Blog entry for:

of the drugs would restore sanity to my life.
this is a topic that has been rolling around in the front of my head the past few days. as i let go of what prayer will start to look like, i keep coming back to this one, just how do i see myself and what part addiction plays in that. as i walked through my week, two interactions stand out. first off, i am not one of those who flock to the newcomer and smother them with twelve step love. that being said, when i see a newcomer out on the fringe, i do saunter over and ask then what is up. one such encounter on Wednesday night, led to a ride home and a discussion about this very issue. better put he asked a question about how much clean time i had and why i am where i am, fellowship-wise and i responded by saying: “after due consideration, i realized i was NEVER powerless over substances, and i need a fellowship that made that distinction.”
yes, you read that correctly, i was NEVER powerless over drugs, even though i could not or would not stop using. that inability to maintain abstinence was because i am an addict, and was the most glaring of the indicators that i had an issue. yes, contrary to popular belief, and the opinions of the justice system, my family, society at large and the other 85%, it was not the drugs that were my problem, nor my uncontrollable use of them, it was something different about me. something so foreign to the well-wishers and the lookers-on, that they could not possibly understand. i was an addict. that simple fact, so pure and so simple explained a whole of the stuff i was going through and FREED me from the constraints put upon me by my society and my culture, and allowed me to begin this incredible journey.
sh!t, there was a daisy for you all!
the other newish member i interacted with, said that they worked the steps every day, without a sponsor in sight, imagine that, all i can do is hope that they stay clean. both of these members to be, attend more than one fellowship, and are struggling to stay clean for more than thirty days. and i know the feeling. as long as i did not match my stereotype of an addict, i could pretend that i was not bone, hence, NOTHING anyone said applied. as long as i believed it was the substances, it was an issue of WHAT and HOW MUCH i used, and i did not find any compulsion to do anything about my real problem. so twenty months of being around the room, even though i was abstinent for most of that time, did very little to get me beyond the lobby. why should i start walking up the steps of recovery, when nothing anyone said applied to me? so there i stood, longing for more, but unable to get the basic premise i needed to get, that i was an addict.
today, well today, i accept that fact, with my entire being, whether one calls addiction a disease,, an affliction or a condition. whether or not society accepts that addicts are not like them. whether or not anyone else gets that fact. the only one who needs to carry that fact into his daily existence is me. for me, and i say that without any reservations, being an addict allows me to seek a path beyond the cultural limits imposed upon me.the steps free me from the throes of active addiction and allow me to seek a better way of life, which includes going to work every day, playing fantasy football with my friends, hanging with the brothers of the leaf at the cigar store and being an active member of the relationships that i have and will continue to form as my days go by. it is the only explanation for why i think the way i do, feel the way i do and when i get insane hurt myself and others as i do. long periods of being locked away from society will not free me from what i am, and only by walking among the other 85%, can i live a life that is worthwhile.
anyhow, enough of the proselytizing, time to get some stuff accomplished in and out of the house. snowy and cloudy as it is, it is still a great day to be in active recovery.

∞ DT ∞