Connections over time

 Oh  man, I've had an emotion-packed weekend. Several months ago I was asked to speak at Summerfest, an AA/Alanon conference in Eugene, Oregon. I obsessed a bit, like I do, wanting to do right by the program, and on Sunday, did my best in the moment. True to form, there were three talks - the stellar pitch I gave while on a long walk last week, the actual talk, and the "coulda, shoulda,woulda" on the drive home. And...I gave myself permission to fret for the rest of Sunday, and then "poof" let it go into the Universe. I doubt that anyone else was thinking, "She really should have said _____" or "Gosh, she left out _____." Relieve me of the bondage of self.

Above all, way above all, were the connections made at the conference - old and new. The other speakers were great - it's fun meeting fellow members from around the country, sharing ideas and experiences. We have a good friend in Eugene, a good friend we often just connect with at the conference (I love our AA friendships that can go months without talking and then pick right up where we left off). We shared a meal and laughs and several conversations with her and another friend - equally fun to introduce friends to each other. And, to run into a friend of a friend, who got her pal on the phone in order to listen in on the workshop I did on relationships (Hi V!)

Friday evening, the local pal walked me over to introduce me to a good friend of hers. As we said our "hello's" I looked very closely at her husband, and with a couple of questions, realized he was the spouse of a dear supervisor in my early work life who died far too young of ovarian cancer, probably 35 years ago. I think of her often, and had frequently wondered what ever happened to her husband who walked those final months with her - and there he was. I cried just a little, and he may have too, as I told him how much I'd loved Kathy. To another friend, who also knew her, I said, "Higher Power in the house," to which she replied, "Always is." Always is, making connections, providing just the right reading or conversation or river path or seemingly chance encounter that reminds me I'm not in charge.

After my talk Sunday morning, two fellows I'd known through another couple, both now deceased, came up for hugs and memories. And then another friend of my closest friend was there for a hug, showing me photos on his phone of me and my bestie in the 1990's. Oh my, we were young.

The topping on the cake was when a young woman stood in front of me and I realized she was the daughter of another close friend, now with nearly 18 months clean & sober after years of struggle, years of her two dads' struggles and prayers, years of in and out, now in a speaker meeting with her daughter and grandchild, and working at a treatment program. I've known this woman since she was a little girl, and while not directly impacted by her disease progression, was well aware of the hell she and her parents went through. Higher Power in the house - the Universe's timing, not ours.

Last week, as I packed for the weekend away, I started to cry with gratitude, thinking of the shivering denizen I once was - the "we don't get here from there." Recovery has given me a full and rich life, not without heartaches and challenges, but a beautiful life of being present, a life of strong friendships, a life of service in one form or another. I never would've imagined the gifts I have today when I stopped on the Sunset Pass on the way to treatment to shoot up for the last time. Grateful doesn't being to describe how I feel. 

And, back to reality, I treated myself to a massage in an effort to get out of my head and back into my body - it can be hard to stay in busy-mind when my tight hamstrings are being stretched. So, back to reality with an eye to intentionally leaving space in my weeks - space for the slowing-down garden, the closet that needs attention, just sitting. I know I keep returning to this theme. As a friend told me years ago, I'll keep getting the lesson until I learn the lesson. 

What lessons are on repeat for you? Can you give yourself grace as you trudge the road? How does gratitude show up in your life today?

 * * * * *

Feeling like an inventory, or a deeper dive into your program? The NOW WHAT workbook is 78 pages of topics and processing questions, great for solo exploration or in a small group. Go to the WEB VERSION of this blog page for the link on ordering (PDF for those outside the U.S., or who prefer it, or hard copy mailed to you). 

Contact me at SoberLongTime@soberlongtime.com or shadowsandveins@gmail.com with questions. A reminder that the workbook is available at Portland Area Intergroup, 825 NE 20th. for local folks. And Jackie, of TMar, has a supply as well, if you're at a conference where they have a table

Time...

 Last weekend, the Lloyd Center mall here in Portland closed after sputtering along the last few years. When built in 1960, it was the largest mall west of the Mississippi, and as a kid, offered a myriad of opportunities for fun and mischief and everything in-between. My cousins and I slid down the garbage chute in the big department store, waded in the fountain, slid down the escalator railings. My first date with my first  husband was there, and very likely, our last meal out together in the food court before the pandemic shut everything down. Last week, six of us who'd gone to grade school and high school together wandered the nearly empty hallways, remembering, laughing, getting misty with the sheer volume of memories. 

And soon, something else will take its place, and we old timers will drive by and say, "Remember when..." like we do at the site of a neighborhood high school that was torn down, the space where my first apartment burned down, and on and on. Years ago, my boss and I were on a work trip in Maine, and when asking for directions, the old guy we talked to said, "You turn where the Dunkin Donuts used to be." I can relate.

We spent the weekend in Seattle to attend a friend's wedding, a friend of a friend I first met at the San Antonio International in 2010. It was a sweet service, and very cool to meet several other AA folks with 40+ years, and several more in the 30's. I love seeing us out and about, living the dream(s) of long term sobriety (which includes the rollercoaster of good and not so good life-on-life's-terms). 

And on Monday, my closest friend, the friend who left treatment when I'd been there a mere 5 days, celebrated 41 years of continuous sobriety, one day at a time. As I tell him, my recovery wouldn't have been the same without that chance meeting that led to living together briefly (twice), travels, meetings and more meetings, losing loved ones, breakups and make-ups, moving and staying put and on and on. Much has changed in our lives over the years, but our friendship as well as our commitment to the 12 Step way of life has not. "Stick with the winners" applies as much today as it did at the beginning. 

It is the connections over time that prompt my gratitude, from the casual to the intense. In a recent meeting, a couple of people shared about having had time, going out, and now trying to make their way back. I hope to never have that experience - obviously for the pain of active addiction, but hugely for the people. What would I do without you? 

How would you describe the gifts of long-term sobriety? If, like many of us, you came to AA to get the heat off, what have been the unexpected joys of a life in recovery?

 * * * * *

Feeling like an inventory, or a deeper dive into your program? The NOW WHAT workbook is 78 pages of topics and processing questions, great for solo exploration or in a small group. Go to the WEB VERSION of this blog page for the link on ordering (PDF for those outside the U.S., or who prefer it, or hard copy mailed to you). 

Contact me at SoberLongTime@soberlongtime.com or shadowsandveins@gmail.com with questions. A reminder that the workbook is available at Portland Area Intergroup, 825 NE 20th. for local folks. And Jackie, of TMar, has a supply as well, if you're at a conference where they have a table

Letting Go

 I attended one of those meetings last week that caused me to catch my breath with recognition, the connections available despite my thinking I'm the only one - the only one who forgets to turn it over, the only one who is sick and tired of thinking about my weight/diet/fitness, the only one who is face-to-face with the aging process. It has felt for awhile now that a shift is due, but a shift from what, a shift to what? I've long described myself as someone who'd rather be busy than bored, but that no longer seems to fit. But if that doesn't, what does?

Is all this merely the continued settling in to being retired? The deeper understanding that I'm now in my (early) 70's? The desire for space in my days? The chair person last week said that she tells herself to bring curiosity and oxygen to the situation (whatever that is). Ah yes. Relax and take it easy. Take a breath. Stay open to whatever is on the horizon. Call on gratitude for the whole of it. 

I mentioned my general dis-ease to a friend as we were leaving a meeting and she exclaimed,  "Oh! I love a spiritual nudge!" pointing out that I will know what I need to know when I know it. Maybe the "letting go" isn't necessarily about something specific but about letting go of the whole darn day. I can do the "upon awakening" routine, set an intention, and then proceed. Chop wood and carry water. 

On another note, sort of, a friend who is in her fifties was talking about aging and how for those of us who did not have children, the timeline feels different. Lacking all the markers of children- starting school, finishing school, getting married, becoming a grandparent Etc - can feel like we are in perpetual, if not adolescence, at least younger adulthood. That was exactly the topic for my Master's thesis way back in the year 2000- the idea that our culture continues to view the life narrative of adult women as being synonymous with motherhood. How do we, men and women,  measure time if not parenting? I can "borrow" a friend's journey, noting when they become grandparents for example as a reflection of aging perhaps, and my own creaky knees. And then there's recovery and our noting of time passing, time passing as a sober person, living longer than we'd likely anticipated.  

I'm a bit off- center this week. My new and old computers are in the shop undergoing the tech equivalent of a Vulcan Mind Meld. Yeah, sure, the smart phone is great, but I'm accustomed to the bigger screen and keyboard (yes, a luxury problem). And, our city has one of the worst air quality in the US due to wildfire smoke, with strong recommendation to stay indoors as eerie light filters through the windows. I can write a gratitude list z that I have an indoors to stay in, a computer to take to the shop, a working phone, doing my best to stay in the moment. Onward!

When did you last feel a spiritual nudge, and where did that lead? How do you let go when you notice your fists are tight? What's on your gratitude list today?

Family, of chance and of choice

A friend, new to retirement, and I have started a weekly walk and coffee habit, solving the problems of the world (or at least, sharing our opinions!). I like our new ritual. It can be too easy to one day think, "I haven't actually talked with anyone in person other than my spouse and the grocery clerk for weeks! That's part of why I'm glad to be back at an in-person AA meeting (and my in-person Alanon), as well as summer music-in-the-park that several friends and I attend. As my introvert brother might say, I don't need a lot of people, but I do need them every so often. I am very grateful for the technology that lets me have daily contact with two good friends who live elsewhere, and, face-to-face keeps me tethered to the here and now.

The in-person friend sometimes asks, "So what are you doing the rest of the day?" Uh, taking a nap and cleaning the kitchen? Hitting an online meeting and watching Jeopardy? Not all that exciting, and I'm getting more and more OK with that. 

My dad's sister had six kids, and from my age 8 forward, we lived near each other. The two youngest girls were my best friends, one in grade school and one in high school and beyond (that shifted when she got married and had kids and I got strung out). In any event, of the original six, just three are alive, and the remaining brother and his wife are moving to the southeast to be near their daughters and grandkids. That seems to be what people do. He and I don't see each other much, every few months at our cousin's brunch, but I'll miss his being near - he who walked me down the aisle when I got married, and who once drove four hours to surprise my mom with a "happy birthday." 

Dad's sister was my mom's best friend.. Over the years, after out mothers died, we cousins drifted - some moving away, busy lives, our social and political beliefs on different paths - and yet, we've maintained a connection born of history. And, as I keep noting, the beat goes on. On the other side of the family, Mom's sister's son moved closer once his mother passed - he and I see each other monthly during symphony season (he's a subscriber). There are other cousins on that side that, once their mother died, I knew I'd likely never see again. History matters, and not having reproduced, all those family stories mean less. Interesting to contemplate my foremothers and fathers, and no one to pass the family lore on to (which is why I donated a lot of my mother's papers, photos and artifacts to the Museum of the Oregon Territory) Funny enough, neither my brother or I, or Dad's half-brother's daughters have had kids. Some Freudian something-or-other there, I'd imagine, or maybe an unconscious desire to stop the family disease in its tracks.

What does all this have to do with recovery? My cousin moving has me thinking about family and what that means. In recovery, we talk about Family of Chance vs Family of Choice - I feel lucky that I do like my birth family, but in many respects, over the years I feel closer to my12 Step family (as well as my bestie, who's been in my life since we were 18). Kind of like birthdays - sure, the belly-button birthday means something, but it is my sober-versary that is the bigger deal. My birth family knows my history (and participated in much of it), but/and it is my sober friends who have walked with me in the day-to-day.

After thinking about family and history and connections over time, I came across the following:

 Yes. They'll forget us. Such is our fate, there is no help for it. What seems to us serious, significant, very important, will one day be forgotten or will seem unimportant. And it's curious that we can't possibly tell what exactly will be considered great and important, and what will seem petty and ridiculous...   Anton Checkhov

More and more I find myself contemplating my mortality, triggered by many in my age range who are doing the same (and writing brilliantly about the shifts in consciousness). What will seem important when I get to the end? Probably not the externals - the education or career, the travel, the marathons, other than how they've indicated my priorities... What I'd hope to leave as legacy is kindness, connection, an example of walking the talk. We humans want to know that we mattered, that our time on earth was more than just a blip, more than just taking up space. We used to do an exercise in treatment where clients wrote their own obituary. What might mine say? I've seen wonderful obits in the newspaper about sober AA's, those that don't mention recovery, and those strangers that do list alcoholism as the cause of death (GSO in NY has guidance on how to handle a person's AA membership in an obituary). Grateful that, just for today, I have the opportunity to contribute to what my legacy might be. But, who knows? In the meantime I'll continue to suit up and show up for whatever the day may bring. 

How have your daily routines changed over the years? How has the idea of Family of Chance/Family of Choice played out in your recovery?  My mother wrote out her own obituary, wanting to make sure we didn't leave anything out. What would you write?

 * * * * *

Feeling like an inventory, or a deeper dive into your program? The NOW WHAT workbook is 78 pages of topics and processing questions, great for solo exploration or in a small group. Go to the WEB VERSION of this blog page for the link on ordering (PDF for those outside the U.S., or who prefer it, or hard copy mailed to you). 

Contact me at SoberLongTime@soberlongtime.com or shadowsandveins@gmail.com with questions. A reminder that the workbook is available at Portland Area Intergroup, 825 NE 20th. for local folks. And Jackie, of TMar, has a supply as well, if you're at a conference where they have a table