LITMIR.BIZ

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she managed to drive down the road about a mile to an all-night diner. As she was leaving the diner, a New York State trooper observed her car weaving and pulled her over. Her driver's license indicated that she was from New York City and her past experience had told her that New York State troopers are not overly fond of people from the city. He gave her a breathalyzer test, which showed she was more than legally drunk. She knew that this was the end and we had finally been caught. She sat there waiting for the inevitable as the trooper called in her license on the radio.

      Suddenly, the trooper appeared at her window once more and handed back her license. He then pointed her in the right direction and told her to drive carefully. She couldn't believe what was happening, but she didn't stop to ask questions; she just got out of there as fast as she could. By all rights, we should have been arrested right then, but God felt we weren't quite ready and still needed more rope.

      We counted ourselves lucky and immediately left upstate New York. We decided we would be better off back in the city where we wouldn't stick out so much. About a week later, I found myself in an area of New York's Lower East Side nicknamed “Alphabet City” because the avenue names are letters of the alphabet—Avenue A, Avenue B, Avenue C. The further down the alphabet you go, the tougher the neighborhood gets. I was there to buy drugs. Normally, the police don't bother you there much, but that day they were doing one of their semiannual sweeps. I was arrested and taken to the Manhattan Criminal Courts building. I found myself lying on the floor of the jail cell, miserable and sick. Although I had given them a phony name, they took my fingerprints. I figured it was only a matter of time before they found out I was wanted by the Feds. But being caught wasn't on my mind. The only thing I could think about was how I was going to get through the night with nothing to ease the pain.

      The following morning, in a semidazed state, I was led through court and told by a court-appointed lawyer that if I would plead guilty they'd let me out for time served. Sounded like a deal to me and before I knew it, I was back on the street. I couldn't believe that they hadn't caught me. But God knew I wasn't ready and needed just a little more rope.

      A week later, my wife and I were back down in Alphabet City. We took a cab downtown and my wife held the cab on the corner while I went to buy what we needed. I got back into the cab with fifteen bags of dope in my pocket, and the cab driver suddenly turned around and looked directly at us. He said, “I was a slave to alcohol and drugs for twenty-five years, but I don't have to live like that any more because I have God in my life.” Oh great, I thought. This is just what I need. I can't wait to get back to do my dope, and this guy wants to talk about God. Then he looked right at us and asked, “Do you two want to stop?” and without a moment's hesitation we both said yes. He said, “Then let's join hands and pray and ask God to help you stop.”

      Now, when I had prayed before, I said something like, “Oh God, please make sure my contacts are there,” or “Oh God, please make sure he's got the stuff.” In fact, I'd often asked God to help me stay sick. I'd never thought of asking him to help me get well. Now the time was right. God had finally given me enough rope, and I was at the end of it. There in the back seat of that taxicab, with fifteen bags of dope in my pocket, holding hands with this cab driver whose name I didn't even know, I sincerely asked God to help me stop. I had finally surrendered.

      The very next morning, we were picked up by the federal marshals and taken away to start our prison sentences. Although I didn't know it at the time, this was the answer to my prayer. That was the last time I had a drink or a drug in what is now almost eighteen years.

      The two and half years that I spent in prison were a wonderful experience for me. It was there that I found Alcoholics Anonymous, the Twelve Steps, and a God of my understanding. It was there in prison, using the Steps, that I started to take responsibility for my life. For the first time, I was learning to like myself.

      The principles of Alcoholics Anonymous that I learned in prison and after I got out still guide my daily life. For my wife and me, Alcoholics Anonymous is the center of our lives. We are both active in corrections work, sharing our stories with those who are still incarcerated, and the message we bring to them is one of hope. We sponsor newcomers and do service at several different levels. It seems the more I give to Alcoholics Anonymous, the better my life gets.

      Today I have an incredible life in Alcoholics Anonymous. I have a beautiful family, run a successful business of my own, and am a useful and productive member of my community. Best of all, my life has meaning today. Alcoholics Anonymous has given me something of real value that I can share with others. I get to see God's grace changing their lives just as it did mine.

      Dennis W.

      Tucson, Arizona

Mama Tried

      July 2006

      I discovered alcohol at the age of thirteen, then drank as much as I could, as fast as I could, for the next ten years.

      I can't stop drinking once I start. So during that time, I found myself in jails in six different states and one intensive care unit, where I almost died of alcohol poisoning at fifteen. They were all alcohol-related incidents.

      Before I graduated from high school, I'd wrecked four cars. I drove one into the side of a factory in my hometown of Newton, Iowa. My nickname was "Crash.”

      A month after I graduated, I decided to appease my father by joining the Navy to “become a man.” My twenty-eight-month naval career helped introduce me to four of the six states mentioned earlier.

      One evening, on the USS Enterprise, I heard someone asking for me. I turned around to see two Masters-At-Arms. They took me into custody and I was charged with possession and distribution of a controlled substance. The court-martial took place when we returned to port in Alameda, California.

      I was convicted and celebrated my twentieth birthday in the brig at a place called Treasure Island. In Merle Haggard's song, “Mama Tried,” the lyrics say, “turned twenty-one in prison/doing life without parole/And there's no one for to blam/'cuz Mama tried.” God bless my mom. She had tried!

      Give an alcoholic enough rope, and he'll eventually hang himself.” While I awaited discharge, I was caught getting high one night in the barracks.

      “You're a drunk, a dope fiend, and a loser,” the commander shouted the next morning, “and I don't want you in my Navy!” Her daddy was an admiral and she meant it.

      I was used to that sort of reaction. My own dad had “kicked me out of the family” for being court-martialed. I had sullied his name for the last time. (Today, thanks to AA, we have a peaceable relationship.)

      I lasted three more years “out there.” At one point I even moved to Austin, Texas, in an attempt to find my birth mother (I'm an adoptee). If I just find my roots, I won't be such a drunk, I thought. Thank God, I didn't find her at that time.

      I came into the rooms for good on an October night in 1987. Stewart, a man who would become my sponsor, invited me to coffee, knowing I was sick and angry. Later, as he drove me to my apartment on Alcatraz Avenue (I'm not kidding), he pointed something out to me that I hope I never forget.

      “You know, Larry, it doesn't take a genius to walk out onto their back porch, look up at the stars, and snap to the fact that you, I, or any other human being could not have made all this.” I flashed on a starlit night from my childhood, riding with my parents in our Impala. I felt as if everything was happening very quickly and slowly at the same time. I didn't know what it meant at the time, but had held it in my mind until Stewart said those words.

      I laughed in response, and I had not laughed in a very long time. Next day, I asked him to be my sponsor. He said yes and gave me the flashlight and road map to work the Twelve Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous.

      Alcoholics Anonymous got my attention with the disease concept. All of my drinking life I had been told that I was a drunk and a loser. From the beginning, I accepted my inability to stop drinking once I started. I didn't know my body was physiologically different until I came to AA and heard about the physical allergy, coupled with the mental obsession. Without doubt,

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