Blog entry for:

of my recovery journey. yesterday i shared my deep dark secret that my reservation was all about my extended clean-time and that the story i tell myself. that story? well that after decades clean, i can **handle** a bit of recreational using. no i cannot shoot heroin like a gentleman, but maybe a micro-brew every now and again, and a bud or two occasionally. the emphasis there happens to be on the “or two” part. after voicing out loud, what has been brewing within for many days now, finally ended up examining that reservation as part of my TENTH STEP. when i did my titular prayer, as i lay down to sleep, i asked to be relieved of this particular reservation. i slept well and this morning, as i “sat” i kept coming back to events in my life, when i was the most social and least isolated. those halcyon days of using socially and being employable in an industry that catered to addiction, or at least serving it up in an atmosphere of fun and frivolity. oddly enough, even though i was quite “social” about my using in those days, the signs that addiction was about to turn my life into something of a low grade nightmare. were all around. this morning, as i sit and pound this out, i am still not quite sure, why i kept tripping back to that period of my life, but as i sat, more and more the nostalgic recall of that time in my life, quickly faded and focused on the memories of when it was not “so good,” and i was humiliated by not being able to do what i was born to do, party like a rock star.
today, i feel just the tiniest bit more hopeful that my recovery can survive through to another annual anniversary of the last day i used, just for today. once i saw that “or two” was appended to my story about control, my recovery side took over. i cannot speak for those who are not addicted, nor can i speak for my peers and associates in recovery. i can, however speak for myself, and once i realized that what i was considering was “controlled” using, i tripped back to being powerless over addiction. believing that a certain quantity, be it one, two or forty-two (*), is okay is where i began to focus, rather than the amount of clean time i have today. the gift here is not the life i have built as a result of recovery, now is it the people who fill my life, it is the ability to hear my stories for what they are: lies, delusions and justifications for acts i have yet to commit, an act of forgiveness for my future crimes. where once i needed to feed my denial with delusion, today i feed my justifications for doing stuff further down the road, with a similar diet of crap.
ah, but i get way too dark, far too often. sure, for my recovery is VERY serious business and i tend to look at the shaded side of my recovery journey, rather than the sunny side. the fact is, i am clean, just for today, i have the life i once envied because i never believed a person like could earn it or worse deserved it. the gift of recovery i feel today, is that tiny bit of wisdom i have achieved through the process of uncovering who i am. no fVcking onion here, but certainly an archeological-like dig through the detritus of my addiction, to uncover the person who i was meant to be. it is a good day to be clean and a better one to let go of whatever reservations i may have, as i am quite certain, they will take me down a dark and twisted path, that i have very little desire to walk upon again.

∞ DT ∞