The Best Man

Some more reflections on the travails of my lawyer friend . . .

We had been out of touch for several years when I ran into him in The Old City.  I was reasonably new to recovery at that point and I was thrilled to hear that he had parlayed a DUI into a trial run at The Fellowship.  Alas, like many of us, he couldn't abide the work and the discipline that our way of life entails.   Drunks don't like to be told what to do and some of us draw a line in the sand.  While we take great pains to allow our members to find their own path to recovery there is, after all, a general framework.  We don't propose that this framework is for everyone - if you can sober up somewhere else by all means do it - but it's kind of what you need to do if you want any success in The Fellowship.

It would like going to yoga class to get in shape and bitching a blue streak about having to do yoga.

He invited me over to his apartment for an evening.  I don't remember too much about that night - unusual for a guy who can recall past events in great detail - but I have no recollection that it was fun or pleasant.  I was with a guy who was adamantly anti-Fellowship and I hadn't been sober long enough to withstand his withering assaults with any equanimity.

He floored me by asking me to be the Best Man at his wedding.  I hadn't yet developed the sense of self that I would have needed to politely decline - the ability to say No is one of the most important skills I've learned in Recovery.  I didn't want to do it, I'll tell you that much.  In retrospect I have to assume that he didn't have anyone else to ask - we burn through our friends when we're drinking.  

As you might imagine the wedding was a slow-motion train wreck.  I knew his parents and siblings reasonably well from our high school days, and they were barely civil.  Clearly furious about something they all stormed out very publicly shortly after the reception began.  As the best man I had to give a toast.  As I walked up to the microphone I had to fend off glasses of champagne and then glasses of sparkling something or the other, ending up with a goblet of water - I didn't want anything alcoholic or pretend-alcoholic in my hand.  I said some things that were probably inappropriate - I hadn't seen the guy in 10 years and anything I could say about his past was not for general consumption, especially with children present.  I don't know a lot about toasts but I don't think you're supposed to curse.

When I was done, sweat pouring off of my face, I glanced over at the band, and saw that the bass player was a friend of mine from The Program.  He smiled and nodded and I was never so glad to get a smile and a nod.  It helped ground me for the rest of the torture-fest.

I say this again: I get comfortable in my recovery sometimes and forget that the disease can take people down.