Good Morning Jessicca

Letter to my Daughter
Sunday, 22 November

Good Morning Jessicca…

The 7 AM meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous in Pacific Beach was the place to be Monday through Friday when I first caught hold of sobriety and it probably still is, despite the fact that you now have to smoke outside its cramped room.  It extends the entire end of a small parking lot and has several windowed garage doors side by side facing away from the street.  The tables inside are parked end to end to make a single row, surrounded with metal folding chairs.  An enormous coffee urn sits alone near the double-door entryway at the north end of the building.  I made this clubhouse for starting-over drunks the place to be each weekday morning for a good five years and never once arrived without the coffee always ready to serve – strong black with a corrosive jolt of caffeine.  Its heavy aroma virtually invited everyone sitting round the table to light up their favorite tobacco product.  The room quickly took on the uncertain air of a San Francisco fog.  If you preferred your clothes not stink of smoke you could always listen from the parking lot, just outside the door.

Someone before my time named the meeting the Dawn Patrol.  Most meetings tend to muster sameness in the congregation:  tenderloin drunks forever trying to string together two weeks of sobriety; lunch hour office workers in business appropriate attire; machinists and exiles from country-western bars; country club types recovering from their furtive, seedy ways.  If we have access to wheels we prefer to pick our community for drying out.  The Dawn Patrol was notably eclectic.  There was a smattering of those stepping in business slacks from pricey new cars.  There were those arriving in cars that seemed to run only on their owner’s desperate prayers.  There were gamblers and homeless housewives.  There was the occasional snob – threadbare but always casting before them a steadfast air of dignified certainty.  There was the goateed accountant, always a bit surprised he was still alive and available to be seen.  There was the young man drifting up from the beach, thought to be in a losing battle with aids, but that story never came from his lips.  Eventually he disappeared, as did others.  There was the deep sputter of motorcycles when the 5^th Step bikers rolled up and parked near the entrance.  They added a swashbuckling dash.  They were always ready to step in and keep the meeting real.  Cut the I’m OK, You’re OK, sandal-soled, tree-hugging philosophizing crap.  This is about life and death people.  I’ve buried too many of my brothers on account of this disease.  Get your head out of your big-assed lalaland.  Staying alive is about doing the Steps, finding a sponsor and not picking up that first drink – for any reason.  You can’t go home for Christmas?  Your wife left you for another man?  No one loves you?  Boo hoo – I’m all choked up.  Guess what?  You deserve it.  You’re a lying, thieving drunk just like me… trying to stay sober.  Stop sniveling.  You’re lucky to be alive.

Religion, talk of God, wasn’t much tolerated at this meeting.  No one credited Christ for their long-term sobriety.  Turning your life over to a Higher Power often meant little more than taking hold of a rabbit’s foot.  That’s not always the case.  I avoided the Jesus meetings if at all possible.  God doesn’t save good people from dying in plane crashes or car wrecks.  Why bother with performing miracles for drunks that don’t take responsibility for their own sobriety?  That message seemed too often lost with people believing that the loving hand of Christ will see them through.  Frankly I never saw this attitude as an act of faith.  It was hoping for an easy way out.  The easy way is more like heading out the door.  Walk to the nearest liquor store.  Check the label of your beverage, making sure you get the most alcohol for your buck.  Find a bush to sit behind.  Now proceed to drink yourself sober.  If that doesn’t work, there’s always a meeting at hand where you can keep coming back.

Love,

          Dad

Good Morning Jacob...

Letter to my Son
Sunday, 12 January

Genius can afford to be eccentric

Good Morning Jacob…

The sun doesn’t rise unless there’s someone there to see it.  You can’t ignore a big production and expect it to take place without the fanfare of appreciation, even if it’s only a birdbrain rooster clearing its throat.  That’s the way the universe works.  Prove me wrong if you don’t believe it.  Could you hand me that?  I believe it’s my drink.

I was beyond remembering the night before.  Whatever happened never took its required place in my memory.  Once I awoke the following morning the first thing I did was go to the window and see if my car was there.  Was it in one piece?  And what of the people I made myself known to the prior evening?  I should prepare my apologies, whatever they might need to be.  I could have done or said most anything imaginable.  My sober mind would have cringed at my insulting and boorish manner, but drunk, I would have considered my remarks stringently witty, if not downright welcomed for being so obviously necessary.

I put down the drink a long time ago and the chaos of my life has been lifted but the nature of my personality remains fiercely intact.  It’s just better caged.  That’s good enough for me.  I’m not working on changing who it is I am.  It would be like substituting someone else’s version of life for mine and I don’t see that a winning point.  We respect others while remaining true to our essential nature.  People aren’t required to accept our authentic selves but we do ourselves a favor by limiting our real friendships to those that truly know us.  We tend to the business of living our life as best we can and leave to society how they choose to value our contribution. 

Governments are always busy mediating the boundaries that protect individual rights while ensuring the stability of society.  Culture, history and contemporary context all help determine the extent of our freedom to pursue our desires and promote our beliefs.  We make ourselves known, letting others observe and judge for themselves the validity of our chosen practices.  Unless the spirit of the individual is repressed this scenario will make for a noisy affair.  The many conflicting points of view will be passionately debated.  What we have created in a healthy society is a marketplace of individual ideas endlessly seeking validation.

How annoying it can be to hear so many arguments for ways of living that go against my own common sense.  I smother my outrage.  It’s quite apparent to me the life I’ve chosen for myself has very little appeal for the vast majority of the people around me.  Should I take offense to this?  Why?  Fortunately we are not all shaped from the same cookie cutter.  A society made exclusively of people like me would soon starve.  My attitudes and skills are at best a fringe benefit to the population of this tribe.  There is need for very few people like me.  But it is good that I am represented because I believe diversity is fundamental to human success.   Look at all the niches human society fills.  We didn’t get to where we are by practicing herd behavior. 

We all have traits clearly meant for us and they do not transfer well to those we know.  This has a lot to do with what it means to be human.  Not everything about us is admirably polished on close examination.  We have our quirks.  They can be surprisingly useful.  Every individual known to history has oddities that are familiar to all.  They may seem laughable at times but I suspect our peculiarities are often unrecognized contributors, instrumental in making for brilliant and heroic acts.

Love,

           Dad

Good Morning Jack...

Letter to my Son
Sunday, 8 December

C a d e

Cade couldn't find his car so he figured it had been stolen and, for now, he’d leave it at that.  He’d been drinking pretty heavy the night before at a bar that must have served food.  Cade figured that out because when he went to leave he couldn't find the exit and he wound up in what looked to be a kitchen.  The people stopped what they were doing and Cade just mumbled “Can’t find my way out” before a big man came to escort him to the street.  Somehow he must have walked his way home because here he was in his own room, just like always.  He put himself together and went out into the morning to bring the car back.  The trouble was he couldn't find where he had been until he found the car.  That’s the way it worked.  He spent a good deal of time walking up and down streets, having no luck.  So he decided it must have been stolen.  It wouldn't surprise anyone.  It was that kind of neighborhood.  Too bad, really.  He didn't have insurance.  The good news was he was a few payments behind to the bank and it wouldn't be long before it was gone anyway.  So, good riddance. 

Cade found a phone and called Janice.

“Here’s the deal, Honey.  The car’s been stolen but I’ve still got the U-Haul.”

“What about Wyoming?”

“Looks like that’s out for now, doesn't it?”

“Yeah, whatever.  Look, we going to the zoo today, or what?”

“Sure we are, so long as you don’t mind riding in a truck.”

Cade knew Janice wouldn't care.  She’d put up with a lot worse in the years she’d spent with him.  A woman could only put up with so many meals of pinto beans topped with Thousand Island dressing before she decided she was due greener pastures.  Now here she was with Bill.  He had a steady job, a real home and a nice car.  They went out and spent money on Friday and Saturday nights, just like real couples do.  It was a good setup for her except it turned out Bill was a mean drunk and that caused problems.  All and all, though, Janice figured she’d never had it so good.  She was determined she’d make it work.  Cade wished her well, and meant it, because his plans never included her, anyway.  She was a crazy chick and, once he’d worked his way through this rough spot, she would have just been in the way.  There was a time when Cade and Janice were only for each other.  They’d be up all hours of the night talking the real talk you couldn't make with anyone else.  It was a short-lived incandescence.  What they discovered about each other wasn’t nearly as important as what it is they thought about themselves.  They were headed for different horizons.  Janice could always touch and feel what she wanted.  Cade always knew whatever he sought couldn't be here.

“I got us a joint.”

“Janice, you've just made my day.”

“So I figured.”

“What’s better than seeing an elephant totally stoned?”

“How about a giraffe?  God must have been toking when he came up with that design.”

“Laughing his ass off the whole while.”

“Yeah, well he saved his best laugh when he created us.”

“You talking about you and me or are we now considering the whole human race?”

“What’s the difference?”

“Blow me and I’ll let you know.”

“If you can find it I will.”

Cade laughed and farted.

“Farts of Fury”, he choked out through his laughter.

“We talking the original movie or the sequel?”

“Let me think.  It’s the sequel – ‘No longer silent but just as deadly’”.

“Get out of here.”

After a time Cade and Janice moved to the patio with a bag of Doritos in hand.  They sat at the table with a large umbrella stuck through its center and starred at the birds flitting about their feet.  Janice had crumbled a chip and tossed it about the ground and now there were little birds hopping all around them. 

“So how about the zoo?”

“How about Saturday?”

“Jesus, Cade.  Why you here?  It’s now.”

“Aren’t we having a good time?”

“You know, you’re an ass.  You never carry through with anything.  You ever figure that?  I should have known.  You smoke a joint, you plant roots.  Zombie man.  Hey everyone, look at the Zombie Man sitting here under several layers of dust.”

“Hey Janice, we’re going.  I’m just messing with you.”

“Stop screwing with me – Loser.”

“You hurt my feelings, Janice.  I love you Janice.  No one hurts my feelings as good as you.”

“Shut up.”

“You taking your camera?”

“Always – binoculars, too.”

“You’re beautiful Janice.”

“You’re stoned.  Let’s go.”

Cade thought how beautiful she was.  They would have a good time at the zoo.  Tomorrow he would find his car.  He would move to Wyoming.  The sky was so magnificent there.  Things were finally coming together.  It was just a matter of time.  He knew it would all come true.