Becoming willing

Last night I was doing an H&I presentation in the county jail and I was babbling on about euphoric recall and how our brain seems to forget the bad stuff. Where I was going with that was how we have to retrain the process and think the relapse through in spite of our natural instinct to romance the dope. But instead I took a little pause and detour from the point and concluded this brain malady might be a good thing in some respects as without that natural reaction to painful situations we would probably blow our brains out at birth. All the women in the room burst out laughing as did my fellow message carrier. And I new at that moment I was in the right place as only a room full of dope fiends could laugh at visual that gruesome.

I was in rare morbid form last night. I'm always grateful for a low bottom, jails, institutions and near death. I know not everyone has to go to those extremes and can get off the elevator to the bottom any time. So I was informed. I was given the opportunity at 16 to stop my wild and wicked ways as my 12 steppen' uncle dragged me to a meeting. I was so repulsed by those old alkie women that tried to reach out, glasses half way down there nose and the knitting needles clickity clacking with a vengeance. That was all I could see... what made me different... coming from a mind full of contempt.(prior to investigation).

I didn't get this thing for another 17 years. All I could remember is how much I didn't want to be saved buy those... zealots. I was having a good time. I was tough. I would rather die then give up ... live fast, die young... yada yada yada... And I really don't remember when I turned the corner. Maybe when my mother died and my aunt had to have the police come to my house to tell me. I was phoneless. Had better things to spend my money on. I had fifty pounds of pot sitting around drying,stinking and a cop leaving a note telling me my mother was dead. I wouldn't answer the door. I wouldn't leave the closet I had barricaded myself in.

Thats one of these pivotal moments in my life. The gold star bottom. Not that I stopped that instant. But an instant of clarity I never want to forget. I was so estranged from my family of origin and my family of making(dope fiends)were falling by the wayside. I had woven myself into the pain of isolation and abandonment. All of my own making. I never want to forget that slice of life/death, as I reached the point of complete spiritual, mental, and emotional bankruptcy.

I became willing to see the powerlessness and unmanageability that had become my life. One of the moments of motivation to seek help. And I remembered the old woman with glasses. And I was beaten down and I was willing to go to any length even though I was still full of contempt. But I was becoming sick and tired of being sick and tired. I just needed a place to rest but I ended up finding a new way to live. How lucky is that.