so things are looking up.
after much deliberation, much sleeping, much not answering the phone, and then much asking for help, there seems to be a crack in the cloud cover as of last night.
I've been going through this imbalance stage, where I'm jumping from thing to thing and just really not evening out at all. all one type of meeting, all... all all-or-nothing with everything. I've been told that it seems like I'm looking for something, which is true. I'm just not sure what. that part will take care of itself. anyway, the closest that I can come to the truth is that I'm dealing with the backlash of said imbalance, which I have already taken physical steps to correct. I started doing that about a week ago. but I'm still feeling the effects, like little aftershocks I suppose. so the prescribed remedy, to take care of the little things, is to look at them. there's a handful of things that I've been doing that I need to stop doing, and a handful of things that I haven't been doing that could use some doing. so I'm going to make some lists, check them twice, and see how it goes. more reports to follow, I'm sure.
of more important standing is the fact that a good friend of mine got drunk on friday. he'd been having some problems in his marriage, which he was sort of dealing with and sort of not. kind of going through some of the same exact stuff I was going through with george. the stuff that I think would have gotten me drunk eventually had I not had that breakdown in my driveway - he's got some of the same stuff, just in a different arena. and he's pulled away a little bit, I hadn't seen him at the meetings a lot of us go to as frequently, but I usually chalk that up to people being in a different rotation. anyway, he went to a concert on friday and got drunk. just like that. and he's already smoking crack, which was my biggest concern when I heard he drank, because he's more of a crackhead than he is a drunk.
I have to pause here to explain, to the perusing strangers, that we are not talking about robert downey jr. in less than zero, which I coincidentally was watching saturday night around 2 am. we are talking about a guy that started there and has worked a program for the last four years, has been in recovery and making use of a 12 step kind of life - with a wife, a house, a few suits, and a nice ride. not the guy sleeping in the park.
yet.
so we go from zero to sixty in one night. I'm assuming that, since he was high so quickly, that the crack probably happened on the way home, which proves the stuff they talk about in meetings about how we pick up right where we left off - it doesn't take another ten years to get as bad as it did.
and this all scares the shit out of me. we look back and go well, he wasn't doing this or that, because no one does it perfectly, and I wonder if I'm living the kind of life where people would say that about me. it's been a while since we - a bunch of us that have been sober for a few years - have taken a hit like this, not since sharon blew four years and sue blew seven has it happened so suddenly. but we all saw it coming, like the dream where you can't run, like being tied to the train tracks. slow motion accidents.
so I'm writing on a monday. I'm repairing, regenerating, getting by with a little help from my friends. sobbing, feeling, walking through things - and I've been to the gym three out of the last four mornings. I'm going to start a progress chart soon.
I'm glad that wine doesn't feel like drinking stars anymore. I've got kristin on the other end of the line for when I need to feel like that.
xo
~vvb
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