Friends of Bill W. [Archive] - Butch Femme Planet

LeftWriteFemme

11-12-2009, 05:18 AM

November 12

EIGHT MISTAKES CLOSER

I am eight mistakes closer to perfection. As long as I fall forward, progress is being made. I fail meticulously toward my goal, more cannot be asked. Loss, pain, frustration are strong teachers and great motivators. I suck each splinter for knowledge, extracting juice from every fragment for information. In spite of sprains and strains, I have stretched, attaining almost my full height. Growth is a wonderful thing, though cost is always involved. Mistakes are an unavoidable price but well worth the expense. They are an expense that pays dividends, dividends that move me toward perfection.

Stretch your body, flex your mind.

Sherrie

Greyson

11-12-2009, 07:46 AM

Good morning Sherri, Tommi. Yes, I stalk your words of wisdom here too. You may have noticed, I and our community really needs this light. Thanks again Sherri.

Tommi

11-12-2009, 08:22 AM

Good morning Sherri, Tommi. Yes, I stalk your words of wisdom here too. You may have noticed, I and our community really needs this light. Thanks again Sherri.

Good Morning Greyson and Lefty, ;),
I too look for the words displayed which seem to magically apply to my day, or memories of the past.

I like to apply just one thing from those daily posts. Sometimes, I take away a mental bumper sticker. Sometimes, I print them, fold them up and carry them in my pocket, and read to remind myself there is more to life than the daily drama of the world.

Keep coming back, it works if you work it....

HAPPY NOVEMBER

Soft*Silver

11-13-2009, 03:13 AM

Ahhh..here is the thread I wanted!
Today is my one year anniversary. I had 19 years but gave it up a year ago. Drank worse than I ever did ... and actually should have been in the ER. Its true..the disease doesnt stop just because you dont drink. Anyways, I am now 1 year clean and sober and am actually glad I drank..it broke what needed to be broken for it to heal the right way...

LeftWriteFemme

11-13-2009, 05:23 AM

LeftWriteFemme

11-13-2009, 05:25 AM

Good morning Sherri, Tommi. Yes, I stalk your words of wisdom here too. You may have noticed, I and our community really needs this light. Thanks again Sherri.

Greyson, thank you so much! I am so happy to be of service to the community which carries me to this life I could never have even known to ask for. I am so glad you're here! How was the Round Up??

Sherrie

LeftWriteFemme

11-13-2009, 05:27 AM

Good Morning Greyson and Lefty, ;),
I too look for the words displayed which seem to magically apply to my day, or memories of the past.

I like to apply just one thing from those daily posts. Sometimes, I take away a mental bumper sticker. Sometimes, I print them, fold them up and carry them in my pocket, and read to remind myself there is more to life than the daily drama of the world.

Keep coming back, it works if you work it....

HAPPY NOVEMBER

Thank you, Daddy! You've read me so long and so well that you know me inside and out, I can not think of a greater gift! It warms my heart that you carry part of me with you everyday!.

love,

the girl

Tommi

11-13-2009, 06:26 AM

LeftWriteFemme

11-14-2009, 08:55 AM

November 14

THREE TOYS FLOATING

I bat the ducks across the surface of my bath. Soaking is supposed to calm me. I’m waiting. I assure you my impatience is no help to this process. These yellow, tub-bound misfits grinning at me don’t fill me with the joy of living, either. I have blown bubbles until I’m blue. I smell like a French elevator from the bath oils. My hair is stiff with conditioner; my face packed with mud. “Do the right thing," said my sponsor. She is such a pain. Here I am bubble bath to my armpits, and not a hint of peace. Her question rings, “What do you want?” But isn’t it obvious? If I knew that, what would I be doing wrinkling in this swilling vat? I wouldn’t. I would be out doing my ‘thing’, whatever that ‘thing’ is. How I’m going to figure myself out I don’t know. And ‘she’ is no help, (you know who ‘she’ is, she the sponsor lady)
So what do I want?
World peace.
A clue.
Maybe just a hint.
But I know part of it. I know more than I admit.
I want sobriety and happiness, dignity and respect, enough time to do these things, and love.
“Well," says she, “those things are easy. Work the steps, then the traditions; practice them, do service, and take the advice you give to your own sponsees.”
I stick out my tongue in her general direction.

Creep toward the unknown.

LeftWriteFemme

11-15-2009, 06:02 AM

November 15

DESERVING

Tender toes crushed by moving memories, fresh pain from ancient injuries, shock incurred from these lifeless reminiscences. Unhappy reconstructions slap unsuspecting faces. The people, who stood by to let the chips fall where they may, try to feign 'innocent bystander' now that shit is falling from the sky. Unexposed skin will burn when the flames leap high. Idiotic excuses will not retard the fire of injustice coming to call. Too late tears carry no freight with the past recipients of the it all runs down hill award. Cowards make themselves cripples and fracture at the force of incoming reality, and deserve more than they get.

Once well is a full feeling.

LeftWriteFemme

11-16-2009, 05:08 AM

November 16

DOWN THE UPSIDE

On the downside of a rising star there is too much fear. Anticipation is recommended for ascent, delight should be encouraged, but all out alarm is usually sounded whether it is needed or not. Panic dims the shining pleasure of mounting the sky. Refuting celestial status, denying astral projection, I renounce myself. Attaining height, my position in space is apparent to bystanders and onlookers. I need to ride the comet and accept fate, my nemesis. Fortune shines on me, I should not squint away kismet.

Expand your spiritual muscle.

LeftWriteFemme

11-17-2009, 04:47 AM

November 17

TIMELY

Spend a minute to rub the sleep gently from your eyes.
Spend an hour smoothing lotion from one end to the other.
Spend a day in tribute to the gifts you give and gifts given you.
Spend a week researching your goals, dreams and hopes.
Spend a month routing energy to a viable flow.
Spend a year studying truth.
Spend a life living it.
Your life is worth all the time you have.
Take it.

Balance doubt and dreams.

LeftWriteFemme

11-18-2009, 05:39 AM

November 18

MAIL FRAUD

The open envelope betrays the tampering I suspect. Too bad my critics are snooping, not my supporters. When they are finished tearing open my mail, they tear me apart as well. Shredded, I feel unable to handle further correspondence. I shut down communications. There is no channel for benefactors to travel. My champions are at a loss to defend me from my opponents; the struggle flounders. Misunderstanding the meaning of messages, I have been mocked and enslaved. I would love to vanquish my foes, but you see I am opening my own mail.

Ask often all the questions.

LeftWriteFemme

11-19-2009, 05:09 AM

November 19

DRIVEWAY TIME

Layer after layer of blue stack the sky, the moon risen and the sun dipping away. I wait for the twin lights, the constellation of headlights---my ride to the meeting. It will be the entry vehicle to a world of population, leaving behind the galaxy of me, the single star. I stand silent and the feeling of fellowship carries the miles. Laughter flies the winds of memory and all the old jokes of truth and tribute are fresh and abide with me until the car arrives and we make it all new again.

Ride a horse to a pony show.

LeftWriteFemme

11-20-2009, 05:19 AM

November 20

NUZZLE’S OFFERING

Like a vegan kitten who wrestles long tailed leaves and twigs, subduing them and dragging these prizes to the feet of human parents, I fight paper tigers and bring the tatters as tribute to my Higher Power. These bloodless battles are pure practice; future wars may not be as clean. I can not enlist my God to fight these skirmishes; I would never believe in one that I could. I accept Deus as creator and cheerleader, but champion, no. Foliage and foes are mine to fight. The spoils, I bring back for pats on the head and bragging.

Talk to things other than people.

Tommi

11-20-2009, 08:35 AM

Saw this early AM post and smiled, knowing form and function, tarry then race. Wait and it will come.

Rested in that trust, and it came. Daily I see, touch and taste the miracle of my existence. I listen to the thoughts that dash about, sputtering and spewing, whistling and cooing.

Clouds come by and I may cry. Sunlight breaks and I know why.

:seesaw:

Tommi

11-21-2009, 06:09 AM

Welcome to the 46th International Women's Conference
February 11-14, 2010

Orlando, Fl
IWC Mission Statement

The International Women's Conference is a bridge to a better understanding of the Alcoholics Anonymous philosophy and way of life because of our special needs in sobriety as women. We, as women members of Alcoholics Anonymous, are survivors. We have found a way to obtain meaning, depth, and responsibility in our lives. This came about out of desire, decision, determination and spiritual guidance. An elevated sense of belong that is brought about by the special services and special needs provided by our Women's Conference is our goal.

Come join us for the
46th Annual International Women's Conference
to be held February 11-14, 2010 .

The 46th International Women's Conference will be held at the
THE DOUBLETREE HOTEL
At the entrance to Universal Studios Orlando
5780 Major Boulevard, Orlando, Florida 32819
407-351-1000, Toll Free 800-327-2110
On-Line Reservations: www.doubletree.com
Note, this takes you directly to the 46th IWC booking page.

Help make the conference a financial success by booking rooms in the conference host hotel, buying meal tickets (which include taxes and tips), because ….. WE PAY OUR OWN WAY!

Important Information
The entire conference is a closed AA women's event for registrants only.
· Mail-in registration closes January 5, 2010.
· No checks will be accepted o-site at the conference. Cash or money orders in U.S. dollars only.
· At the conference, name badges must be worn at all times. Please register by January 5, 2010 to ensure a pre-printed badge.
· The 46th IWC and the International Women's Conference, Inc. are not responsible for any loss of personal items or personal injury.
· No child care will be provided

http://www.internationalwomensconference.org/#

LeftWriteFemme

11-21-2009, 07:33 AM

November 21

FLORAL TROPHIES

Captured pet plants grow in my window. Why these specimens are given such regal care I suspect, but can’t explain. Delicate shoots pile out of sturdy stalks; roots force the confines of my decorative pots. How many neighborly blooming faces stare into my kitchen, greeting me mornings? I am amazed what good company my leafy friends can be when I am loving myself. Advantageous to my mental health, I breathe their exhaust and they breathe mine. Symbiotic, we live. I grow and flower; grateful these plants keep me.

Allow also small dreams that fit in your hand.

LeftWriteFemme

11-22-2009, 07:20 AM

November 22

JELLYFISH AND PEANUT BUTTER CARDS

Jellyfish and peanut butter cards make for busy days and cheerful nights, sunlit at the beach and lantern light filled with double-decker solitaire. Camping as a way of life suits some as they run from their lives. For the more balanced, camp is a temporary retreat. To the overly invested, camping is an aberration, a threat to the foundations of civilization as we know it. I can take a bit of sand in my hair, smoke in the air. Though I do dread the feeling of coming back to the life I love and feeling like a stranger. Temporary disengagement estranges me from the place, the things, the dog. I need time away, variety of experience, expanded horizons. I need my entrenched home life. I need it all and must accept the clock never stops running anyplace on the planet even if I am enjoying a good game with sticky camp cards, regaling tales of man-of-war.

Don’t break your wishbone.

Tommi

11-22-2009, 08:26 AM

Wow, woke refreshed and thankful

:turkeyday:
It is almost Thanksgiving. I began doing the annual requisite list of what I am thankful for. It has gotten so much bigger.

I am greateful beyond words.

Thank you God, I couldn't have dreamed it. It is more than I had on my list.

LeftWriteFemme

11-23-2009, 05:12 AM

November 23

PRIDE GOETH BEFORE A FALL

In truth, pride goes wherever it wants, it’s pride. Pride wanders alone, for no one enjoys its company. Pride travels far but gets nowhere. Pride rises above reality and seeps beneath the surface. When pride wears out, love and honesty poke holes in it until it is grounded and transforms to humility. Pride’s past is remembered with flush and embarrassment. Recounting yesterday is pride’s unenviable task. Keeping it from recreation is mine.

Dress yourself with love.

LeftWriteFemme

11-24-2009, 04:45 AM

November 24

LIKE PEACE

Peace, like an elephant on my chest; I can’t breathe but at least we are not fighting. The rigid air hangs like sheets on the line, stiff but dry. Plastered smiles and short salutations get us through until bedtime, but what we can hold in standing up pours out lying down. Tender feelings are compressed and come out only as water. Anger bubbles and brews. Disappointment lives down deep and sours the milk of love. There are things worse than cross words. Moldering, festering, frozen words pound spikes in a relationship fraught with apprehension. The truth is I would let these pent-up things out, but I don’t trust you and I don’t trust me.

See through time.

LeftWriteFemme

11-25-2009, 05:14 AM

November 25

THE FLYING MIND

When my brain flies out my ear, destination unknown, I am left mentally bereft. I feel intellectual convolution and show no affliction other than my inability to fulfill my assignments. I stare out sure a ring of blue birds circle my head, or maybe stars like any other cartoon patsy. What to do? These parodied wingdings ridicule me privately leaving the impression of idiocy with onlookers and supervisors. My focus and perceptions quaver and I lose my place. I have to find a way to spot and keep my emotional balance, the same way I stay upright during pirouettes by watching one doorframe or light switch. I need an unmoving object in a sea of swimming thoughts. I still need to make the mental turns but this should be much easier if I stop landing on my face.

Work with yourself.

LeftWriteFemme

11-26-2009, 07:41 AM

November 26

ASSURANCES OF GULLIVER

Poor Lilliputians and my egg shaped conundrum! At least they have the strength of their convictions when I have only pondering to share the space between my ears. What sense could the world make if there is no one right way and each person is free to open the egg from either end or leave the thing intact, having instead maybe a bagel? I have been looking for the combinations to unlock the universe when possibly it’s an egg shaped thing with no doors or locks and all that’s left is to break in or out.

Believe what you can do.

LeftWriteFemme

11-27-2009, 07:14 AM

November 27

THE STORYTELLER

Funny stories I long to share with new friends have to be put aside while the core of this entity is built. Mutual memory is the siding on a house framed in integrity. Treading together through the past, we strengthen each other's perception; it's the only support that can be offered without time travel. We take hands, then link arms, wander happily toward the future having the keys to history jangling in our fists; we can return whenever prudent or necessary. We forge a fresh path and hope for a pleasant journey; between us we figure we have slain all the dragons.

Invest in idealism.

LeftWriteFemme

11-28-2009, 05:03 AM

November 28

NAVY DUCK

When the postcard is hung upside down the plane flies away on its back. I know one of those irregular days with the disposition of a bee-stung mule is on its way to visit me. I have found diplomacy goes a long way and when it runs out, humor is the best fallback, nothing mean or sophomoric, but the ability to laugh is a fortune in the face of a bankrupt day. When the sun sets on these spare and harrowing days, I mortgage strength from tomorrow and right the picture then try to fly right.

Plod when you can’t skip.

Tommi

11-28-2009, 04:55 PM

plodding along..:listening:, singing all the way.

Thanks for being here every day.

Tommi:tiger:

LeftWriteFemme

11-29-2009, 07:28 AM

November 29

ENDLESS PASTA

Having limits in a seemingly limitless universe makes me feel horribly inadequate. I am a sad little creature in the face of overwhelming tasks. Pressure and unwarranted ego compress my ability and eager disposition. I am forced to see there are chores outside my qualifications and willingness. Going on in the face of crushing requirements extrudes my life force into a plateful of capellini lying exposed with no gravy to keep me warm. It is hard to realize, in this world of wonder and delight a plate of naked spaghetti can’t do it all.

Put a penny in your sock..

LeftWriteFemme

11-30-2009, 05:14 AM

November 30

FLAW IN SNOW

Waiting for snow. Waiting for cold fingers, slick roads, warm beds, reading by firelight. Waiting for the proof of lack of control. Waiting itself proves lack of control. I can dance the snow dance and refuse to buy new shovels, hang out laundry, put out every manner of storm tempters; still I cannot force the hand of nature. I must sit with my crystalline optimism and endure these cloudless skies. There will be snow, it will fall somewhere, but I mustn’t grow overanxious ‘cause it may never snow in Miami.

Treat yourself with learning.

LeftWriteFemme

12-01-2009, 04:33 AM

December 1

ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT

Arrested development was bad enough; the living death sentence it imposes is completely unacceptable. My childhood ran down the hill away from the mountain of confusion that is life in this society. My ability to mature was damaged and what I learned to do was mutate. I could move laterally but never grow up. I became the goose being grown for its liver. All the honk and squawk in the world couldn’t change my plight. I don’t have to understand how I was let out of the prison of addiction. As long as I don’t go back I’ll never fear breaking out in handcuffs or getting locked in my crib.

Effort is already made, just add your hand.

LeftWriteFemme

12-02-2009, 05:04 AM

December 2

There are only 23 more shopping days left till my nervous break down

Shoppers beware: I have a careful plan! I can juggle these thirty things, keep these twenty people happy, dig around in the dirt at these three excavation sites and hold on to my sanity for twenty-three more days.
My sponsor says having a plan like that means I’m already crazy. My sponsor says I don’t have to please anyone but myself, my Higher Power and her. That can’t be right. What is the point of sobriety if I can’t do it all?
She says I don’t even have to please her or myself. What does that mean? How can I tell if I’m pleasing my Higher Power?
She says, “Shut up and you’ll find out.” Great! What a plan. I like my countdown better. Of course I do, it’s mine. My countdown, my life, mine, mine, mine.
Maybe my sponsor is not all wrong. OK, quiet......da,da,da.....da,da. OK, quiet for real. Hmmm. I don’t, don’t know. This isn’t working. I can’t do this. Why would I need to stop being me in order to get better?
“Who are you?” she asks. She thinks she’s so smart. I’m the one in the middle. She says the eye of the storm is empty and I need to get a life of my own.

Endurance lets you live in the house you built.

Tommi

12-02-2009, 06:47 PM

LeftWriteFemme

12-03-2009, 05:39 AM

December 3

MIRACULOUS

Sometimes the blind lead the deaf. The subtle signs are the bumping into trouble and inability to listen to reason. It is an expedition into disaster unfettered by common sense or boundaries. Tumbles and falls propel this pairing to unknown destinations. The attraction is baffling but undeniable. These pairs can be seen through the ages. In spite of this confounding coupling, sometimes the blind find their way and the deaf hear the call. And even when they don’t, life seems to roll along. But try to keep your eyes and ears open anyway.

Set the goalpost where you can see it.

purepisces

12-03-2009, 05:09 PM

LeftWriteFemme

12-04-2009, 05:25 AM

Hi Sherrie,

I am so happy to see this thread here. You really do keep the light on for us, don't you? Thank you for posting every day for all of us. I don't know how you do it!

And, hello to Tommi, Greyson, Softness and everyone else who is reading along. I'm grateful to share this space with you all.

Hope everyone is enjoying the day.

purepisces

Thank you so much for being here! It's my pleasure to have this place to post. I am so grateful that you take the time to come in here and read!

Very truly,

Sherrie

LeftWriteFemme

12-04-2009, 05:26 AM

December 4

PERSONAL DICTIONARY

Everyone keeps a dictionary in his or her head. All the words lay on platters each with its own flavor and meaning. There are favorite menus, phrases, which form warmly in the mouth and hang sweetly for the ear. Other vocabulary is exotic, pungent, occasionally with a strong aftertaste or off-key ringing. Abundance brings a wealth of conversation and keeps the cold of boredom at bay. Free for the taking, words grow out of life lived. When we have lived separately, even if only in our separate heads, meanings vary and reference must be checked. Blue sky is blue sky, but do you speak of azure, cerulean or peacock? Life is so much show and tell. Drink the sunshine with your eyes and flow it out to me with your words.

Write on scraps then tape them together.

LeftWriteFemme

12-05-2009, 07:10 AM

December 5

THE BOAT

On my ride home from work there is a boat stuck between two trees in the middle of a horse pasture next to a riverbed so dry it's filled with grass. I think the boat is me. I feel for the boat every time I see it. Turned on edge, waiting for a river, which doesn't exist anymore and may never exist again. Placed on edge for protection, not comfort. Although having my bottom rot out, well, let's just say might be more uncomfortable. What good will I be even if the river runs again since I'm fenced in? My sponsor says I shouldn't ask any question which starts with the word 'why'. You know my reply.
If my Higher Power has a plan...if it includes a river and a fence… if I'm in this plan, me, the rowboat…I just don't see it. Not seeing my purpose in life is a theme in my life says my sponsor. I don't tell her the theme in hers.
Truth is, I don't want to face the fact I might float away. Even though I'm supported by two big trees. Even though there is a tall fence all around me. Completely in spite of the fact THERE IS NO WATER! My Higher Power loves me. I am the boat.

Enjoy the flowers and slide on the snow.

LeftWriteFemme

12-05-2009, 07:54 AM

Tommi

12-05-2009, 08:31 AM

I think I forgot to mention that I will be the main speaker at the Western Area Conference of Young People in Alcoholics Anonymous. I hope to get a chance to meet anyone from this site who will be there. Here is the link:

http://www.wacypaa.org/

Hope to see you there!
I was told that this is the first time they have had a gay main speaker (I don't know why that is so shocking to me but it is)

Sherrie

The first time and this Out gay main speaker will knock their socks off..I have been there, and will be again.
Yes, and what a great, inspirational, and fun night/weekend they are in for.....:D.

Anyone in the Portland/Eugene OR area let us know and we can meet up while we are in the area. We will be in the area Wed before and Mon. after the meeting.

http://www.wacypaa.org/host.php

Tommi, The Gay Main Speaker Authors Escort(f)

LeftWriteFemme

12-06-2009, 07:17 AM

December 6

MOSAIC

I couldn’t prevent this plate from shattering, so I saved all the pieces, losing none. I laid them edge-to-edge and made a design, secured it with thin-set. Pieces of pattern framed with grout are seen, as they never could be when this dish was whole. I am part of this construction more than just handing china onto the table. Integrity has been lost but replaced with fractured openness. The plate has lost personal unity to become an ingrained part of my personal archeology.

Fly your kite in the wind.

LeftWriteFemme

12-07-2009, 05:07 AM

December 7

ORIGINS

Pain-filled interactions with people better suited to be left alone changed me in the way of acceptance. Wretched relationships with people made it difficult for me to have a loving relationship with the world. I had imprinted as a fledgling on sarcasm and ridicule, bitter milk that starved my expectations of kind response. I could not greet the world eagerly. Having never embraced the world; I failed to hang on as it turned. I slid on my face and hands. Mud covered, I try to keep an open mind and attempt a connection with this spinning orb.

Color your emotions.

LeftWriteFemme

12-08-2009, 05:16 AM

December 8

THE WAY I DO IT

Cooking by smell, parking by ear, recovering by touch. The latter has to be done this way; I cannot see into the black-box technology, which keeps me sober. Feel through the resentments, pain, sadness, joy; find myself under a pile of rags with a match in my hand. The many times the steps have saved me from becoming a human torch are balanced by the weight of the rope, woven from these same rags, that together we use to drag one another to safety. The savory scent of a meal, or the glee of front row parking can’t compare with the tender sense of a sober heart.

Write bad advice on tissue and wipe with it.

Tommi

12-08-2009, 08:27 AM

Hello to all those that come to read and venture on, but keep coming back...(y). Thanks sherrie for your daily service in so many places. :writer:

The way it's done...for each and every one of us along this journey.

What delight in another day of life as I know it today, and remember it tomorrow.

The mind is full of treasures, if we just open the door and look.Peeking into a day full of wonder, a night filled with sleep and wonderful dreams, and a destiny of love and life as sobering as it may be.

Tommi, walking that happy road of destiny.

hottprof

12-08-2009, 12:03 PM

I am really proud of you all for posting and sharing days of inspiration. Though I am not a friend of Bill's I am a friend of his wife Lois. Together anything is possible and no matter what dark or uncomfortable days lie ahead, there are always people with inspiring thoughts and compassion that will help the "you" inside return to the surface to face that adversity.

I am proud of all of you.

Love and Smiles :frog:

HP aka katrinka82

LeftWriteFemme

12-09-2009, 05:43 AM

December 9

CLIMBING ON THE ARC

If time swings and the seasons swirl and I pulse out my existence, why does the bird's wing flap and the rain fall down? If the song comes from my mother’s lips and my father tells his tales and I dance my heritage with each step I take, then why does the flower open to the bee and the swan trumpet her way home? If everything pulls from the ground and reaches for the light, then how can I duck my head, hide my heart and pass this all off as a coincidence? Am I less than the rain or greater than the swan? Why can’t I just climb on the arc and let the continuum spin its web around me? Well, you see I can, but will I?

Let little birdies speak.

LeftWriteFemme

12-10-2009, 04:10 AM

December 10

ELECTRIC CONNECTIONS

I step into a room and take its currency. Is the flow good? Steady? The pulse even and strong? Where are the power brokers and are they sharing the time or using their magnetic personalities to draw the current off others? I check the complement of resisters, examine their stripes and access the possibilities. I pump in energy when I can and take when it is available. I keep in mind we are all transformers and change is possible for everyone as long as we make the connections.

Rich mistakes make good batter.

LeftWriteFemme

12-11-2009, 05:15 AM

December 11

TAPERS

I wax poetic and burn the candle at both ends. I borrow from the beginning, I steal from the end, coming up short and feeling deeply cheated. I pass myself off as the time-keeper but am the time-pleaser, arch-traitor selling short the days and hours for approval, not fulfillment. I put away my true identity: mammal, human, the love of; I have exchanged it for the mask and cape of the Do-do-doer, a tragic figure of myth and legend who breaks the spirit of everyone who attempts the portrayal. In spite of this the roads teem with actors becoming caricatures of a life less lived. The world is more than a stage, and I must free powers greater than I to be more than an audience.

Laugh at old jokes and tell new ones.

LeftWriteFemme

12-12-2009, 08:19 AM

December 12

BLEATING FORMALITY

Stupidity stalks me when I am tired, hijacking my mouth. I can put this off to pilot error or interruption of service on my neurologic pipeline, but truly I have been captured by senseless, irrational muttonness. I would love to say it was pigheadedness but, alas, I am not self-determined, I am a sheep. I open my lips and out pours the same plaintive cry as the surrounding herd. In addition, once begun, the wail is unending; it’s as if the bellows works on its own carrying a tune which blends with the entire wool-coated world. I shift and run with my position according to the movements at large. I am following the reactionary breed, dropping the specifics of my personality as one of the crowd; my brain is switched off and a quick veneer grows over my eyes. I can’t see, think, or speak for myself and yet it doesn’t occur to me to hit the hay. When as a petulant three year old I do fall to sleep in my tracks, I wake as myself with many bleating apologies to be made.

Put morbidity on a leash and never walk it alone.

LeftWriteFemme

12-13-2009, 07:34 AM

December 13

WHAT IS MINE

The cloud of snow slept in the tree overnight and poured from the branches with the morning breezes. Showers of crystal, dropping from a clear daylight sky, are telltales of intentions delayed. What was meant for moon time has been kept till sunshine, a treat for bright eyes and young hearts. How can I weep over altered destinations? Arrivals and departures are truly within the province of poetry and postcards, not things for worry or fretting. Putty is for forming into an image of my desire not the world. Time is a liquid substance I cannot decant at my will. Shoulds and oughts are parlor games for the bored and senseless. If I waste my life playing a game I can’t win I will fail to see what I can’t lose.

Work with someone who works.

LeftWriteFemme

12-15-2009, 04:11 AM

December 15

GOOSE

I round this corner nearly everyday. There in the field stands a flock of problems pecking the ground and flapping their wings. Uniform and regular, the honking and squawking is undistinguishable from yesterday. I ponder and squint; are these the same or yet another gaggle making their way along a migratory path? Trouble is feral, skulking the edges of the field but never sheltering in the yard. I must leave my hands off, knowing these are not mine. The feathers fly and I gather the strays acutely aware of the ticklish nature of this. Awkwardly I face the truth; no matter how much of a perplexity this is to me or to others, it is only geese.

Run because you want to and the starter’s whistle won’t bother you.

LeftWriteFemme

12-16-2009, 05:11 AM

December 16

GOOD SAMARITAN PIE

The meal prepared from my cognition, the bread and jam of humility, salad of expectation, roast of determination and Good Samaritan pie, wait on the table to be devoured. The courses pass and come dessert my kindly intentions are cut to wedges and pushed from setting to setting. I can, with dollop after dollop, cover the requisite desires of this tart in an attempt to deny my addiction to fixing or I can serve up the plain truth. I help and help and wander down roads looking for lost puppies to return to their homes. I must admit my longing to lend support is sometimes half-baked, and if kept to home and hearth it might serve me better and make a sweeter dish. Assistance is best in proportion to the meal. I must live my life and save my pie till last.

Hold each other's hands but explore.

LeftWriteFemme

12-17-2009, 04:46 AM

December 17

POPCORN FLAVORED LOLLIPOP

I can’t know it. I can’t believe it. The world of popcorn flavored lollipops is now being visited upon me. Both a surprise and a comfort, a popcorn flavored lollipop is given to me by the gas station attendant. A blast of sugar and salt waken my tongue. What can a mind do in the face of a buttered, salted bonbon on a stick? I wouldn’t have thought of it, not in a million years. This is somehow a source of hope to me. There are open-minded people living in the world around me. I often pray for creative thinking on the part of my Higher Power; I inadvertently dismiss the populace who is producing prodigies of ingenious originality and cunning. I want the world to be gifted with what sobriety has given me. Candy is not world peace but many great things start with a little sweetness.

Real rules can’t be broken.

LeftWriteFemme

12-18-2009, 05:05 AM

purepisces

12-18-2009, 09:09 PM

December 18

WATER PROOF

What could water prove anyway? I get in the water and I get wet. I’m sure there is a theorem but a proof is highly doubtful. Naiads dance with tridents in their hands illustrating the beauty and danger of the waves but this certifies nothing. Juiceless arid dirt can make no claims either. I see the ducks take flight pushing the air with their wings and the rivulets trailing from webs. This is the thing to scoot beneath at the surface, take sustenance and pleasure, but never to become so saturated that the air is lost. Waterproof… is the way to go.

Give preconceived notions a place on the shelf or in the can but no place in your life.

Hi Sherrie (and Tommi)

I'm having a rough day today and I'm so glad to know that you are always here, keeping the light on for me.

Thank you. :bouquet:

I'm grateful to be experiencing today with a sober mind and an open heart. Really facing the pain of a difficult situation can be so cleansing. And exhausting, I think I need a nap!

LeftWriteFemme

12-19-2009, 05:49 AM

Hi Sherrie (and Tommi)

I'm having a rough day today and I'm so glad to know that you are always here, keeping the light on for me.

Thank you. :bouquet:

I'm grateful to be experiencing today with a sober mind and an open heart. Really facing the pain of a difficult situation can be so cleansing. And exhausting, I think I need a nap!

Thanks for taking the time to come here and read and share! I wish you the best as you face your difficult situation.

Sherrie

LeftWriteFemme

12-19-2009, 05:49 AM

December 19

ALMOST TWINS

You and I are more alike than different yet we cannot get along, though I ponder why this surprises me so. A cloud and a watermelon are 98% the same and no one would mistake them in a crowd or expect them to be companionable except in the way of two things existing in the universe. My expectation of liking you for our similarities is set up by my fear that I don’t like myself, but the joke is on me. My dislike of you is not a reflection of anything but time and space. My friends are the people who like me, not necessarily the ones who are like me. The president didn’t like broccoli without slurring its good name and I can dislike you without inferring you are a vegetable.

Enjoy the approach as well as the work.

Tommi

12-19-2009, 11:11 AM

Hoping Saturday is a day of good music :listening: and dancing purepisces (even if it's all by yourself, no one is watching ) . :bellydancer: :hiding:

Wishing you well, and it is good to have the light on. :moonstars:

and sherrie, thank you for today's one liner ~ inspiration. "Enjoy the approach as well as the work". I will apply it today as I dust :p

LeftWriteFemme

12-20-2009, 07:54 AM

December 20

COOCOO’S NEST

I ran away to join the zoo hoping a life contained would calm me. The segregation hit me first; isolated exclusively with those of my stripe drove my thirst for diverse scents and opinion. Next, the monotony of the landscape bore into my brain. The well-meaning effort of the keepers bears the mark of folks who go home at night. The blandness of the food and music lent nothing to the experience, and antiseptic could drive anyone wild. The final blow, the one that struck constantly and coldly, was the stream of observers waiting to be entertained.

Embrace plain tools and fine minds.

LeftWriteFemme

12-21-2009, 06:30 AM

December 21

WHAT’S MINE IS MINE

I don’t always know how to get the dog off the baby. The attacks are often sudden and always swift. My shock at the reality delays my response, falters my steps and fogs my mind. What should I do to disengage this assault? What can I do that won’t make things worse? How can I resolve this now? The pain is almost unimaginable but yet all too familiar. It all comes down to ownership. I must admit this baby is me. I have to face facts; this dog is my pet, I have fed, nurtured and groomed him and now I have to put this dog to sleep.

Explore the air not just the dirt.

LeftWriteFemme

12-22-2009, 06:11 AM

December 22

CHANGE IN MENU

If God is drunk we pray for spiritual sobriety and strong sponsorship. If God is sober we ask for these things on God’s behalf and glory in answered prayer. It is amazing that the rain comes down if I dance for it or not. I can get this wonderful recovery just like the rest of ‘we agnostics’, I don’t have to shake your hand, wink my eye or say some special bit of poetry to have it. Just the same way that weather is and changes and deepens so too is my spiritual condition. It is there as I tread this path. I don’t have to mark the rows in my garden for the plants to grow. I wish for God a salad with two forks, we no longer need to share a bottle.

Dance with your skeletons.

LeftWriteFemme

12-23-2009, 05:04 AM

December 23

TRUE VOICE

Some tears pour from my eyes and others from my heart. What once was a head-game and theory is now heartfelt and real. I have grown in my compassion, leaving qualification on the curb. Letters and notice mean so little in the full-out scheme of all the world; like fashion, what is true today, stood on and dependable, is next years joke and off-hand reference. The thump of the muscle deep within me is a compass I can trust. The daily tide of splash and rush can spring water to my face, but what rouses my spirit is much more. I needn’t worry for its receding or discount that it is faithful; it abides with me still and will keep me if I let it. Some sounds ring from my voice; others resonate from within, these are the ones that last.

Aim is as important as a strong arm.

LeftWriteFemme

12-24-2009, 05:27 AM

December 24

RETRO ANTICIPATION AND SUNSHINE

The night after a victory I fret about the blocks. Will my stance be right? Will I leave cleanly? I have been first through the tape. I have won the race but yet I worry how I will start. Had I anticipated a win I might have handled the accolades better. Apprehension has a long half-life and feeds through the night on my gizzards and my dreams. Failure gives homework, there are rewrites and typos, but checkmate leaves an empty board and hands to shake. The long ride home is filled with recriminating thoughts of luck and fortune. By the time I arrive home the win is devalued and no longer mine. I must pry misgivings from the winner’s circle and enjoy. These moments in the sun are just as real as any others.

Draw pictures of monsters, then let them lay.

Tommi

12-24-2009, 10:28 AM

I am writing my Christmas letter and posting it here, because it seems a likely meeting place.

Happy Holidays it says on all the windows, and read in all the cards...I enjoy this season for so many reasons, and am sober and sane enough to live and love, and recall many miracles. Jan. 7, I celebrate many sober years, but for now, the Christmas magic is at hand, and I recall the wonder of my miraculous childhood.:anothersnowman:

When I was a little dyke/tyke only child of the alcoholic parents, I got everything I wanted...except a sober holiday..I escaped into Plasticville USA, the twinking bubble lights on a huge tree, and the sound of the midnight train I steered around the living room.......

My memory bank floods with the wonder of Christmas Eve, when my Uncle Donny morphed into Santa Claus ( he never fooled this precocious kid).We would travel from one house to the next watching the younger cousins, the aunts and uncles open their presents, in a caravan progression that ended at our house. Grownups toasting the seasonal favorite toddy.

All the family gathered for a midnight dinner prepared by my Gramma, and then the magic of Christmas took me away. To the little town my Mom and I had created unter the big tree that dad had planted firmly on the 4 X 8 plywood platform in the corner of our living room

Everyone gathered around our Christmas tree. I engineered the Lionel trains dodging through snow covered tunnels, corning around the Plasticville town. Letting the cousins blow the horn and raise and lower the lights of the Main Street USA village, I was in charge.:mountie:.

The family would all leave, the treelights would be tuned off, and then the parental fireworks would begin. I retreated to my room, and wondered if she would be alive Christmas morning.

I vowed to never pick up a drink, but, I did..and it took no time at all to raise the Rum and Coke toast at Christmas Eve with my Mom, aka Big Butch(who came out when I was 17) and our "chosen family". We moved 3, 000 miles from home, no twinkiling lights, no train and no raging alcoholic father. We drank together, we double dated, we went to Hollywood and did things I don't post about.

Then the miracle happened right after a drunken Christmas and New Year's eve. My Mom went into rehab. I visited her, attended Al Anon, and knew, I needed to be in the other rooms too. We finally were able to enjoy every day, and night, a chance to love and live a rewarding and sober life before she passed away.

Tonite, I open presents, toast with Diet Coke, and celebrate the miracles of the season, and being sober for over 30 years.

Against all odds, miracles do happen.

Have a very Merry Christmas and a sober new year,

Tommi

LeftWriteFemme

12-24-2009, 07:12 PM

Thank you for sharing, Daddy. I am so grateful for the joy we have today, even holidays we share on the phone are so much better that all the past holidays before we found the joy we have with each other today. I can hardly wait to see you!

All my love,

the girl

purepisces

12-25-2009, 01:16 AM

LeftWriteFemme

12-25-2009, 06:38 AM

December 25

ALCONAUT

Want to learn it fast but not deep? Just go to meetings and listen with half an ear. Call your sponsor only for her birthday and anniversary and tell her about all the things you are not doing anymore but none of the things you are. Skim the books for good quotes that sound impressive when they pass your lips but whose meaning has no chance of passing your heart. Find playmates and cliques, not a home group, and surely not a service commitment. Things fall out of orbit when they run out of juice and you will too. This program is not an air lock on the way to worlds unknown; it is a way to live in the world you know. There is no question that you have the right stuff. The question is, do you want what we have?

Hug your feelings, pat their heads, then let them go.

LeftWriteFemme

12-26-2009, 06:25 AM

December 26

HEART HANDED

I pick up the pen in my heart hand and the blood of my soul pours onto the page. The words coalesce and clot into the binding phrases; sealed deals with my spirit's punctuation. Some days it is hard for my mind to keep up; the current is swift and deeper than I expect. The pulse of energy is amazing even to the mind it feeds. Like clouds racing the sky this power brings shade to some and rain to others. The reaction of the moistened varies, some pull up hoods and scurry away, others with upturned faces form a friendship with me. At the level of electrons, we have a molecular bonding, we are forever changed because I have picked up the pen and they picked up the page.

Chain yourself to wisdom.

Tommi

12-26-2009, 04:41 PM

Wow, Tommi! That is quite a story ... AND a happy ending. Wonderful to read about the journey you and your mom took together. Thank you for sharing it with us.

I'm happily enjoying my own sober Christmas tonight. :xmascandle:

Merry Christmas to you and Sherrie!!!

p.s. It snowed here today!!! :snowballfight:

Life is good even if I don't have snowballs....:penguin:
,. So Cal weather is getting chilly...
High of 65 expected today. .what will that do the tomato's in bloom out front? :cowboy:

Thank you purepices, and sherrie.. Glad you are safe and sound, well, as sound as can be expected..http://theinspirationroom.com/daily/print/2007/12/KitKat-Santa.jpg

LeftWriteFemme

12-27-2009, 06:05 AM

December 27

SIZING GOD UP

God doesn’t need to be big. I only look for a big God when I feel very small. I turn to God as compensation for my feelings, as some sort of bolster to brace myself with. I have found when I am diminished in any way, God is tucked in a corner or pocket or drawer. I flee to the great out of doors and find earth, nature and wind but the God of my understanding is proportionate to my mental state. My partner is with me, near enough to hear the fear pour off my skin. God doesn’t run from me to adventures in the wild. I want to escape myself regularly but this is not my Higher Power's defect. I come back to God when I stop running from me. I face my reflection and recognize I am not towered over by a giant God; I am yoked with a power to share the load.

Enjoy the shape of things.

LeftWriteFemme

12-28-2009, 06:52 AM

December 28

DON’T BITE

Desperation jumps up, runs around, then drops. If I don’t feed it, desperation burns out fast. I used to buy the advertising, the Horror, the Humanity. The acorn falling on my head convinced me easily. I grew this nut into terrifying despair never realizing if I had left it alone how quickly it would pass. When tragedy comes there is no time for a performance. The whirling splendor itself proves the farce. If I learn to recognize these triggers I might keep from shooting myself in the foot. If I let desperation wear itself out I can stay with the pack. Despondence splinters me and separates me from anything rational but quiet resolve lets me watch the wind twist while I keep my feet on the ground.

Pay your friends in consideration and truth.

LeftWriteFemme

12-29-2009, 06:35 AM

December 29

RELAPSE IS NOT REQUIRED

“Relapse is not required,” said my sponsor, “though at some meetings they make it seem appealing, all that prodigal drunk treatment.”
“Well, so far, I’m living in the blessing of being convinced the first time,” I told her, “plus what could possibly be out there that’s better than what’s in here?”
“That is the point. There is so much out there that is faster and bigger, more dramatic and extreme, but I sure have never seen anything better,” she patted my head and I grinned.
“Since I am winning the first time why would I want to lose?” I add just to overstate her point.
“This is the perfect place for those who want it, and all the rest get drunk, but drinking is not required any more than Santa has to come on Christmas.”

Save pretty words in a jar like candy.

LeftWriteFemme

12-29-2009, 10:02 PM

December 30

CARGO LOST, CARGO FOUND

I fill the pallet of a new year's sobriety and, when it has been accomplished, make a manifest and strap this pallet with the others on the flatbed of my life. The cargo is secure and weighty; there is ample pressure where the rubber meets the road. I maneuver my rig carefully. I feel assured as I stream with the traffic on the byways. The power and magnitude of my transport prompts in me overconfidence. I fail to realize variation in weather or road conditions can jeopardize my journey. Eighteen wheels make for a poor cantilever when traction is lost and top-heavy wins out. In losing the battle of gravity, inertia and control I realize the past is not a weight I need to haul; all that is necessary is the inventory. I slip the pages into my pocket and walk the rest of the way. I am my only freight.

Medicate with laughter and tears.

LeftWriteFemme

12-30-2009, 09:53 PM

December 31

FAILED SOUP AND DISTRUST OF BURGUNDY

What keeps me coming back to meetings and step work is an abiding mistrust of booze. Despite promises and advertisement, hopes and folklore, I couldn’t rely on drinking to take me where I wanted to go and I surely couldn’t depend on it to keep me there. The struggle is great; the attempt to cling to salvation through decanter is mighty but in the end this joining of my chemistry to other chemistry failed miserably. No matter how I held my mouth, held my head, held my liquor, satisfaction escaped without me and I was left here in the soup of my disillusion and disappointment. Failure to cooperate fully with alcohol lead me to try sobriety as an alternative. I may not always succeed in my recovery, but I can draw dividends on every deposit and use this to build a path to my desires.

Make a private heaven with plenty of windows and doors.

LeftWriteFemme

12-31-2009, 08:15 AM

To my readers:

Beginning January, 1 I will be making a change in the format of my post/ blog. As you may or may not be aware. I have for several years been posting each day’s page from my book Sober on the Way to Sane. This year I will be posting a combination of the day’s page from my new book More Sober on the Way to Sane and underneath that the corresponding page from Lines from My Life a poetic reformulation of Sober on the Way to Sane.
As a way of introduction I am sending this post, which contains the dedication to each book set in the new posting format I will be using. I hope this is a change for the better as is my intention.

Happy New Year!

_

True Confessions and Ernest Pledges

The world changes everyday. I don’t know if you notice it, I don’t always, but how different the world has been writing this volume than it was writing Sober on the Way to Sane has shocked even me. This year I have been shaken in ways I had hitherto thought impossible, actually these things were so out of my realm of thought that I had not dismissed them; they were in fact unimaginable. I am still here and you are here with me and for that I am grateful and I thank you. The world is at once wonderful and terrible and staying sober through it all seems improbable even as I stand here clean and sober all these long years. I believe this book contains some of my finest work and I hope that you find it a help; possibly an encouragement. Hand in hand we travel this path. If the only place we meet is on the page we are still bound to one another, still the iron in the blood of the other. I extend my hand to you in oath that I will use the tools I have and open myself to new ones. I hope that you will offer your pledge to do the same and I will meet you here if you will and face to face if the Fates will have it, together we stay sober so that you and I never need be drunk or alone.

Very truly,

Sherrie T

~
Dedication

This book is dedicated to my mother,
Winnie Jenkins,
Who had a vision of these poems.
She took my blocks of words and
Teased the poetry out of them!
Thank you, Mom,
I not only wouldn’t have done this without you
I couldn’t have done it without you
You are the best!

Love,
Sherrie

LeftWriteFemme

01-01-2010, 03:20 AM

January 1

Lie

Yes, a lie is just a lie, but the truth also has problems. I relay the facts and the words take on a life of their own, leave out the backdoor and walk on down the road. They move to another town and never find time to come back for a visit even though, I am their mother. And woe to the woman who grows attached to credit or recognition for her ideas. These kidnapped prodigies are never ransomed but sold outright and their DNA not questioned or tested.
So, my advice is to love your words in secret and raise your notions behind high walls. If you are ever called upon to share your wisdom, lie. For even if you’re caught the risk is tolerable. Exposure is awkward but then again no one is looking, so, what is there to lose. A lie is just a lie but it stays home with you at night.

Tie a string to the moon

~

THE COWS ARE HIGHER THAN THE HOUSE

I got sober only to end up living in a house
where the cows are higher than the house.
I mean next to my house there is a hill
The hill is surrounded by a fence
The cows are pastured inside the fence
Standing on the hill the cows are taller than the house.

I didn't expect to live in a house where the cows were higher.
I expected normal
I didn't expect the cows at all.
I expected the house but not this house
It's at the end of the lane
It's the one with the rose colored shutters.

My sponsor wants to know why rose colored shutters
Are OK but cows overlooking the house aren't?
I can't answer her
It's just wrong - that's all!
I don't know why she can't understand this
It seems perfectly clear to me.

My sponsor says I am powerless over the cows
And my life is not unmanageable but my thinking is.
She tells me to paint purple cows.
To write stories about worse places for the cows to be
I tell her the tub.
She says write it down.
She's no fun.

I heard in a meeting I should pray for the people
And things I am upset about.
I pray for the cows
My sponsor says the cows see how I live my life
And she is sure the cows pray for me.

LeftWriteFemme

01-02-2010, 12:22 AM

January 2

GOOD AS GOLD

Just because I’m as good as gold doesn’t mean that I win the prize. Doesn’t mean I get my way. Doesn’t mean I gain your heart. Being ‘extra special sweetness and light girl’ doesn’t secure my future. It does prevent me from living my life as someone I don’t like. It contents me to keep my own company. It is a huge improvement over living as the raging fury I once was. Any destination I desire is more readily assessable from this amiable posture; in spite of inexpert yearning. I can breathe past you if must be, walk down the road holding my own hand instead of holding a lung full of air. But I am the treasure. You must earn me never capture me. Appreciate me not devalue me. I’m good as gold. And please know that I am the prize.

Remember yourself as you would an old friend

~

THERE ARE ONLY 23 MORE SHOPPING DAYS LEFT TILL MY NERVOUS BREAKDOWN

Shoppers beware: I have a careful plan
I can juggle these thirty things and keep these twenty people happy
Dig around in the dirt at these three excavation sites
And hold onto my sanity for twenty-three more days.

My sponsor says "Having a plan like that
Means I'm already crazy."
My sponsor says "I don't have to please anyone
But myself, my Higher Power and her."

That can't be right.
What is the point of sobriety if I can't do it all?
She says "I don't even have to please her or myself."
What does that mean?

How can I tell if I'm pleasing my Higher Power?
She says "Shut up and you'll find out."
Great! What a plan, I like my countdown better
Of course I do, It's mine, my countdown, my life, mine, mine, mine.

Maybe my sponsor isn't all wrong.
OK, quiet....da, da, da, ...da, da, OK quiet for real
Hmmmm, I don't, don't know
This isn't working, I can't do this.

Why would I need to stop being me in order to get better?
"Who are you?" she asks, she thinks she's so smart.
I'M THE ONE IN THE MIDDLE.
She says "The eye of the storm is empty and I need to get a life of my own.

LeftWriteFemme

01-03-2010, 09:21 AM

January 3

Maniacs on Pogo Sticks

I fear maniacs on pogo sticks peeping through my rural second story windows as the smoke of paranoia curls between my ears. Overestimating my interest to others causes me as much harm as the underestimation. Attributing super powers to onlookers is a parlor trick my ego plays to keep me occupied while my life passes by. I sacrifice all my possibilities for fear of what could be stolen through my keyhole. I cut off my face to spite my poor lonely nose. I must move forward in spite of my disquietude for the future lay ahead, yet I do console myself that it is harder to hit a moving target.

Use honey to get the peas to stick to your knife

~

DIDN'T KNOW I WAS GOING TO THE CIRCUS

I show up at a meeting
I didn't know the circus was in town
I expected calm, demure, sober behavior
My expectations were dashed, my bubble burst.

There were people streaming back and forth in front of the speaker
There were kids playing among the chairs
Smokers worked the meeting in shifts
Hustling out the back door and smoldering back in.

The side conversations rivaled the main attraction
People dressed for the street not the meeting, the bibby shirt, tights and no shirt
Was more of a high-wire act then I had ever seen before
Shock cannot even begin to describe the state of my mind.

"But for the grace of God" said my sponsor
"No" I said "It's a choice, they're sober now."
"Oh yes" she remarked "Weren't you sober when you took on
Every man with time, looking for a fight with each of them?"

"I was cutting my chops. They understood."
"Some of them didn't." said she
"Weren't you sober when you dyed your hair red - but only half?"
" I was afraid I'd dye my scalp, so I started lower."

"Yes, but aren't you the one who says sudden hair color change
Is a sign of instability in sobriety?"
"Yes, I do." I replied
"I think you would have fit in well with the circus."

"You and your two tone hair but you didn't hear it from me."
"You're mean."
"And what are you being?"
"Judgmental."

"That's my girl, what are we going to do about it?"
"Be grateful, grateful I got in quick enough"
"Grateful people let me work things out in these rooms."
"Grateful I still have something to learn from everyone. GRATEFUL."

LeftWriteFemme

01-03-2010, 09:27 PM

January 4

One Singular Crowd

Isolation among the isolators is replete with metaphor and theme. Expectation blithers loudly but is drown by the palpable inevitability of the outcome. I pirouette in a room filled with dancers but we do not touch, we just spin near one another full view but little contact. Yet I hear my heart beating in my ear and know that I am alive. The flush of neighboring cheeks attests to duplicate conditions there. We are moving together sometimes in harmony but other times in antipathy, dependant all the same. We are the army of independent meanings. Individual cases sharing one slender goal but that’s all that we need.

If you can’t find the grape try some jelly.

~

THE BOAT

On my ride home from work there's a boat stuck between two trees
In the middle of a horse pasture
Next to a riverbed so dry it's filled with grass.
I think the boat is me.

I feel for the boat every time I see it.
Turned on edge, waiting for a river which doesn't exist anymore
And may never exist again
Placed on edge for protection, not comfort.

Although having my bottom rot out
Well, let's just say, might be more uncomfortable
What good will I be even if the river runs again
Since I'm fenced in?

If my Higher Power has a plan
If it includes a river and a fence
If I'm in this plan, me, the row boat
I just don't see it.

Not seeing my purpose in life is a theme in my life
Truth is, I don't want to face the fact, I might float away
Even though I'm supported by two big trees
Even though there is a tall fence around me.

Completely in spite of the fact
THERE IS NO WATER
My Higher Power loves me.
I AM THE BOAT

LeftWriteFemme

01-05-2010, 08:16 AM

January 5

Time’s Temperament

Bubbling tides of white water, time roils past me and my protests go unheard. Physic feedback loops revisit raw moments to me with inopportune exactitude. The beautiful droplets of dawn rain down then evaporate leaving another day’s timeline to fan out before me. The alternating fury and jubilation of passing intervals leaves a challenge, first a question of bend or break, second a call to forecast. Can I flex or will I live in pieces? Shall I look at patterns and strive for harmonious waltz or turn my face from the calendar dreading each trice? Bully or benefactor time rolls. I can go with it or be under it that choice is mine.

Orbit order

~

THE FLOCK

Today I came to a place in the road covered with birds
The nearby field - covered in birds - the trees covered.
As I approached the birds took wing
The flock responded to my presence
Each bird flew - the sky darkened with their flight.

Wave upon wave, boundaries intact
Taking action in the face of obstacle.
The gift of instinct displayed for me as I fly to my meeting
My instinct rehab, I am learning my intuition
My sponsor spoons it to me from the steps.

I suck it down never knowing what it is about the process
That makes me better
Anymore then I know how grain and bugs make birds fly.
I have theories, things I roll in my fingers when I'm nervous.
I get glimmers.

Things my Higher Power sparkles in my eyes for a treat.
In truth, I don't know how, I don't need to know
Anymore than birds need to know lift to weight ratios.
When I respond to life events
When I spend less time self-concerned I am closer to self.

"Aren't we spiritually centered?" Quips my sponsor
"Yes" I reply "One day in a row."
"I'm going for the record."
"That's all the birds have."
"You're doing as well as they." she smiles and pats my back

LeftWriteFemme

01-05-2010, 08:17 AM

Tommi

01-06-2010, 12:28 AM

I've seen that boat.! ! :titantic:

Thanks for the BD wishes and all...:dance2: the fun.
Thanks for all the posts here too.

LeftWriteFemme

01-06-2010, 05:08 AM

I've seen that boat.! ! :titantic:

Thanks for the BD wishes and all...:dance2: the fun.
Thanks for all the posts here too.

You are so welcome, Daddy! It was great getting to spend your Birthday with you!

All my love,

the girl

LeftWriteFemme

01-06-2010, 05:08 AM

January 6

Hand Me Down Pain

You have sent a cold thing into my heart it causes my feet to move me away from you. It need not be spoken of this is a thing of ice and lead. Words are no help here action is the only cure. Eternity can be spent with a soul bisected by slivers. Stepping the willing way to joy and freedom seems so unlikely from this frosty local. Make my mind up I must. Close my eyes and move forward. I will leave your pain behind me I hope not to have to leave you.

Kiss tiny pebbles and roll them away

~

HELP FROM STRANGE SOURCES

I cannot get my mind wrapped around the places I find help.
I struggle with believing I have been helped.
I struggle with disbelief at my own resistance.
I am helped daily by many tiny things seen and unseen.
I realize now I was injured by the same tiny things.
When I was misaligned with my Higher Power
The sun rising, the tiny star I circle in this great nothingness
It makes my whole day.
The air hanging around just in case I need it,
Which I often do.
The people who live with me, a mean feat.
The people who work with me.
Those who exist here with me keep my ship on course,
How sweet of them to do mostly right everyday of their lives,
What a help that is.
The whole ecosystem and all the weather
What would I do without it?
But this is on a good day,
On a bad day, the sun is in my eyes and scorching my skin,
The air is too still, or well, the wind is always a problem.
And people, people are an endless plight,
People do things to hurt, annoy and irritate me,
Full intent, targeted to me, my life, my wants destroyed.
Bugs seek me and I am followed by the darkest cloud,
Everyday, all day, lurking.

I AM SO THANKFUL FOR A SPONSOR AND A TENTH STEP

Tommi

01-06-2010, 08:07 AM

Wandering down that happy road...at least I can se the Crossroads now.

Some days and some nights were so lost, and now, I just forget where my car is parked... That is normal right? ....Right??? Confusion less Confuscious = my own Yin and Yang :kettlepot:

LeftWriteFemme

01-07-2010, 04:22 AM

January 7

Dion

Everything in the world happened before I was born and the cinders sift through my fingers. Accomplishing cohesion of the ashes is a goal I have not yet achieved. Cremains precious but meager are a difficult building material, shifting due to emotions and wind, I find they stick too well to my lungs and not well enough to anything else. Tears help, but I will not cry forever. I must draw from a fresh water source and wet the powdery scratch I have inherited and form the world anew.

Use caution when interacting with the crème de la crème this may trigger intolerance

*

OLD GOLDFISH

I got them when my sobriety was new.
They were tiny little guys, ten cent feeders.
I wanted my stepson to sleep soundly
In our strange jumble of a home, fresh from purchase.

The tank sat on a dresser under his elevated bed
Space to fit my hand to feed them
No space for baby boy to climb in
I loved my goldfish.

There is never a NO with goldfish
Feed them as often as you want
Let the water get cold
Put them in a big space, small place, plants, no plants.

NO was so hard, I hate and fear No.
I am hard, fish are easy.
Tears and mesmerizing aquarium
Meetings and steps.

I could not keep myself alive
I don't know how I kept the fish fed.
The program kept me going,
Kept hope flowing and the fish swam.

In this century when we are finally outliving wild goldfish
We are sober together,
By the grace of Higher Power, in this century.
It's been a wonderful time.

I am grateful to be here with the goldfish.
I am grateful the goldfish are here for me.
Expecting so little
Maybe I could return the favor

LeftWriteFemme

01-07-2010, 05:33 AM

33 years on continous sobriety!!!!!!

Daddy, as always you are my inspiration!

I hope you enjoy this recovery song by recovery folks!

All my love,

they girl

YouTube- los lonely boys-how far is heaven

.

Tommi

01-07-2010, 08:55 AM

Thank you so very much. Well...It is an amazement to me.. :deepthoughts: as I trudge this happy road..

I am one of those miracles ! I did wait for it to happen, and keep watch for the good , the bad, and especially the UUUUGgggggllly. The HP smiles down upon us girl..You too are one of the sober miracles in my life.

Tommi

01-07-2010, 08:58 AM

"Heaven"

Save me from this prison
Lord help me get away
Cause only you can save me now
From this misery
Cause I've been lost in my own place
And I'm getting' weary
How far is heaven
And I know I need to change
My ways of livin'
How far is heaven, Lord can you tell me

Cause I've been locked up way too long
In this crazy world, how far is heaven
I just keep on prayin' Lord
Just keep on livin', how far is heaven
Lord can you tell me, how far is heaven
I just got to know how far, how far is heaven
Lord can you tell me

Tu que estas en alto cielo,
[You that's in a higher place
Send me down a blessing]

Cause I know there's a better place
Than this place I'm livin', how far is heaven
So I just got to show some faith
And just keep on giving, how far is heaven
Lord can you tell me, how far is heaven
I just wanna know how far, how far is heaven,
Lord can you tell me, how far is heaven,
'cause I just gotta know how far,
I just wanna know far .

Los Lonely Boys
:bandana:

Tommi

01-07-2010, 09:39 AM

Sherrie does keep the light on every day, and so much more folks don't know about.

....Sherrie spoke in front of 1,400 young people at a meeting in Eugene, Ore. this past Sat, and it was awesome. She was the main event speaker Sat night at the Hilton Conference Center for Western Area Conference of Young People in Alcoholics Anonymous.

http://wacypaa13.org/. She reaches out and touches so many lives, and I am thankful for her daily service here,on other sites where people can read and take away a moment of sobriety that can be that lifesaver to hold onto in the good and bad days. I know. I have been reading her posts for many, many, years.

Thank you LeftWriteFemme

Just sayin (f)(f)(f)(f)(f)(f)(f)(f)(f)(f)(f)(f)

LeftWriteFemme

01-08-2010, 05:20 AM

January 8

Lathe

Turning into a spin, the edge cuts into my misconceptions, the point sharp and accurate to a fault digs into the excess I carry around, keeping me from my useful purpose. A good eye and steady hand are needed lest breakthrough ruin me. Not that all is ever lost for a spoon with a hole in the bowl will stir a soup smooth. Relinquishing my burdens and trusting the carvers tools and methods takes great commitment. I am carved commitment or no, but things turn out better when I don’t flinch.

If you can’t make hay then mow the lawn

*

IN A BACKWATER

There is a place so removed, uninspired, ignorance flourishes
I hate to go there.
I avoid it when I can
Today I could not avoid it.
Today I saw the gable end of a small barn
Half hidden in the scrub trees.
On the face of the gable end are two plywood cutouts
They are large, taking up the major portion of the space.
The first is a budgie, a bright blue parakeet, 7 or 8 feet tall.
It is tilted to it's side, it looks dyslexic but intriguing
Above it is a cutout of a black guitar, similar in length.
Hanging long ways across the top, almost from eve to eve.
I don't know what it means.
Why they are there.
Who could have put them there.
A story is there,
Just sticking it's tongue out at me.
I can hardly bear it.
I think of God and laugh.
If my God has nothing better to do then tease me,
I need a better God.
I think of my Higher Power and wonder if the power is curious too.
Am I overlapping a layer of consciousness I have no part in?
Is this subliminal previews of my future?
Am I too nosey for my own good?
I just don't know
It could be something all together different
I have only time.
Time will tell in the end it always does.
I hate to wait

LeftWriteFemme

01-10-2010, 06:53 AM

January 10

Hoarfrost

On balmy evenings dew forms in my life and moistens my extremities. This friendly act requires the maintenance of temperature. If I become suddenly cool the landscape changes and the once welcoming vapor is now a show of crystalline rigidity. Cold to the morning light I am brittle and snap at even a tentative touch. For want of passion I have replaced it with definition and structure I can not absorb. I am outlined clearly but no longer myself. I am frozen, formally changed within and without. Warmth is necessary, but how to start my own fire? Learn, I must and quickly lest frostbite set in.

Wear your mantle don’t leave it to the fireplace

*

LONELINESS EATS MY LUNCH

There are days loneliness eats my lunch
And I can't fight back.
How can I stand it,
How can it still be this bad?

I pull out the old chestnuts.
If I'm not happy with what I have
How could I be happier with more?
Even tickets on the 50 yard line don't interest me, I came to play.

I think of other slogans, the tidbits, the smiles and hugs.
I roll them around.
Still, there are days my lunch is gulped down
And I sit with my plate empty.

Pickle juice, coleslaw drool is small comfort
Actually, it's a jeer.
I stare at my empty plate
I turn and twist it, stick my tongue out at it.

"Your good company." Says my sponsor
Then why am I alone, if I'm so good
If my company is worthwhile
Why do I sit her hungry and desperate?

"Are you sure you are?"
It sure feels that way.
"Well, it might be true and it might not."
I get it.

I am unhooked from myself
I am ignoring the multitude at my elbow
While looking for someone in my lap
I'm holding out for old terms from a new contract

I am loved by people
Who aren't trying to consume me
And I am letting my expectations
Dine for free.

LeftWriteFemme

01-11-2010, 05:15 AM

LeftWriteFemme

01-12-2010, 04:15 AM

January 12

Live Bait

Is being a taunt to others really a life? Dangling as the cover for a hook, luring intended and unintended to their deaths, is that living? Or if I draw you with my attack rather than my appeal is that a worthwhile existence? If I carry myself filled with poison praying for a strike is that anything other than a march to an unhappy grave for two, or more? Hidden under an avalanche of harassment strips me of my vital quality and my soul loses its true nature. I am allowed to transcend the setup of competition and social strife. It’s alright to be tempting with no agenda. I could be an appetizer if only I removed the barbs or better yet I could be dessert.

Tuck tiny wishes between your toes.

*

JOY IS NOT ENOUGH

I was driving around in my car
Eating a meltingly ripe persimmon
On the radio came a fiddle playing band
Performing their rendition of In The White Room

I was traveling with the three drafts of my first step
Version one consisted of 690-some words
And the final had only four, JOY IS NOT ENOUGH
That's it, the whole thing.

Today my life is unmanageable
Due to the fact that having a balanced life
Feeling my wide range of feelings, including joy,
Is not sufficient to eliminate the pain and damage of the past.
My horrific childhood has not healed
Has not mended seamlessly
I have joy today, everyday, at some point
In proportion to my sober choices.

I fail to realize the promise doesn't say, Heal the past
It says, I will not regret the past.
I don't, at least not any of the choices I made,
Other peoples choices are not mine to regret.

I will not wish to shut the door on the past
And I don't wish to.
I want it Healed
I may not get my wish

Just because I am doing my part to heal the past
Doesn't make anyone else do it
I can't strong-arm the perpetrators into recovery
The way they strong-armed me into the abuse

JOY IS NOT ENOUGH but it's a hell of a start.

purepisces

01-12-2010, 12:14 PM

January 11

Pepo

My father used to destroy a perfectly good watermelon by cutting a triangle in the top and pouring a bottle of vodka into it. I used to destroy my perfectly good melon the same way. Emulating bad ideas in new ways was a onetime pastime of mine. Giving it up was harder than I had expected. Flawed thinking blends so freely with my mental landscape I have trouble distinguishing it. Condemning the action and not the man is not usually my preferred method. I would rather condemn the man, but this leaves me with the actions in place and him long gone. And though I prefer him gone I will recreate him within myself if I don’t flush his actions as well. I have a good pumpkin on my shoulders but it is my job to keep it intact.

No need to wait for joy, jump when you please

*

LIFE IS TOO GOOD

I know it sounds crazy, is crazy
But I hate having the fear, the gnawing gut, of WHAT IF
WHAT IF I can't maintain this, the sober life I live.
WHAT IF I get struck, unable to connect to my Higher Power?

I had a spiritual awaking
WHAT IF I get spiritual narcolepsy?
My spiritual cord was cut when I was young, not by my choosing
WHAT IF it gets cut again?

"WHAT IF this line of thinking cuts it?" Asks my sponsor
I hate when she's right.
WHAT IF this is a test?
Be like them or not.

Follow the path of the twelve steps
When there is no weight of need pushing me
When everything is going in my direction
I have to keep my eye on the ball for myself.

I am still not God
This is the lesson
The abusers never learned
The one I have to.

What went wrong was not bad people
Making bad choices, in bad circumstances
It was disconnected people
Making decisions without help.

I have to stay in your pocket
Never be a free bird
I have to remember what true freedom is
It's not being cut loose.

I have had that
And it never felt free
Keep your eye on the ball
And hold onto my hand.

January 12

*

JOY IS NOT ENOUGH

I was driving around in my car
Eating a meltingly ripe persimmon
On the radio came a fiddle playing band
Performing their rendition of In The White Room

I was traveling with the three drafts of my first step
Version one consisted of 690-some words
And the final had only four, JOY IS NOT ENOUGH
That's it, the whole thing.

Today my life is unmanageable
Due to the fact that having a balanced life
Feeling my wide range of feelings, including joy,
Is not sufficient to eliminate the pain and damage of the past.
My horrific childhood has not healed
Has not mended seamlessly
I have joy today, everyday, at some point
In proportion to my sober choices.

I fail to realize the promise doesn't say, Heal the past
It says, I will not regret the past.
I don't, at least not any of the choices I made,
Other peoples choices are not mine to regret.

I will not wish to shut the door on the past
And I don't wish to.
I want it Healed
I may not get my wish

Just because I am doing my part to heal the past
Doesn't make anyone else do it
I can't strong-arm the perpetrators into recovery
The way they strong-armed me into the abuse

JOY IS NOT ENOUGH but it's a hell of a start.

Hi Sherrie.

I just wanted to say that, yet again, your words have really touched something in me. These last two, Life is Too Good and Joy is Not Enough are especially timely for me right now.

I love that feeling I get when something I read or hear really connects for me and the light goes on and I finally "get it" ... :deepthoughts:

Thank you, Sherrie.

LeftWriteFemme

01-12-2010, 12:27 PM

Hi Sherrie.

I just wanted to say that, yet again, your words have really touched something in me. These last two, Life is Too Good and Joy is Not Enough are especially timely for me right now.

I love that feeling I get when something I read or hear really connects for me and the light goes on and I finally "get it" ... :deepthoughts:

Thank you, Sherrie.

I'm so glad to connect with you! Thanks for taking the time to post and let me know! Have a great day.

Sherrie

LeftWriteFemme

01-13-2010, 05:32 AM

January 13

Offset

I often feel out of round and unmatched to my counterparts. Awkwardly I sit unable to strike a plausible pose. I want my asymmetry to seem chic. I feel a victim of universal ugliness and gracelessly plod through my days. Luckily offset thinking, the partner of my offset soul, saves me. I see that I am uniquely useful, like a screwdriver set at right angles for use where a straight one could not reach. I am counterbalance and compensation. I may be lateral but I am also collateral. I am an embellisher, beneficial in unexpected ways and shouldn’t seek to be inline with the multitude. I am the new growth, the spur to the future.

Romance the noodles in your soup

*

GRAVITY WORKS ALL THE TIME

Limits and boundaries are a drag
I hate feeling tied to the ground
I know I could fly
If not for unseen forces

I sense myself lightening, smoothing
I drop my burdens, I pick up speed
Fourth dimension
Hell, I'm proverbial vapor trails

I should explain, when I get moving this fast
I inevitably wind myself into a position
Where my head is up my nether regions
A place it does not belong

I have slowly grown to love my limits
No restraint holds me back
In reality, I am supported, rooted as it were
I am not hydroponic, I can live in the real world

I am me
Encouraged by the wind and the rain
I am not a hothouse flower
I am truly free

I can walk where I was born to walk
I forget life has not been found outside my little world
And when it is
I am still better off being me

LeftWriteFemme

01-14-2010, 05:24 AM

January 14

Specks

Spectacles are for specks; tiny things that must be watched. Commotion is nothing but a congregation of minutia with an audience. How many small things do I strain my eyes to see; then seek help to pursue further? Some of these are put on display fishing for voyeurs. Others are secreted away only to be ferreted out through magnification. Whether curiosity or contempt drives me to these pinpoints I must search my motives before I scan the plain. For truly if I am not careful I, myself will end up either speck or spectacle.

Let old wood and old women inhabit the shoreline of your mind.

*

NO MAPS

Maps have existed longer than I have
By the time of my birth there was aerial photography
Which had made pinpoint accuracy the norm.

I can be tracked by satellite on my daily commute
I can get a trip tic
And travel to the far reaches of this continent

"So what is your problem?" Asks my sponsor
There is no map for where we've been going
There are only the twelve steps, but after that-

It is all uncharted territory except of course-
For my families warnings about dragons
'Those critters stay to home mostly." She says

"You have bigger things to worry about."
So where's the map
I need to know where to go.

No Map, we go through this together
The pitfalls are similar, sex and money
There are a few others

What each of us finds on this journey is uncharted
Plus if you spend your time looking down
You will miss the view.

We prop each other up as we step off into the unknown
And reel each other back
If we start falling off the beam.

How do I know if I'm doing it right
"Are you still sober?"
Yes, but I'm unsure.

Lots of people are sober
Right up until the time they're drunk
"So true, it's all about motive."

It's difficult to chart a heart
"Do you have willingness?"
Yes, you know I do.

I have found that is the vehicle
To everywhere, So.,
Learn to enjoy the ride.

LeftWriteFemme

01-15-2010, 05:18 AM

January 15

Comparison Shopping

Cost analysis of the yeas and nays requires a savvy consumer. Every word has a variable price dependant on whom it is spoken to and when it is said. Some words charge compound interest and others pay dividends. Timing and delivery is of the utmost importance. Knowledge of the markets requires constant assessment. The risk to benefit ratio varies widely and the short term verses the long term price can flip the market from profit to loss. Hold my tongue, speak my mind, these must be weighed; the clock consulted and inventories taken. What I say and when can be less a matter of bull or bear than whether or not I can afford to be a sheep.

Tap the wellspring of your heart.

*

FEEDING SQUIRRELS ON A ONE LANE BRIDGE

Cattle-corn spread on a single lane bridge
The Trap, Food or Safety
There are plenty of other choices
My disease sees none of them.
Gluttony and danger the perfect combination
How can I resist?
Why would I resist?
I have to have More.
I cannot depend on my nature
The ability God gave me to survive in my environs
Help must come from outside
And must be wild and dramatic.
Inward help is boring
Too subtle, to tiresome
Where is my image?
Where is my excitement?
How am I going to prove my God worthy?
Without too much
Without perilous risk and rescue
I can't.
I can't prove my God
My God doesn't need to prove anything to me.
I can find my way off the beaten path
Away from the prying eyes of rubberneckers.
No cheers from the crowd are necessary
I have the equipment, it comes standard
When I take the controls
And follow the twelve step tutorial.
I should be able to manage just fine
No Mack truck in my face
As I stuff myself
With ill gotten grain.

LeftWriteFemme

01-16-2010, 08:37 AM

January 16

Bon

Comfort or motivation these are the two major reasons for building a fire. Sometimes I set it before me other times under me. The warmth can be soothing and the light dazzling, but licking flames move me off the spot like nothing else. Fuel and surrounds contribute to the effect. Mental state and personal company provide dampening or air. How high the flames rise or how long they burn varies widely. Inspiring my passions, my thoughts, my fears the conflagration is an apt tool as long as I don’t go up in smoke.

Try to go sometimes with the grain and others against it.

*

IN THE COMFORT OF MY ROOM

I sit and panic concerning the future.
I have come through Hell
Built a safe and satisfying life
But it will all end soon, I can feel it.

The tide rises in my soul.
The blood red tide of self-doubt and degradation.
I fail to see my strength or intelligence
Hell, I can't even remember the sheer willingness which has carried me this far.

All I see is shreds.
Tattered little bits of my hopes and dreams
Scattered by the breeze of fate.

What is the point of me being in this sweet space
If I'm going to intellectually turn it into a dungeon?
Why set out fluffy pillows
Only to frighten myself daily
With thoughts of their removal?

How can I pray for safety and practice personal terrorism?
My mind is closed to the double-side of life.
I know the destruction but forget the glory.

I have washed ashore in the land of love and support
I need not drag my mind and spirit to the nether world of hopelessness
I've been to the dark places
My task is to warm in the sunlight today.

LeftWriteFemme

01-17-2010, 08:14 AM

January 17

Hades

There is a strangeness to the dark. A velvety comfort when my paranoia is not alive with ice crystals and contempt. Cocoons of light create hives of life in an otherwise isolating phenomena. Pressing to my skin I can wear the night out as a jewel, a talisman for the hope I dare not share. Pixies and faeries inhabit dawn’s wee hours but the black blank stretch of space is home to things quite different. Unspeakable in their face I allow them to pass. Should I be carried off my return is eminent for half the seeds remain. Not wholly ransomed I live only part time in the sun. When the shadows fall there is the oddness of home I can neither embrace nor deny.

Load the scale in your favor.

*

THERE IS A TREE

There is a tree in the woods
I've seen it.
It was cut off from any visible source of
Strength or sustenance.
Carried aloft by surrounding trees
The splintered trunk dangles in the air
It makes no connection to the forest floor.
I know the feeling
I have been cut off too.
Violently separated from my God, as it were.
I probe the fractured stump at the bottom of my soul.
I explore the crevices
Seeking tendrils of hope.
My anxiety bonds to my frustrations
But faith eludes me.
I look down to the broken place
The view unrealized by me.
I have a vista of unimagined beauty
Provided to me by the growth of others.
I am eye to eye with my peers,
Held in their loving embrace.
I bloom and flower with them.
I endure the winters the same as they
And come spring am stronger for it.
I don't know why I was damaged.
I don't know why I was saved.
I am grateful it is done.

My sponsor says "It's for our sobriety
And the pleasure of your company."

Tommi

01-17-2010, 11:25 AM

I celebrated my belly birthday and my sober and clean 33rd anniversary with my girl, who has 22 years sobriety, in a Sports Bar watching football on January 3rd. We were in Eugene, OR, where she spoke in front of 1,400 people at the Western Area Confernece of Youth in AA the night before.. Neither of us drink. She doesn't enjoy football, but loves me more than anything. We were staying @ the Hilton, that did not have my favorite team on TV in the room or in the lounge. It's the end of the season... She suggested we go to a place that had the game on..THAT IS TRUE LOVE..:3femme:

I will watch Football today, and she knows I won't be drinking, but will be jumping up and down and yelling anyway. Growing up near Pittsburgh, the Steelers were GOD's and we celebrated by toasting them, again and again. A habit I took to heart, and enjoyed at the expense of family, friends and work. Drinking took me away from the day to day.

Today, No beer in hand cheering for my favorite team. My friends won't be getting another keg. No drunken weaving on the road home from those party days and nights.

I will watch Football today and remember the game. I will cheer for my team, be with sane friends, and drive home, not get a DUI, or kill an innocent person.

I will watch football today, and celebrate 33 years of being sober and clean and cheer for the San Diego chargers..

and my girl loves me and knows I love her more than football (even if I only talk at 1/2 time). It's good to be free of :angry: and just play :pile: :lol2::footballpass: :freak::footballpass: :football::cheerleader:

San Diego Chargers vs. NY Jets

LeftWriteFemme

01-18-2010, 07:53 AM

January 18

Between Two Chains

The curving movement half seen sweeps forward and catches me squarely on the chin. Realization glimmers that next time it will strike me in the mouth and I take a step back. I estimate the returning arc, raise my arms, push the board back from whence it came. As it hurtles toward me once more I reposition. Force returns force; fury comes vigorously my way and I thrust with strength and enthusiasm. And this is fine for what it is. I have learned how not to get hit. I can push when I get shoved. How much better will it be when I can get on and swing?

Tie your lose ends into bows.

*

IN THE PRAIRIE

In the prairie there are small fenced cemeteries
Family plots.
The flat expanse of land opens to the eye
Hand carved monuments stand in testimony
To love and service.

In these places grow wild flowers
These places cordoned off
From mechanization and agribusiness
Held in trust are the bones of loved ones
And the soul of nature.

Blue bells, paint brush, lupines
And all manner of reedy grasses.
Deep inside me is a place like this.
The place I have buried my young.
The little ones who died of shame, neglect and hurt.

And I must return, not to exhume the dead
But to pay tribute.
To return with honor and love
Harvest the daisies and buttercups.
Grow them in the garden of my heart.

I can tend the flowers
Which spring from destruction
I can mingle them with the growth of my sober life.
Restore my prairie
To a splendor it has never known.

I can enjoy the bounty
Of saving seeds worth saving
And planting my Higher Powers will for me.

LeftWriteFemme

01-19-2010, 04:10 AM

January 19

What Is A Sheep To Do?

Things are bad out there. I see the trouble as I circle within the flock. Many of us whisper to each other as we pass. How can I create lasting change? Is there something helpful that will not separate me from my precious life, something that will not make me prey to the vultures before I even realize that I’m dead? How can I live and strive while the wolves hold the hilltops? Is the choice merely, one death or the other? Is there an as yet unseen path? Can I find it while maintaining my place in this congregation? What is a sheep to do?

Topple the toys from their bins and play

. Tea or Sympathy

Tears pouring into the teacup growing cold on the table create a sea of emotions uncharted. If I can not offer sympathy to the contents, the soulless heal that I am, how then do I expect to have a future? If I will tender only meager tolerance toward the spindled thing valiantly trying to beat within me why do I even show my face to the mirror? If shoulders are cold and turned inward then I will collapse into the inexpressive, dismal thing that has been misshapen through misuse and I might as well drink the chilly tea for that’s all the comfort I’ll get. I must do better by myself in order to brew a better world.

Smooth one hand with the other.

*

SOD

Green and black
Pinwheels of rolled grass
Speed by me on a flat bed.

Sod
Headed for home
That is how it is for me.

I grew up in a place of impermanence
A place clearly not my destination
Uprooted and prepared for relocation I am in transition.

My future surroundings unknown
Will be a perfect fit.
I have been anticipated
Grown for a purpose of which I am uninformed.

I have done my part, I am ready to lay down my roots
And become a lawn of seamless expanse
Somewhere my Higher Power is grading a hill
Smoothing the way.

I am ready to take my place
In the landscape
Of sober living and right thinking.

LeftWriteFemme

01-20-2010, 05:16 AM

January 20

Saurian or Dalliance

I love to be mystical, but the only dragon in my life is when I drag on and on. Procrastination is the winged beast in my world. I armor plate the thing, shiny and gleaming, my loitering delay is mightily impressive and you might think it would take flight from the way it postures but departure has been adjourned in favor of misgiving and postponement. I wander through the forest attempting to appear brave and feeling it occasionally while my tale grows longer. I need the fierce face and sharp claws; I can beat the mythology if I will just continue to take action.

Never confuse signposts for guideposts.

*

THE FROG

Stretched in the water
Still
The frog hangs.

The pond is barely a tea cup
Sufficient for communion
Of God and frog.

I watch the frog
Unblinking
Savoring respiration.

In a pond in Maine, I bore the posture
Center-stage
A quarter mile of water all around.

I hold my head above the surface
And feel I am in the eye of Gods creation
Face to face with benevolence.

Peace spars with uneasy smallness
I am a tiny speck, floating in the soup.
I am one organism in a sea teaming with life.

I am a part of
Not protected
But equal to the rest.

Can I bare this reality
The struggle of living
On a web?

Can I live a humble life
Knowing
I am favored no more then the rest?

Can I set aside my need
For preferential treatment
A God given Band-Aid for my multitude of hurt?

"If you can't, you will drink." Says my sponsor
"If I have to live this way I will cry." I respond.
"That is your God given right."

LeftWriteFemme

01-21-2010, 05:24 AM

January 21

Guest Flag

The polite thing to do is fly the silly blue rectangle with its equally silly white diagonal stripe. That would be the polite thing, for sure but that would peek my disease’s hold card. If anyone knew that my illness was sailing my ship instead of me the effect would be ruined. Or so says the canker that grips me and steers me to disaster. Announcing this day-tripper as an unentitled accessory to whatever wrong I am about to commit might warn my friends or enlist my sponsor, but no I leave my colors fly and endanger the surrounding water. For in truth my flag is just as fraudulent as this vessel and is only on loan to me as well.

Panoramic inventory shows the landscape in a better light.

*

THE MUSIC

I hear a tinkling noise and look around the room.
No, it's coming from my head.
It's the sound of the music of my life.

The bells, a horn or two
The strings,
Always the strings.

The sharp clear cry of the vixen
Calling from the hedgerow
The lonely voice of resolve.

The melody shifts
Tomorrow's tune warming up
In the wee hours of the night.

I don't try to part my lips
Replication is not a possibility
I am only just learning to move with the rhythm.

Keep the beat in my heart
And draw it down
For my toe to tap.

I cannot sing my song
I must let it live in me awhile longer.
I can't share things of which I haven't had my fill.

Giving too much
Too often
Makes the anthem run thin.

I have to be fully me, to be full voiced.
I need to stew in the juice
Of overflowing harmony.

The pounding of my feet on the steps unite the accord
Wild things and practiced plans
Put forward the waves of life on earth.

I follow
Placing my feet in well worn trends
The dance school reopened for sober living.

Passion plays and calls my response
For today, I pass
I leave the song inside

LeftWriteFemme

01-22-2010, 05:11 AM

January 22

Lathhouse

I want to face the sun. I want to stand and the wind to blow. I want the rain uninterrupted on my head. I want to remain upright and unburnt, to prevail amidst it all. Tender stalks and verdant leaves frustrate my anti-social streak. I want to bear the worst without cover or assistance but here I am in the slanted shade of this dynasty. As I grow so does the awareness that even when I am strong enough to leave this sheltered abode I will be relocated to a row where I am never alone.

Dream of a way to paddle a round boat.

*

THE PRIVILEGE OF SUN RISE

I awake happily at 5:30.
I will again see the show beyond compare
In stark contrast to the mornings
I filled with moping or sober angst,
Shades of the same dark color.
I shuck my covers
Bathing and dressing with purpose
And propel myself forward.
I hate to miss the first act.
Down---------------------------
The tint of clouds dusky and sweet
I'm on my route
I start my open eyed prayer.
For all those living at the hands of an addict
Be with them---Please
For the addicts
Help us all to fail----Fast
I scan the horizon
Checking all the views
I reflect on the striking change,
Earth bound green and gold
Sky held pink, orange and blue.
The silhouettes of trees exquisitely lit from behind.
The sweet moon sharing the sunrise with me
Add to the pleasure of my drive.
I start my gratitude list.
Beginning with my sobriety
Each moment.
The people, The life,
The thinking, The feeling
And my ability
To share it all
With You

LeftWriteFemme

01-23-2010, 07:12 AM

January 23

Frankie

“Why do I expect new leaves to grow on dead sticks?” I pleaded to my sponsor.
“Is that a ‘why do fools fall in love’, question?” she retorted.
“Oh, I suppose it is. I was doing so well having a ‘listen only’ relationship with someone then she asked why I don’t tell her my opinion and I like a ‘fool’ I told her. The ensuing pile of rationalizing and justifying she gave stank up my whole day.”
“I bet your steady stream of self reproach didn’t help either,” my sponsor added.
“But, I know better!” I cried. “I mean this is why I stopped my speaking role with this girl. I know she is a reactor NOT a listener. How could I fall apart at her first recognition that I am wordless in the face of her diatribes?”
“You were hopeful. Is that such a crime? You think better of people than they really are. I think that helps you stay willing to help them,” she soothed.
“Yes, but this snapped my willingness to work with her in half. How do I put it back together?”
“Maybe you needed to learn that it’s okay to leave the dead sticks behind.”

Why do turnips look like tops and turnip tops look like greens?

*

COMPOST

Looking at the bins
The stages of decomposition
Remind me of my disease
The stinking garbage I came in with.

I have learned to work my program
The same way I learned to tend my pile
Personal experience, advice, watching
And smelling, the mistakes of myself and others.

I learned covering thoroughly with meetings
And steps works like leaves and hay
To eliminate the immediate stench.
Circulation is important to prevent me from becoming stale.

In the end, the secret is turning it over.
If I don't turn it over I become putrid.
I rot and ferment instead of decomposing,
Breaking down in a way which restores me to usefulness.

When I work the process
My higher Power turns me into a medium of growth.
A renewed source of life and depth.
I become rich in all things that matter.

I am sought after by all the people involved
In planting seeds of hope.
My sponsor says, “It’s a sign of humility
That I aspire to be like dirt."

Encouraging sprouts
From the remnants
Of my past.
She might be right

LeftWriteFemme

01-24-2010, 07:11 AM

January 24

The Max Factor

I apply foundation and rouge to make up the difference between reality and expectation. My composition is unexamined by onlookers; appearance is the subliminal standard bearer. My brave face is plaster cast as an estimation and a singularity. Powder gives and takes power; builds a glass ceiling then a glass floor. What I owe my mind is more than what I allow its representation to be. I am made up to a spot on the wall from which I can not move, all because I wanted to put my best face forward.

Cuddle up to curiosity

*

LIFE AS AN ELM

I stand tall
My bark sloughing elongated rectangles
Great bunions of wood protruding
Giant bubbles of tight grain grown in reactionary curls.

These tumors born of abuse and endured in maturation
Are harvested in recovery
The burden of them severed from me
By the sharp teeth of truth.

Sectioning these masses
For purposes of inventory
Allows the twisted and deformed wood
To become dry and constructive.

I inlay the contorted sheets of history
Into the panels of the doors AA built for me.
The doors built to exit hell
Which gave me access to the world beyond.

I stand in the woods
Reaching the sky
Sinking deeply in the underlying spring
Surrounded by the joys of reality.

Things unseen in my pain
Consumed
Blister covered life of addiction
Life was a forest of one.

The wind hit me
The snow fell on me
The drought
Affected only me.

Today, lightened by the loss
Of my inappropriate growth
I grow together with my sponsor,
My group and the We.

I can accept shade and shelter
Also offer it.
The bugs and parasites meet
With the resistance of communal health.

My disease
Has no harbor,
Not in my bark,
Not in my heart.

Today
My program
Strips me of my disabilities
And makes me strong in camaraderie

LeftWriteFemme

01-25-2010, 05:09 AM

January 25

Responding to Response

Thankfully I’m not in charge of what is so freely given in this program. I want it to be available, but I want gratitude to be the universal response. At first I thought I couldn’t understand how anyone could hold this gift in their hands and not feel grateful, truth is I know exactly how that’s done and I don’t want to look at that ugly thing. “Cunning, Baffling, Powerful” But they left out how repulsive it is, maybe they didn’t want to see it either, or thought it was self-explanatory.
No matter which, I’m glad I am not the arbiter of the flowing fount that is recovery, I might have been tempted to cap and meter it, killing all the beauty and wild randomness that makes it real and true. I despair that others don’t recover as I recover and yet I am relieved that I didn’t have to drink as they drank.
I have to see those around me well enough to stay out of their traps or follow their leads, whichever is appropriate, but I don’t have to adjudicate their reply.

Pick up sticks and put downs stones

*

THE BUTTON BOX

I go to my button box
To sort out my life.
I lay out the matching sets
The various sizes, shapes and colors.

Coat buttons are commanding
But unsuitable for delicate places.
The tiny pearl buttons with shanks pull my attention
But work well only on silks.

The metal, shell and horn buttons
Come from such far off places
And all end up crossing my table
As I try to see clearly how to stick with the winners.

I know the people represented in this box.
The strong, the loud, the beautiful.
I know the weak and the unique,
The ones of special circumstances and occasions.

I come to the realization the simple ones,
The buttons sewn on the inside,
The ones who silently give strength
And support to the large and the small alike.

The ones which come in every shade and size,
Who match their ability
To service they render others,
These are my favorites.

They make secure all the things I love and trust
Flat and unobtrusive these buttons
Hold fast the fabric of my life.

LeftWriteFemme

01-26-2010, 04:22 AM

January 26

A Living Love

What I love about the program is that it is a living thing, like me.
It is not perfect, it is growing and changing, adapting and correcting for each experience and need. AA is a life into life process and saves me because life begets life, no matter what I was told. The answer to life is living and I get to see that being done by everyone from newcomer to old-timer each at his or her personal ability. I am allowed to dangle my feet, wade, tread-water and swim, all under the watchful eye of loving support and critical pretender. Difficulty is not removed nor is the way made smooth, but I am no longer without a thread to hold. I love the web I help weave myself into and feel protected from the spider of my addiction because together we are living proof.

Bear Grace

*

DEEP IN THE SEA

Under the mirror
There is life
Under what I reflect to the world
I am a world apart.

I smile sweetly, political in my response
To confrontation and conflict
Deep, deep in the sea, is a current of sadness
I can't always shake.

Pain is the past
But it's there like a moray
Lurking to strike aimlessly, pointlessly
At the passersby.

The ripping teeth
And the cold stare
My terror
No way to escape it.

I focus on the topside
The reflective part of me.
I keep as clean
And free as can be.

I stick to my business
List my goals and make plans
The water runs cold
Then hot beneath.

I carry the steps to this underwater grave
Trying to inflate the rubber skin of god
But No
There is no life in the god of my understanding

Or maybe there is no life.
For the character the drowned balloon represents
The sea is bigger than me.
The life stronger and more abundant.

The sky it reflects as vast as liquid
I swim
There is a Power
And it doesn't need that comic book face.

Safety is not the requirement
That can be granted.
Lack of safety does not end my life
It does not end God

LeftWriteFemme

01-27-2010, 05:20 AM

January 27

Simplicity Itself

My life runs at a Gilbert and Sullivan pace, with about as much sense and comic relief. You say 'keep it simple' and my disease says 'why ruin a good play?’ The truth is this is not play at all but a work that consumes my life from me and doesn't thank me for my time. Simplicity for me requires respect, a gift I selectively give myself; a gift that I often use only as a shield during battle. My past method of increased self-respect is life in a war zone. This is no solution. Release of grief, this is the onerous path I avoid taking. Purging the wrong thinking and action of others from my blood, my eyes, my skin, allows me to lift my chin and square my soul to plumb and level living, don self-respect as a birth right and set a calendar fit for plausible life, a simple life.

If you are not a hero in your own home you are not a hero

*

HIDE AND SEEK

I have sought You
High and Low
But like the rain
You have always found me.

I like a cold, wet cat on a winters day
Peer into warm lit windows
Hoping
You will be home.

I seek to keep moving
You find me for some unknown reason.
I have given up
Naming You.

I trust You know who you are In spite of the fact I do not.
You are places I don't know
Doing things I think better of.

Citing the list of errands I daily make for You,
Not to beleaguer You
But the unfinished list of history
Trails out of my pocket.

I worry I may possess
Your only copy
Of this Injustice List.

There have been days of peace
Days I don't think too much.
Days I turn away from
My history lessons and future projections.

My ultimate problem is with the equal sign
I run the numbers and it figures inequity.
I check my calculations and shake
The calculator of my mind.

Deeply, I fear
You're a one god
And do not comprehend
The implications of zero.

If you multiply with only things above naught
You may be unaware of nothingness.
The empty things I feel
When I can't seem to find you.

Self-possessed - insensitive of the cipher
Your dimensions stay positive.
Bring me into Your realm or join me in the void.

I seek You
But You have found me.

LeftWriteFemme

01-28-2010, 05:40 AM

January 28

Sponsorship

Right now, as I think of sponsorship, I think of all the things I have done wrong. Times when I was not understanding enough and times when I was too understanding and enabling. Sponsors I chose for ulterior motives and the ones I didn't challenge when they wandered away. I search my mind for the ingredients that were in the mix when things went well and the dominant component was willingness, mine and theirs. Whether I was sponsor or sponsee, willingness overrode ability, determination and love. We had to come to the table willing, this was never something we were able to cook up or construct. Nor is it something I can always hold onto, sometimes willingness evaporates or slips away like sand in a clenched fist. The permanence and impermanence of sponsorship awes and frightens me. Like a guidewire twisted from many strands none of which reaches from end to end I worry about the unraveling but depend on the strength.

Expectations are incubating resentments

*

THREE TOYS FLOATING

I bat the ducks across the surface of my bath.
Soaking is supposed to calm me,
I'm waiting.
I assure you, my impatience is no help to this process.

These yellow, tub-bound misfits, grinning at me
Don't fill me with the joy of living either.
I have blown bubbles until I'm blue
I smell like a French elevator from the bath oil.

My hair is stiff with conditioner
My face packed with mud.
"Do the right thing." Said my sponsor
She is such a pain.

Here I am, bubble bath to my arm pits
And not a hint of peace
Her question rings,
"What do you want?"

But isn't it obvious, if I knew that
What would I be doing
Wrinkling in this swilling vat?
I wouldn't.

I would be out doing my thing.
Whatever, that thing is.
How I'm going to figure myself out I don't know
And, She, is no help (you know who She is, She is the sponsor lady)

So what do I want?
World peace, a clue, maybe just a hint
But I know part of it
I know more than I admit.

I want Sobriety and Happiness,
Dignity and Respect
Enough time to do these things
And Love.

"Well" says she, those things are easy
Work the steps, then the traditions,
Practice them, do service
And take the advice you give your own sponsees"

I stick out my tongue in her general direction.

LeftWriteFemme

01-29-2010, 02:07 PM

January 29

Inertia

in•er•tia
n.
1. Physics. The tendency of a body to resist acceleration; the tendency of a body at rest to remain at rest or of a body in straight line motion to stay in motion in a straight line unless acted on by an outside force.
2. Resistance or disinclination to motion, action, or change
This force is real; the laws that govern it act on me for well and ill. When I’m on a roll it’s hard to guide me and like the girl with the curl; when I’m stuck, I’m very, very stuck and it’s awful.
I am bound by this reality and go or stay according to what is set in motion or stopped, but what about ‘the outside force’? Am I in charge of summoning ‘it’ or is ‘it’ summonable at all? Will ‘it’ obey like the dog, or obey like the cat? Or is ‘it’ more random than the rain? Can ‘it’ be lured or tempted or does ‘it lure and tempt me? And the biggest questions on my mind: Is ‘the outside force’ also subject to inertia? Are we in this together? What is ‘its’ outside force? Might it have something to do with me?

Wash one pain at a time

*

NURSE

What if the word God is like the word nurse?
What if the person is only the simple meaning?
The actor doing the service
The plain act, uncontrollable from my end.

What if my active part of God,
Is the same as my active part of nurse?
What I draw down, how I schedule myself
To be ready when the milk arrives.

How I pull and am satisfied
Digest and draw again.
Like the sea laps at the shore,
The moon tugging it all the while.

What if God is about my hunger,
Satisfaction dependent on finding a suitable teat?
Maybe this is why, when it comes to God
Much of what I do, is cry.

When faced with my need, I open my mouth
Finding only two possible responses,
Suck or Scream.
My aching consumes me and I don't know how to calm myself.

I look for the caretaker, the person, the deed.
I need sucker but never look for the breast.
I am the child of God.
I must learn to draw God in

LeftWriteFemme

01-30-2010, 09:12 AM

January 30

The Was and the Is

The Silent Scream that existed as a placeholder for my G-d was incomprehensible to me. I entered AA and was informed that understanding my Higher Power was required not just some far distant goal. In true alcoholic form my first move was to shun G-d. This made room for my rage which was in much need of the space. After a few fine years of dissipation I lost interest in incendiary devices no matter how large their detonation capacity. Having cleared the room I brought in G-d as potted plant. I talked to it occasionally, watered and fed it, mostly ignored it. Growing in spite of lacking ministrations G-d was an unobtrusive force living in the corner changing gas into air and demanding nothing. As I quelled my apprehension and lived with the Presence I looked, listened, probed and questioned the subtle Force sharing the room. “Add it up,” chanted the children in my ear, “run the numbers, settle the accounts.” I calculated proofs and discarded the faulty and inaccurate. What was left, the whole, not the remainder was mine to keep, but it was not everything. I haven’t an everything G-d, because I am not a nothing person. I am something and G-d is something too. We are complimentary, like pairs of angles who come full circle.

Show the sun the souls of your feet

*

TRUST

You can trust people to be who they are.
I am a different being in relationship to different people.
To some I am the center of their constellation,
The sun burning bright, I 'm all they can see.

To others I am the moon,
Orbiting them, silent and dedicated.
With another group, I am a comet streaking through the sky,
Seldom seen but well remembered.

For many I am a distant star.
One among the multitude, blending in the night with the other signs.
Then there are the folks who see me in a more down to earth way,
I am the dirt beneath their feet.

The farmer sees me as a plant to be tended.
The cowboys view me as a horse to be broken.
To fisherman I'm a catch.
I am what people want to see.

So what can I trust them to be?
Wrapped in their own worlds
Yes, mostly I guess,
None of my business in the end.

I watch them and learn what I want to do, who I want to be.
In large part by avoiding what I see them do.
I do trust people to serve as bad examples, often
And good ones infrequently.

LeftWriteFemme

01-31-2010, 07:02 AM

January 31

Principles before Personalities............and gratitude!

As with everything I have to be careful of how I infer meaning. You say ‘Principles before Personalities’ and I hear, Their principles and Their personalities, immediately I’m on a tear. How different if I think of ‘my’ principles and ‘my’ personality. When I face it this way it is reflexive; I embrace my principles and my personality falls into step. I am safe and sane therefore gratitude follows just as the topic suggests. Good orderly direction is elegant when I don’t reverse direction. There is an obvious way to pet the cat when I accept that we get along fine, when I don’t………well, need I say more?

Books open minds, music opens hearts

*

WHEN I WAS YOUNG

I'm sure it will come soon
A time I can be carefree, innocent.
Worn and weary, I slog through the painful
Over awareness of what was considered my childhood.
What can I do but hope things will get simpler as I age.

My sobriety takes years from my face.
Lines slip from me and I feel the weight lift from my shoulders.
My tender branches twisted with the constant force of wind
Bud and flower in the shelter of recovery
Holding them in their own embrace.

Colors seep to the windows of my mind
Forming pictures and carrying me to a new world.
Limpid pools, a place I dive, as I look to the mirror.
Serenity a rebounding of life fills me
And I am the gentle girl I missed so long.

Longing for my loveliness, I cry at the sight of my baby one.
I have not yet taken my place on the swing
But I have been down to the edge of the playground
And run barefoot in the sand.
I will be who I was to be, it's late but it's better.

I know well enough
To enjoy it as it comes
Treasure it for every sweetness.
I will come into my youth

LeftWriteFemme

02-01-2010, 04:17 AM

February 1

Know Enough to Clap

If I know I’m happy I can clap my hands, but if I’m happy and I don’t know it, what then? Will my face display tell tale signs without whispering a word of it to my mind? Will I whistle a happy tune therefore revealing my inner state? If I can’t demonstrate my reality does it cease to exist? Does my retarded ability to reflect my emotion condemn me to remedial society? Is there any other society? If I become well enough to reflexively feel and exhibit my mood will I graduate to the advanced class or be forever alone no longer having a place amid the emotional head bangers, hair twirlers and cobweb pickers? Is it a choice of knowing happiness in isolation or confusion with a crowd? Could I know? Should I know? Would I know? Who knows?

Iron your will

*

THE DIFFERENCE

Falling and flying are the same, save the landing.
No matter what you do in the air, how well or how poorly
In the end, if you don't land, it's a fall
And if you do, a flight.

How we begin seems of ultimate importance
But is seen as a farce in the face of ruin.
The most promising of starts can be sucked ground ward,
Compass and instrumentation rendered useless, through lack of humility.

Piteous starts, starts without plan or goal
Are viewed as triumphs when safety has been captured from defeat.
Willingness is my aileron
It contributes to my lift in ways I cannot explain.

It smoothes the gusts of life which forever blow in my face
And willingness brings the ground up to meet me.
All I have to do is be willing
And stick out my feet.

LeftWriteFemme

02-02-2010, 05:13 AM

February 2

The Inside Half

I have drunk deeply from the glass set before me. I’m not entirely sure that I am half way through, but I am into it a goodly bit. I would be happy to have another 19 years; nineteen more hours would be a gift, too. That glass might be half empty but I am at least half full and I am amazed! I am regularly stunned by the prodigies this half trek has born to term; equally dazzled by how quickly the generations compound in this painstaking construction. Development both internal and assembled surpasses my wildest imaginings. Amazement is my most constant companion, more than gratitude and as of late even outstripping willingness my most trusted ally. Shock has been replace by wonder, bewilderment with surprise, I am fortified with these feeling realities and look happily to finishing the rest of what is in that glass.

Turn left into your right mind

*

DUCK TONGUE

Trying to get out of myself, I travel to an Asian fish market and grocery
I had heard has very fresh fish.
Greeted at the door by thirty large and lively tarpila
Swimming in their tank,
I felt my mood lift.

The captured beauty gave me pause.
Shiny and silvery, the faces banged at the glass
As they tried to get a better look at my entrance.
Like passengers packed on a subway car,
The fish jockeyed for position near the glass.

Further inside, I see the wonders we have extracted from the sea,
Cuttlefish, conch, squid, mussels, clams,
Whole fish of every stripe.
My belief in a power of diversity strengthens
And I smile.

Leaving the seafood section, I head forward,
To the refrigerated cases of other types of meat.
Frozen pigs tail, fowl with feet on, the novel variety pleasing.
When I approach the trays neatly filled with rows of chicken feet
I break out in a grin.

Thoughts of soup and days gone by flutter through my mind.
Finding formed foam piles with layer after layer
Of ducks tongues was my limit
Spinning in my mind,
Who? Why? Oh no!

But in the end I came to care
About how these minuscule flaps of leather
Were placed.
The person whose job is done well
And to the fact people are just people.

We do what we do.
For reasons unimagined to the rest
And we do it,
With full faith
And hopeful breath.

LeftWriteFemme

02-03-2010, 04:31 AM

February 3

Today’s Math

Today is 12/06/06 this is an equation to me, 12 = 6 + 6, simple. Not everything is, but math always works for me. My Higher Power is math based and one of my major decision making tools is to run the equation of the presenting situation. There are many constants in my life and those numbers are easier to calculate the variables often prove more difficult. Scalable problems allow for my Geometry. Proofs are a comfort when I can get them. Set Theory is what I settle for when I can’t. I try to show all my work and have others check my calculations. I can’t tell you how often a simple error in addition or subtraction has fouled my whole equation not to mention my equilibrium. In conclusion I would like to say it is now 12= 9 + 6 and somehow I’ve lost three days, or did I gain them? See how tricky the signs are.

Put misconception up for sale

*

HOW LIKE THE MOON

I show the shining bright face to the world
But cannot enumerate the dark.
I change and turn for all to see
Glowing silver, to full fledged smile.

I inventory all phases
Can tell you from wax to wane
But the darkness, the anchor to my lonely life
I can only guess.

I feel my way across the unknown topography
Searching with fingers and faith
To find the secrets
Of this magic nightmare.

And What? What is the thing to break it?
Hope, Reverence, A detailed map
Or is the darkness just a fact,
Part of the big equation, the equalizer of the light?

If this is so, how best to live with it?
Continue the search or post barriers,
Go ever forward looking for an answer,
Endear myself to the void?

The choices are always mine
The way seldom clear.

LeftWriteFemme

02-04-2010, 05:29 AM

February 4

What is “Offender” Number 2?

I’m not looking for trouble, really I’m not, it’s just that thanks to this program I’m no longer plagued by resentment, but I doubt that is the only stumbling block there is. Possibly the remaining list is as divergent as the alcoholics who make the lists. Though I am guessing we have more in common than that one thing. I stare at the various and sundry bric-a-brac measuring potential harm and formidability, so many candidates with razor edges. I take my combat pose as I lift the pen, wondering if giving things status also gives them power. I take comfort that acknowledgement is empowering for me. Tell me the weights you lift to strengthen your “Spiritual Muscle” the things that crowd behind resentment vying for their turn as perpetrator of downfall and misery.

Poetry in motion is like a marching band with words

*

THE FORGOTTEN

I am not Cleopatra.
I am not in denial.
I forgot.
"Sure" says my sponsor
"I've seen the headdress."

That's not fair
I've heard women say they forget the pain of child birth.
"They're kidding, you can't just forget pain,
It's there waiting in the wings,
Looking for it's fifteen minutes of fame."

"You will be the worse for it" she say with her smug way.
What if I can't drag it forward?
"Honey, Baby, Sweetie, you need to let those things come up,
Before they drag you back to a drink
Or whatever your new addiction of choice is."

"Just open your mind,
You might be surprised what is waiting to see the light of day."
What if it kills me?
"Darling, you're not that lucky,
You don't get to escape through death either."

"Lean into this and you will get through it faster
Hold onto the program and you will get through easier,
Fight it and it will tear you up."
Always the optimist my sponsor.

Tommi

02-04-2010, 07:23 PM

Hellooooo out there.

Anyone interested in having a meeting at the Planet's Reunion. ....Helloooooo

:welcome::ymca::harp::linus::wheelchair::deaf: :3femme: :waitinggirl::2butch::3butch:

LeftWriteFemme

02-05-2010, 05:13 AM

February 5

More Than Less

There is a difference between doing G-d’s will and winning, though some times they look the same. Skin deep appearance or monetary prowess share no border with the will of G-d, but these can stack as transparencies seeming invisible to the uninitiated practitioner. The organs exist and blood flows in the living thing and the shell is hard, lifeless; though it glints. Success can be the mantel of right compliance or the shroud of something deadly. I mustn’t be pushed or pulled by the desire of accolades or acceptance, nor shall I flee into a trap for fear of ridicule or rejection. The lacerations of emotional infliction, unloving judgments and imprudent fallout cause me to flinch in the face of changing focus and relinquishing hope of control. I am powerless over everything and responsible to everything. Anything else is incidental and with loving help will work out if I do not panic. Ah, to love myself as G-d loves me.

Control is an illusion I perpetrate on myself

*

THE THRONG

The more people I meet, the more vehemently I do not believe in God.
The tidal wave of human ignorance hits me
And the sheer and repetitive force of it
Is more than my single souled craft can bear.

Cyclical, coincidental tragedy, coupled with purposeful meanness
Barbed with arrogance and misaligned fear
Hold my child's faith under a scalding bath of realism
What to do, I do not know.

The fragility and perniciousness of life war with each other,
Though loss wins out.
What can I use to keep myself from withdrawal
To despondent hibernation?

Looking for glimmers of goodness in the sea of overwhelming depravity
Is not cutting it with me.
Mystery as an explanation
Is not working either.

I am not a retarded five year old.
I am a despairing thirty-eight year old
And I am tired of game playing and coyness.
I want God to arrive, not with explanations, but solutions.

I am not looking for a punishing parent
To send errand persons to bed without supper.
I am looking for the equation of repair,
The dance steps to healing.

I am yearning for global twelve step,
A universal attunement
And galactic spiritual awakening
And by the way, I want it now

LeftWriteFemme

02-06-2010, 05:55 AM

February 6

Two Powers

The river and the bridge; one force swift and roiling the other stolid and stoic, the first carries me away and the other carries me over. For the love of liquid, current and life I have slipped in to the water and washed; my life abandoned. For love of upright contact, terra bound movement and love I cross the bridge. Will I be deposited in the Ocean or wend to the City and back? Where is the greater power in Surrender or Choice?

Ignorance and greed are the same thing aren’t they?

*

THE SEAMLESS DOOR

Tongue and groove fit tight.
The pickled boards do not belie the passage.
Hinges buried deep
Secreted inside the place with no words.

The door remains shut, hidden.
The air, candy sweet.
The space, filled with the unbroken stream
Of surreal childhood.

What can I tell you of this living snapshot?
Nothing but haltings
Stops and shutters
Of a life encapsulated.

Proudly, I walk from this train wreck
Only to find the tether stitched
To my heart,
My soul, my mind.

Flashing through the room,
I weary and wonder.
I have often found myself outside this confusing destination
But never have I seen the door.

Always, I believe this time I am free of it.
When I find myself again within this realm
I know it is something
I cannot be parted from.

Then what of the door?
The undetected portal
Was spied by me one day
While it swung in the breeze.

I saw the simple barn
And the open loft door.
I never thought my incubus to be housed
In so plain a construction.

There the turmoil of my forward motion
Stored in the attic of the pony shed.
So may tragic contrivances
Are stored in such candid spots

Accessibility is the beginning of approach.
I take the stairs.

LeftWriteFemme

02-07-2010, 07:57 AM

February 7

From Pen to Progress

“Leave those gaters in the paddock awhile longer,” said my sponsor.
I gave a little better than a cursory glance at the hulking forms though I did stay strictly on my side of the fence and grasped tighter the hand of my custodian. The once over worked fine as my first pass through the creatures of the swamp, I didn’t fully grasp what lay beyond the petting zoo, but given my newness this wasn’t entirely a bad thing.
On second run I was in a boat with a glass bottom and a guide, I had vision, clarity. Third time through was a charm, swim fins and a rope tied about my waist, it was all too real. I floundered and had to be hauled bodily by my home group, my sponsor stood anchor.
I have numbered and charted these murky waters now and I see the lure they have for my ailing, twisted mind; the intensity of the brutes awash and the dark calling to dark make that sick sense that only an alcoholic can parse. I have to take to those by ways with supplies and reinforcements. Never swim alone!

Hand in hand is the best way to get anywhere

*

CONSERVATION OF LOVE

Love does not diminish
It recycles like the rain
Ever in transition and transmission

Love is not salvation or redemption
Nor do I believe it to be the currency of Godliness.
Love is an element like cobalt or gold
It has weight and substance.

Love is the coinage of responsibility
Not a door out of consequences.
Love, true love, inspires right action
Never cowardice or disrespect.

In this strange amelioration
Standing in the wings of realism
Love is love no longer

Love is the standard I have to bear
Not the canopy I stand beneath
In the frozen center.

Love cannot endure the pressure of misinformation
And melts with friction,
Floods with irresponsibility.

Love, like money, admiration and sex, has its place
And must not have expectation of being more than it is,
With that said,
Love is peerless, to be treasured, protected and shared

Tommi

02-07-2010, 09:51 AM

Well today is the day. tailgating parties around the country...When The Saints Come Rolling IN,,,,,DIANOPolis Lord I want to see in that Number, When Dreee Bees # 9 will shine..:note:.

Okay, not a good song, but an alcohlol free toast to the team I am rooting for because Pittsburgh and The Chargers are noi in it.

The olden golden days threre would have been beer kegs on the patio and drinking from last weekend to post bowl winning HIGH..or depressed Low..
So today, it is watching my buds, do the suds, and me getting hot on the best Salsa in So Cal.

So, here's to it, Let's Do it.Go New Orleeeeeans SAINTS...
_________ :football:

____________:footballpass:________________:footbal l:

____:football:________:football: -------------:football:--------------:football:

:footballpass:

I'll be back after football either smiling, of funky dunky wanting :chocolate::chocolate::chocolate::fastdraq:

LeftWriteFemme

02-08-2010, 04:50 AM

February 8

Simultaneous Acceptance

Being typical is a difficult thing to live with, but I am typical. Being extraordinary is a challenging thing to live up to, but this is also mine to bear, you see I am a typical alcoholic after all. Walking with one foot in each camp is not enough. I must simultaneously accept both my common commonality and my lottery winner uniqueness if I am to travel hand in hand with my Higher Power. If I don’t integrate this double reality, allow it to imprint my thoughts the way it is tattooed in my DNA I can not possibly take the biggest step of all and drop my judgment of these things so that humility can dwell within. You see there is not enough room in the vortex of my humanness to accommodate the jags of verdict and the desire for the sublime smoothness of humility. I can’t chase humility I have had to face that, but I can remove the impediments to its residence.

Have some compassion for your wounds

*

READY

Ready or not here it comes.
Life on terms of its own.
Bracing for the onslaught of gravity
I grip too well the implements of past days.

Fearing the pressure, I lay in my shallow grave,
The ground having been scooped out by my own hand.
Withering from expectation, my blood runs slow and dark,
Reducing to coagulated futility, loosing my life in anticipation of death.

Attempts at being less, as means of protection,
Less is not a solution.
Fading does not make life more livable
It makes me unavailable.

Readiness is my responsibility, it is momentary, momentary is sufficient.
Sobriety is nothing more than lining myself up with the needs of this instant
I need go not further,
Whole solutions are not my department.
Showing up,
dressed and washed,
ball and bat in hand if possible,
Just making it to the lineup is my full-time job.
Even if I never swing
It is better than being buried on the field

LeftWriteFemme

02-09-2010, 05:30 AM

February 9

Hospitality

What unites us, heals us, serves us, is the hospitality of the program. Fellowship encircles us and draws us close, in a word unites us, hospitality is our core. Hospital is the root of hospitality and recovery is the route to health, hospitality is the skeleton of recovery. Hospitable aid, the true gift of self is hospitality; hospitality the master of A.A.

Observe inaction and discover its root

*

FORGIVENESS

Forgiveness is not something to force on people
like unwanted coffee.
It is only appropriate to forgive people who ask
for forgiveness
And show with their behavior that they want it.

It is never appropriate to shove forgiveness on people
who haven't asked
And show no signs of wanting it
or demonstrate just the opposite.

It's been said, forgiving was to help you feel better.
It doesn't.
Letting go of resentments makes you feel better.
Making amends to the people you've hurt,
Cleaning up your side of the street makes you feel better.

Keeping an open mind and heart will make you ready
for the possibility of someone coming to make amends.
Forgiveness is a two way street.
Anything you have to throw over someone like a net
is usually a mistake.

Tommi

02-09-2010, 07:46 AM

Good morning world.. I woke to the sound of rain pelting against my window.. Recalling that in a nother time and place , that would have been an excuse to play hooky from work, and meet the Boys...:bluesbrothers:

So, off to work and just for today, I will dance ...in it..:rainsing:

LeftWriteFemme

02-10-2010, 05:24 AM

February 10

Recognition

All I have are these two hands; I can not lift the world

All I have are these two legs; I can not flee the hoards

All I have is this one heart though need and want prevail

All that’s left is this one mind to try to tell this tale.

Everything in this bright orb is there for me to see

Everything laid out before me all that I can be

Everything that I perceive as wrong and know it in my heart

Everything I think to touch and change believing it’s my art

Once I take the giant reins acceptance escapes the scene

Once the fates are in my grasp chaos is the theme

Once the sight of my right place is lost from in my mind

Once I try to fill the great big shoes is the day that I go blind.

Prune expectation with open-mindedness

*

DON'T BE A FRAUD

Fake it till you make it is like saying,
Keep drinking till you get sober, complains my sponsor.
But what about the things I can't do yet?
You work on them, that's all, you work.

You adjust your attitude.
Practice the steps.
Carry your behind to meetings,
And talk to me and others in your network.

Yeah, that sounds like a breeze.
It's easier than staying sober while lying.
In this program we try to stay honest
And in the moment.

Pretending to feel differently than you do
Defeats your ability to be present
And makes it hard for people to trust you.
But it's so awkward, I grumble.

Which is why we of the alcoholic persuasion,
Try to find short cuts but don't get sucked into them.
Tell the truth and do the hard work of sobriety and
Stay away from people who try to sell you a Softer Way.

LeftWriteFemme

02-11-2010, 07:49 AM

February 11

Rebellion Dogs

“Rebellion dogs our every step at first” AA’s 12 and 12

They won’t come to heal, won’t sit, won’t stay, these dogs circle waiting for signs of weakness or vulnerable skin, but there they are; they have been found out. The ones that worry me more are those that took show and place, the dogs that stand in the shadows and lurk in the wing. What are their names I wonder? Their distinctive smell? Must I identify these writhing mutts or simply call animal control? Though this never worked with rebellion dogs these lesser pups surely would run from would be dog catchers and leave me to my dreams. Alas, I name them and show them to my friends; we like they run in packs and are served well by honest disclosure.

Prune expectation with open-mindedness

*

THINGS THAT ARE THICKER THAN WATER

Pudding, mud, ice cream, cement, sauce, paint,
sap, drool, gravy, wood.
What is that?
A list of things that are thicker than water.

There are so many,
Why do people get so hung up on blood?
Survival, comfort, or maybe tradition?
There must be many reasons.

Why we strong-arm one another into relations
with family.
Families we drank with
Or families we drank to get away from,
But it's not the family is it, it's us.

We have to learn to do what we need to do.
We can't force ourselves into relationships
with anyone for any reason
Other then it is what is best for us.

Shoulds and aughts have no place in the family situation
So can I walk away from them all?
You can't do anything in the sweep of the wand,
In the same vein don't obligate yourself to people
due to viscosity.

That sounds like a promising start.

LeftWriteFemme

02-12-2010, 04:53 AM

February 12

Whittle it Down

A famous sculptor mentioned that he doesn’t so much create the objects as remove the stone which doesn’t belong. I have had the same experience with willingness. Encased in the bedrock of my will willingness had no opportunity to open doors. Flaking away the extraneous the key shape appears, rugged, blockish, rudimental. As the tears stream down my face and wrong thinking flies from my brain the key is more finely formed. As I wheedle at misconception and haul bodily wrong action the teeth of this thing show sharp in this day’s sun. Many doors stand ajar, at first those with basic tumblers, but now even those with encrypted defense are no match for the willingness, which I wield with rapier wit. The obvious blocks to progress open to me as well as the subtle doors to untold destination, I am let out of danger, released into possibility.

Trace implication

*

NIGHT FLIGHT

The small log shape with wings
Passed the windshield of my moving car
Without collision.
Meticulous calculation and correction
In a night sky.

Silent passage
Swift and meaningful
The owl lives as it knows how.

I was not born to the night.
Darkness not my given realm.
I have inverted my senses and compensated
For the moonlight.

I pull my way through the air
And hunt for my survival
In a world of shadows.
The morsels caught on the wing.

Snatches of conversations
And lines from books sustain me.
Giving me strength to live
In spite of the nocturnal bondage.

I have made peace with the night.
I am changed by my living
And my living endures.

The grace required to abide here
Is bestowed on me nightly.
I wear it though it is not the prize I sought.

LeftWriteFemme

02-12-2010, 09:02 PM

February 13

Progressive Fourth

All I can do is stand on the grass and count the shutters, the windows, the doors. At first I cannot approach to inspect any closer than that. Time passes and the other steps work me. I peer through the windows the next time and count the stuffs I can glimpse through the glass. I possess no periscopic vision, but what is in plain sight I reckon. Subsequently I wished to exteriorize and draw the inventory of the house out onto the lawn and tally there wishing to avoid that interior life, the poisoned vixen who haunted there. Time passed and she recovered as did I, into the house I went. I am now able not only to number my possessions; I can assess the flow and function, work patterns, interplay, reliability. I have now appraised not just the what, but the how of my life and progress into tomorrow.

Give cooperation a hand

*

TRAVELING PICTURES

I parked next to a beaten little import.
The well of the passengers side filled
With empty sports drink bottles and soda cans
The dash board was a shrine.

Three taped photographs.
One of a young man and young woman.
One of the young woman and an older woman.
One of the young woman and an enormous marble statue.

There were small carved objects
Affixed to the dash.
Jade and soapstone figures,
Beads and a feather.

The sanctuary in my head is decked out
In a similar manner.
Postcard pictures line my mind.
People I love, trips I took, pets long gone.

The road signs of my journey
Stand as exhibits of a tour of duty
Not always to my liking
But nothing I would trade.

I know clearly where I have been
And study the map to prepare
For the future escapades and loved ones.

Trinkets strung on my life line
Give texture, flavor and flash
To my pilgrimage.

LeftWriteFemme

02-13-2010, 07:41 PM

February 14

ONE

One skin
One mind
One spirit
One day

If I live in more than my own skin, I am a body snatcher and ghoul. If I live in a duality of thought I am ejected, ostensively out of my mind. If I redouble my spirit the increase takes a dark cold turn and I am lost. If I try to live two days at a time the sand shifts in the glass and I am worse off in that hour than Dorothy.
This skin is all I can be in, as many times as I walk in someone else’s shoes it’s the skin I’m in. This mind is my only bequest, treasure enough to earn my keep. Free as this spirit is it is still tied at the heel and like my shadow it remains. And today is the only day where the magic works, witches melt and clicking my heels gets my attention even if it doesn’t always take me home.

Create competition-free zones in your life

*

COMING TO THE TABLE

For many years, decades even,
I stacked the table against myself and others.
I piles the sacred next to the trifles.
I deposited item after item and built towers to confusion.
After years of sobriety I sorted the piles in earnest.

I made a place for myself at the table.
It's amazing what I can accomplish with a seat and a surface.
Over months, tediously separating, the needed from the useless,
I made a place for others at the table.

There is a whole world of life I missed
While trying to keep myself safe from unrealistic expectations.
Expectations of who I am and what I can do,
What I should do and who I should do it for.

Having strong boundaries and a clean table is like a homecoming.
I am coming home to me.
The good games and happy meals had at this table
Are unexpected and surely welcome.

The wall I built held good times at bay.
Because I could not keep the flood of trash
From spilling in from every direction
I had to learn to hold my head up before I could look around.

LeftWriteFemme

02-15-2010, 04:16 AM

February 15

Black and Blue Prints

Building hell from plans I found in the attic; furnishing it with what was left in the basement didn’t make a life but it did keep me occupied. Activity insulates me from living; camouflaging the windswept landscape I claw across turning my face from the oasis believing I have perfected a mirage. I have battered my hope and tied her in the corner the corner which I built from the blue prints I used to turn my life black

Turn up in the best places, turn up when needed, turn up the corners of your mouth

*

THE DEALS I'VE MADE

Because they are deals and not resentments or secrets
These circular schemes did not come out in my fourth step.
They didn't come out in the wash.
They come out whenever they are broken.

If the deal is-Don't eat pickled herring
And you won't remember X
The deal will be broken when pickled herring
Is served to me at some social gathering.

As I get healthier, the breaks connect evermore deeply.
What in early sobriety would have given me unexplained discomfort
Now gives me full-blown flashbacks
And I watch the deal unravel.

I wasn't supposed to eat this
Because this was on my plate-------When
But now that it's on the plate here----Now
I have to face this ugly roiling mess.

The deals saved my life
But unless they are handled with care and honesty
They can cost me the life I have now.

I must choose a safe person and place
To share these broken shards with.
Living alone with this will not work
And making it public fodder is a setup as well.

In every one of these deals
There is a back door to a drink
And therefore WE have to go out the front door together.

LeftWriteFemme

02-16-2010, 04:23 AM

February 16

The Long Dark Ride

Are fear and ignorance one thing that looks like itself or terrifying twins who feed one another? Can they be separated and if they can will it kill them? And if they die what will spring from their remains? Will it be better or worse? Can I tell what better is? Should I tell if it turns out to be worse? Is there ever an end to either fear or ignorance? If there is, how deep is that well and will I survive a trip to the bottom? Do you know and do you care? Will you go with me if I find the way? Will you take me if you find it first?

Learn from ugliness

*

THE 24 HOUR GOD

Matching a loving God to the horrors of my past
has proved impossible for me.
Projecting a connection to an all powerful God
of the ever foreshortening future seems implausible.

In today, I see a nurturing God
not an all purpose God
Not a God who serves all.
In my life there is a God I trust today.

Each morning, when I wake
there is a pleasant surprise to find a God.
Not an expansive God, not a God to fit the continuum
But a nice neat God who fits right in this 24 hours.

Tommi

02-16-2010, 08:55 AM

All is well on the Florida vist..
The day ahead is filled with fun, frolic and ...lunch somewhere special..

Drinking Diet Coke with the Dad, and the Mom watching over the roost, my girl writing an into to a new book,...and the funny little squirrels jumping from tree to tree entertaining the watchers.

Life is great and I am glad to see it through sober eyes. :farmer:

LeftWriteFemme

02-17-2010, 04:40 AM

February 17

Suzy Q’s Mother

Through process of elimination I have had to learn who G-d is and who G-d isn’t. When it comes down to my understanding everything incomprehensible is off the table and what is left is mine, all mine. I can’t fathom an all powerful G-d; therefore my G-d is not all powerful. I can not begin to comprehend a vengeful G-d, as you might have guessed; my G-d is not vengeful. Because of these constraints I have a non-omnipotent G-d, one with limitations and bounds. This doesn’t mean I love my G-d any less in fact it may be why I love my G-d so very much. And G-d loves me with a Mother love that trails me to the depths and heights of the path, but like any mother, she can’t do everything. My G-d is accomplished and wonderful, but there are days that I need things, which lay outside my Higher Power’s area of expertise and I must turn to help beyond our little circle of two. This is not easy at first. We both feel awkward in the attempt, but Suzy Q lives two houses down and her mother still has her hook shot from college and since my mom’s experience of basketball is that it’s the court you walk through to go play tennis, I ask Mrs. Q with help making the three point shots. I don’t have to understand Suzy Q’s mother, I leave that to Suzy. I just have to ask for help, learn the jump and go home when I’m done. It’s nice to be able to slam dunk, but there is no place like home.

Recommend earnestness

*

THIN ICE

The ice is brittle, transparent and breaking away.
I brace for destruction, turmoil and frigid descent.
I am stuck in my topside thinking
And cannot realize the chance for freedom the cracking expanse promises.

I am an oceanic creature.
I can escape my watery bonds with the splitting of the ice.
Trapped in a hole I keep open only through the friction of my unrest
I am kept from the community of life to which I belong.

My reflection mixes with my view of the sky
And I forget my place, forget my name,
Forget how I have come to be trapped here.

The pining after what is not mine to have
Has brought me to this thin edge.
I must break through to be who I am.
In doing so I shatter the illusion of who I thought I was.

Zeal to zenith
I must move away from the phantasm and mockery
And take refuge in what I am

LeftWriteFemme

02-18-2010, 04:35 AM

February 18

Hiding

“Defeat is what you make of it,” says my sponsor. “Fighting a thousand secret battles when you claim that you want peace is not right. The agony of defeat is when you keep on fighting. There is no honor in waving the white flag, but never laying down your arms.”
“I can’t just give them up they have been in the family for years,” my whining retort.
“I’m sure they have, darling, I’m sure they have, and haven’t done any of you a lick of good either,” her smug reply.
“They are good for sabotage,” I begin my running start at her.
“Sabotage is something you only do to yourself, because who else can you really sabotage? Who do you really hate enough other than you?”
“My hobby is denying that you know.”
“Yes, and sweet lot of good it does you, the war rages within you and outside you say it’s harmony, no matter all the signs of discord.”
“And if I were to really give up. If, I were really tired enough, how can I insure my safety?” I asked with my hands nearly in the air.
“Tell the truth, even if it’s only to your self. Put space between you and weapons of mass destruction. Oh, and make sure you surrender to a friend.”

Loosen your grasp as often as you can

*

LIFE IS UNFAIR

Assuring myself I will not be permitted through the gate,
I walk the perimeter assessing the fence,
Looking for a place to exploit, a wire slightly high.
Trying to look graceful, I duck under the fence.

Telling myself I prefer life on the edge.
The water is less dangerous here on the fringe.
I wouldn't want to be swept away.

I stay clear of my peers.
I stand in the baby pool and feel confidant I won't drown.
Brushing from my conscience that I won't swim either.

Struggling to the top of the pile or scurrying underneath
Is a blatant lack of humility
Skirting the margin is the same.

Facing life and finding it unfair
I take to the world of exception
And hope to slip through the cracks to a life of safety.
In that act, I discount my talent and ability.
Worst of all, I disconnect from God.

LeftWriteFemme

02-19-2010, 04:58 AM

February 19

Jenny

Though ignorance may be bliss, living in the shadow of someone else’s ignorance is sheer hell. The confusion is bad, but the lies are worse. Want to cripple a child for life give it to a well meaning fool who has the rule book to the wrong board game, that child will grow to need crutches they don’t make and medicine they can’t brew. Dependant on misguided insanity the child will require a miracle cure and may lack the ability to ingest it. Best case scenario the kid makes a brave escape into a world she can barely comprehend, worse case she turns the rule book upside down and reads it backwards to her own unfortunate brood. Ignorance is always a twilight proposition, half agreement the other half handcuffed nightmare. Full consent is by necessity impossible while blameless innocents is similarly unachievable. The only suggestion I can make from this side of the looking glass is to pick your poison and plan your getaway.

Rain encouragement down in your dreams

*

TIME IS HERE TO STAY

I have passed my days emptying them.
Like bread crumbs on a trail of rescue
Expecting them to facilitate redemption
And if not that at least retreat.

I release an audible sigh
As I let each evening slip to the path behind me
The future I view as a cliff I am nearing
I hope to be ransomed before the edge.

I plan carefully how to stay in sync with revision
Things must be resolved and revert
But this is not the way.
The past is there to be mined.

Inert gold as well as land mines linger beneath the surface
The days stream on.
I am not nearing the limit
I am shrinking from hope.

I turn my eyes from expectancy with a shutter
Deeply, I realize I must leave my fairytale life
And walk away with my days in my pocket
A treasure------mine to spend.

LeftWriteFemme

02-20-2010, 04:22 AM

February 20

Katie’s Wish

Does G-d arrange for my parking spot, foil the Colts opponents, release the stains from my dry-cleaning? Can I ask for the petty and pedantic? All One G-d Faith, reads the side of the soap bottle, but really is there only one? Like Santa? The Tooth Fairy? OZ? Is my life better or worse for the whimsy? How would I know? Why would I care? As long as I live with what I get most times, it truly is okay to ask for what I want sometimes, I mean hell, the Superbowl is only once a year. I’m allowed to be unreasonable and happy.

Open your mind more often than seems necessary

*

FOREVER IS NOT AS LONG AS IT USED TO BE

What time gives in permanence it takes in fluctuation
The relationships I stand on to reach with tippy toed grasp
The light of heaven
Flutter by like flounder disturbed from their sandy bed.

My mind probes the past looking for the shroud lines
To hold up the sail of hope.
Togetherness the banner of life,
Bonds to strength, protection, from outside and within.

I yearn for a life of love, unbending and calm
I am met with a tug of war
Which ends in the mud.
Days stretch into years but years are no protection from terminus.

Forever rings in my head.
Promises I have made to myself
Promises I have made to others
Promises made to me are nothing in the face of the promise of tomorrow.

Time flows like air over a row of seedlings, fresh and challenging
Sustaining life and carrying away familiarity.
Forever is not as long as it used to be.
I can live with that, have to live with that.

I shake my fist at the sky
But it won't make love last.
It will not keep my heart from loving again.
Sails which have filled before will fill again.

LeftWriteFemme

02-20-2010, 05:51 PM

February 21

Word Comprehension

There were scads and scores of words that I had at my command. I could command them that was a fact; comprehend them that was an illusion. My sponsor had every confidence in me and started my word comprehension lessons with the tough ones first: “No,” she would ask, “What don’t you understand the Nnnnnn part or the OHhhhhh part?” Took me sometime to catch on to words deep as that. Serenity that I learned through living Braille. Learned it like any hungry child, by taste. Learned it like learning the ocean as you swim in it. Serenity is my ballast and my bail, as for peace, all I can say is: No comprehension, no peace; Know comprehension, know peace.

Re-pattern fear

*

SEAM ALLOWANCES

The space, given and taken.
The space used to bind and sew us fast.
The permission for humanness
And the need for seams to make us whole.

The narrow margin is a shoulder on which I lean.
Slender strip, a place of refuge.
Darts are shaped to hug the curves,
I bend to fit to life.

Our nearness, being my own part and part of more,
Planning and a pattern, cut to order,
With allowances made for fraying and fragility,
Allow me to feel woven into a web of what is
And still hope for more

The unfinished garment taking shape
Easing and stretching
And before my eyes
Pins held between the teeth of God.

Tommi

02-21-2010, 08:53 AM

February 21

Re-pattern fear

SEAM ALLOWANCES

The space, given and taken.
The space used to bind and sew us fast.
The permission for humanness
And the need for seams to make us whole.

The narrow margin is a shoulder on which I lean.
Slender strip, a place of refuge.
Darts are shaped to hug the curves,
I bend to fit to life.

Our nearness, being my own part and part of more,
Planning and a pattern, cut to order,
With allowances made for fraying and fragility,
Allow me to feel woven into a web of what is
And still hope for more

The unfinished garment taking shape
Easing and stretching
And before my eyes
Pins held between the teeth of God.

Nice writing* Nice time * Nice family* Nicest Nicest Y-O-U.

LeftWriteFemme

02-22-2010, 04:13 AM

Nice writing* Nice time * Nice family* Nicest Nicest Y-O-U.

It was soooooo nice to be there with you!!!:lips:

LeftWriteFemme

02-22-2010, 04:14 AM

February 22

Ace

Like an ace in my pocket step one is the beginning and end of my step work. This step carries the high and low count; its rise is so near to the ground I didn’t have to lift my chin to clear it as I crawled my way in here, it is appeal so exalted that it is all I hear when I finish the twelfth and am on my way back around. The high and low of any hand plus the card I keep up my sleeve for emergencies. The greatest blessing is I don’t need four of a kind, not even a pair; as long as I have step one I am guaranteed a full house, full heart, full life and between you and me that’s just how I like it.

Lick your lips then smile

*

SHAME

I push shame around my plate like a chunk of spoiled meat.
The toxins leaching to every interface and cavity
With an inverse half-life, the lethal substance grows
Reinforcing and sending runners and tendrils
To worlds known and those yet undiscovered.
I wage my war on this shapehifting plaque.
Thrust and parry, I step back from the unsurmountable walls
And set my sights on tearing down the bunkers
In my personal city.
Like lead plumbing
The danger eludes the observation of my fellow citizens
I am labeled a lunatic
And no attention is paid to my evaluation of water quality.
I search for similarly crazed friends
Variants within a theme.
I depend on the poisoned sanity of my wounded compatriots.
We shovel the plate loads of spoiled meat and detritus.
The foreshortened mountain of shame
Allows tiny strands of light to glimmer across the surface
But the shamed devotees turn their heads.
We, the few, face the glowering mass.
I worry like a petulant child.
What if we cannot prevail?
Is shame stronger then recovery?
Have we traveled this far to miss the glaciers edge?
As it slides away from us
I console myself with the sure knowledge that,
This life of sobriety is better than any other offering
Healing the world, What a lovely thought.
Living free from shame today, What a necessity.

LeftWriteFemme

02-23-2010, 04:28 AM

February 23

Over Troubled Water

Though G-d might be everything, for a long time G-d was a resident of an unknown country; a theoretical citizen of a theoretical land. It took some time for me to spy yon distant country and longer to realize what a miracle it was that I could see my neighbor, holding my optics turned around the way they were. Turning over the binoculars came long before introductions or interaction, but it was an important step in relationship building nonetheless.
Having seen the island my mind fled due to the trumped up stories about its resident. Open minded observation cleared up the fallacies of ogres and super heroes, but this only told me who G-d wasn’t and nothing of who G-d is. Direct knowledge was going to require direct contact.
I began throwing tethered balls of string across the channel that separates us and was shocked, delighted, horrified to find that the far end would get tied to the far shore. I threw twine next, then rope, after a few successful repetitions I was able to shinny across for the first time. Filled with fear and trepidation I arrived on the apposing bank and stood shivering more from nerves than cold. I saw no one and felt much. I didn’t stay long and swam back. The first plank bridge was simple and straight. Having this link somehow emboldened me to explore the land of my own country. With great regularity I found narrow margins. I crafted a new bridge for each slender passage. The more I learn about me the more regular my connection to that inner land.
Like something shy of my wrath, G-d made an illusive sight. The more I calmed the more often the sightings. We made acquaintance and then we made friends. I’ve widened some bridges and G-d has widened others. We stroll together often hand in hand. We talk and laugh, cry and joke. Occupancy is fluid, times I live on the island and others the surrounding continent sometimes we live together other times we are one another’s guests. All the days are not happy ones but we are always happy to be together and more than that I will not ask.

Quarantine reluctance

*

DOMINOES

What happens to the dominoes that do not fall?
The show cut short by my sobriety.
The tiles stand front to back
The foul respiration will send them to their preordained destination.
I hold my breath as I glance over the display of generations
The design is set
Painstaking patterns lain with meticulous, ingenious deft.
Skill for falling, laying waste.
Sad pictures told and retold in speedy drops
The rhythmic fall of dominoes turning eight blocks to a corner.
Direction shifts
But the descending continues.
I cannot occupy this ground.
I must not upset the arrangement.
I cannot clear it from this world.
I must walk away from the upright mosaic.
A flower waiting to bloom with destruction
I have to move, climb the steep slopes
Vertical life,
Leaving the tumbling destruction for Yet.
Grasping the sides of the cliffs
I haul myself off the tableland,
A place set for a show of laying down,
I build my strength and keep off the well known flats.
This is a life apart
The game is there if I return.
It is a game no one can win.

LeftWriteFemme

02-24-2010, 05:13 AM

February 24

Cured

Ham is cured. Thank G-d, I’m not ham. Ham likes to be the center of attention. Thank G-d, I’m not ham. I can’t be the worker among workers if I believe I don’t need to work. I can’t be a friend among friends if I am an island or a precipice, above or away from the need or reach of others. Cured is a one way street that leads to a dried up lonely end. Just the same way that turning my cucumber into a pickle took me out of the garden, curing takes me away from the only home I know, recovery. Though I am often raw and sometimes fresh, these I can survive, finished due to the drying out process that would be a living death. Thank G-d I’m not cured.

Side step pitfalls

*

BECAUSE

Because I am my fathers child,
I make my attendance at meetings frequent and regular.
Having looked deeply in the genetic mirror
I see so many bitter days.

I've run from implications and sheltered in the steps.
The humility that saved my life,
Is understanding I am no different from my family
And since this is a progressive disease we all have
I will just get there faster.

Knowing who I can be helps me turn my will over
And keeps me grasping my Higher Powers belt loop.
All I am turns in every direction
And can pull or push, lift or fall.

I know my assets.
I know their power and their limitations.
All my hope is placed on a plan to use these resources.
I follow the only lead
Which has never promised more than it can deliver.

LeftWriteFemme

02-25-2010, 06:05 AM

February 25

Exceptance

“I want G-d’s will for me,” I sigh to my sponsor.
“Except for this and except for that,” is her trig response. She knows me, knows I have exceptance. “You have a list of exclusions, a list that dams up the works.”
“Well, trust is hard,” I splutter.
“Trust is not the issue here,” says she. “You don’t feel acceptable and exceptance is what follows.”
“Whatever could you mean?” my broken bluster leaving only this plaintive whine.
“You believe you’re not good enough for G-d or anyone and cross everything off the list in an attempt to duck blame or shame or some other nasty thing. You are good enough kiddo, get that and everything else is good enough, too. At least good enough for now and now is all we have. Accept that.”

Include water in your life

*

TOP

The chipped paint of the red stripe
Gives the illusion of fading to rose as it spins
The edge, painted thalo green, in it's intensity
Reflects the windows of the room.

The bead, purple and gleaming
Affixed to the stem holds the cuff
With it's two opposed openings
The cord recoiled inside.

Underneath, protected from easy observation
Resides the point, lathed and faultless
The turning weight is carried and balanced
Perfectly on this nib.

The hum, spiraling and melodic
Comes from the table as well as the top
The aptness of form and function
Grace and harmony

In spite of it all
The only thing
Which truly matters
Is who pulls the string.

LeftWriteFemme

02-26-2010, 08:53 AM

February 26

The Resentment of an Acorn

Because no one believed that I was a giant oak inside, I had to prove it and drop my little cap and leave my shell behind. Now I stand big and tall, alone, board feet to the sky. I have lost my portability in my quest for the recognition of my potential. My amazing growth painful due to its cause; poor mental health is a bitter road to achievement. As I stand head and shoulders above the undulating canopy reflection comes on a sweet breeze. Am I sorry I’m here, it could have been worse, could have been eaten by a squirrel or glued endlessly to a third-grade art project “my walk through the woods” bugs could have gotten me, though that looms even now. I could have disintegrated, lost my power and integrity. Whatever the driver I am appreciative of the destination, there were many darker roads on that map. It’s good to be here. It’s good to be anywhere sober.

Shade your honest attempts

*

BELIEVE

Listening to what people say
Is a half waste of time.
Believing it is a full waste of time.
Truth wills out in behavior.

No matter what is said
What is done is the real deal.
What is done over time
Is the final test.

The things that are repeated
Resounding from one generation to the next
Are to be counted on.

Believing in told truths
Is a snare and a delusion
The trap of all traps.

If your sponsor has a sponsor
You may sleep at night.
If your sponsor works with that sponsor
You can sleep soundly.

Doing the right things.
Doing them over and over again
Doing them with others,
Your group, your friends, your sponsees

That will make you believable
I can think of nothing else that will.

Tommi

02-26-2010, 08:55 AM

LeftWriteFemme

02-26-2010, 09:16 AM

Nice way to start my day...Thank you for all the wonderful, inspirational words.

You are so very welcome!

LeftWriteFemme

02-27-2010, 07:54 AM

February 27

Adjustment

The chase is on, round and round it goes and where it stops no one knows. I run after control and change as I grasp, but can never quite get my fingers wrapped around the thing. An open fist is an adjustment; no fist at all would be a feat. The fool’s errand I send myself on brings suffering; there would be suffering anyhow, I feel I am the cause due to my attempt to avoid it; another backhanded attempt at the illusion, the goal, control. Adjusting to reality is at first freefall; rarely do I get to second. The shape taken by the shift in my gears to no gears at all dilates my pupils and the rest is white. If the colors come back I don’t know when. If the ground beneath me returns I don’t know how. I am blinded by the light and can only follow the sound.

Stall your reticence

*

ONE IN A THOUSAND

"Did they tell you the odds when you came in?"
Asked my sponsor
Yes, One in thirty make it to the rooms
One in thirty of those stay for five years.

One in a thousand get truly sober
And are catapulted to another dimension
I responded.
"What was your response to that?"

Well, I showed the proper amount of surprise
"Yes but what did you think inside?"
I thought, Climb with me or I'll climb over you.
Not very spiritual is it?

"It worked, you're still sober.
A lot of folks aren't.
The company you keep is sober.
There is nothing less spiritual than a drunk."

Is that why it's called a selfish program?
"I don't know."
It seems to me sobriety is a gift you give the world
But I give it to myself.

"Yes, but you can't give a gift
You don't have in your possession."
Point taken.

LeftWriteFemme

02-28-2010, 06:54 AM

February 28

Pucker Up

The gifts I never expected, never knew I needed, never imagined wanting, arrive wrapped in fretful apprehension more often than not. “Who knew?” I ask myself standing swathed in a skin I never realized I owned. My identity has been handed to me an article at a time, each item less likely than the last. Do they fit, yes of course, fit as if they were made for me, fit because they are me. My inability to recognize myself is a stumbling block; my willingness to try is my salvation. Though there are times when a kiss is just a kiss, there are other times when a kiss can change the whole world.

Quarter your difficulties, dice your recriminations

*

YARD BOAT

Early in my life, I lived in a gated yacht club,
The canal passing in front of my home.
I had no boat
I didn't know how to sail
I had not a thought of learning.
In later years, I learned to sail.
I covered the water in choppy tacks
And prayed for safe returns to shore.
Those were the years with a yard boat.
Covered in a tarp, the blue sided craft sat dry
The sun and wind taking their toll
The vessel stayed on the trailer
Waiting to be towed.
At the reservoir it would fill
Water leaking in from every joint.
I would bail and sail with all my heart.
Timing has never been my strong suit.
Rare are the times when all the ingredients
Come together in my life.
I have used this as an excuse
To feel like a failure.
I have used it to blame and dismiss God.
I have used it to avoid pursuit of opportunities.
I have averted my attention from the satisfactions in my life.
Living on the water is a pleasure
And stolen moments tacking in the basin of Round Valley
An equal joy.
Happy with what I have makes MORE a surprise
Not a necessity.

LeftWriteFemme

02-28-2010, 04:19 PM

February 29

Leap Day

When winter is almost at an end it becomes beautiful; a theoretical thing, which though it may hurt you, can not hurt you for long, therefore is safely appreciated by mere mortals. You don't have to beg for G-d's own protection, time has become a friend and winter only a show. I will soon wake from this chilling fright, will in fact thaw from it in short order and needn’t fret though chilblains still catch out me now and then. I can stand at the window admiring frost and ice formed lace; intricate patterns whose beauty will soon be lost to me, put away in favor of crocus and daffodil. The terrible loveliness of soon to pass trauma is not lost on my hyper-vigilance I grasp it I just can’t seem to let it rest.

Unseat disreputable ideas

*

WANTING

Wanting to be alive is not as important
As wanting to do right. Said my sponsor.

I don't want to be here, I half blurted, half sobbed.
I know came the reply.

Many of us come in not wanting to live
But sobriety is about living
And you want to be sober said my sponsor
Yes but I don't want to live.

This moment, this moment you don't want to live
But you still want to be sober
And you still want to do right
Yes

And that is what you will do.
You will pick up the tools
As you have done so often
And you will try everything suggested.

Then you'll see how you feel tomorrow.
What if it doesn't go away?
You'll keep it up
And see how you feel the next day.

What if I never feel better?
Ah well-----
When have you ever had anything
That dependable

LeftWriteFemme

03-01-2010, 05:09 AM

March 1

Reality and Desire

“I know the difference between desire and reality,” I whisper to my new found friend. Who I am and what I am, are a reality unto themselves, your recognition of that and how you handle said recognition are for you and G-d. The vastness of the true you; I hope to spend a lifetime surveying; but not sampling. What you want and your reality are not mine to mind or mend. If you are driving that train this is on you and if HP is the driver all the more incentive for me to be still, enjoy the ride and await the outcome. For in the end the question is never, will you be mine, but what will I be to you.

Explore beyond the bend in your mind

*

IF I HAD A SCREWDRIVER

If I had anything other than this hammer
Possibly, I would discontinue pounding
This helix into the side of my universe.

The slot is unused
The flat heat of my sledge slams.
A wide void is punched into my abyss
As the threads are pummeled, not turned.

If I had picked up the right tools.
If they had been displayed within my reach.
If my granny had wheels
She might yet be a wagon.

I have picked up new tools
But having never seen them used, I bang with them
Watching others twisting the wrist and angling the elbow
I try to wrap my mind around the posture.

Muscles I have never used
Laminated to mental configurations unthought of
Improvements in workmanship is slow.
May a fine toolbox has remained full and untouched.

The mind lacking the dexterity to grasp the in-workings
The body ill equipped for the outer
If I had a screwdriver, I pray I could bring to it
The flexibility of sinew and the nimbleness of wit

LeftWriteFemme

03-02-2010, 05:09 AM

March 2

Stepping up

I look along the list of names, look upon the sea of faces. Are there any whose eyes I avoid? I gaze across the landscape are there any craters, any pock marks, any divots. I tick through my actions those I’ve recently taken checking for stubbles, glitches, snafus. These combined facts and figures create a portrait of my day; I appraise the eyes, the hair, the teeth. If I can smile at what I see all is well if not I begin the repair.

Plan for your contentment at least as much as you plan your escape

*

SWEAT

I turn the desk lamp into the eyes of God.
I put question after question
To the construct of my childhood concept.

Would you please explain?
Or exactly why did You do this,
That, or the other thing?

Are You now or have You ever been a member of?
I put the pressure on.
The beads of perspiration join and then trickle.

I have God in the box, I will not relent.
I don't understand You, I say disappointedly
As if speaking to a troubling adolescent.

You have so much potential, if only You would apply Yourself
The icon shakes It's head slowly and deliberately,
I shake my head too.

So much time has passed
And I am no closer to embrace.
You don't understand Me, says God to me.

Dawn breaks, I uncuff this mythic creature.
You are not the One I am looking for,
You are free to go

LeftWriteFemme

03-03-2010, 04:12 AM

March 3

The Horse of a Different Stripe

When I arrived at the horse and pony show, I saw all there was to see; there were Morgans, Walkers, and Paints. Yet I couldn’t help, but return to this particular zebra, the spark of my imagination, the inspiration of my dreams. There was no help for me, I want what I want and need what I need. It was all about spirit, all about soul; the fire in its eyes matched the burning of my heart, ignition at the point of recognition. Then I stumble, then I fall, bad behavior and wrong thinking, the selfishness of the self-involved takes hold and runs my mouth, “Nice mount, great steed, But can nothing be done about these stripes?” The flash in those eyes, the knowing knickers, said it all. I was trying to stay in my small place and that would never work with her, if I wanted the Zebra, I had to be willing to go to Africa.

Respect randomness

*

DICHOTOMY'S' EMBRACE

Contentment and security
Bleed in through the doors and windows of my heart.
Peace blows its fine wind across my mind.

I fear for my identity
I raise my hand to beat the drum
Is my pulse still here if the beat of discontent is not?

The warmth seeps in
My fingers uncurl
I resist the urge to tilt my face to the sun.

How can I be I
If my countenance is not bleak?
Mirth escapes my lips, Am I a creature of laughter?

My brain feels through levels of sheltered memory
I am old and age hangs from my brow
I am young and exposure stings my flesh.

In all this----Joy?
Where can I enfold this antithesis
Shadows play across shade.

A child of extremes, Yes
Brooding and rage, howling and silence
How have sprinkles and starlight added to the mix?

Purring, musing and sweet kisses
What am I in this embrace?

LeftWriteFemme

03-04-2010, 05:09 AM

March 4

A Duck Trying to Teach a Fish to Swim

Just because you’ve been in the water doesn’t mean you know how to swim. Just because you swim in the water doesn’t mean you can teach me how. Floating on top and plunging your head under the surface occasionally, doesn’t qualify you to safe guard me. Poaching is unpleasant to those of us caught, we that were foolish enough to believe that birds of a feather can teach school are picked off and swallowed by the benevolence of so much quack.

Stand up to extend your reach

*

AND I BELIEVE YOU

"This will be easy." Says my sponsor.
"Oh yes, simplicity itself I'm sure." I respond
"I've participated in these plans before."
"We get good results." She retorts

I love how you pick goals.
They seem like intellectual straight lines
And turn into roller coasters.
You do it with an open face, not a modicum of guilt.

Why should I feel guilty?
You keep getting better.
I keep staying sober.
What is there to feel bad about?

The guileless look on your face,
I fall for it every time but no more,
I know you're cunning.
You know this will be hard.

I remember when we worked on Honesty.
What could be simpler?
Or Hope, how sweet a concept.
Or the thirty rounds on the floor with Setting Limits.

I've begun to realize you're like,
The bean seller that Jack met.
You say they are magic beans
And I believe you.

You say they'll grow to the sky
I know they will
And I will climb them
Just don't tell me it will be easy

LeftWriteFemme

03-05-2010, 05:20 AM

March 5

What and When, When and How……and Why

Arriving at the place where I have nothing to prove, afforded me the luxury of not having to proclaim the amount of time I have, when I share in a meeting. Taking the score keeping out of the equation I was then able to think of what it was that motivated me to speak in a meeting. Self-Possession, a great gift to inhabit, a greater gift to demonstrate; quiet dignity is a real favorite of mine. If I am calm yet in control, if there is time, if there is a lull, I can share parts of my experience. If I have chaos, an agenda, a theory, a grudge it is all better left unsaid in the meeting and saved for the less vulnerable ear of my sponsor. For if I am wrong I might persuade in error and if I am right I might convert in righteousness.
Why is it that what I never say rings louder than anything I do?

Leave gossip where you find it

*

MOTE

I dug the mote, the alligators came on their own.
The rain fell, I did not bid it.
I've burned all the bridges
I've sold the farm.

I wonder at the company I keep
The birds fly in and stay for a season
Friends used to wave as they passed
Now my island is overgrown.

I stand to my chin in the tall grass
I guess it's a matter of maintenance
What I don't keep pruned grows back
The connections I don't secure weaken and fail.

I am subject to all that falls, if I don't keep my roof on.
The wind chaps me without the walls of my home
No clothes and I burn
No joy and all I do is cry.

It takes more than a continuous ditch
To protect my heart.
More than water and reptiles
To safeguard my soul.

Tommi

03-05-2010, 10:24 PM

LeftWriteFemme

03-06-2010, 06:02 AM

It's been a bad week...a sad week, and I feel weak.

It has been a journey. I have found the mountains, and loved to climb them. When little creatures and kids fall down, I know I can pick them up and cradle them until they heal, or pass into the valley of death.

"Steel on the outside , velvet on the inside", she says, in the special way she sounds when she knows, and I know, I am filled with the awe with the power of clarity, in those few words.

Ice water has been my drink of choice today. How about you?

I'm so sorry that you have been having to go through all of this. The price of loving those feline deities is their life span is so much shorter than ours and we are destined to live so much of our lives missing them. I love you and hope that today is at least a break from the sadness and grief.

All my love,

the girl

LeftWriteFemme

03-06-2010, 06:03 AM

March 6

The Price of Today’s Ride

Much of my spiritual awakening has been spent separating myself from the nightmare of the past, reassuring myself that in fact, it the horror, is over. As my present has improved my reactions are still invested with the hide or fly coping of a child dealing with terror. Things get better yet barricades are erected, departing flights secured. Disengaging the clutch of fingers wrapped so tightly around the escape hatch takes a great deal of my short supply of faith and confidence. Laying down my anticipatory reluctance in favor of optimism has had the breathtaking feel of pain, though in fact it was only the separation from a poisonous crutch and the vacuum it creates. Allowing myself to see beauty at the same time as I deal with the truth of the past; standing in the full light of morning and not blocking out the brilliant pain of night is the outstanding gift my spiritual path affords me.

Open stored creativity

*

ECHOES OF ACTION

Squares of light outline a patchwork on walls and ceiling.
Ripples of water formed this ancient glass.
Three hundred years these waves have shone through those panes.
Three hundred years these waves have held,
Like stability in a world of change.

Looking through the window
The City rams life down it's own throat.
The ripples are invisible,
Caressing currents imbed the glass
The wavelengths shining projections only with the street lights.

How much mundane activity is captured,
Only revealing itself surreptitiously.
What is not echoed from year to year comes to final rest.
My voice does not terminate at my mouth
How therefore can I consider a blunted end to my behavior?

Tommi

03-06-2010, 07:47 AM

I'm so sorry that you have been having to go through all of this. The price of loving those feline deities is their life span is so much shorter than ours and we are destined to live so much of our lives missing them. I love you and hope that today is at least a break from the sadness and grief.

All my love,

the girl

Dusty was happy and healthy looking when I went there I went to pick him up and take him to the Vet for his diagnosis. . Knowing death will be scheduled when he turns the corner of health is just weighing heavy.

Was Dr. Death so wrong? We can put animals to sleep....what about it .hearinig you song about algae ...and I smile.

Thanks for the love, the daily inspiration above and the poetry below it. I love having dessert with my coffee.

All my love backattcha.

PS.. I saw that Greyson is signed up for the Reunion.

Should you stop in here, just WaVvinnng at you.. Hi Greyson, HEllo anyone that stops in to read. Jump in the water's fine.

One hell of a week....so, Oscar Movie Preview day is today.:choir: The music will be good..

Greyson

03-06-2010, 09:36 AM

Waving "Hiya" to Tommi and Lefty. I don't know why, I am just partial to calling you "Lefty."

LeftWriteFemme

03-06-2010, 12:13 PM

Waving "Hiya" to Tommi and Lefty. I don't know why, I am just partial to calling you "Lefty."

I have to tell you a million years ago when I was creating my screen name it never once occured to me that I was going to spend my life being called "Lefty" ..........lol

Waving HI back at you, Greyson!!!!!!

Tommi

03-07-2010, 02:24 AM

Waving "Hiya" to Tommi and Lefty. I don't know why, I am just partial to calling you "Lefty."

Hey there Greyson , so good to see you... We are setting up some times and places for meetings at the Reunion. More to follow...Any suggestions are welcome.

Friends of meetings!

Cold embers to a Fire Within. That's how many of us felt, caught between conflicting moralities, maladaptive behaviors, and little understanding, support, or hope of finding it. We had to break our personal block to transcendence. Many of us found it in 12 step programs (Friends of Bill). Meetings will be held on Friday____ and Saturday at ____ and on Sunday at _____. All meetings will be in the ___ Room - "Our Place". No meeting is scheduled for Thursday. If you are interested in leading a meeting, speaking, volunteering in some way, send a PM.

LeftWriteFemme

03-07-2010, 08:17 AM

March 7

Migration

Why does an alcoholic leave the drink behind? To go where it’s warm, because drunkenness has become cold comfort, because the climate has changed. The wind resists the flight from the bottle and the initiative to break the flow is rotated among the flock. Though each member of the band plays their part, the one diverting the air just ahead of me and the one just behind trumpeting still hold the majority of my attention. Flocking is my primary purpose because survival is the intention of life, demise the intent of my illness. One more sober day is all I can ask, it’s all I ever need, it’s all that’s ever offered.

Put wheels under procrastination

*

POPCORN FLAVORED LOLLIPOP

I can't know it, I can't believe it,
The world of popcorn flavored lollipops
Is now being visited upon me.

Both a surprise and a comfort,
A popcorn flavored lollipop
Given to me by a gas station attendant.

A blast of sugar and salt wake my tongue.
What can a mind do
In the face of buttered-salted bonbon on a stick?

I wouldn't have thought of it, no in a million years.
This is somehow a source of hope to me,
There are open minded people living in the world around me.

I often pray for creative thinking on the part of my Higher Power
I inadvertently dismiss the populace
Who are producing prodigies of ingenious originality and cunning.

I want the world to be gifted with what sobriety has given me.
Candy is not world peace
But many great things start with a little sweetness

Lady Pamela

03-07-2010, 10:27 PM

LeftWriteFemme

03-08-2010, 05:17 AM

I just wanted to say ty for creating such a great thread! As you already know,you never know who is watching. Or who might need to hear what you have to say.

I am happy to say my daughter just celebrated her first birthday on the 15th. It is nice to get her back...Smile

October 10th will be my 20th birthday since I quit. I am a rocovering addict.

Have a Blessed Day!

Thank you so much and congratulations on your recovery and the recovery of your daughter. What a gift to have our kids safe and sober in a world so filled with drunken traps.
You are right I have no idea who is reading but I am always so glad when what I write helps.

Have a great day,

Sherrie

LeftWriteFemme

03-08-2010, 05:18 AM

March 8

Résistance

Resisting tough love is approaching long run action with short run thinking. I hate to set the toddling babe down lest he fall, but in the end if I do not put him down he and I will both be the worse for it. Whether I see a forest or I see trees depends so very much on my perspective, also on my willingness to delay the prevention of minor scrapes to eliminate the need for permanent scaring. The theme is greater personal responsibility and less irrational fear. Guarding tomorrow’s possibilities by not hamstringing them today through the resistance of tough love saves lives, it saves mine.

Raise the roof on your thinking

*

PICTURES & FRAMES

I paint my way into the corners of the frames.
Each picture I fill diligently,
Color, texture, all the tricks I use.
I work hard to get the desired effect.
I hold nothing back, I put heart and hopes forward.
I load my brush with pigment,
I propel my tongue out of my mouth,
I use it for balance like a kangaroo uses it's tail.
Stroke after stroke I layer the image
My depiction is fresh to me,
I bring the green, the red, the blue,
All of them flow from me.
The canvas fills, my soul soars through the tinctures
Then the disappointment begins,
The complaints, the lamentations,
The perspective is off.
I can't seem to contain this scene
Within the confines of this gilded prison.
I readjust, I tilt my head
I paint from the bottom up, then the top town, No---No.
I must pick up a new canvas and frame.
The oak, burnished and honeyed brown.
I cast to the side the gilt and sculptured casing.
I lay it along the wall with the others.
The many discards of my life
As yet the obvious has escaped me.
The tint, the hue, the angle
Size may diverge but that is all.
I have recreated the same scene
In all the frames,
In all my attempts,
I have painted only one picture.

LeftWriteFemme

03-09-2010, 04:13 AM

March 9

Revelations

And I, Sherrie, had a new freedom and a new happiness for the first freedom and the first happiness were passed away. And there were no more tears. This is how it should be and for the most part this is how it is. Hell’s gates hang broken on their hinges and I walk free. The world is mine to explore and I am happy. More than a notion, my life is a fact; sounder than a bank note and I am on an emotional foot race to keep pace with my recovering self. Could it be lost? Lost like paradise, lost like I was lost before? Why, yes, all could be lost and that is what makes this freedom truly free and this happiness truly happy, they are mine, mine to keep and mine to lose, they may not be in my control but they are within my reach.

Voir dere contempt

*

VOLUNTARY MUTE

I have learned I don't have to answer just because someone asks.
I have learned to change subjects.
I have learned it is better to say nothing.

Repeating the phrase, "It's just my opinion."
Followed with, " I could be wrong."
Has proven insufficient.

Somehow things frequently turn out worse than I expected
But as of yet none have turned out better.
This upsets.

People become angry when I am correct.
They are less angry when I'm silent.
I tell the truth and trouble follows.

I didn't get sober to lie so I keep my mouth shut.
There is no reason to distress folks
And reality has a way of doing that.

Silence is my new defense
I hide in it
And find my new freedom.

Unless it's my sponsor, my sponsee or my cherished friend
Battening down the hatches saves me from a tempest
And spare others their outburst.

Tommi

03-09-2010, 06:29 AM

I just wanted to say ty for creating such a great thread! As you already know,you never know who is watching. Or who might need to hear what you have to say.

I am happy to say my daughter just celebrated her first birthday on the 15th. It is nice to get her back...Smile

October 10th will be my 20th birthday since I quit. I am a rocovering addict.

Have a Blessed Day!

Welcome. Addiction runs deep. I am so glad your daughter found her way out, and with a bonus to meet a Mom who knows the struggle. Congrats on the almost 20.

and , again my thanks to LeftWriteFemme for keeping the light on and her daily inspiration and poetry.

Lady Pamela

03-09-2010, 11:08 PM

Just a small share.

http://i44.photobucket.com/albums/f2/Redwood39/serenity_prayer.jpg

LeftWriteFemme

03-10-2010, 05:18 AM

March 10

Isolation

I isolate from you, I isolate from others, I isolate from friends, isolate from G-d, I practice connecting by connecting with my sponsor, practice connecting with my friends, practice connecting with G-d, finally I am able to connect with you, the first thing I do is isolate us from them, my sponsor, my friends, my G-d, they are all now on the outside of the bubble of us and I must start again, only now I must try to maintain the you and me connection while at the same time connect with the rest. Are we still us if I am connected with them? Are we still us if we are in the midst of the crowd I think of, the crowd I call, them? Just because they see us as us, refer to us as us, are we still us if we don’t feel like us to me? If I don’t know us in the landscape of hordes are we still we? Isolation is an attempt at preservation, how can we best be preserved without being pressed in a book or jarred or jammed? You say let us be, and I say that’s how I got us are you sure that’s how I keep us? And you hug me tight.

Bloom with or without a garden

*

THE WALL OF PLEASANT

How quickly I am protected by a sweet smile
A disarming countenance and gentle phrase
Save my skin and psyche.

No longer do I defend my reputation as a wit or critic
I let it all flow by.
The simpler I appear the more effective the facade.

The energy I conserve not fighting loosing battles
Is well spent in the company of like minded sober friends
In the pursuit of sober lives.

I stay out of the fray and behind this partition
It's insides are posted with announcements proclaiming my opinions
And the lunacy of the person on the other side.

The reading of these notices
Does not persuade me to dismantle the enclosure
But encourages me to keep it sound.

Many year of shelter behind this vine covered fortification
Allow restraint of my words spoken and written
To safeguard my sanity

When I am gifted with comment I am spared the desire for credit
Boundaries are a blessing
And living within them a saving grace.

LeftWriteFemme

03-11-2010, 05:07 AM

March 11

Conception 2

My active voice is the elixir of fire my addiction would have me snuff in order to keep us hidden from each other, me hidden from you, you hidden from me and no one noticing you or I pouring the drinks. Minus my active voice I slip easily into unconsciousness, my effectiveness doused. My active voice is the light in my room the candle in my window, the glow within me, which illuminates my days as well as my nights. Moving ever forward the gyroscopic precision of this voice never fails me if I keep my “listening ears” turned on and tuned in. My active voice is and will always be the live wire connection of my Higher Power uniting with me through people, places and things. My effective conscience is everything that results from this bond. I run at an unfathomable rate of efficiency when my active voice is on, my feet fail to touch the ground as I fly to right action, the nature of my effective conscience is just that, nature, as natural as if I were not carrying a fatal malady, but instead possessed the secret to serenity, which in fact I do: sobriety.

Try not to confuse available with empty

*

SPIRITUALITY

The bedpan of spirituality
Was shoved under my ass
Early in sobriety

It kept me from increasing the mess
With which I surround myself.
The cold smack of enamel got my attention.

The old timers showed me there is a place for my shit
It was not any of the places
I had been using.

My side, your side, all sides were strewn with my waste
Fragments, tatters and fearful reminders
Were all there for me to clean up.

Amends as the shovel
And willingness as its handle
Is what I use to clear my past.

Sweat is refreshing when progress is being made
I've made inroads, paths of travel help me more easily
From the past to the present without regret.

Tommi

03-11-2010, 07:38 AM

GOOOOOOD MORNING Everyone. Sing it with me..

YouTube- Hair - Good Morning Starshine

LeftWriteFemme

03-12-2010, 05:21 AM

March 12

Creed

We have a long standing family tradition of viewing miracles as tragedy; this custom has afforded us many a fine escape from the unknown. Most things in life are bad; people, places, things, this belief is protective though useless. Ultimately I feel this belief is not what colors the dynastic impression of the miraculous, but the apprehension is due to the limited nature of the thing. I come from a line of dissatisfaction; miracles are provided when what is desired is panacea. If everything is not imperially resolved then it is all for naught because the same psyche which cannot begin a process without a guaranteed outcome can’t pickup the slack after a triumphant start. Give it all to me tied with a bow, I will begin the critique from there though I will accept, offer me a beginning fraught with uncertainty and I will decline. A secure entrenchment is preferred to inexact risk. I will die with my boots on, but I mustn’t leave the house.

Respect your age

*

FRIENDS

My sweet, dear, funny friend
Steeped in beat
Whose hand I can no longer hold.

I yearn for the wildly flying words, like feathers in a snow
The shock of hair and glinting eyes I see so clearly
In my shivering mind.
I must let go.
I miss all the friends who for reason or no
Have traveled down the yellow brick spiral to who knows where.
My arms feel open and starved
But there is no way for me to retain myself
And follow them.
Some are lost, altogether
Some are lost only to me
But my arms remain empty nonetheless.
My ruined heart is sore and sad
But chasing this friend or that
Will not heal it.
The lonely path before me is the answer for me.
Possibly only for me among our former group
And will the paths cross later in this day or next?
I don't know and am better not knowing.
My path requires me to release outcomes
As well a kindred.
I must travel with my arms open
Some fall out of them
And others find their way in.

LeftWriteFemme

03-13-2010, 07:22 AM

March 13

Wax On

“Sometimes a dish is just a dish,” I said to my sponsor.
“Yes and sometimes it is the world away, which you hold in your hand,” her reply.
I stand at the sink and try to wash the dishes when I am washing the dishes. I try to drive the car when I drive the car. These simple acts of concentration focus and sooth the jagged mental sutures where I am supposed to be coming together, but ultimately come apart. Anything to break my frenetic gyrations is a blessing, anything to cut away to a closer view and a clearer understanding of where I really am; anything to derail the speeding blur of a life of my creation, is good. What I do and who I am are secrets and mysteries when I don’t know how to pay attention and ironies when I do. And if you doubt me, just go ask Arnold.

Contrast confusion

*

BLUE CROWS

Blue crows streak across my dreaming minds sky
They take up their post in a line of trees
I stand at the edge of a burning field

I feel nauseous at the thought of glorifying an 'active' life.
Everything is burned, scared and crumpled
The flashy crows call from the hedgerow.

I know it's time to fly
The fire is out and I have work to do.
To keep the sparks and dormant embers from ruining another harvest.

I must travel with these strange birds
And live an odd but regimented life
I needn't scorch my feet on this ground again.

Like my companions I must spend sometime in survey
If I do not fully assess this damage
I might not fully embrace this dawn.

LeftWriteFemme

03-14-2010, 05:58 AM

March 14

Patricide

I never killed my father. Why finish a job that someone is completing all on his own. It’s not that I didn’t wish him dead; I did and do for that matter. Don’t misunderstand me, I wish him no harm, it’s just that he is like a creature so tortured that he is nothing but a danger and a misery. Left to live he is a hazard to everyone he has contact with, an agony to live inside. What can I wish for him, but departure and rest, something he can never give to himself. I don’t plot, don’t scheme, I only know; know in part, the terrible lie he lives and hurt he drags from place to place acting like it is not there and nothing matters; let’s just get by. So, if he is not dead he should be. He is the embodiment of the hurtful impotent god and I don’t kill that man but I kill the image, perish that thought.

Provide for the future of your sanity

*

PRETTY FEET

I look at the line on my heel
Where I must stay vigilant with pumice and the moisturizer
My toes clean and straight but nothing more.

I see my feet as passable, it's hard to see them as beautiful,
Well cared for is the best I can do
But there is a beauty in that.

I think of myself,
I am an alcoholic
There is nothing beautiful about alcoholism either.

The care I take in tending my sobriety
The nurturing I see others use in their own lives
There is a certain loveliness to it.

Crusted over hearts
Scraped and oiled
Fit and ready to beat anew.

Polluted minds, drained and reformed
To turn lives upright
Step work and making meetings

Is just a functionary thing
But gorgeous in its own way
Efficacy is a pearl not to be disregarded.

LeftWriteFemme

03-15-2010, 04:09 AM

March 15

Three Card Monty

When I learn to excel at the good games and learn to leave the bad ones alone I think I will be all right. Simple enough to do when I can take off this blindfold and see the long term consequences of my pursuits. Engage this pastime and have no future; abandon that play and squander hope. Eyes open wide, I see what there is to see, but around the corner I am lost for anticipatory sight and must guess at destinations let alone intention. Tricky, tricky, is this life which toys with me. I think I have the bow in hand, though as life rubs me wrong then right, I see I am played upon as much and as often as I play. I take up the reins, but must also be led, I can lay out the deal, but sometimes, I just have to roll the dice.

Speak with your friends

*

ANGLE OF RETURN

As in a hall of mirrors, it is sometimes hard to tell
If I am moving forward in my recovery
Likewise, as promises are fulfilled
Their obtuse arrival is a quandary

The juxtaposition of acute homecoming
Of former faculties is also startling
How the light reflects itself from sober face to sober face
From open heart to open mind, is the spectral of hope to me.

My soul seeks me day after day
Though I left it so far behind
It brings to me the person of God's intent
And my new acquaintance.

Patience, never my virtue, finds me stacked with packages
Delivered in piles so high I can't keep up with opening them
Never in my life have I known less about my future
Or felt more assured.

LeftWriteFemme

03-16-2010, 03:19 AM

March 16

Bad Acting

Because there never seems to be enough love in the world to fill the wound, my wounded self riots. At times the debauchery seems good natured enough, flamboyant yet without harm, at other times the disturbance is apparently violent and the issuing tumult a crime. All for want of wholeness and sanity I pursue shattered fractured activity just to keep from dwelling where I cannot live, where there is no air. I want land beneath my feet and full, full lungs; on my own I find neither of these and little else of use. Isolation even in a crowd is the tell tale sign that I am in the, me, myself and I mode of drowning in a teacup and require rescue. Little more than raising my hand above the surface and asking for help is needed though this is a Herculean effort as we all know. Rowing up stream is a bigger battle then it ever looks and I know the river runs through me.

Turn, turn, turn then rest

*

UNNECESSARY WORDS

I've spent years trying to put names on the streets in my 12 th step map post.
Clear signs with monikers easy to remember, themed and progressive
But I have been wasting my time, the map is there, no doubt.

I have seen people follow it to varying degrees.
The names are unnecessary, like ants, we trail each others scent.
We track so closely as not to loose visual contact, we don't play with our survival.

Or we are bees standing in front of the meeting
Doing the dance, which describes the path to sobriety
With meaningful jokes, and well earned tears.

As I stand at the foot of a few twenty-fours
And see the evolution of my recovery
I realize the names in the placards are ever-changing.

Meaning and value pour through the kaleidoscope of time
And come out as indescribable gifts, Which I can only give through action.
I will no longer fritter away my time looking for tags and titles

Tommi

03-16-2010, 06:20 AM

12 Step Meeting in BFP Chat
Sunday 9 PM EDT
Click here ~ (http://www.butchfemmeplanet.com/forum/showthread.php?p=67066#post67066)

Lady Pamela

03-16-2010, 12:11 PM

A.A. Thought for the Day

Before we decide to quit drinking, most of us have to come up against a blank wall. We see that we're licked, that we have to quit. But we don't know which way to turn for help. There seems to be no door in that blank wall. A.A. opens the door that leads to sobriety. By encouraging us to honestly admit that we're alcoholics and to realize that we can't take even one drink, and by showing us which way to turn for help, A.A. opens the door in that blank wall. Have I gone through that door to sobriety?

Meditation for the Day

I must have a singleness of purpose to do my part in God's work. I must not let material distractions interfere with my job of improving personal relation ships. It is easy to become distracted by material affairs, so that I lose my singleness of purpose. I do not have time to be concerned about the multifarious concerns of the world. I must concentrate and specialize on what I can do best.

Prayer for the Day

I pray that I may not become distracted by material affairs. I pray that I may concentrate on doing what I can do best.

by Hazelden Foundation

Ima Dandy

03-17-2010, 12:40 AM

hello............I've been in different "B/F" rooms for a while now.............now I am stepping into these rooms :hospital-snoopy: ...................... it's not quite that bad, yet I am finally gonna reach out here as well as in real time

thank you all for being here :rrose:

Ima Dandy

03-17-2010, 12:51 AM

OK....yes, it is that bad, or I would not be here, I just ment I haven't been taken to the hospital for drinking

Tommi

03-17-2010, 01:13 AM

OK....yes, it is that bad, or I would not be here, I just ment I haven't been taken to the hospital for drinking

That's good. I hear the food isn't all that great.:rainsing:

Welcome. Keep coming back,

Ima Dandy

03-17-2010, 01:25 AM

That's good. I hear the food isn't all that great.:rainsing:

Welcome. Keep coming back,

LOL...........that's what they tell me....on both accounts :wallbreak:

Tommi

03-17-2010, 01:45 AM

LOL...........that's what they tell me....on both accounts :wallbreak:

Thinking about that, and realized food tasted better with a drink. so maybe the food was awfuj after all. I keep coming back, because I am fuckin' lucky to be alive, and thankful to be able to.:bobby::bobby::police:

LeftWriteFemme

03-17-2010, 03:59 AM

March 17

Suit up, Show up

I stand naked, paralyzed, unable to reach my intended destination or any destination at all. Goose flesh is no real motivation and I am reluctant to use the prod having only produced resistance and reversals with past applications of this weapon. Entreatment might work if only I could find the right one; then again anything might work if it were a fit. Covering my all-together is an action; taken judiciously it sometimes is all the arrival I can manage, taken disingenuously it precludes the chance for any further forward motion and may create set back or retreat. I should not attempt to hide fear with wardrobe though I can try to warm it. Façade building is best done with a bottle in tow
reality is best faced with a sponsor by my side.

Acknowledge pain, acknowledge joy

*

OLD BEARS

Cold and Despondent
Nothing comforts me like the bear of early sobriety

Bought on a day I thought I would shake apart
This fuzzy old guy has been a display item,
For many years now,
Tucked to the corner with the lace edged pillows and folded shawls.

Jittery and Sleepless
It's easy to panic.

I turn and see the amber eyes waiting for my embrace
His body clothed in a hand knit child's sweater made by a friend
The warmth of this snuggle is more than comfort
It is also the acceptance of loss.

Quelling the dramatic highs and lows of the beginning cost many things
And the depth of this is not lost in the moment.

Alone in my bed the passageways to the future appear to me
I must rest and then walk on
I cannot stall or simper, plain work is before me
And simple old bears a consolation.

Tommi

03-17-2010, 04:17 AM

purepisces

03-17-2010, 08:50 AM

Looking at the Sober on The Way to Sane excerpts and the More Sober on The Way to Sane, and the block format and the poetry format.

The 2010 change to post both block and poetry just doubled the work.

Looking at your writing every day for many years now, I realized how exceptional you are. Inspiring others that have your books within reach, and read when the darkness comes and the sun shines in their windows.

Thank you for your servicem, and for keeping the light on every day.

I'll second that!

I can't tell you how much Sherrie's words mean to me ... some days they cut, some days they comfort, but always they make me think. And, somehow, it always seems to be exactly what I need at just the right moment! I don't know how you do it ... but I'm so glad that you do. :flowers:

Thank you Sherrie, and thank you Tommi ... you are both an inspiration to me.

p.s. Last week (3/11/10) was my two-year anniversay, but I wasn't posting much because I was very busy cuddling my Dakota :schnauzer: after her surgery. It's easy for me to remember the date I quit drinking, since it was on my actual birthday ... and it's the best gift that I could give myself.

Tommi

03-17-2010, 06:33 PM

I'll second that!

I can't tell you how much Sherrie's words mean to me ... some days they cut, some days they comfort, but always they make me think. And, somehow, it always seems to be exactly what I need at just the right moment! I don't know how you do it ... but I'm so glad that you do. :flowers:

Thank you Sherrie, and thank you Tommi ... you are both an inspiration to me.

p.s. Last week (3/11/10) was my two-year anniversay, but I wasn't posting much because I was very busy cuddling my Dakota :schnauzer: after her surgery. It's easy for me to remember the date I quit drinking, since it was on my actual birthday ... and it's the best gift that I could give myself.

The gift that keeps on Giving, because, you are miraculously still living.

CONGRATS ON Belly Birthday and 2 yr Anniversary.

I know what you mean about her writing about where you are or need to be that day. I read her posts for almost 2 years..then she said Hello, and I said Well Hello There, and well, it's been a miracle too

Hope Dakota is better tooooo.

Lady Pamela

03-17-2010, 10:49 PM

JUST FOR TODAY

I'll take my inventory just for today
just for today...
I'll stay sober and clean
just for today...
my disease won't run my life

I'll go to a meeting just for today
just for today...
honesty and trust will guide me
just for today...
I'll share my experience, strength, and hope

Quickly, I'll make amends just for today
just for today...
I'll leave nothing undone
just for today...
I'll admit to being powerless

12 steps will guide me just for today
just for today...
I'll listen more than I speak
just for today...
I'll be willing to learn

My Higher Power will guide me just for today
just for today...
I'll pray and meditate
just for today...
I'll be gracious for my gift

Tonight I'll go to bed sober just for today
just for today...
I'll remember I still have a choice
just for today...
yesterday will be in the past

I won't worry about tomorrow just for today
just for today...
I'll see the world with a child’s eyes
just for today...
I'll live... for today

And when tomorrow comes
I'll realize... that just for today
I'll once again have a clean slate
just for today...

©2007DaveHarm

LeftWriteFemme

03-18-2010, 04:08 AM

March 18

Malaria

Flailing, reaching, screaming; hiding, avoiding, misdirecting, theses are subsets in a list of extremes whose commonality is lacking, lacking humility. I fall to pieces just thinking of standing exposed, imperfect and unprotected. I’m not sure what I think will happen to me in this posture; instantaneous death? Couldn’t be, I’m not that lucky, nor am I foolish enough to think that I am that lucky. Possibly, I fear rancorous humiliation, but really who is powerful enough to do that to me? I know and like myself well enough to deflect obvious flying nonsense, so what is it that I do flee? I think it is the endless grinding inelegance of life, the stinging nettled nature of things, my inability to weave my way around my weakness and slip into the open unpoisoned. I fear exchanging peace for failure. Humility is when I know I cannot fail.

Be conscience of judgment and try not to react to it

*

WET BLANKET

I have carried this sodden thing with me all my life.
It's weight a burden for numerous years,
I have never been able to explain my continuing drag of this pitiful thing
Though it has been commended on by many.

My fidelity is boundless
In spite of inner questions and doubts.
Now that the fire is here I am glad to have it.
I pull it over me and step into the fray.

Thick and moist, I somehow struggle under its influence
And am able to do what others, bare of my encumbrance, cannot
I don't believe I can quench all the flames but I hope to help some to safety
And bat down the encroaching inferno a bit.

Tommi

03-18-2010, 06:50 AM

---- Possibly, I fear rancorous humiliation, but really who is powerful enough to do that to me? I know and like myself well enough to deflect obvious flying nonsense, so what is it that I do flee? ..... Humility is when I know I cannot fail.

Be conscience of judgment and try not to react to it

The excerpt from above will be my mantra today. Hope everyone had a Happy Humpday.

About to embark on another lovely day of employment. Can anyone tell me what a pipe dream is?

Does buying a liottery ticke expecting to win fit in a pipe, or a dream?

LeftWriteFemme

03-18-2010, 04:43 PM

The excerpt from above will be my mantra today. Hope everyone had a Happy Humpday.

About to embark on another lovely day of employment. Can anyone tell me what a pipe dream is?

Does buying a liottery ticket expecting to win fit in a pipe, or a dream?

A pipe dream is a fantastic hope or plan that is generally regarded as being nearly impossible to achieve.

smooch!

Lady Pamela

03-18-2010, 10:33 PM

I wanted to share something that touched me today that I read.

Today I humbly ask my Higher Power for the grace to find the space between my impulse and my action; to let flow a cooling breeze when I would respond with heat; to interrupt fierceness with gentle peace; to accept the moment which allows judgment to become discernment; to defer to silence when my tongue would rush to attack or defend.

I promise to watch for every opportunity to turn toward my Higher Power for guidance. I know where this power is: it resides within me, as clear as a mountain brook, hidden in the hills -- it is the unsuspected Inner Resource.I thank my Higher Power for this world of light and truth I see when I allow it to direct my vision. I trust it today and hope it trusts me to make all effort to find the right thought or action today.
Written by: Anthony R.

http://passitongreeting.com/images/card149.gif

LeftWriteFemme

03-19-2010, 04:21 AM

March 19

If I name it do I know it?

Does emotional proximity necessitate a nearer name? Far off I would be called earthling possibly human. On this plain, female maybe woman; in this country Mrs. Theriault; in my home call me Sherrie, but in my bed hy calls me Baby. Do these names offer the requisite information, no further inquires required, is it personal enough? Is the limited nature a stunted interest from without or a privacy fence from within? Does the boundary shift dependant upon the participants or is it an almost universal standard of metered advance and reveal? And do I get more when I give more or does that end in less info and a change of direction? Also who determines what I really need to know? Wanting curiosity; my hungry mind and lonely heart do not direct all the world, yet ceaselessly they strive, shutter and ask again: Who are you?

Step toward yourself

*

JAG

I have the most interesting lawn ornament.
It is long and sleek, low to the ground,
Resting on rubber rolls,
Steep of side and languid front and back

It has glass, glass which slants
And glass which slops into its sides.
It's paint shines when I buff it
And shows dust when I don't.

Inside there are seats and many artistic accessories
I sit on the steps and admire the thing
Then I sit in the thing and admire the porch
That's all there was until I was handed the key.

LeftWriteFemme

03-20-2010, 05:05 AM

March 20

Bent, Spindled, Mutilated

Injury changes memory, not just the memory of the individual trauma, but the very nature of the mind. The hooks and loops distort and I can’t hold on as I once did. The misses and disconnects become more frequent, then they become expected. Emotional fluff-ups do not suffice, the hardware is damaged and a positive attitude is advisable but the pliers are a necessity. Some things are easier to break than to repair, in fact most things are easier to break, no skill required, though some take it on as skill, most destruction is ignorant or accidental, nothing personal just a part of a pain filled landscape. Direct intervention is not the same as hands-free degradation, though both have their cost. Redemption, restoration, is sought from all comers. Possibilities and probabilities stack; action is a relief, whether or not it is a fix. I take a breath to face the final blow, for when the cost adds up and I look for recompense all I hear is the check is in the mail.

Line the bin so the ick won’t stick

*

20 CART PILEUP

What's the problem here?
Asks my sponsor, as she approaches my apparent impasse.
Well, I've been trying to get these carts lined up
What do you think of my progress?
How many carts do you have here?
A few, quite a few, why?
And how many horses? She asks
Just the one, the same as everyone else, I answer.
And where is this poor animal?
Back here.
Behind the carts
OK, we have a twofold problem here.
First, one horse can handle only one cart.
So pick ONE
Second, that sad creature needs to be in the proper position
To do any good at all.
You had best figure out a way to get him in front
Or you will remain stuck
Even after you whittle down your burden.
I was stunned
She went to her cart
Climbed to the seat
And took the reins
How long did it take you to get yours like that? I ask
Honey it takes every day.
Don't kid yourself
I wake up every morning with the same train wreck
Your standing in now.
Learn to sort faster
And you'll have the rest of today
You can start over
With us tomorrow.

LeftWriteFemme

03-20-2010, 06:17 AM

Just a quick reminder:

Our first AA, NA, Al-Anon chat meeting will be taking place in the Friends of Bill, Lois and Jimmy chat room on Sunday night at 9 pm eastern time and 6 pm westcoast time. I hope you can join us there and please don't for get your Options because the room is password protected. I look forward to seeing everyone there!

Tommi

03-20-2010, 08:40 AM

I'll be there with boots on >>> Western BFP

:fastdraq:

LeftWriteFemme

03-21-2010, 06:48 AM

March 21

When is enough, enough?

“What is the difference between full and all? Don’t know? Well, let me tell you,” said my sponsor with a wink. “Full is when the broccoli that went perfectly with the entrée leaves a pleasant smile on your face, full is when the arrow on the gas gauge points to F, these are little indicators of full. Indications that you have reached all: the wet scary feeling in your mouth after your second piece of pie, all is the gas pouring down the side of your car because you have to try to squeeze more in.”
“Yes, yes,” I reply, “I know when I’ve overdone it; I resent everyone or at least I am cranky about everything. I know when I’m under doing it, too; I get either a lost feeling or the sense that I should be in charge, but how do I really know that I am doing enough?”
“If your sponsor has a good idea of where you are mentally, physically and spiritually; if the people in your home group can count on you to contribute service regularly. If most people in most meetings know not just your face, but also your name. If your sponsees freely admit that you are their sponsor, those are sure signs. Though the biggest signal for me is how constant my contact is. If I’m reluctant to pray I’m usually not doing enough of something.”

Learn from pain

*

MATH

If this is the solution why aren't I happy?
I ask my sponsor in a piteous whine.
You've run the equation and the solution equals happiness?
She queries, that's the whole and total answer?
How many times did you go through the computations?

What's your point?
Are you saying happiness isn't the answer?
What about joy and freedom?
I heard someone say that was the goal
I know that's what I heard.

Let's think about it for a hot second
What would you think
If I worked the steps as hard as I do
And as a result walked around in a perpetual grin?
I'd think you had lost your mind.

So you're telling me you believe
The product of recovery is idiocy?
The thing we all are aspiring to is bliss and nothing but?
No, I guess not.
Then what is the solution for you? I ask.

A tally which fits the day I'm having
Joy sometimes fits that bill
But other days it's sadness or concern
There have been days when disbelief
And dismay were part of the appropriate response.

For me, the solution is having an equation
That helps me respond to life
Instead of reacting to it.
That's better than unending happiness
That's wholeness she said with a grin

LeftWriteFemme

03-22-2010, 04:10 AM

March 22

Clever Me

I am clever, I am so clever, everyone knows it and I know it, too. So, why do I get slam stuck on the very simple things required to keep my life running smoothly? I know what needs to be done, yet have no clue as to how to accomplish these threads of minutia. I stall; panic, plod, pout. When I do force myself to do it I end up creating either a new pile of impossible incidentals or some anticlimactic end, but secret solutions are as of yet undiscovered. The whip, the lash and the club avail nothing though sweet enticements do no better. I pray, “Dear G-d please help me!” but this has no point, I don’t want the help, I am afraid of the help, I am afraid of the change and of course who wouldn’t be? Beyond here lay someone I don’t know, someone I only fear, beyond here lay the fearless me and I am clever enough to be afraid of her.

Fill the potholes in your thinking

*

THE PROCESS

The mountains don't wash away like sandcastles
The amount of persistence required is far greater.
Acorns don't work like sunflowers
Not everything is instant gratification.

Marathons aren't run in seconds
If you don't love the whole adventure, pick a smaller goal
There is no shame in sunflowers or sandcastles or microwave popcorn
As long as you want it and hold it in esteem

Time-consuming, life-consuming journeys
Have a high price in boredom
And are not worth the consumption
If that is not where your heart leads you

You don't have to love washing the pans
To be a good baker
But it helps
Peace is in the process.

Tommi

03-22-2010, 08:38 AM

March 22

Clever Me

I am clever, I am so clever, everyone knows it and I know it, too. So, why do I get slam stuck on the very simple things required to keep my life running smoothly? I know what needs to be done, yet have no clue as to how to accomplish these threads of minutia. I stall; panic, plod, pout. When I do force myself to do it I end up creating either a new pile of impossible incidentals or some anticlimactic end, but secret solutions are as of yet undiscovered. The whip, the lash and the club avail nothing though sweet enticements do no better. I pray, “Dear G-d please help me!” but this has no point, I don’t want the help, I am afraid of the help, I am afraid of the change and of course who wouldn’t be? Beyond here lay someone I don’t know, someone I only fear, beyond here lay the fearless me and I am clever enough to be afraid of her.

Fill the potholes in your thinking

This is one of my favorites from your book, "Sober on the Way to Sane".
it is one of those bent pages in the book on my coffee table. It amazes me when I pick it up and there are clever insightful words , put together just right for what I need, that are just the light in the tunnel...Oh now it WAS a train.

PS>>Glad to have gotten together with friends last night, Options are a good thing.:hangloose:

LeftWriteFemme

03-23-2010, 03:28 AM

March 23

Suddenly

Creeping realization has never been my experience with G-d’s handy work in my kitchen. I start out making a mess and I find in short order that G-d has made a meal; fit food for apt hunger. I could throw myself into the kneading and shaping, but without the yeast which is so freely given I have no bread; only a lump that will choke me in the end. Even my very own abilities are gifts I was incapable of offering to myself and are only found here in my possession through sheer grace. I have woken up with my face saliva glued to the table top far too often only to discover my Higher Power doing and I am grateful for without that action I would be un-done.

Learn to live with the shadow of the moon

*

HOW RED IS RED

I check my color and contrast
I paint the setting sun
Add a bit of yellow
And fill to the edge burgeoning poppies

Add more blue and paint the blood
Which pools around my mind
The equalizer of all my mental conversations

Too much is never enough, as the story goes
I pursue my shades and signatures
Too much for the fingers and not enough for the toes
I disregard fraudulent crimson

I scale the mountains of intention looking for perfection
The leach of my addiction drains the other colors from my rainbow
My sponsor asks only one question
"How red is red?"

LeftWriteFemme

03-24-2010, 08:22 AM

March 24

Water Buddha

The longer on the river I am the less I fear the river. I still don’t know what lay ahead, anything may wait for me just around the next bend, but I fear this less and less. Experience is a great foundation no matter what you are building or in which direction. I’ve gotten my sea-legs, a sure sign of the mind cooperating with the realities the body is experiencing. I have learned to avoid some forms of trouble and anticipate fortune more often. Further on could be waterfall, ocean, dam; I will contend with any or all, come what may, for when it comes to riding the river I have learned the most important thing: I don’t need to push.

Be left, be right, be yourself

*

THE ORDER

I can't expect delivery if I haven't placed the order
I never seem to know what I want
Until after I have accepted something else.

I can remember thinking order meant procedure not procurement
Set the table, not end my hunger
I focused on rational intent and turned my face from desire

Assailing outcomes leads to disappointments
Asking for a hole to be filled may cause dumping
Not management or conservation

It's good to have a plan before signing the requisition
Please help me know who I am
So I know what I want

I can make a request and stop accepting orders of attack
Don't let me order the end
While I am still at the beginning

LeftWriteFemme

03-25-2010, 04:25 AM

March 25

Two X’s

I play sport at the three X folks and their still sometimes skewed thinking. Yet, I attack myself for feeling like a babe in the woods. Old and wise should be my stock and trade by now though I find vastness at my door regularly and confidence struggles to peek in the window. What in the world will I do if I can’t perfect this stuff soon? Hopefully nothing as foolish as fretting or anything as mean spirited as accusation, possibly I could try reception. Truly this only comes in gift wrap and after twenty years I would hope I had learned to live in the present.

Think kindly of chickens if not of cowards

*

THE ORPHANAGE OF MY HEART

The orphanage of my heart hold many children of the past
They gaze at me
Fixed in an attempt to draw me near their needs

I scurry, often my head down, eyes averted
Not knowing how to offer comfort or consideration
To these hapless souls.

Fearing the largess of poverty
I decline to open my small purse
What could I tender
Other than a tease?

Nearly barren, in my heartbroken, disconsolate, inconsolable state,
I rarely even obligate myself to extending my hand
This is the pit of my idiocy

These wee ones have the world of hope and strength to give
I am their offertory
I am the place where their gold resides
They live inside me to fill me and bind me to life and light

I flee them in the height of misunderstanding
Disconnected from these inner spirits I am impoverished
And far too weak to grasp their help

I too fogged to see the world within
Starve in the world without

LeftWriteFemme

03-26-2010, 04:16 AM

March 26

Whirly Gigs

Pivot points and reference points subtlety disguised as harmless bric-a-brac escape my comprehension until I either stumble or land on one or the other and ponder the affect. Realization that much of my life’s contentment hinges like a door shocks me, though I don’t know why it should. Isn’t it the way of things that it all turns on a whim or at the very least hangs on fine gauged calculation? I am not the capricious vixen I accuse myself of; I am however human and given to a certain amount of fickle fussy frenzy which all reckons out given enough perspective and wit.

Resuscitate inspiration

*

CALIBRATE COINCIDENCE

Do good
Do right
Line up with the next movement

Get the universe into the sprockets of my desires
And make the miracles flow in my direction
Ah, The boy scout merit badge of sobriety

I force spiritual alchemy through the pasta maker
Of my small life
Expecting gold

And where is God?
Where is the realness of reality?
Where is my place in this hairy mess?

Well, who knows
Am I the Wizard, the Chemist?
The mechanic of the galaxy?

Though I wish and hope
In truth I am not the one who calibrates coincidence
I am the receiver of.

LeftWriteFemme

03-27-2010, 07:24 AM

March 27

New Borne

What happens when you finally get what you want, what you barely dared to dream? What happens when you can hardly do more than drip tears down from smiling eyes? Where do you go with a future filled with proposed joy? Heaven is an option if only you believed, but hell has been such a perennial destination it’s hard to realize there will be no return trip this year or possibly ever again. The work required to change from an attitude of longing to one of satisfaction is as real as all the work needed thus far. Tending love is a host of disciplines I want to step to, like I have done it all my life, like I was born to do it and I was, yet still growth is accompanied by its own pain and awkwardness and who am I to deny this treat. Any new life worth living is worth the pain to bear it.

Turn up your smile

*

FEELINGS

Getting my feelings back
Was like a package delivered.
Not a letter bomb
More like live squid or bait of some kind
It was something to catch me out there.

I think overcoming the shock
Was more or less the small part
Though it seemed to loom at the time.
The squirming, the writhing of my soul
Was like a pregnancy following a bad dream.

I wondered how this became a part of me.
I squandered my days
Hoping it would leave quietly some night soon.
Like all difficult relationships
I attempted to hold my breath through it.

Failing this, I tried to offer my feelings a guest wing in my heart
And a never ending supply of tea and cookies.
When the reality of life with feelings planted itself firmly in me
I let out my breath, stopped the hostess act
And endeavored to roll with it.

This worked well.
I have since invested in a wet-suit and fins
The squid are much easier to live with
When I meet them on their turf.

LeftWriteFemme

03-28-2010, 06:22 AM

March 28

Feelings/Facts

Delay is when I don’t deal with the tack, don’t deal with the finish nail, land up with a 12 penny in my heel and think about waiting for the railroad spike. Rebellion is when I run through the razor-wire fence expecting to make a clean get away. If I don’t socialize my problems when they are puppies all hope is lost when faced with the big dogs. Exiting out the fifth story window is suicide in fact, but in my thinking I am merely rebelling. Willingness and cooperation make a dynamic duo; powerful combatants of delay, rebellion, many other joy killing, life stealing foe. A life led with cooperation and willingness is not necessarily perfection, but it often feels that way.

Coax loose your tangled frustrations

*

FUTURE TENTS

The future seeps in through the windows
Like the dawn steeling across the sky
Once I inhale it, I am out of doors
Only the lightest of canvas covering me

The opening, flaps in the breeze
The wind of unbidden things echoes
Off the wall of people
Shut out from this adventure

I brace myself for the cutting current
But am greeted by the softest of zephyrs
I duck out
I stand unfettered

Lonely whispers call
But I am isolated
The scene is empty, serene and beautiful
There are other tents

Other seekers standing on other hills
But they see their own futures
From the vantage of their own tents
And thankfully I am left to see mine

LeftWriteFemme

03-29-2010, 04:19 AM

March 29

Yes, Virginia there is a solution

Suspended in the colloid of sobriety the overly large molecule, which is me, finds a fix I couldn’t imagine. I can get better, I do get better, I have a set of values to substitute into the old equations. I now live in a mixture where there is one thing in common and all the rest are variants which ordinarily don’t mix. The scientific method is entry to homogenous living; a concept that never made it to the table in my days as a rogue element. And with all this on board, the thing I love the best is that it grows; what I can do and how I can do it is an ever widening frame of reference, even things which were once outside of my view are now possible. I am grateful that there is a solution; I am amazed that it is the solution to everything.

Rethink awkward restriction

*

CRAZY

I try on crazy
The way I sometimes get out the jump rope
And see if all those muscles still work.

The unemployed, unexploited
Fallow nature of my once fertile insanity
Saddens me in an odd way

Today is a place
I stand in stiff comfort
Even though it has taken concerted effort to get here

There are days I slip from reality
The way I can slip off a chair
I no longer allow myself to lounge on the floor

Pride is not so much the issue as hygiene
Crazy is bad for my health
I gave it up like cigarettes or romance novels

I don't have enough time
Or insurance for these dalliances
Though I do remember them all with fondness

Tommi

03-29-2010, 11:03 PM

Coax loose your tangled frustrations

I worked almost 14 hours and I AM tangled and frustrated. I need that chocolate, cool whip with banana dessert thingeeeeee....:dance2:

LeftWriteFemme

03-30-2010, 03:10 AM

March 30

Catalog of Growth

The right seed in the right season grows a garden of miracles for me. I get the food for my table or the stores for winter, sometimes when I’m in a Jack like predicament, right planted seeds can provide a bean stalk of escape from my restricted life. I have a role to play with these wonders. I must sort the seeds from the pebbles. I must let the kernels out of my pocket and into the ground. I water when I can and harvest what comes to fruition. Though the best by far is the part when I get to share the seeds.

Putter in your emotional garden

*

RAIN

The rain makes shadows of water
It spills onto the ground like tiny worlds
What had been airborne and mist
Is now earthbound and integral
Feeding, cutting, learning the world

Once I contemplated theories and mystery
Now washing dishes is a spiritual service
The view was lovely when I was above it all
But now I course through the veins of life

There may come a time when I am untouchable again
But by then I will have been a part of it all
I will carry the world with me always
An orbiting servant
Not just above but through

LeftWriteFemme

03-31-2010, 04:44 AM

March 31

Face and Ass

“It is hard to save your face and save your ass at the same time.”

What I haven’t tried in an attempt to live my life as a showman spotlight front and center. What I wouldn’t sacrifice to keep peace and image intact, but in the end it was just that, my end, that saved me from a life chasing prevention of defacement. I can’t live with the posture of an ostrich it leaves so much at risk. Hiding my face won’t protect it no matter how much I wish it would. I have to put my butt in a seat, a seat up front where folks get to know my face. I have to try my best yet still make mistakes and let people know my ass as well. Being a part of AA saves my behind, once that is cosseted my face might just get its day in the sun.

Don’t invite ridicule, but deal with it if it comes knocking at your door

*

PADUANS

The pussy willows bloom
Looking much like crested poultry
The coldest part of my heart
Is fighting to thaw in this early spring

Weather is not of the mind to be rushed
My hopes nor the changing calendar
Can persuade the warmth into the May morning
It's May for me too

No longer the early sobriety of January
The years have marched on
I wait for the delivery of my returning brains
Long-term sobriety has begun

I am still beset with the chill of fragility
I desire dignity but find myself strutting
Like a fowl with blooming plumage
Addled and gawky

Don't worry says my sponsor
The pussy willow is in no way less
For showing itself
In the rawness of growth

LeftWriteFemme

04-01-2010, 04:24 AM

April 1

Why is it so hard to be me?

I have everything I could wish for. I have love and friendship, I have talent and ability. What more could I want? I don’t want more, I want to learn how to overcome fear and live with disappointment. Abundance is ever at the door, but I have no room for plenty. Reassurance is the thing I chase after, yearn for, pine about, but it is an illusive thing like taking hold of smoke. Allusion is the gift-wrap of reality the unwrapping often puts me off the contents; regaining my composure and reestablishing willingness is a difficult job requiring dedication and fortitude. The barrier before the carefree me is thought the strongest of all substance. I must heal the calcifications of my mind and resist rigidity. My thinking is what makes being me problematic without it I am nothing at all.

Free fun from the shackles of expectation

*

ACCEPTANCE, ACTION, CHANGE

Acceptance equals action
Without action, acceptance is a death sentence
Action puts me in the hands of my Higher power
Inaction puts me at the mercy of others or worse self-justification
For acceptance to glow with life it must be moving

Action equals change
Action without change is repetition
The moon does not change
It orbits flat on it's face, forever dark on one side
And a mere reflection on the other

Change equals acceptance
Change sparks possibilities in mundane endeavor
Change without acceptance is a walk off a cliff
For change to endure, agreement is necessary
A one-sided argument is fascism and fraudulence

The heart of change is acceptance
Beating the blood of hope to the extremities
Whether we circle the heavens
Or the bowl depends on the cohesion of
Acceptance, Action and Change

Tommi

04-01-2010, 01:59 PM

ACCEPTANCE, ACTION, CHANGE

Acceptance equals action
Without action, acceptance is a death sentence
Action puts me in the hands of my Higher power
Inaction puts me at the mercy of others or worse self-justification
For acceptance to glow with life it must be moving

Action equals change
Action without change is repetition
The moon does not change
It orbits flat on it's face, forever dark on one side
And a mere reflection on the other

Change equals acceptance
Change sparks possibilities in mundane endeavor
Change without acceptance is a walk off a cliff
For change to endure, agreement is necessary
A one-sided argument is fascism and fraudulence

The heart of change is acceptance
Beating the blood of hope to the extremities
Whether we circle the heavens
Or the bowl depends on the cohesion of
Acceptance, Action and Change

I really like this poem and this resonates for me
...." Beating the blood of hope to the extremities
Whether we circle the heavens
Or the bowl depends on the cohesion of
Acceptance, Action and Change..."

Although I read your inspiration and then the poem you post every day, I seldom add in a comment, as the flow seems so natural:rrose:.

Thank you for putting such feeling and re- organization to words I see and use all the time, in a way that shouts it out with feeling and strength.

My best regards.

OP.:mountie:

LeftWriteFemme

04-02-2010, 06:06 AM

April 2

Clock and Calendar Girl

I depend on the count and measure of time to get me through. The swing of the pendulum carries me from moment to moment and the divisions between days are like the rungs on a ladder; I climb from month to month and age to age. When I hold my breath I count the tic, tic, tic till the difficult time passes and I can inhale once more. Harder things require X’s in their numbered boxes to help me transverse the larger distance and rockier terrain. Take away my clock and I go deaf, remove my calendar and I go blind. Tools are tools even if they only aid sight and sound.

Address your future

*

THE SCULPTOR

Stuck in a block, my sponsor chips away at me
I struggle to hold still
With surgical precision she cuts through the debris
With which I have surrounded myself

After my sponsor frees my hand and arm
She places a hammer in my open fingers
When the other arm and hand are rescued
She places a chisel in that hand

This is how before my head showed above the surface
I began to help in my own restoration
I am the sculptor
The program has made me

Recovery has taught me
I can be anything
If I keep chipping away
At the things which hold me hostage

As time travels on I am a new shape
With each turn through the steps
And have an ever lustrous finish
With every application of the traditions

LeftWriteFemme

04-03-2010, 07:03 AM

April 3

Unfettered

“The difference between a demand and a request is apparent to everyone.” A drunk once said this and I hold it to my heart. I can not be bullied or swindled into a corner; neither will I allow you to put a rope around my neck like a wayward calf. I obey because it works for me and if you teach me that you are untrustworthy or careless I will obey you no longer, this doesn’t make me less obedient it just takes you out of the lead. Sometimes I hold the reins and most times they are in the hands of G-d, but never shall my reins be in the hands of another, this is what I drank over and this is what I could drink over again. No one person is my salvation and I cannot allow anyone to be my demise. If you consume me like a drink, I will kill you as surely as any drug.

Hobble disrespect

*

STOP TALKING

Try to stop talking when people stop listening said my sponsor
And try not to take it personally
Why is that? I query

Most individuals can't handle much of anything real
Try as they may they are unable to listen
To anyone speaking the truth

Tell them a story and you can hold their attention all day
Sprinkle bits of honesty into the tale
And you still will keep your audience

But strafe them with bullets of the truth and they run for cover
I've seen it happen, I never knew what made them scurry
But I have seen them sprint away

It's a coping mechanism
If you try to turn their heart too quickly
They're afraid it will stop beating

Why is it you never worry about that with me?
You tell me the facts whether I want to hear them or not
I can tell you because you take step three

PearlsNLace

04-03-2010, 10:16 AM

Today I re learned that I have a hotel in my head for my resentments. Some resentments come and go- they check in for an hour or 2 for some nasty business and leave the dirty laundry for me to clean up.

Some, Ive kept like cherished guests and have redecorated their rooms with mongrammed towels and fluffly bathrobes.

These resentments find their way to my hotel through expectations and assumptions.

My check out key is a broom of acceptance of life on lifes terms. And the vaccume is service.

My occupancy has gotten a little full while I wasnt paying attention- and I couldnt figure out why Im snarky and panicky when things are going really quite well. Its check out time, Inventory list is in progress. Sponsor has been notified. It would appear I DONT need a couple of beers after work to be normal, no matter what the full hotel is telling me. Its not that Im overwhelmed, my hotel is overbooked.

Check out time in NOW.

LeftWriteFemme

04-04-2010, 08:00 AM

April 4

Give Me a Goose Any Day

The geese breaking wind resistance, the close ones, the far ones, the ones behind trumpeting, this is the gang who gets me sober and keeps me that way. Maybe you think that G-d is not a flock of geese, but it has been my experience and the honking and the mess are part of it all. I spend my days making sure I am one of them. Sometimes I am even in the lead, which may seem like a place of honor and prestige, but is actually a lot of hard work. Sometime I am the cheering squawker who makes my encouragement heard. Other times I am the one waddling around leaving an untidiness behind me. All of this just makes me part of the flock. I am especially fond of my nest mates though they are often the ones I chase and bluster at the most. I feel a sense of identity and pride when I see any goose flying high and know that because we don’t do it alone we are able to do it together.

Pet inspiration

*

FINE PRINT

I can scrawl the wall with everything I know
I can fill my books chapter and verse
With pure and honest hope
But let me begin the precision of language and watch.

My once open face becomes tight
My associations peek regularly around each corner
Neatly painted lines are a trap with teeth laid bare

Serrations of careful craft sever my umbilical
And God floats off untethered
Truth returns when I am shouting my prayers
Scrupulous observance never advances my sails

I must meet life with an open hand
The devil may not be in the details
But be sure to check the fine print.

Tommi

04-04-2010, 10:34 PM

Today I re learned that I have a hotel in my head for my resentments. Some resentments come and go- they check in for an hour or 2 for some nasty business and leave the dirty laundry for me to clean up.

Some, Ive kept like cherished guests and have redecorated their rooms with mongrammed towels and fluffly bathrobes.

These resentments find their way to my hotel through expectations and assumptions.

My check out key is a broom of acceptance of life on lifes terms. And the vaccume is service.

My occupancy has gotten a little full while I wasn't paying attention- and I couldn't figure out why Im snarky and panicky when things are going really quite well. Its check out time, Inventory list is in progress. Sponsor has been notified. It would appear I DONT need a couple of beers after work to be normal, no matter what the full hotel is telling me. Its not that Im overwhelmed, my hotel is overbooked.

Check out time in NOW.

I have seen that vacancy sign flashing in my neighborhood. Nice post./ thanks

LeftWriteFemme

04-05-2010, 03:05 AM

April 5

Please Sir

Gratitude is a thing which collects and solidifies, it’s pink and I can walk around on it. Some days it is a broad highway and other times a winding spindling track. Ever present if I am mindful gratitude roots out pests and pestilence while planting a garden beyond my dreams. Gratitude is like handholding it warms and strengthens me, keeps me connected to real life and reassures me that I am not alone. Many days I find a way to make a face and pout, plundering the rich rewards of sobriety for the thin gruel of discontent, poke me with a stick on these days and remind me who I am, for I am never Oliver even if I feel a little twist.

Rest between great ideas

*

FEELING TEMPLES

I failed to appreciate the initial onslaught of feelings
I spent much time trying to capture them
Lock them away or in some other way submarine them

This only had the effect of retarding my recovery
I had to reframe my thinking
I had to start with simple calisthenics, embrace and celebrate

As my emotional health began to take shape
I started the foundations for tiny shrines
Each with its own theme

Happiness had a party going on until all hours
With grief there seemed to be a constant internment in progress
Body or no

Fear showed on IMAX film
Of the realities of life on earth
Curiosity had an endless library plus a DSL line

Making myself a willing and frequent visitor
To these contrasting places
Created in me wholeness and peace

Never again do I have to trudge
The two dimensional desert
Of my monochromatic former life

Tommi

04-05-2010, 07:31 AM

The earth shakes and reminds me what powerless is all about.

It also reminded me as i treid to naviagate across the living room, what being drunk was like.

LeftWriteFemme

04-06-2010, 04:11 AM

April 6

Fearing Fearlessness

How many times have I given the credit to night blind fear, credit due the brave persistent child? How many times have I blamed the willing diligent pursuer when the fault was the backstabbing delay of mistrust? I resist the onset of freedom. Fear was my oldest familiar and I put from my mind that it was my jailer, captor; kidnapped me from my cradle and kept me locked from G-d’s fine intentions. Fearlessness sounds debilitating to my crippled ears, organs who hear well the disclaimers and are deaf to the claims. I am the producer of bile and addicted to dread, endorphins wear white hats and win the day once this yellow belly is put to bed.

Allow yourself distance from uncomfortable people

*

BIRDS AND BEES

Birds and Bees can get me drunk
I have to watch the amount of envy
Which pours through me as I watch their bliss

When others make a beeline to the hive
I must head to a meeting and save myself despair
If my spiritual condition is not sound

When other couples are weaving their nests
I have to be careful
Not to weave my way back to the bar

The mating dance is so sweet and seductive
I have to make sure
I don't end up doing the two step

For as much as I hate to admit it
If steps one and twelve where enough to keep me sober
The rest would not have needed to be written

LeftWriteFemme

04-07-2010, 04:27 AM

April 7

Two Things That Should Be One

The difference between my will and G-d’s will is that G-d actually likes me all the time, never looks to punish and would rather that I don’t settle for less then what is best for me.

The difference between G-d’s will and my will is left to my own devices I would run in a perpetual circle and dig a trough. I would never ask for help and would refuse if it were offered. I would take on misguidedness as a mantle and wear it to my wake.

Often my will and G-d’s will are miles apart, but they needn’t be. G-d is the president of my fan club; I just need to start attending the meetings.

Make music in your head that you can feel in your whole body

*

WHIP

I have been to the meeting where the play 'whip'
The meeting where the members are gotten in line
The tempo increases constantly in an attempt
To flick each other off into the land of shame and slips and less-than

This game is invisible to the participants
Though the stress on their bodies is surely felt
Spectators often misunderstand the meaning of the activity
And wrongly interpret it as strength training and endurance building

I think of it as a backward step
Throwing me to my initial desire for a drink
Living other peoples skewed lines
Sent me running for a bottle

The same lines
Placed around me in sobriety
Will measure me up for a box

LeftWriteFemme

04-08-2010, 04:09 AM

April 8

Out on Your Front Porch

“If you want what we have,” said my sponsor, “you will have to follow somebody and lead somebody and do a few other things.”
“I have to follow somebody, that shouldn’t be too hard,” I mumble.
“In order to follow it helps if you stop looking at the ground, lift you gaze,” her retort. I raised my chin until I met her eyes. “Better,” said she.
“I follow you?” I ask.
“Me, yes, if I have what you want, follow others if I don’t,” she said.
“Okay and lead somebody, how do I do that?” I ask.
“It’s attraction, Sweetie, be attractive, show your smile and your smarts, but most of all show that you’re sober, because that is always your best asset. And no matter what anybody tells you about the allure of bad girls, nobody can resist a good set of assets”

Don’t let the rush of the river scare you from the bank

*

WHAT IS PAST

The past cannot hold me in a loving embrace
I run too often looking for affection and recognition
In things long dead and purportedly buried

I return to the ghoulish obsession of digging up
Old hates and sorrows longing for support
And finding only the cause of the ulcers in my soul

I wallpaper the crumbling facade
Not wanting to cover it up but to hold it together
Trying to unify something which is totally scattered

When I view it with a sober eye
The past is nothing but a slideshow
Under a strobe light

The pulse triggers the impulsive belief that it was all real
When in truth it was the lie I survived
No life existed in the past

Only now is there air to breathe
The past is all vacuum
And I don't need to be sucked away

Tommi

04-08-2010, 07:28 AM

If Wednesday is Happy Hump Day.

Is Thursday ...never mind.

And why in the world is it not spelled wensday or maybe whensday, and

wensday is when the sun comes out tomorrow when it it is Thursday.

Written on an empty stomach, before coffee, and before I work on whatever teh special name for the day after Wednesday is.:bicycle:

Thanks for posting thought provoking and wonderful stuff Lefty ;):dimbulb:

LeftWriteFemme

04-09-2010, 04:14 AM

April 9

Up and Down: Round and Round

Like the wheel on my spinning wheel I pump up and down on the treadle and the wheel spins round and round, the roving twists in my hand and yarn is made. Really all I do is tap my foot and gently hold on, pulling occasionally. It is a small part I play in this production at least it feels small almost unnecessary, but with a clear mind I see that without me it doesn’t get done. I am essential yet still just a foot-tapper and hanger-on neither of these is prestigious yet the whole fabric depends on my mundane actions. I take great comfort knowing that allover there are foot-tappers and hangers-on keeping safe this way of life, sometimes keeping it safe just through sheer repetition. And if you ask, “Is that Unity or Recovery or Service?” All I can say is “Yes it is.”

Powder your bottom line

*

CLAW MARKS

There is a brackish River
Whose current changes directions twice a day
Its bed is well washed on every side.

It begs the question-
Which way is down hill?
There are times I struggle up hill in both directions

There are times I slip from every slope
What is up is often down
Judgment of topography requires distance

Scaling the surface takes tenacity
I plan on leaving my mark as I go
Life's residue staining my finger tips.

LeftWriteFemme

04-10-2010, 05:18 AM

April 10

Stumbling Under the Tenth Step

When I’ve been outside of my mind it is so hard to tell when I’ve come home again. The landmarks take on such distortion in memory that the facts seem bloated or anorexic as I turn my face from side to side. Old journals remind me of old journeys and perhaps there are accurate landmarks mentioned, but how can I know for sure that these too are not just the ravings of a mind gone mad. Real or imagined I must take the daily count and try to keep the score in favor of the actual. I don’t always know that I’ve fallen until I inventory the dirt on my face, but better that I face the dirt than live the delusion of a mole.

Notice the shape of your fixtures

*

DROWNING NAKED

Bare & Exposed
I laid myself on the alter
Of my home group

AA, my only Source
I emptied the contents of my soul
And bore the mantle of overexposure

But vultures lurked in many rooms
I was safely guided by persons of my gender
To more secluded and effective place of transmission

I thrust myself into the arms and mind of my sponsor
She escorts me to the steps with the door closed
And taught me how and when it could be prudently opened

AA is a power greater than me, so is the ocean
Precaution needs to be taken when wading in
Care must be exercised as to how much to bare.

LeftWriteFemme

04-11-2010, 05:57 AM

April 11

The Key You See

The key you see is letting you accept me. Oh, how I hide from that, run from that, flee from that. I must be in control of what you think of me. I curtain off the view of me I don’t wish to share with you. Add to that the unusual choices of what I hide. I will strip down with all the lights blazing long before I would let you see me drop the ball, be confused, misunderstand. What I truly fail to realize is that in the process of trying to hide my faux pas and fumbles; what I show you is my controlling ass. Backside bare I moon you with my freak show trying to hide my humanity. Your compassion and tolerant waiting for me to calm down and open my eyes is the key I fail to see about you.

Learn the difference between area and circumference

*

RANK

I took an area level service position
And my sponsor laughed herself off her chair

What is your motivation for this? she asked
I want to move up through the service structure, my reply

Are you trying to make rank?
Problem with that? I ask

Ever heard of self-fulfilling prophecy
You will become what you desire

You will become rank
And you will stink

The triangle is inverted to help you clean up your act
Don’t get washed away in a tide of ego

I put down my swim fins
And removed my epilates

LeftWriteFemme

04-12-2010, 03:25 AM

April 12

My Experiences with Tennis

I have held the racket, I have hit the ball, but I have never played with a partner. I have slammed the fuzzy orb against the wall for long years now, but I have never had a mate. There were times when I had opponents; yes I’ve had a couple of those, a collaborator though, that I have never had. I have learned to overcome opposition either through wile or guile. Slugged my way toward some inevitable outcome, I never expected you on my court. The game we play is for keeps and the muscles required I have never used, I ache from the pain of ending an atrophy imposed on me by isolation and misunderstanding. Often I don’t know how to stand, don’t know how to act; don’t know how to be the equal to your service. I play chase, running after the thing I didn’t see and only faintly felt. I have come to the place where I know, you and I are a team; you will not be leaving looking for someone better equipped or with greater experience. It is time for me to lay out in front of you my host of tendencies and inclinations. I’m in the habit of overwhelming with my strength to hide my weakness; I must expose this all to you, the strength and the weakness, and work together for the resolution. I will no longer pretend that I know what is right and wrong in this un-played game. I fear that I will lose the old game by making this change, all that is familiar put up for grabs to the uncertain outcome of paired sports. All I truly know is that with you by my side I can never lose and I will learn to do whatever it takes to be your wife.

Dream with an open mind
*

SOLIDITY

Apprehension stands in the archeological site
Which is my life -----listening
Listening for the rumble of a cement truck to come
And help solidify the shifting and tenuous nature of my existence

A wet and sloppy solution
A solution to be raked and smoothed, covered and cured
Something to build a monument on
Or a place to park my car

The nearby grass looks lush and green
But I dare not leave apprehension alone or it spreads
I stand with it on bad days
And against it on good ones

I pray for the mixer to arrive
Or at least the gravel spreader
I need to fill this hole so it can be a life
And stop being a grave.

Lady Pamela

04-12-2010, 10:00 PM

I seen a post out there somewhere,
That clued me in on the two of you...Smiles

I just wanted to wish you Both a very
Happy Anniversary!

May you be able to share the same with
each other when you are old, gray and
rocking side by side on a front porch swing
with more love than you can imagine now.

When you look into each others eyes,
many years from now!
May you see your flames forever shine together as ONE!

http://www.commentnation.com/comments/happy_anniversary_pink_candles.gif

~*~

LeftWriteFemme

04-13-2010, 04:26 AM

April 13

Neither Frog nor Fish

I was falling and my Higher Power caught me in a net called AA, all of which was a pretty neat trick, but the strangest consequence of this is now I somehow think it shouldn’t be possible for me to drown. Defying gravity 24 hours at a time doesn’t make me aquatic or even amphibious for that matter. I still have all the corollary restrictions of anyone who is me. I still need sleep and water, food and warmth just like a mere mortal. How silly I am. I dodge a bullet and suddenly I think I am waterproof.

Don’t exchange your trinkets for your tools

*

WHAMMO

I have been hopping on one foot
With a ball of hope shoved under one arm
And a ball of hysteria under the other

I wish I could tell from the outside of the ball
Which one is hope- I worry I will put down the wrong one
So I hold onto both

My life is sorely limited by the baggage
And I fear I am losing life with every hop
A lack of information is my problem

I don't adequately know the properties of either
And suspect my every interpretation
Finally I stand before my sponsor

To ask the question of my life- That's easy Honey
Hope is the one that bounces back
Is all she had to say

LeftWriteFemme

04-14-2010, 04:15 AM

April 14

Who to Ask

“You ask good questions and you ask the right people,” said my sponsor.
“I ask questions because I need answers,” my reply.
“Do you know how many people need answers and never ask?” she quipped.
“I ask my friends, no stroke of genius there,” I continue.
“You ask your playmates, you ask the people you trust enough to have fun with. You don’t realize how clever that is. You know lots of folks who work hard and you could ask your questions of these, but instead you save them for those diligent ones who still know how to play and that, Sweetie Pie is proof that you are no dummy.”

You may mute your horn, but don’t soap your bow

*

CRUMPLED PETALS IN MY POCKET

I can't bring back the bloom
Cohesion, lost ripeness
Is left only to memory

I carry home the parts
Folded, petite, fragrant bedding
For my wistful desires

I put these colored remnants into a jar of salt
I make an aromatic rub
For the sweetest wounds

Transforming the parts to useful duty
Doesn't restore the flower
It doesn't pay tribute to the past, it is survival

I have a mind filled with roses but I must make hay
Today I live, today the rose is dead
Its pieces in my pocket

I don't die with the blossom
Though my head blows in the wind
The rose runs its course, I run mine.

LeftWriteFemme

04-14-2010, 07:56 PM

April 15

Chickens and Eggs

Who is more sober the early riser or the long-timer? How do we get here and what does it mean. It all starts with a day, which is good because this is more than we had hoped for, sometimes more than we could do. Then it moved into an ever escalating game of can you beat this, each day an improvement over what had been accomplished the day before. For years the standard bearer is the pain or relief of the very first in this string, orbs of 24, yet here stands the question, “Is the essence the last pearl you touch or the total of the strand, which makes it real?” I don’t know for sure. Sobriety is like light; is light made up of waves or is it made up of particles and the answer is invariably yes, for it is. And what you need and how you look at it seems to make the determination, scientific method or no, the watched is affected by the watcher and vice versa. The end is a day round and imperfect as any and what is strung between the beginning and the end is what you’ve made of it.

Never underestimate bitterness

*

ESCAPING THROUGH THE CEILING

Up and away is my motto
Upwardly mobile is my goal

If I can flee without leaving a track
I'm clean

No heart wrenching walk down the isle or lane
No dust on my shoes, no possibility of stumbling

Grace at all cost
Empowerment through elevation

If I must leave my human plane to attain this, so be it
Give up my natural rights, such is life

But yet, if I lose my bonds to earth
What did the leaving gain me?

I arise, to appear better
As a result, I appear not at all

Tommi

04-14-2010, 10:03 PM

April 15

Chickens and Eggs

Who is more sober the early riser or the long-timer? How do we get here and what does it mean. It all starts with a day, which is good because this is more than we had hoped for, sometimes more than we could do. Then it moved into an ever escalating game of can you beat this, each day an improvement over what had been accomplished the day before. For years the standard bearer is the pain or relief of the very first in this string, orbs of 24, yet here stands the question, “Is the essence the last pearl you touch or the total of the strand, which makes it real?” I don’t know for sure. Sobriety is like light; is light made up of waves or is it made up of particles and the answer is invariably yes, for it is. And what you need and how you look at it seems to make the determination, scientific method or no, the watched is affected by the watcher and vice versa. The end is a day round and imperfect as any and what is strung between the beginning and the end is what you’ve made of it.

and I just wondered why :doh: Wednesday is spelled that way...You enlighten and lighten my load. Thanks for being here and the service of posting daily.
:pile::clap:

LeftWriteFemme

04-14-2010, 10:15 PM

and I just wondered why :doh: Wednesday is spelled that way...You enlighten and lighten my load. Thanks for being here and the service of posting daily.
:pile::clap:

Thank you for everything you do and everything that you are! I love you so very, very much!!!!!

Tommi

04-14-2010, 10:19 PM

Thank you for everything you do and everything that you are! I love you so very, very much!!!!!

Ahh..shucks, thanks
Hmmmmm..Looking at the big clock on the wall. Can't sleep Huh? :thud:

:flying:

LeftWriteFemme

04-14-2010, 10:21 PM

Ahh..shucks, thanks
Hmmmmm..Looking at the big clock on the wall. Can't sleep Huh? :thud:

:flying:

In bed so ready to sleep, just waiting for the computer backup to finish, it is almost done 85%

Tommi

04-14-2010, 10:24 PM

In bed so ready to sleep, just waiting for the computer backup to finish, it is almost done 85%
Ahhhh...the Zoom Zoom Zoom of electronics. I need to do the back up thingee too,. Sleep fast, morning is just around the corner..OH wait..IT is morning there..:brightbulb:

LeftWriteFemme

04-14-2010, 10:29 PM

Ahhhh...the Zoom Zoom Zoom of electronics. I need to do the back up thingee too,. Sleep fast, morning is just around the corner..OH wait..IT is morning there..:brightbulb:

Love you Daddy, I will be sleeping soon, the backup is at 95%

See you tomorrow!!!!

Tommi

04-14-2010, 10:30 PM

Love you Daddy, I will be sleeping soon, the backup is at 95%

See you tomorrow!!!!

:hiding: Yessssss :motorbike:

LeftWriteFemme

04-14-2010, 10:32 PM

It's done, I'm off to sleep!

Tommi

04-14-2010, 10:36 PM

It's done, I'm off to sleep!

G'nite > See you for lunch...It's sposed to be 68 tomorrow....Brrrrrrrrr

LeftWriteFemme

04-16-2010, 07:25 AM

April 16

Not Fur but Fin

You can’t delay the river, I’ve tried, all it does is distort. I block the flow and swamp ensues, mighty oaks waist deep in water. The current is strong and I fear being swept away, not realizing I was born to swim. Dreading the swim back for spawn I try to stay too close to my origins, never make it to open water, never to live the life I was intended for. I’ve heard it said, “Don’t push the river it flows by itself,” but I can’t stall it either.

Line up the little endearments offered you

*

FEEDING THE MONSTER

Who will feed the monster, once they’ve made her?
Her hunger burns in her like a beacon
Should I let her starve?
Should I put her on rations of old crust and tepid water?

Rebuke her as if she were her own idea
Possibly bind her hands and cover her eyes
Stand her in line with the good girls and fit her in
Turn her visage from her desire and tell her to forget?

Hold her hand and tell her that’s enough?
When I stand in the face of her yawning hunger
What do I say---It's for your own good?
Well that's what THEY said too.

LeftWriteFemme

04-17-2010, 06:29 AM

April 17

Like an Elf Working in an Empty Tree

The chairs in the loft are empty, but I still hear the choir sing. The bottle though it’s empty, still sometimes calls my name. Though front pocket is empty and there is rolled up empty sleeve, still the nicotine haunts my dreams. On this empty road I travel, I still long for company. The stillness is not all that’s empty, but I run to fill that spot. Chaos is like a tapeworm it eats me from inside, but in the meantime I still believe it’s filling me.

Curve around what is sharp on your tongue

*

HOW THINGS SEEM

Not everyone who pushes me down is my enemy
Not everyone who pulls me up is my friend
I have been seduced by the closeness of people
Who used me as their shield

When I have been held in a place of honor
The point man of life
I forgot that made me the replacement target
For the one who stood behind me

I have been offended as I was thrown to the ground
The hands that shoved me I saw as my rejecters
I was spared the tragedy and peril of the thing which flew by my ear
Thanks only to the grace of a thrust in the right direction

Accurate appraisal is my weakness
Seeing things for what they are is hard
Things are rarely how they seem

LeftWriteFemme

04-18-2010, 06:29 AM

April 18

In Training

Like a faithful dog that was hard to train, patience is a thing hoped for yet peevish during the breaking in. Stanch companionability is hard won, but worth the cost of acquisition. And what is the price I truly paid in the end; whatever I gave in the pursuit of patience was a cheap babysitter and kept me from far worse reformation. For what would I do in this late day and age as a tempest torn toddler, no bottle to sooth my woes and bothers. Strictly speaking this is a world ill suited to the edgy intolerant masses and only seems to fit those who can mark time and bend.

Be careful what you do with idols

*

SERVICE & SACRIFICE

The difference between life and death in my recovery
Is the equal difference between service and sacrifice
If I offer you what is in my hand, fine
If I also give you my fingertips, I am lost.

Service lightens the load in my heart
Sacrifice removes my tools for living
When I go into debt for your existence
The cheer and optimism is sucked from my awareness

My eyes go dead and soon I follow
The cingulotomy of obligation crucifies my future
And murders true hope and love
Service feeds my heart and yours

Renovating makes space
It builds the muscles for joy and contentment
Pumping and refilling
My plate with spirituality.

LeftWriteFemme

04-19-2010, 07:58 AM

April 19

Ground Floor

Step 10 is the place where the doors slide open and I discover I am out of the basement. I have to pay close attention to where my feet are; it is so easy to stumble here in the light of day. Oblivious limitations and universally accepted interpretations are pried from installation and put on trial. Never is it acceptable to allow my alcoholic thinking to make decisions for my sober life. The road to my door must be kept clear so I can get out to do my part and so G-d can come home to me.

Spin heads, spin tales, spin dry

*

CHAPTER & VERSE

I remember being trained and rehearsed for finding the words
Which would release my soul from bondage
The scrupulous concern for detail pointed me to heaven
And yet I drank.

Inside these rooms the path is wide
Judgment is suspended and I have the right to be wrong
The penalties for error can be great
But the privilege and risk are mine

As in all things, the extremists come
They have come to this place too
Thumpers hound and belittle
Threaten and cajole

They tell page numbers like punch lines
And narrow the field at every opportunity
I can't stay sober sitting on my old stool
I can't maintain desire by their chapter and their verse.

LeftWriteFemme

04-20-2010, 12:26 PM

April 20

What I Take from Laban’s House

If I have the audacity to have a problem I must provide the instantaneous solution or be the cause of world-wide panic. Additionally it is the height of rudeness to have open-ended dilemma. It makes the gods uncomfortable, don’t you know, makes them shift in their seats and wish me away. I prevent banishment by either being problem free or solution-full and when the answers are not to their liking I exile myself saving them the inconvenience and me the embarrassment. It is never good to implode the household deities, you never know when you might need one for historic perspective or a door stop.

Inventory your reservations

*

WHEN A SNAPPER CROSSES THE ROAD

What should I do?
I see the soggy green/gray lump creeping the macadam
Too slow to survive for long

The urge in me to aim
And end the duckling-eaters life
Is short lived but a palpable surge

My Disney style justice is dismissed
But heard from nonetheless
Shall I pull over and assist?

This turtle is as ill equipped
For this stretch of road
As I am ill equipped to aid in its conveyance

Should I reach with my fingers or toes
To something I know can extend its neck
And sever me from parts I hold dear?

The ever present missionary in me has spoken and is silenced
In fact what I can do is slow down and give wide birth
I know this creature is a danger but never more so than me.

LeftWriteFemme

04-21-2010, 06:48 AM

April 21

Bound

The reason the sleeves of my disease wrap around and tie in the back is so that I will struggle with change. Alcoholism is my straightjacket and my goal is that ‘loose garment life’ I’ve heard so much about. The sweat I work up from railing against my confining existence causes petulance. Frothing and enervated, defeat is the landing on which I collapse, acceptance a flight of steps away. My ailment leads me to believe I have nothing to hold onto as I adjust; and though this isn’t true, the fact remains that this is still a process of letting go.

Have a parenthetical lunch with a friend

*

PINK CLOUD

When the pink cloud lands in my valley
My task is to walk
The pleasure of its presence can never outweigh
The practice this cloud affords me.
Walking in a haze of cherry blossom lightness
The future is a blur I do not fear
Forward motion seeds my inertia
I will keep on.
When the test begins
And I must proceed in the obscurity of night
The lively steps of pink-cloud days
Will cheer and empower me.
I can imbed my future with right action
And bank the confidence I feel today
Saving it for the rain swept days which come to everyone
Progress is positive even when made in bliss.