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June 5
DOLL “Why is your face all red?” asked my sponsor. “I didn’t get my way,” I responded. “And this crimson appearance is the result?” “You see that it is. I was very careful about what I wanted and worked hard to be reasonable.” “And Baby, you were. You did nothing wrong. Your ego was in check and you kept your expectations in proportion.” said my sponsor. “Then why didn’t it work out my way?” “I only have a sad and simple answer for you. The result had nothing to do with you, your wants, expectations or desires. The whole experience boils down to only one thing: It was not that type of party, Doll.” “Oh.” Promise yourself tears like rain and smiles like sunshine. * Discussions with my Disease “You’re not the girl I used to know.” “Not the girl you used to love is what you mean?” “You’re different is all I mean to say.” “The rest you leave there to rot, unsaid?” “Something has happened to you.” “Is it something that you do not like?” “I don’t know who you are anymore.” “Or is it that you never knew?” “One false move could break us up.” “All your moves are false why will one more cause such change?” |
Yesterday's meeting was profound (as usual) and completely spot on. It blows my mind that each meeting I attend seems to be specifically fine tuned so that it dives into exactly what I am struggling with.
Obsession. Um, ya. That oh-so-fun way we take something and turn it over and over and around and upside down in our brains, picking it apart and unraveling it until it has been dissected and pinned down at every appendage, all so it fits into an acceptable version of what we want it to be...so it either fails or meets our expectations. How exhausting. We, as a species, do this innately. It is biologically programmed into our developing psyches. The key to releasing your obsessions is to see them as stepping stones out of the darkness and into the light of day. Stepping outside the realm of ruminative thinking in order to sit with what exactly the object of that thought is trying to show us. Just one drink and I'll feel calm and be able to unwind. One more slice of cake and I won't feel so sad and empty inside. The perfect car will help me find the perfect person who will then complete me. The perfect clothes will mask how ugly I feel inside. These obsessions only further remove us from the freedom of ego and self. The truth is that there is no "perfect" scenario that will lead to that ever elusive peace of mind. Peace of mind is something we have to cultivate and tend to on a daily basis by working the steps and holding ourselves accountable for our thoughts, actions and deeds. When we get off track it is up to us to guide our minds back to mediations such as the Serenity Prayer. *taken from my own personal notes |
Two meetings today.
What I learned: " Take the 'personal' out of being a person.Thank you to everyone who shared part of their story and/or their advice with me. I'm going to go apply it to what's left of life. :) |
June 6
THE ONE I BOUGHT There are fairy tales I never gave credence to. Multiple bear stories don’t move me. Cats with footwear have not warranted a second thought. True love-----now that one I still buy hook, line and sinker. Work hard and true love will fix the rest; that is what I have always believed. The evil spell I have walked under during my sad little life will be broken only by the durable and all-fulfilling love of my betrothed. Each time this plan fell through, the blame was leveled at the wrongness of the match but not the wrongness of the plot. Anytime I work to be restored to sanity by one person, I have displaced a rightful power and thrown myself to the sea. Let a whisker width of optimism carry your day. * Enclosed Space In the echo chamber it is the cymbals which cause the most pain. The drums resound, deep and loud, but it is the crashing of brass that drives me wild. Cotton, wool and sealing wax cannot put my head at ease. Resonate walls with their hollow effects create the feedback loops of hurt. Like the endless reflection of parallel mirrors the sounds come back to me with relentless repetition. Aural illusion might have been the idea, but chaos is the result. Leaving the space between these ears will be, will allow, the band to play on without the benefit of my torment. |
June 7
HOSTAGE DOLL A doll stands wedged between two mailboxes, naked and exposed, the edge of the road passing her by. She is there to pay for my self-loathing. I throw my treasures in the air as skeet to be shot and shattered. Hate is the obnoxious microbe, which sours my digestion and rids me of nutrition and affection. I purge love and tenderness. I rip the covers from my playthings and leave them to bleed. I hide in my self-destruction. I put garish displays street-side and cry my tears alone. I can not ransom innocence to pay the price of fear. I must bring in the broken babies and put hate out on the curb. Tickle wit with realism. * Weight Problem I have trouble raising my 50 pound hand in meetings. In between meetings I have the problem of trying to dial the 500 pound phone. Which leaves me with this 2,000 pound weight on my chest and no air to breathe, no life to lead. There is the difficulty of the relentless tyrant, my would be sponsor, the person I fail to ask. Plus the home group that does not support me, since they do not know my name. All the while folks laugh and talk and have a good time, I can see none of them have suffered from my weight problem |
June 8
THREE ROOSTERS The three roosters come to the meeting to hear themselves crow. The membership purely spectators in the longest, lowest, loudest sobriety competition. Those of us in the fray are like picked-on-puppies who learn slowly not to put our heads up to spare our eyes and hearts. The same noise comes repeatedly. Suspicion is never aroused; the heads nod at all the right places, orchestrated for ego and nothing else. The meeting is closed with a momentary prayer for the still suffering in and out of the room. I pray that will be enough. Tour your past but leave at closing time. * Abraxas I was waiting for a magic person and then you appeared. I was dazzled; I was under your spell. In an attempt to prove myself your natural assistant I sawed me in two. Then I stepped into the vanishing cabinet and promptly disappeared. I was not wrong to see the miraculous in you, but I never looked from your visage once you arrived. The world around me melted at your entrance and I flowed down the drain along with it. I somehow expected a response from you, but why respond to an empty room? So, I will plug back into myself and power up. Power draws power and I will see if I can draw you once again. |
June 9
GULPING The plug that lodges in my throat from too much, too fast, causes the anxiety to rise in me. The panic fulls my contracting muscles into rock solid revolt. 'I can’t live' is the predictable result. Gulping attention, acclaim, excitement, sex does the same thing. My heart clots and my personality stops in mid flow. Everything, in carefully chosen well-chewed bites, makes the process proceed. My life works along workable paths if I stay away from oversized freight. I can never swallow myself whole; why would I keep trying to imbibe giants like desire? Tumble your heart like a stone then warm it. * Prize Catch There is a reason that fish flap and twist when they are caught, why even though they are in the air they fight for the life that once was theirs Only martyrs go without a fight, it is good to know that at least this vice is not mine. When I did not love my life its loss was not an actual change, there was nothing to hold onto, nothing to struggle for. Now I thrash at the feel of my loved life slipping from me. It is good to know I have passion enough to rally a defense. My life can be taken from me, but I haven’t lost my will to fight. |
June 10
DANCE OF DEATH Honeyed words pour from painted lips; shades of doubt color my mind. Stained glass eyes look to blank walls and picture the gallery of imagination, attempting to sell it for hard currency. Sirens sing from the throats of mute men; the screams which rise in me fall on deaf ears. Paradox feeds controversy but it needn’t. Evolution from a cesspool is repugnant though progress is steadily made. Inertia is violent if that is from whence it came. Afterbirth is always bloody and humans not always nice. I must live and heal as others climb up and slide down. I must keep the beat and forget the dance of death. Float your expectations and check for daggers underneath. * Dido Either I can have a bad relationship that I never wanted or no relationship and the painful isolation of having been lied to, deceived by someone who, in theory, should have been trustworthy. You are off to war and I am agape not having realized until too late that you are a soldier. The fact is that one of these things will occur; you will be killed by a machine which cares nothing for you and sees you as its enemy or destroyed by the organization that sees you as its own. Or you will throw yourself on your sword and keep from bothering anyone else with this task. There is no scenario where you are the One you promised me you’d be. No homecoming, no welcoming arms to hold me. I stand on the sidewalk, a garbage pail of cold water poured over my shock and dismay. To my grief you say that you have heard it all before, so why did you set me up to say it all again? I am heart stricken and cut in a place to obvious to hide and too hidden to speak of. You have no time to talk, no aid to give, no love to spare. I thought I was yours, but see that I have been swept from your life by the flood of a large gauge hose and water of questionable origin. Everything is wet but nothing is clean. This is an unholy act and I am defeated and living in Carthage |
June 11
BOTTLE THE ACID My sponsor said to bottle the acid and so I did. I sat back in smug reflection until the plumbing backed up. I grabbed the fast solution and poured it down the drain. My sponsor smiled as I learned the baser things will eat my life away, too. I can never just decant power and expect it to sweep clean the clogged pathways in my recovery. Sloshing caustic medicine into open orifices brought me here. I long for the ease of a liquid resolution. In the end, I must clean the pipes myself. The traps are simpler to cleanse the less I’ve lied. Telling myself I don’t have to get my hands or heart dirty is the biggest lie of all. Eat lunch with relish. * Sanitized All the water in the well, gone dry, belongs to me. Such an offer, how could I refuse? I stand as near the edge as I can get and try my best to peer, is the goldfish alive? For you see this is still my best hope, you, the source are also my wishing well, more than just survival you are prospect, neigh dream. You say that what’s left is mine, but you think of it as incidental, not a need, merely a want. Someplace deep, beyond where you admit, you know that life is dependent on desire, but will play mine off as casual when it becomes inconvenient to your drives and blindness. Eunuchs do not immediately perish, but you must confess they do not live. I stand here a lock to which there is no longer a key and whether I am open or closed it doesn’t matter for the partnership of change is desiccated and I do not care for a waterless solution. |
June 12
THE WORM Because there is never enough punishment for those who inflict hurt, I punish myself. Only I can tell if the depth of the pain is a match; only I can judge when enough is enough. This is the turn of the drunken worm who lives in my brain. The belief that what began in pain must end there, too. Even now in recovery, I persist in hurting myself a thousand tiny ways. setting trap after trap to catch the perpetrators, I make my heart a mine field, a place unfit for me to live. I must sober the worm and let myself off the hook. Dip intentions into action and let them firm up. * Circular Needles I react badly when I find a loose thread because I never know what might be unraveling. I have knit my heart out; have dropped an occasional stitch to be sure. Unbeknown to me these little holes in my logic wait for the stress of overextension to run through the length of my life, untying earnest work. If I could catch these unsecured thoughts before it all goes too far , I might have a chance to hook back into the main fabric and prevent this unfurling of collateral. When the cord is cut and the line flaps freely real panic ensues. Even if capture of both ends is possible, knots are awkward, unseemly and gauche. I was planning a seamless life, smooth and beyond reproach. My fear of reprisal flares before the ever-burning coals of abject self-doubt have a chance to be felt. This banked inferno generates the things which bake and fry my nerves, burn my threads and disintegrate my mantle. I need to put out the fire before I re-knit my world. |
June 13
OPEN WINDOWS I roll down the window in the rain hoping reality will soak in with the droplets. I tilt up my face as I leave the car and let the water shower my features. The downpour is the jolt to living for which I have prayed. I stand on my lawn and rinse the day out of my hair; I clear my brain in the fresh rainwater. The driving rain pounds the house and trees but I feel massaged and cared for. My skin, reflexive, teaches my mind to absorb and hydrate. I turn my thoughts to Greater Powers. Even if the doors have been closed, I can open the windows and let the rain come in. Soap the windows on some of your ideas so you can work in privacy. * Down to the Watership The immoderate champions immoderation; the glutton recommends consumption, more often than not a drunk will pour you a drink It is part of the social norm to conform to the addiction of the day. If we are all high we laugh at each other’s jokes and there is less finger pointing about the mess. When we are all in this together we sink or we swim, but we mustn’t look around. Like the rabbits who cannot ask, “Where?” We try to look at ease with dying and contented with our lot. More must be better for we can’t survive on less than what we’ve got. |
June 14
RED ROSES From tight green buds come beautiful red roses. From small verdant places I blossom, too. I open to richness unexpected and fullness unbelieved. I look at laundry crumpled, never anticipating the look of clean sheets blowing on the line. Doors I perceive as blocked by vast boulders are thrown open by willingness. Who I am today is no one I recognize; I didn’t see myself coming. I write though I can’t spell. I love though my heart is broken. I think though my mind is warped and I trust though the amulet is long shattered. Promise is not a laid out plan but the continuum of change. I can fight it or let it carry me where it goes. Smile at similes. * What I Heard Through the Snow The commentator’s voice fades in and out as the reception is lost and found among the static of my drive home. In here is a pattern, a connect the dots matrix; I try to feel my way too as I weave past the slow and stubborn traffic. Like a call from the wilderness distorted through a storm, my frantic thoughts obscure, sometimes distort the content, the intent, the soul of a message I so desperately need. Broadcast warnings, safety suggestions, help and hope are torn to slivers and rewoven in my careworn brain. The distraction of the road allows the subliminal heart beat to tattoo in my ear then my chest, all the way to my toes, bodily acceptance overpowers my relentless mind and clarity is achieved, no matter the drifts. |
June 15
IN THE MEADOW Being the only tree in the meadow often leaves me feeling lonely. I tell myself of the camaraderie I imagine in the forest. These images are more poetic than real. I believe in community and support; I think of the woods as this place apart from the complications of my exposed life. I shrug off the very real competition and struggle from sharing every inch of root space and the search for each square of sunlight. There is much joy in being an individual. An eco-system of diversity allows me to fully develop. I can spread my branches and my roots. I can offer shelter to those in need of my reaching and my shadow; tender flowers and tired birds find me a haven. I have unique abilities in this field. Space can feel lonely but it is full of possibilities. Press up against your iron will. * Poe-etiquette Cosmic questions cross the sky, I wonder but don’t ask why I pitch the tent, but don’t stay the night I borrow money and don’t pay the rent I sooth myself but can’t be content I earn my keep though it is all been spent The real true meanings are pushed away, Has ready tragedy come to stay Forever darkness, no more light of day Cheerful greeting left to lay All the poets bring their knives For blood letting’s become their prize Here I sit and tend the boat Rocking dingy out to moor I play the Raven, black and poor I dare not speak it but in my mind sing “Never more” |
June 16
THE BEAR Living with my disease is like having a sleeping bear in the house. I knew it was there, could hear it snore. I never felt comfortable or able to turn my back on it and get on with my life. I felt under certain threat. Fearing the bear would wake when my attention was elsewhere, I proceeded to poke my sleeping bear with a stick. I prodded it to wakefulness; in retrospect, it is clear I was unprepared for a wakeful bear, even with my full attention fixed on this brute. The bear, which is my disease, roamed about the house and made forays out into the world. I had no plan or tool for these events. Finding a legion of people who had worked out living arrangements with their bears, I happily joined their ranks. My bear wakes and sleeps at its will but I am no longer afraid or unskilled at handling this creature. Today I am so grateful for the bear in my life and would never want a life without it. I live in a world filled with bears and would be at a loss as to how to exist if not for the practice and success with the bear that is my own. Draw a picture of time. * Limen Do you leave when it is time to go or are you the type who exits early? Does departure time find you lingering trying to squeeze out one more minute rooted in this spot? Are you the kind of person who loves the street, but avoids the parade? Can you bear to go, bear to stay, bear to think that the world exists beyond this door? Do you move with the other sheep when all the crowd says, “Baa.” Are you fleet with a sky full of clouds obeying the breeze, flaunting the tides? Do you change with the seasons or are you passed from hand to hand, living your life in the snow of a globe? My life is my life, but the most vital evidence of how I live it is what I do on thresholds. |
June 17
BOUQUET I love the flowers in my garden. Their upkeep is my solemn trust. With my shears, I must cut, clear and swift, the runners that detract from their health and structure. When fruiting is heavy, I must spare the stalk and choose what stays and what needs to be taken. I am scrupulous in my observation of form and function. The bucolic scene thrives; the pageant of color sweeps the rows. I bend to nurture and stretch to prune. I pay over-much attention to the plucking and forget I need to bring the blooms home. Allow a dark worldview to illuminate a lightness of spirit. * Tea Totaler My alcoholism was anonymous even while I was active. My destruction was internal, outside evidence kept to a minimum. It is easy to understand why so many from my past as well as my present are shocked to see me a member in good standing for a club they never saw me pay the price to join. But cost doesn’t always advertise in the public square. I know the score, the numbers etched upon my soul. I need to be well even if you didn’t know I am sick. I take the medicine; offer a smile to those who think it prophylactic and keep upon my path. Just because you didn’t know the contents of my bottle doesn’t mean I didn’t earn the tag on my tea. |
Grateful
Celebrating 27 years being clean and sober today! It has been a wonderful, hard, and would not change a thing adventure to date :)
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Happy 27th Recovery Birthday to You, nowandthen! :)
I am so happy for you!!!!! |
Sherrie, your June 17th (today's) post is a wonderful read for me. Your writings are such a soul-soother. Thanks for continuing to "keep coming back" and sharing with us.
Your friend always, Brock (f) |
Quote:
Happy Birthday!! It's a fun journey, isn't it :-) |
May 18
STRONG WORDS Serious language, deep language, real language helps me by grounding me. I don’t have to be nice for company when I can just tell the truth. I needn’t have guests with virgin ears or unrealistic expectations, and I no longer pander to such foolishness. I know the layered meanings of my words and value the intensity of a large vocabulary. I am not intimidated by prudish co-conspirators who stare down pointed noses at powerful utterances. Weak words make poor boundaries and breed victims. I will not be trapped by niceties; I will speak clearly out of necessity. Allow your integrity to increase the value of your truth. * Martinizing The price of upkeep scares me, it daunts me even. I pay the initial cost, I have bitten that bullet of required outlay; the continued charges for maintenance push my face in the mud until my ears clog. Avoiding the need of perpetual responsibility to things, relationships, life, doesn’t change the reality, rather it embeds in my skin a slick denial and an indignant retort to the drycleaners and shoe-shiners of the world. Waste and want play tag inside a misunderstanding of what is required of me; of what life requires in general. I must make quietude, draw a map and find my way to this psychic change; Unfortunately all the little voices scream “Yes, you paid the price to see the show, but you don’t make enough to stay!” |
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