The Angle of Repose

I had a guy in The Program do some work in my house recently. He was a nice man and his work was beyond reproach. This was important to us because he was rehabbing a job that had been done initially by someone who needed The Program but hadn't found his way into our midst yet, and whose work was extremely reproachful. There is nothing quite as distinctive as an alcoholic cutting corners and covering up deficiencies. We are good liars. We are good at the old misdirection play. Fake right, run left.

It was funny watching another perfectionist try to do a perfect job. Are alcoholics perfectionists, almost without exception? I think so. I see it all the time. My house is as old as sin and all you have to do is look around to find defects. It doesn't take a certified home inspector, I'll tell you that. I kept trying to convince this man that it wasn't important to bevel a baseboard that would be hidden behind the refrigerator and under several lbs. of dust bunnies, to NASA standards. I was going to pay him the same amount of money for Horseface standards -- quite low, by definition -- as I was for NASA standards. I'm lucky if I can get SuperK's shoes out of the doorway. I'm not worried about the bevel angle.

I like how the phrase "perfectionist with an inferiority complex" seems to describe a lot of alcoholics. I constantly set the bar higher no matter how many times I've achieved my goals. The result is that I always seem to be failing. If I need to dig 3 holes I go ahead and dig 4, then toss and turn all night because I didn't get that 5th hole dug. Eventually I get to the point where I'm knocking out 20 holes a day -- good, big, wide, deep holes -- and still tossing and turning all night. It's never enough with me.

Just do your best today. Screw it.