the fact that one of the first things they told me was to forget what I was like.
Boy, I like that. Now, I'll tell you, I started forgetting real fast. I like the fact that I didn't have to worry and plan my life and everybody else's life for the next day. I had been working on everybody's life for so long, and my own, and fixing that good. I didn't have to worry about that. And in Houston, you've got less to worry about than any place I know of. If you have driven down some of these streets, we haven't got much to worry about tomorrow.
I don't think about it. I like that about alcoholics and all that. I once reached my low, and that's when I made a phone call. And I called this clean old man that had been hanging around the show for a long time, and he belonged to that, you know, thing, and I was even sneaking drinks from him. And he, you know, he didn't care. But I called him one morning, my wife, it was a Sunday morning, I called him one morning, my wife, it was a Sunday morning, I decided I'd see how long I could go without a drink in the morning.
It was one of the gravest errors of that day. I wasn't a periodical. I was around the clock. And I didn't ever have the shakes. I had the leaps! Some of you still got them! And I went leaping around that house for about three minutes, thinking, oh, God, I drank that coffee too fast. Something happened here. I inhaled too deeply, or I'm emotionally unstable this morning for some reason. The B1 is killing me or something.
Everything but the fact that I drank too much. So I thought, well, I'll go outside to get a little air, and I went out on our porch, put my arm around the porch, So I thought, well, I'll go outside to get a little air, and I went out on our porch, put my arm around the porch, stood there, and damn near killed me, that fresh air. Incidentally, I sobered up, and about three weeks later, I noticed there is no post on our porch.
And I got a lot of things I found out later. But I found out, you've heard the old gag, how much you drink, and the guy says, well, I drink a quart, and the other one says, well, hell, I spill that much every day. That's kind of funny now, but when you're standing there alone in the kitchen spilling it, it's not funny! And I had a jiggle glass about the size of a malt glass, and I couldn't hit it. And I want you to know that I have always been a devout coward, but that morning I was plum yellow.
I never want to be that scared again, nor do I ever want to forget how scared I was that morning. I hope that never leaves me. But I thought, oh, that clean old man that used to hang around, I believe I'll call him. Now, my wife was out at the church of her choice, shall we say an Episcopal church, and she was, is that okay with you, or what are you? A hell of a gent, we've got a Catholic here. So I thought, I believe I'd better, for two reasons, wait until she comes home.
One, she won't believe it if I tell her, and the other is I like an audience. So she came back, and I said to her, Caroline, listen to this call. And I got on the phone, and I said to this fellow, I am scared to death. You have said if ever I got real scared and meant it, I should call you up. I want to quit drinking, and I want to know what to do. And he said, now, are you going to admit to me that you're an alcoholic?
And I said, gladly. And he said, thank God, that makes it unanimous in town, because everybody else knows it.
[00:40:04]
So I said, well, now, what'll I do? I'm scared to death. I will do anything you say, but what'll I do? And he said, go out in the kitchen and take a drink. I said, you want me to go over that again? You probably didn't hear what I said. And he said, yes, I heard you, some of it, but for God's sake, go out and take a drink. Your head's rattling so I can't hear you. We'll come over and have a little talk with you.
So when they got over there, like every 12-step call, they were there to give, and they gave. They didn't tell me what to do. They said, this is what help does. And while we were talking, the back doorbell would ring. I'd go out and answer the doorbell. Nobody there. And we'd talk a little while, and I'd hear the phone upstairs ringing. We'll go up. He doesn't have a phone up there. And I made a couple more trips, and pretty soon one of them says, hell, Dad, bring the jug in here.
Well, I felt a little cornered right then. And then they told me a couple of ways that I never had heard of, and they really knew how to sneak drinks. So it made me feel good. Here's a couple of guys. They're just as bad as I am. They're lying thieves, bums, and they got well on this Alcoholics Anonymous program. And then a big blow struck. They said, well, you've heard quite a little about it, the 12 steps we've told you about.
We've told you what helped us. There's one thing you must know. You need us, but we don't need you. That's kind of a crusher, and that made me think just a little bit there because I forgot that I had applied. They hadn't hustled me for membership. They told me a lot of things, and then I thought, well, there's one thing they don't realize, and I'm going to tell them. Now, there probably isn't another soul in this room ever said this, but I said to them, fellas, I don't think you understand because my case is different.
You mentioned that. And then I said, and I meant it with every honest fiber of my body, I said I am afraid to quit drinking because I know if I quit drinking I'll die. And I meant it. And I got great courage from what he said. Nobody has ever heard of anybody dying because they did not drink. Then they said, there's nothing to sign. Don't say yes. Don't carry a banner. Don't wear a badge. Come to a few meetings.
Open your mind. See if you like it. See if you think you need it. See if you can get something that'll help you. And for a few days, let go and let God. Never forget this. Let go and let God. And it seemed sort of a release. This whole thing come off my shoulders. Let go. The only fight in the world you can win by giving up. Well, what peace anybody gets when they're in the condition we were in when we had to have our 12-step psalm made on us?
Huh! And I felt so good about it. And I began to like AA from then on. I was once lecturing on demon Rome in a place and I said something in this speech and at the end of the meeting we were having a little coffee and donuts and a guy come up to me and he said, say, you said something on the talk tonight about the spiritual side. And I said, well, yes, I did. I'm glad you heard that. And he said, well, may I ask you a question?
And I said, anything you want to know? I got the, what certainly. And he said, you mentioned the spiritual side. What other side is there? That was a couple of years ago. I don't know yet. It's a God-given thing. A miracle. It's got to be. Now, there was some people down in the, by Peter said in the south, down in, I got to think of a new state it was taken. No, as a matter of fact, I think it was in Little Rock.
They've been beat enough around by other things, but this is a story. And a fellow from Portland, Oregon was visiting. And a fellow from Portland, Oregon, was visiting the clubhouse down there, and on the picture of the clubhouse, they had a picture of Christ on the wall. And the guy from Portland said,
[00:45:01]
well, what do you, what do you have that up for? Doesn't that scare him a little? And he said, no, I don't know of anybody that ever got scared. And he said, well, gee whiz, what if, what if an atheist had come in and wanted to find out about AA, and he'd see that. And the guy said, it wouldn't make any difference to us, we'd just say, do you want to be a drunk atheist or a sober one? You see, I was usually part of the expression, Father, both fathers. I was born a Methodist. My maiden name is John Wesley.
You can't get any more Methodist than that, and I was scared. I was scared by the preacher, he was the kind of the boogeyman, my gosh, we used to run from him. And they preached at us, thou shalt not, or you know where you go. Don't do this. Oh my gosh, he played cards. Murdered. And I learned in Alcoholics Anonymous that it's just the reverse. We got a buddy up there. He's our friend, he's the president. He's God as we understand him.
Now I don't know for sure what kind of a God he is, neither do you, and I don't think it's any of our business. I have in my keychain what we call, uh, Blessed Martin. Now that's the colored thing, I don't even know Blessed Martin's last name, that's from the Catholic Church. I've got a Star of David here, from the Jewish people. I just carry this blank thing because the Methodists don't have anything.
But I got, I got this little blank here, and all I can say is, whoever's running it up there, I'm with them. Nothing to be afraid of up there. It's all for us. I once heard a man say at a meeting, they asked him in a little discussion meeting, you know, and they said to this fellow on the panel, do you mind telling us about your prayers, or how you pray, or what you pray, or he said, no, I'm glad you asked me. I don't remember ever getting up without saying this because I, to me, it's just perfect. And it sounds like maybe a little joke at first, but why can't you speak of prayer and smile? I don't know of any reason why, there's no boogeyman after you.
This fellow said, every morning of my life I get up and I say, God, please don't you and I get in any trouble today that you can't get me out of. It's a beautiful thing, and that's the way I feel about the spiritual side of alcoholic phenomena. I think the greatest prayer in the world for an alcoholic, and you can say it all, thank you, God, for my sobriety. Boy, that covers everything in our house, right?
Right? Without that sobriety, what? Nothing. Sick. Nuts. No good. In our business, you can't say to the boss, I missed the sale. Sorry, he wasn't in. So-and-so-and-so-and-so, couldn't make the deal, you know, flat tire. They can say, the hell you weren't drunk, would you like to hear yesterday's record? You can't lie to yourself, can you? You can't lie to the old man upstairs, and on AA, you don't have to, and you don't want to. What a relief! For the first time in our lives, it's fun to be honest. It's fun to be good, it's fun to be kind, it's fun to be helpful.
And by that, it helps us. And it's easy, and it's simple. It's something, Bob, you've heard this before, I've never forgotten it. It's something to think about, always worry about, never. Because there isn't anything to worry about. What the hell are you going to worry about? You're either going to be nuts, you're going to be dead, or you're going to be happy on AA. And I found out there's a lot of things that us older men can do a lot better sober than we could drunk. And you don't end up with all those mullets you did when you were sick.
That's just the word for the single brothers. You're happy, you don't have to be happy, you don't have to be glad that you're an Alcoholics Anonymous, you don't have to be, there's nothing in the book that says you do.
[00:50:02]
Go around with a long face, stand over in the corner and so, and somebody will come up and say, what's the matter with you? And you just say, I can't drink anymore. No sir, I think that people that aren't happy on AA just aren't trying, because you couldn't have gotten any worse than you were, you wouldn't be here. What I like about AA is they don't want nice people. You gotta be no good to make this deal.
Right? You've been at dinner with these people, they get a martini, they get about half done, oh my gosh, it's time to eat, please, waiters, oh geez, who needs them? We want them old slobbering drunks in here. We want people that can't handle it. We want them that have gone to the end of the road and some of them got off that owl car and started walking, there's the best. And you know, a lot of people, I hate to talk about it, but a lot of people, they get the kids with the program, they get outsmarting the books and they don't go to the meetings and they take a slip. You know, it's a wonderful thing. If you get blackballed in the masons, you get thrown out of the shrine, the Knights of Pitheas, the Ku Klux Klan, oh God, I shouldn't have said that in the South. Anyway, you get kicked out of it, you get kicked out of Ku Klux Klan, oh God, I shouldn't have said that in the South. Anyway, you get kicked out of any of those things, you get kicked out of a sorority, you get kicked out of some of those places, you don't get back in. You don't get back in. But if a guy has, a gal has a little trouble in Alcoholics Anonymous, and he gets with it again, or she gets with it again, then they come back home where they belong. There's nobody here with a long face that says, oh, you shouldn't have done it, what's the matter, young boy? Somebody laughed with one and said, what's with you? He said, well, I had a little trouble. The hell he did, let's have some coffee. Oh, there we go. Didn't he go ruin your kidneys again with that stinking AA coffee?
You're welcome back. And so many people in these small towns like I was from in Hampton, they said, oh, the village drunk. Ah, weak will, no good character. Don't you ever forget as long as you live, ladies and gentlemen, it takes an awful good man and an awful good woman to make the Alcoholics Anonymous program. And it takes a damn sight better one to make it and stay with it. So you've got nothing but pride, nothing but joy, peace of mind and self-respect. The fact that you were a good enough gal and a good enough man to turn honest, to do something you knew was right and stick to it. And you've got to be proud of yourself because you're a member of Alcoholics Anonymous. My God, is that clear?
There's one thing I like to say in closing. It's the truth. I mean, sick as we can get, dingy as we can get, reach some kind of a low, maybe all of mental, moral, physical, everything. We went to the end of our particular road. We got on Alcoholics Anonymous and we learned a new way of life, a happy way of life, the right way of life. And as low as we were, no matter how long you've been on AA, it's not only our privilege, but it's our duty to put our hand up to God as we understand him and he'll grab it.
And through this old body of ours, it was as low as we could possibly get past the spirit of God as we hold our hand out to another sick alcoholic and say, come on, buddy or lady, if I can help you, I'm going to. And the greatest moment of every alcoholic's life has got to be the family's in bed, the lights are out, you're alone. And when you can say and say honestly, thank you, God, for another day of sobriety.