Sunday, March 30, 2014

A Much Needed Swift Kick In The Ass

After a week or five of feeling sorry for myself, I reacquainted myself with a blog written by a guy I went to high school with.  Rocky is no longer really battling cancer, he is surrendering to it with more valor and wit than I could ever hope to master.  Please don't skip over this.  We all need this wake-up call to go out and have the best damn day we can manage.  Today.

Terminal Velocity

Thursday, March 27, 2014

Real Life Is Just Real Life

Thank you guys for your kind words, it was so good to hear your sweet voices again.

I don't know what is up with me lately, I'm feeling so apathetic about the whole "support thing." I'm not drinking, not thinking about drinking, not wanting to drink.  It's just that when I think about blogging or posting on my message boards I just feel "Ugh".

Did this happen to any of you?  I know if I were in AA they would probably say this is a harbinger of a relapse.  But I don't think so.  I think it is a step in recovery.  I watched my brother move away from AA after a few years and he's never drank again.  He just lives a normal life without meetings and without drinking.

So do any of the rest of you ever say to yourself, "I am just so done with all of this recovery crap?"

Here's what I think is happening.  When I quit drinking, I filled up my days to the brim.  You know how that is, you're so afraid if you have a second to spare, you'll pick up a bottle.  But now I want some of those moments to spare.  I want to do some other things.  Or I want to do absolutely nothing.

I'm to the point I've got to give up something, but everything seems too important to give up.

But here's what I need to remind myself, even if I give up this blog, or posting every day on the message boards, it doesn't mean I have to give up the friends I made here or there.  Some of you have become a part of my life as a whole, not just the fraction that is my recovery.

On the up point, I have created another blog, it's not about recovery but it's about living a sober life down here south of the border.  I haven't published it yet, I'm still working on the first posts.  I'll post a link here when it's ready if any of you want to become a part of that part of my life.

And I'm still working on my book, or trying to work on it, except I keep letting all of these other things I've gotten myself involved in conveniently interrupt my work on it.

Or maybe that's just another excuse for not getting done what I need to get done. 

Ugh!

Wednesday, March 26, 2014

Good-bye Sweet William

My best friend from high school died a week ago, I hadn't talked to him since our tenth high school reunion, and I hadn't talked to him for the ten years before that.  So all in all, I went 26 years without talking to my best friend.  I tried to remember why.  I couldn't remember any big fights or falling out, try as hard as I could.

Then I remembered.  He called one day and I didn't return his call.  A week later, he called again and I didn't return his call.  No big reason, I was eighteen, suddenly pregnant, suddenly married, trying my damnedest to stick in my first year of nursing school.

Then a month went by and I thought, I should call William, but he's going to be so pissed off at me.

Then a year went by and I thought, I should call him, but what can I say?

Then ten years went by and he walked into our tenth year reunion and it was as if no time at all had passed, as if I'd returned all of those phone calls.  And we made the usual promises to stay in touch, and we did.  For that whole weekend.

In recent years I had this fantasy of walking into his liquor store in Wichita, Kansas, yes he owned a liquor store, ironic, huh?  Anyway, I had this thought that some day I would walk into his liquor store and it would take a minute but then he'd look up from the register and that look of recognition would flash in his eyes and he'd jump over the counter and he'd hug me and we'd hop in his old '58 Chevy that we used to drag main in and we'd head to the Taco Tico for his nightly bean burrito that he ate every night of our junior high and high school lives.

I'll never get to do that now, I should have done it when I dreamed it up.  I tried.  I was actually in Wichita a couple of years ago and I actually drove around looking for his liquor store (this was after I quit drinking so I wasn't looking for a bottle) but I didn't even know the name of his store or where it was located.  I guess I thought fate would somehow steer my car toward a storefront that had "William's Liquor Store" etched in the front window.  Of course, I never found it.

Yes, I could have called him, but what would I say?

I have a terrible history of walking away from or letting go of people when my focus changes.  I hate that about me, I view it as one of my biggest flaws.  One that I need to make more strides in overcoming, as my recent two month disappearance from this blog demonstrates.

I know now what I would say to William.  I would say,

"I'm sorry I haven't been there for you all of these years, I'm sorry I never got to know the man you became.  The fact that life keeps trying to convince me that I have more urgent, more pressing issues to take care of is no excuse.  There is no more pressing issue, no more urgent "thing" in need of my attentions more important than a friend who supported and loved me through the most trying of times. I will do better."

"I promise."

P.S.  I'm sorry for the "Sweet William" title, I know you hate that.