Audio
Transcript
Source: 1985 Montreal International Convention – Unknown Speaker – IMPROVING CONSCIOUS CONTACT – RS 06389.mp3 File: 1985-montreal-international-convention-unknown-speaker-improving-conscious-contact-rs-06389.mp3 Duration: 01:03:45
============================================================
God knows I don't. I've got to tell you that I should be out there. A few months ago a guy called me on the phone. He said, do you mind if I put your name in the hat? It's a hundred to one shot. I wish I had that kind of luck with the lottery. About August of 1977 was the last time I was in this city and I was green in my sobriety. I remember we came up, my two sons and I, camping through the Adirondack Mountains in New York. The first night we stayed in a little town called Warren and I remember the tent was one of those umbrella ones and the flap opened up and from where I lay between my two children, I looked up and that night and saw the stars as clear as I'd seen them in a lot of years. And I remember feeling so good, so happy and so grateful. And we took the tour of the city and the grape line. A member, our driver was a member of the Canadian National Ski Team.
He was a wonderful person and he asked me a few questions. We were sitting next to him and I told him I was an AA and he said that was wonderful and that there was one stop that I would particularly appreciate and that one stop was the Cathedral Notre Dame. I remember walking in there and being drawn to the altar and going right up to the rail and kneeling and thanking God for the gift I had gotten. And I remember the tears ran down my face. My children were a little concerned but they saw the smile and it was okay. So this trip is kind of a pilgrimage for me and when I returned to the Cathedral yesterday, I went up to the same spot I had been at and knelt to thank God for the intervening time. And something was missing. I was aware of the tour guides as I knelt there. It was over on the right side where all those candles are. Somebody at the Cathedral came up with trays and started unloading the candles and it sounded like a cafeteria. Something was gone. That's why I was kind of amazed when I got the topic I got, improving conscious contact. Because for the, almost since I became sober, mine has been slipping. And so what I can do today is tell you about that and then maybe after the meeting you can tell me what to do. Thank God we only have to experience or share our experience, strength, and hope, not our success. Sometime in June of 1977, I was at the end of my drinking road, thank I hope. I was drinking two quarts a day of whatever was cheapest vodka I can remember walking into the liquor stores and pretending to peruse the the offerings as if I were a connoisseur. I was really looking for the cheapest half-gallon that was there. I would say to the man there, this looks good. I haven't tried that and he'd say, very nice choice sir. Standing there with a nose that stopped traffic. And I was going to work every day. I was the teacher at the time and by 930 in the morning I would begin to shake and sweat and gag and pray for the two o'clock bell to ring so I could get out to the parking lot and the quart of vodka that was under my front seat. And I was vomiting blood a couple of times a week. And I remember one night when I did some other things along with the alcohol and felt
[00:05:01]
myself going under, thinking that I had overdosed fatally. I remember the last words or thoughts that went through my mind as I went under were, thank God. And I remember the next morning when I woke up it was, oh God. I didn't want to live anymore and I envied those who weren't. And I've got to tell you a story, I'm sure you've heard it. Nancy's favorite was the starfish story and this one is the Eskimo story and I love it. There was a guy sitting at a bar talking to another guy and somehow the topic of God came up and this guy who was about halfway where he wanted to get to was saying, no such thing as God, don't believe in God. And the guy sitting next to him said, why? He said, well I had a situation. He said, I was in the Arctic regions exploring, doing scientific research. He said, a terrible storm came up. I lost my way. I finally managed to pitch my tent. The snow came and blew and covered me over. And he said, I knew it was the end. And I had heard about this God business. He said, so I prayed and I said, God, if you're there, save me. He said, and if you can't do the job personally, I hear you got some angels that'll do. And the guy sitting next to him in the bar said, well, obviously your prayer was answered. You're here. You're alive. You didn't die. He said, it wasn't God. It wasn't any angel. He said, some Eskimo had lost his dog and he came traveling by and happened to find me. My first contact with God was an Eskimo. It was a woman who cared. One of those people who go around fixing things that are broken and making healing things that are sick.
And the attraction was instantaneous because I was as sick, I guess, as she'd ever seen one. And in her way, whatever way it was, she let me know that she cared. And I became instantly and adolescently in love with her, even though I was 36 years of age. And within three weeks, I hurt her as only we alcoholics can do by being unfaithful to her. In the three weeks that I knew her, however, I came to know her God. And it was a God that I didn't know from the Episcopal church or my cousins told me about from the Catholic church. It was a God I remember one day she shook her fist at the skies and said, is there anything else you want today, you son of a bitch? And I'd heard not to stand beneath trees. And I was looking for some open space. I said, how can you do that? She says, it's okay, he understands me. And she called God the big guy. And I was so in love with her that I fell in love with her God too. And then I hurt her and she showed me who I was. And not in retaliation, but I think still out of love. She painted a picture for me. She held up a mirror for me. And I saw myself as I really was. That's that moment I guess we all need. And I was unable to escape it. I picked up the booze. I picked up another woman. And I spent three days trying to erase that picture and I could not escape. And after three days of crying for myself, the extent of my prayers were just the word God uttered in pain, self-pity. A friend of mine who had told me once that he had been to a detox center said, I called him and said, tell me about it. And he took me. And I spent seven days there and they were the seven days that really put a U-turn in my life.
When I came out of the detoxification center, this wonderful person came back into my life briefly. I imagine there was something there that she knew that the job wasn't done. And now without the alcohol to make me feel good about myself and to comfort me, I depended completely upon her. I
[00:10:02]
simply switched my drugs from booze and pills to people. And of course that couldn't last. It was an unhealthy thing. And eventually I had achieved enough sobriety. I connected with the Chicopee group and my sponsor, Dave. Dave, are you here today? Okay. Dave's here in Montreal. I just got to tell you this. Yesterday was his 26th, 26th, 29th anniversary. Terrific. Any case, I tied in with the Chicopee group and the people there and they told me something that was very, very important to me. And that was, it's going to get worse. And worse. And when you think it couldn't possibly get worse, it's going to get worse. I was hearing on the other side of town, it's going to get better and better. And when you think it, but I was an immature 13 year old, 36 year old. And I wasn't going to very shortly have what I wanted and nothing was going to be going my way. And believe me, it got worse. If we come kicking and screaming into this world in our first birth, my second one in sobriety, I did the same thing. Kicking and screaming. Because the lady said, it's time. God's calling in the lone. That was the way she put it. And said, if you love me, you'll walk and that'll be that. And she said, try to remember you didn't mess this one up. And that helped too. But not much because I wanted her because as far as I could see, I had nothing else. But I also knew that I had to be honest and I had promised her and I was trying to understand and be involved in what they talk about in AA. And I turned to her God. I remember one night walking around the apartment building I lived in saying, how come? And then a frightening thing happened. I got an answer. Lily Tomlin has got the line of the century for me. I saw her do it in one of her routines. She said, things she worries about. She said, one of the things she worries about, she said, I worry that when we talk to God, it's called prayer. And when God talks to us, it's called schizophrenia. Maybe I was, but I heard a voice in my head saying, do you know, do you have any idea how few, how very few are willing to do my will? And I said, no. And the voice said, then why would you begrudge me this one who is? And I said, keep it coming because I wanted to do the right thing.
And I remember many nights lying in bed filled with my own adolescent self-pity and pain, and that God would come to me, never talked about this, and take me into his arms. And I remember one night knowing that while he was holding me, he was holding billions and billions and trillions of others throughout the universe. But still I persisted. I remember I wrote a letter to this lady telling her she was in a sick relationship. She was married, by the way, and had five children. And I wanted her to run away with me. And she was sick, right?
But I remember writing her this letter telling her what a sick relationship she was in and how if she had any sense, she'd, you know, bring her five kids and we'd find a house somewhere. But, you know, I was going finally out of my pain to do a step meeting and they were talking about turning it over. And I kept saying, how do you know if it's right? You know, they were saying, well, you've got to get up and close the window. If you're cold, you can't ask God to do that for you. And if you want French fries, get a hole in some potatoes. And so I was saying, well, how do I know what's right, what's wrong? And I wasn't getting answers, except one guy said, if you got to ask, don't. And I didn't like that one. But I was doing what they were telling me to do or I was trying to. So I went to my sponsor.
[00:15:00]
and I said, should I send it or shouldn't I? Now if I'd followed the first guy's directions I would have had my answer. And my sponsor, God bless him, said, it's hard to trust God. He went right to the heart of things and he said, we don't take other people's inventories. And I said, okay. So I went home by way of this lady's house. I drove around it. Remember doing that as teenagers? I was doing it, I was 36. And I went home and I said, I thought for a few days, I agonized for a few days and then finally I came up with a solution.
I put the first letter in an envelope and I wrote a second letter saying, look out for this letter. If you don't want to be convinced that you should leave your husband, don't read it and just tear it up and throw it away. And I went back to my sponsor. I said, what do you think? And my sponsor said, it's hard to trust God and we don't take other people's inventories. I'm trying to be honest with this. I really believe there were six letters within letters that I eventually wrote. You know, I wrote a third saying, watch out for the two inside of here. I wrote a fourth saying, watch out for the three inside.
And I got crazier and crazier. And one night I remember I was writing, I think the sixth and the words were something like, I know I may not be honest in this. And then it was like something came through and I began to write the truth. And I wrote that all of the other things that I had written were for me and they were selfish and that they were self-centered and uncaring. And I began to cry. I was lying in bed, propped up in bed when I was writing this and I began to cry and it was hurt, hurt, hurt crying. I remember I got out of my bed and I got on my knees and I begged God to take away all of the pain and to take my life because I just couldn't deal with it the way I was doing it anymore. And I really let loose. And I remember after crying for about five more minutes, I was filled with peace, an absolute knowledge that everything was going to be all right. It wasn't so much an intellectual understanding, it was just a knowing. I remember sitting back on the bed and the tears just kept flowing but they weren't painful anymore and I was smiling and I just sat there basking in this sureness, in this perfect peace. And I sent the lady a short note saying it was okay, wishing her the best. Years later, I was to be on a religious weekend with her husband. And in the strangest way you could imagine, we made amends. I remember saying to him, years ago I meant you a great harm. He said, years ago I was a great harm. And I said, can you forgive me? And he said, I did a long time ago, can you forgive me? I said, I never thought about it. Still got a long way to go. But that was my last conscious contact with God, as fully and as purely and as really as it was. I like to think from time to time that it was God's way of kind of tussling my hair and saying, okay kid, from here on in, I don't have to carry you. And maybe that's it. I miss it. And yet, last night, out at the stadium, I had a little bit of it back. At every AA meeting I go to, I get a little bit of it back.
[00:20:04]
When I am having a lousy day and I sit down and consciously count my blessings, I get a little bit of it back. When I see a newcomer begin to enjoy living again, I get a little bit of it back. I try to find quiet time and it's helpful. It kind of re-centers me, it refocuses me on where I am and what I should be doing. But nobody holds me any more at night, except my wife, and that's new too. What I mean is we've been married for two and a half years now, both of us a second time. She's been in Al-Anon a little longer than I've been in AA. And maybe that's the way it's supposed to be.
Maybe the intensity that I first experienced is not really something that we need as we get well. But the memory is there. And the memory I'll never lose. And there's one other thing there is, and that's a remnant too of that hour of perfect peace I felt. And that's the absolute surety that if I am ever in that much pain again, God will be there as he was for me in the beginning. In the meantime, by working this program, pretty much as people suggest it, and as the big book outlines it, I have never found myself in that much pain. I don't think that's the goal of this program, the avoidance of pain, that was why I drank. But I think if we follow the program, it doesn't always come at us that hard. I wish you peace with your God, as I have found with mine. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Peter. And they tell me it's in the seeking and our willingness that conscious contact will be improved. Our next speaker is the only one I had met before I came up here today. I've never heard that story, but I know that she's very active in AA because we bump into one another at a lot of AA functions through the years. So I'm looking forward to it. So help me welcome Dorothy from Virginia. Hi, everybody. My name is Dorothy Perry, and I'm a member of the Ocean View group in Norfolk, Virginia. Patty! I got a lot of friends here this morning that I know personally, but I feel like that all of you are my friends. I hope you are. I got a lot of friends all over the United States. Thanks, God. Oh, I tell you, this is something else. At the stadium last night, I was looking around at all those people, and I was listening to Sybil. I'd heard Sybil. In fact, she was the first alcoholic woman that I ever heard speak. And she was talking about her brother Tex, you know, sitting up there swinging somewhere next to some drunk. And I was thinking about my sister Evelyn, and I thought, God, Evelyn, you're up there swinging with somebody, some other drunken woman. Because my sister Evelyn, God bless her, she died at my house when she fell down the steps, and it killed her instantly. She didn't make this blessed fellowship.
And I just felt great sitting there and just thinking about all that. And when I got the letter from the General Service Office that this was going to be the improving the conscious contact with God, I said, how did they know that was my favorite step? No coincidence. Please believe me, there's not a coincidence in my life today, because that is my favorite step. In my first year of sobriety, I came very close to picking up a drink. But that loving step came
[00:25:02]
into my mind, and I didn't do it, thank God. My sobriety date is September 25th, 1974. For this, I am very grateful. Because of drinking 30 years, and just about dead when I got to you people, I didn't think there was anything or anybody could help me. I didn't know where I was going to go. I was 44 years old. I had nothing when I got here. Absolutely nothing but 210 pounds of me. No place to live, no home, no nothing. And I got a job as a housekeeper. The first nine years of my drinking, I guess you could say was, I would say was fun drinking. Now I know today it was not fun drinking. In that nine years, I went through a five-year marriage. Now I got started drinking when I was 14, and I got married when I was 16. So in that nine years, there was a five-year marriage. And I know today that I was an alcoholic in all of that five years, in fact the nine years.
The next 21 years was absolutely pure hell, because alcohol had really taken its toll to me. I didn't know where I was, I didn't know what to do except to drink. I had to drink, that's all I knew. I had to drink to live. It did everything in my body. I shook from head to foot with alcohol. All I could think was, Dorothy, as long as you can get some form of alcohol in your body, you're going to be okay. It was just screaming out for it, and this is what I did. And I'm so grateful that today that I don't have to go out and look in trash cans and hope there might be a sip of alcohol in an empty bottle, which I've had to do that. I don't have to do just anything, which I would have done at times, mostly anything for a drink of alcohol. That 21 and a half years, I was married to a practicing alcoholic. I didn't know he was an alcoholic, I didn't know I was an alcoholic. All I know that man was crazy. Why in the world did I stay with him, I never know, except that I was an alcoholic and I knew there would be plenty of drinking. And you know, I used to pray just something, I didn't know what I was praying to. Please take this man and kill him. I used to stand at the window, I used to stand at the window and wait for him to come home, and if he didn't reach underneath the seat and pick that brown bag up, I was a nervous wreck, but he usually did. But on the way before he got home, I was standing there thinking, let him have a head-on collision, let something happen to him. I hated this man, yet I stayed with him for 21 and a half years and let him beat me up physically for all those years. Scars all over my body, being put in the hospital, yet I didn't know what to do. I would run, of course, to some of my family's house and beg for something to drink, look in their cupboards and get the vanilla extract when I couldn't get anything else. All of this because I had had something to calm me down. I had, let me tell you something, there's a man in here, he's a good friend of mine, he's been there. This is a far away from Petersburg Central State Hospital, friends. I've been there. And I really should have been there, but I, anybody as crazy as I was, but when I got there and they locked those doors and cut my fingernails to the quick and pushed me in a shower, took my clothes away from me, I didn't want to be there. And after I got out of there, I went right back to drinking again. I didn't know where to turn, what to do. I went into another hospital in a rehab hospital of May of 1974. I just don't know, I went, after I left there, I went back to this man, this husband who was a Norfolk police sergeant, carried a gun, been shot at three times. I know today who was with me. But I went back to him and I thought maybe just if one of us drank, it would be better. Maybe I won't get beat up so bad. Well, he continued on to drink and I didn't drink for a little over two months. I stayed there taking antabuse. I don't know how in the world I didn't go in that kitchen and take a drink. By this time he was leaving the drinks in the kitchen, which ordinarily he would have taken in his room and hid it so I couldn't get to it.
And I sat on the side of the bed and I said, God, please don't let me take this drink. And I didn't take the drink.
[00:30:05]
on me, and I knew darn well he would have killed me if he really hit me hard enough because I just had my eye operated on where he hit me so bad. And I begged him not to. And he went on and went to sleep. I thought he had gone to sleep. I didn't know where I was going to go. Like I said, I weighed 210 pounds, I was 44 years old, didn't have a dime, and he didn't either. But I got a pair of scissors and I went into the room and I was going to stab him. Thank God he turned over. So God's been working in my life all that 30 years that I was drinking and I didn't even know it. And what happened after that night when he turned over, it's not important for me to tell you, but I can tell you it was not good. So on the first day of July 1974, I left him for the last time. I got around AA, and there's a difference, friends, in being around it and in it. I drank on antibuse. I wound up in my last hospital, I hope and pray, TPI, Virginia Beach. That was my second husband, a police sergeant. And in TPI, I met my third husband. And I'd like for you to meet him right now. Ben, stand up. Ben and I will be married nine years this coming October. After I got out of TPI, I did get a job as a housekeeper, like I told you. I didn't know what was wrong with me. I just didn't know what I was going to do.
I was betwixt and between. Ben called me up and asked me if I would go with him to a ship's reunion at the Lake Wright Motor Lodge as his lady. These things are very important to me to tell you, friends, because I can't go through the whole thing because I don't have enough time. So I cleaned house for a gal, and she gave me $20, and I got me a long dress. And Ben picked me up at my twin sister's house. And by the way, my twin sister, I've been praying for her since I've been in this program. And she had her last drink, I hope, and prayed September the 17th. How about that? Anyway, I was at my twin sister's and he picked me up. And he took me to the Lake Wright. And I took my long dress because I figured, well by this time, too, by the way, some of the fluid had left my body. I think I lost about 70 pounds of water in 9 months. Anyway, some of the fluid, not all of it, but some of it had left my body. And I was down to a size 18 dress instead of a size 22. And I took my dress with me to the Lake Wright. And I went in this room, and it had to be as big as this, and I'd never seen so much alcohol in my life. Everybody was drinking.
Ben was drinking. And I said, we're not supposed to be drinking. We just got out of the hospital, you know. So everybody was, they were showing all these old pictures way back from 33 years. He had never seen these people. Some friends of his, his shipmates. So I just moseyed over to this table and I started helping myself. I hope and pray that was my last drunk, because I don't remember getting in that long dress. The next thing I remember, it was on Sunday morning. I woke up in somebody's room. I don't have any idea what state he was from. I have no idea. I know it wasn't Ben. I was around looking for Ben in that evening dress on Sunday morning. And that was the lady that I went to be. Ben wound up in another hospital, of course, that's his story. And I wound up at 4th Street and picked up my second white ship and that was on September 25th, 1974. My God knew exactly what I needed. And I guess I needed that to prove to myself that I knew that I was an alcoholic, that I could not drink safely. I was going to meetings every single night, yet there was something inside of Dorothy that wasn't right. I didn't feel right inside. I prayed every night like you told me to. I thanked God every night for one day of sobriety. I still didn't feel good.
I got on my hands and knees by my bunk. I was, at this time, at a Jewish girl's house, keepin' house. Over top of the garage was my room. And I looked out the window and all
[00:35:07]
I said was, God help me. That's all I knew to say. I'm ashamed to say that I could not repeat the Lord's prayer. I said, God help me. Believe me, friends, from that moment on, he started helpin' me and he's helpin' me today. I got up off my knees and I got in that bed and I went sound asleep. I got up the next morning and I started cleanin' this five-bedroom, three-bathroom house, takin' care of three little Jewish girls and gettin' on the telephone to get a meeting to go to that night. I'm in conscious contact with my God every single day. And keepin' in contact, to me now, prayer and meditation. Prayer is liftin' my heart and my mind up to God. And meditation is listenin'. And Ben can verify this, and he doesn't mess with me in the morning, because I have to have my quiet time. I didn't mean that the way it sounded. But I have to have my quiet time, and I have to have my quiet time. Things can go wrong in my life like everybody else's today. And I can get off into a bedroom someplace very quiet, close the door, block everything out, and get very still. And I know that my God is with me, just like he is with me this morning. Believe me, when I got that letter from the general service office, the hair stood up on my arms.
I started cryin'. Again, Ben left me alone, because he knew I had to be quiet. I could not believe this could happen to a drunk like me. This is my third international convention. My first one was ten months of sobriety. I went to Denver, Colorado. Can you imagine how I felt? Prayin' the serenity prayer at Kerrigan Hall with all those thousands of people with ten months of sobriety. Ben and I, naturally, of course, we did get together.
I had to let go of Ben, though, by the way, because Ben wasn't through drinkin'. Today, the most important thing in my life is my sobriety. I love that 24-hour book, January the 6th. That's my favorite. The most important thing in my life today is my sobriety. It comes before Ben, it comes before my 89-year-old mother, and she's still livin'. God bless her heart. I never saw my mother all those years. Right in the same area, but I was too sick, too sick to even go see my own mother. I even told my mother one time, I said, Mama, please don't die, because I know I can't go to your funeral. Isn't that awful to tell your mother that? But that's the way it was. I didn't go to my sister's funeral, the one that I told you fell down the steps. I was too sick to go to my own sister's funeral.
Things have changed in my life, friends, that there's no words that I can express, the gratitude. In that marriage of 21 1⁄2 years, actually, that's how long it was, there were three children in there that I did not bear myself. He had three children when I married him. One was two years old, one was nine, and one was ten. I've made my amends to these three children. I have a son in California, Modesto, who has a big-shot job for Gallo Winery. I have two daughters in Virginia Beach, my baby daughter, she was 36 years old with her on her birthday, my husband and I. My husband today took me to this ex-husband's funeral that alcohol took him. I was on a program in New Bern, North Carolina, five years ago, and when I left, I see somebody there from New Bern, when I left Norfolk to go to New Bern, this husband was in the hospital with machines in every hole in his body, this ex-husband, I mean. Keeping him alive because of alcohol had ruined every organ in his body.
And on the way back home, I didn't call to see if he had passed away, they'd taken him off the machines and put him in a little room just to let him die. And on the way home from New Bern, I was looking out the window, Ben was driving, and I said, God, if you see fit that Clyde is still living when I get to Norfolk, I'm gonna be at that hospital tomorrow morning. When I came home and I called my daughter, my youngest daughter, and I said, Terry, how's your daddy? All he's doing is breathing, mama. That's all. 8.30 Monday morning, I was at
[00:40:06]
that hospital and I asked him where Mr. Carhartt was. This was a 265 pound, 6 foot 1, good-looking man, and I guarantee he was laying there late at night. I know he didn't weigh 100 pounds soaking wet. He was 63, he looked like he was 163. And I went over to the bed, and God knew that I had not finished making amends to this man that I hated so bad. I had put the love in place of hate. I had to, I'd have been dead today myself. But God knew there was something there that Dorothy needed to do. And I went in his room and I poked him on his chest a little bit, trying to nudge him to let him know that I was there. Nothing happened. And I nudged him some more, and I said, Clyde, please let me know if you know it's me, it's Dorothy, that I want to tell you that God loves you and I love you. Please, honey, I said, let me know. And he shook his head yes. And then he died. Now whether you believe it or not, friends, but God kept him alive long enough for me to do that. I was able to take him and lift him up and hand him over to God. God has worked in my life every day, things that I need. He knows when I can handle it, and he doesn't give it to me until I can. This I know. I've been through a lot, a lot of pain since I've been sober physically. A lot of pains. I prayed to God that I could make it to Montreal. I didn't even go to the doctor, because I didn't want to go into a hospital. I average, I average about twice a year going to the hospital, it seems like. I said, I'll wait until I get through in Montreal, then I'll go to the doctor. But I have, I've had the cancer the whole bit since I've been sober, but that's okay. I'm not the only ones that have had cancer.
I'm living today, and I'm living a good life. A life that I never dreamed could happen to a drunk like me. Never. And you know, I heard last night over there, somebody mentioned, I forgot which one it was, was they say, why? You know, why him? Why me? I went through life that way. Since I was a little girl, since I can remember, why me? Being born in a poor family, eight children in the family, no food on the table half the time, having to get free lunch at school, being, having a twin sister, you know, not getting nothing.
All this stuff, I went all the time. Why me? And when this man that I married in 1952, the police sergeant, beat me up all the time, cut me, kicked me so bad I couldn't even get my own clothes on for days. Why me? Why did my sister have to fall in the steps at my house and kill herself? Why couldn't it have been any one of my other brothers or sisters? Why me? Why I had all this all my life, I thought. I didn't like Dorothy a bit in this world. I hated her, in fact. I kind of like Dorothy today. And I know God's got a lot of good things in store for me. I don't know what they are, and I don't want to know what they are. I don't know what, I have no idea what's going to happen tomorrow, and don't want to know. I know that if I had the same attitude today that I've got tomorrow, I'm not going to take a drink. Because after drinking that 30 years, and here I'm going almost 11 years without a drink of alcohol, believe me, friends, I am so grateful. Last night, anybody sat in that auditorium and didn't fill it up, something's wrong with you. Something's wrong. I got me some Kleenex out of the bathroom before I got up here. I knew I was going to start crying, but God says, no Dorothy, you're going to wait until you get through. When I walked down the aisle with Ben Perry, or to meet Ben Perry, my three, my two stepdaughters, I wouldn't say that they were here, because they don't like that. My son didn't come from California, and their daddy was still living, but my two stepdaughters were standing down there when I went down to meet Ben, at the altar. But God was in that marriage. You just don't know how I felt when my mother stood up, and now everybody, Crank's in here today, he was at that marriage. I said, God, please, if you want me to cry, wait until I have this over with. I may have fun until the ceremony was over, and I didn't know, but this had not been planned. Ben and I had to kneel down at the altar, and everybody said the Lord's Prayer.
I said the Lord's Prayer. Oh God, if I could tell you how I felt this morning. I don't have the words. I don't have the words. But I will say this. If I had to go through the torment,
[00:45:11]
the hell, pain, the heartaches of all of that for 30 years, I can honestly say, why not me? Why not me? Oh God, I love you people. You have given me a new life. And most of all, you've given me a God that I know that loves me. And he looks after me every day. God bless you and keep coming back. Thank you very much. We're having our annual fish fry at the end of this month and anybody that can make it down, I'm sure we'll find room for you. I'm here because I'm an alcoholic, but I'm also here because I'm up here because I'm very naive. My sponsor phoned me up and he said that they want everybody that's going to Montreal to put in their names because they need speakers.
And he says, you'll never get picked. He put his name in too. And I'm up here shaking like a leaf and he's down there relaxing. But I must say, he just came back from the other hotel. Two of us got picked from our group. I think AA uses a stack deck sometimes. And when I did get that loving invitation, I was glad that the topic was improving conscious contact. Because if they asked me to get up here and say how I tiptoed through life every day, enjoying it and having a good time, I probably couldn't have come. But conscious contact was the power that I understand. It's a personal thing and I should be able to talk about it for a few minutes. I'll quit when I finish, that's all I can say. I'm sure you'll understand. I used to live in Winnipeg and I was playing football when I was a teenager and we went to Vancouver to play a game, Canadian championship there. And I never drank. And we went out there and we lost that game by a couple of points and we'd never lost before. And I started drinking after that game, anything I could get my hands on. And I remember being in the big hotel and I'd run from one end of the hall to the other and bang my head against the wall and get up off the floor and run to the other end of the hall and bang my head against the wall. And I really enjoyed it. That's the insanity of this disease. I still think back fondly on that. But I continued on banging my head against the wall for another 16 years. And if you do that, you end up with a kind of haircut that I got right now. I moved to Sioux Lookout and I knew that I had to stay away from the drinkers. I moved from Winnipeg and I thought I did most of my drinking in Winnipeg and I thought if I could just stay away from the drinkers, I'd be okay. But it didn't work that way. And I continued drinking there. And one day one of my friends said to me, if you're gonna keep this up, he was a drinker too, he said you're
[00:50:01]
gonna end up going to see Mosier. And being in a small town of 3,000 and a drinker, everybody knew Mosier was the president of AA. And that just sent chills down my spine. I think about that now. And it's more important to me all the time in my sobriety. That fella's sober now in the program. And I often wonder how I got here. And I think that probably had something to do with it. And we were both drunk at the time. One day I was in his apartment and I had a glass of scotch in my hand and I couldn't put it down. My whole life was falling down around me. I was ready to give up. I'd already given up my wife and I was ready to send the kids away. And I went to, I made that walk to AA. Now it wasn't a very long walk. This fellow that I'm talking about was my next-door neighbor. And I walked across the lawn. Oh, it was a long walk. And I got to the door and nobody was home.
And I had to make that walk again. And that was a long walk. And when I got in there, I said, Bob, I'm ready to take the big swim. He didn't know what I was talking about. We live on the edge of a lake, by the way. And, uh, but then I told him I had to do something about my drinking. And he took me in and he read a little bit from the big book. And he got me to my first meeting. And he still thinks, and I think the same thing, get the drunk to that first meeting. That's very important. But my life really started to change from that time on. I got to that meeting. I didn't have any spiritual values at that time. But I, I liked the people. And they were there for me. And they loved me back to life. So what I'm going to talk about, how to improve my conscious contact, is what I have to do to stay sober. And that's why I'm here now. And I've talked a little bit about meetings and the people I've met. But like I say, I didn't have a higher power or didn't believe in God when I came into the program, even though I know today that he was working on my life. But I started going to meetings and enjoying. And my first sober Christmas, I sobered up in September. And my first sober Christmas means so much to me. Some people came over to our home that night and there was a lot of drinking. So I decided that I better go for a drive. So I, I just hopped in the truck and I drove around. I wanted to go to a church. I'd never, never been to church. I never go to church. So I didn't know what one to go to and it didn't matter. But I ended up at one at a midnight mass. And I came home from there and I was overpowered with gratitude. I saw the things some people had there that I saw people had in our group. And I had an overwhelming spiritual experience. I found out today, or I found out that's what it was. I, I don't ever want another one. I went to the doctor the next day, told him my story. He didn't lock me up and he didn't do, he did a electrocardiograph and I didn't have a heart
[00:55:17]
attack. And so I chalked it up to a spiritual experience. And from that day on, I've known there's a God, a God of my understanding. And this God is personal, but the Spirit I feel is with us all, around us, under us, in the room. It's been here all weekend. But this improving conscious contact with God, I think there's people out there and there was people in that stadium that might not have felt that. Even there's, even though there's so much sharing and, and loving, there's somebody out there, they might even be sitting beside you that was still lonely. And I talk to myself a lot. I call it talking to myself. I guess it's thinking to myself. That's kind of how I generate this conscious contact. Like I said, there's no doubt in my mind anymore that there is this, this spirit.
But, but it's to use it and feel it on a daily basis. And I really think it's the feeling of it that's so important to me. And how do I do it? Well, like in the big book, it says, read inspirational books. And I read the big book and I think that's an inspirational book. I read A. A. Comes of Age. And I think that's a spiritual book. I cry when I read A. A. Comes of Age. And what else do I do? I go to meetings and I try to share with other people. And I think about this fellow that's in our group now. He's been in for a couple of months.
Five years ago he came to the group and he's been coming ever since and couldn't stay sober. Two months ago he came back in, couldn't keep his head up, looking at the table. And now he's just laughing and smiling and enjoying himself. And he latched on to a couple of fellows in the group and they're keeping each other sober. And they're sharing. And when I see that, that improves my conscious contact. When I see you people here enjoying this weekend, that improves my conscious contact.
Four thousand people in one subway coach improves my conscious contact. But, like I say, I have to think about these things. And I remember I'd been sober for a couple of years. And I went down to a roundup with two girls from our group that had never been to one. And they started off the roundup. They opened it. And then they sang a very inspirational, spiritual type song. And we're all standing. And I thought, oh, they should never have done that.
They were going to blow the whole thing. You shouldn't do things like that in AA. And I was really negative. And I got nothing out of it. And I turned to the two girls beside me and they were both crying. And they just loved it. So that's really the point I'm trying to make. Our higher power exists and is amongst us. But we have to let them in. have to, we have to let them in, into our hearts and, and I kinda, I can work myself
[01:00:00]
up into it. I, I've got a beautiful job. I ride along in a caboose with my feet up on the window and the beautiful countryside goes by us and like I say, I'm from northwestern Ontario and it's all lakes and beautiful trees and I think about the good things that have happened to me in this program and I think about the good things that have happened to my friends. I was so fortunate in this program because when I sobered up, three, four, four people that I drank with and that I did all the, the crazy things with joined the group and that really helped me because when I walked in there, even though I, I liked everybody, they were a little old for me, a little too big for my britches, but things like that have happened in my life. These people have sobered up and stayed. Everybody that, all the speakers that I've heard so far have said glowing things about their group, that their group's number one. Well, I'm from the New Outlook group and we don't say things like that in our group. We just kind of smugly smile inwardly and we just let people whirl.
I don't know how long I've talked. I'm having a great weekend here and I'm worried about coming up here and like I say, I've talked to myself a lot and the people I've met, well, there's so much friendship and love, but what I'm going to do when I leave here, I'm going to go out and buy my daughter a present. Now that's the little girl that I was going to give up. That means a lot to me. Well, I think I'll close and I've said enough and I'll never forget this moment.
Thanks to you people and I love you. What a spiritual experience this has been this morning and it's definitely conscious contact. I can feel it in this room and I have since I walked in. Thank you for coming and God bless all of you as we go to our next meetings. I love you. We'll close with the Lord's Prayer in our usual way.