Ralphie and The Mouse

An anecdote . . . 

Ralph is one of my neighbors here in our Older Persons community.  I like Ralphie just fine.  He and I are both swimmers so I run into him in the pool in the morning.  Ralphie is a raging extrovert and a bitcher.  Ralphie bitches about everything.  When there's something he doesn't like in the community he tells the harried site manager in-person and follows this up with an email to her AND to her boss.  As you can imagine he's not a favorite of the site manager.  He's also a great repeater of stories so I get to hear about the things that he's upset about over and over.  I could care less about most of these things.  To me they're incredibly minor.  I don't care how often the garbage can in the exercise room is emptied.  So I sit in the hot tub with a vacant look on my face and nod over and over, like one of those novelty dogs you see on the back ledge of old sedans.

Today, as I tried to sneak past the exercise room (he rides a stationary bike before getting into the pool) he waves me in.

"Hey," he says.  "I was in here yesterday and there was a rat in the pool."

"No way," I said, glad that if I was going to hear about some minor infraction it had an arresting beginning.

"Yeah," he continues.  "I get into the pool and there's this rat swimming around, trying to get out.  So I go into the clubhouse and get a cup and fish him out and toss him onto the pool deck.  The son of a bitch turns around and gets back into the pool.  Then it heads for the deep end, swimming underwater."

I don't have a lot of rat background knowledge.  I'm imagining one of those huge brown or black rats you see in horror films.  

Ralphie then tells me that he shrugs and swims his laps.  

"You're kidding me," I say.  I'm trying to imagine this overweight old guy swimming so slowly I have no idea how he stays up, in the pool with a huge black rat that is swimming around underwater, like some rogue Soviet-era mini-sub.

"Yeah," he continues. "So when I'm done I scoop him up again, toss him back on the deck, and the son of a bitch makes a beeline for the sauna and dives right in."

"You.  Are.  Making.  This.  Up," I said.  I think he was trying to be semi-serious, trying to get me to finally show some outrage over the problems in the community,  but with each turn of the tale I broke into laughter.

"Yeah," he says.  "But when I get over there?  No rat."

We walk over to the hot tub and look down.  It is rat-free.  

I said: "See that plastic disc inset into the concrete over there?  There's a filter basket under it.  It filters out stuff from the hot tub.  Maybe the rat got sucked into the recirculation intake."  Fair disclosure: I made all that stuff up and I had no idea what was in there.  I encouraged him to investigate.  He prys open the lid and peers in.  He gets a stick and prods around.

"Just stick your hand in there," I suggested helpfully, moving to the other side of the hot tub.

There the little guy was, swirling around.  Looked like a mouse to me.

Here in California, the two rat species that invade homes and businesses most often throughout the year are Norway rats and roof rats.  Both of these rodent species will eat anything from fruits and grains to meats and even insects!

Our Hats Are Off

Sometimes when I'm just sitting here I'm being productive.

I believe that The Program allows you to become the person you were always meant to be.  It takes a while.  When I was getting sober you couldn't get me to say anything in a social situation and now you can't get me to shut up.  I believe that today, more or less and for better or for worse, I'm the man I was meant to be.  Very satisfying and very terrifying.

Good leader at the morning meeting today.  He's a man I met when we first moved to SoCal.  I liked him immediately while simultaneously thinking: "I don't think this dude quite understands what we're trying to accomplish here yet."  I was right - he went back into the gloaming, drank for a while and staggered back in with an earnest vengeance.  He's cooking with gas right now.

For those of us bedeviled with anxiety alcohol was a tremendous discovery.  It worked - it really did! - even while I vaguely sensed I was being none too smart.  It's like shooting a syringe full of novocaine into the damaged knee of a running back and telling him to get back on the field.  He could do it but it wouldn't work out well for him in the long run.  It takes a lot of diligent effort to overcome our anxieties like . . . you know . . . normal human beings.  It's not helpful to overwhelm them with drugs and alcohol and simply pretend that they don't exist.  That's just nudging the problems further down the road and hoping that they magically absolve themselves all on their own.  Sometimes waiting is a good strategy but often it is not.

When I drank I was tired all the time but slept poorly at night.  I had to drink to doze off - which was less and less effective the longer I drank - and then the hangovers made me lethargic the next day.  A good strategy for being miserable all the time.  Today I sleep like a dead man and I'm disturbingly chipper when I'm awake.

Don't worry about saying good things in a meeting.  No one is listening to you.  They're thinking about themselves.  They're formulating their remarks.  You aren't as important to them as they are to them themselves.  One of my earliest leads at a meeting was at a halfway house in Cincinnati.  I was standing on a dais in front of 50 or 60 guys.  At the time I was even more terribly impressed with myself than I am today, also a disturbing thought.  I was going to rock the crowd with my profound insights on recovery.  The scales were going to fall from their eyes and everyone would get sober.  They'd talk about this "amazing guy who told me what recovery was meant to be" for years and years.  What I didn't realize was that attendance at the meeting was mandatory.  If it had been voluntary there would have been about 5 people there.  So when I started to share it was immediately obvious that no one was listening save for a few dudes in the front row.  And I don't mean they were politely sitting there - people were talking, sleeping with their heads down on a table, reading the newspaper, playing cards.  I was really knocked off my feet for a couple of beats before I remembered that the lead was for me - it was me telling my story so that I could hear it.  Me staying sober was the only important thing about that lead.  I am always hopeful that someone likes what I say but the important thing is me staying sober.  When I say that I'm an alcoholic it isn't for your benefit - it's an auditory reminder that I need to hear often.

"If anyone who is showing inability to control his drinking can do the right-about-face and drink like a gentlemen, our hats are off to him."  Big Book, More About Alcoholism, P. 31.

I need to remember that I'm not in charge of saving anyone.  We shouldn't tell someone that they have to stop drinking.  Because they don't.  But if they want to stop drinking then we can show them a Program that has had some pretty good success.  I'm happy to talk to someone who has been dabbling in Alcoholics Anonymous but I draw the line at initiating the contact - if you're drinking, fine, but you're on your own.

Meditation, Baby

 I went to a 11th Step Meditation meeting this morning where several passages that emphasize prayer, meditation, and/or self-examination are read out of "As Bill Sees It."

You want a good meeting?  Read out of the books . . . .

Here are some of the principles mentioned in today's passages that resonated with me . . . 

Our troubles are not something to get upset about.  Everyone has troubles and that's that.  Troubles are part of life and I'm going to have them and so are you.  Moreover, if we look at troubles as a learning tool then we handle them better.  We know there's a lesson there that needs to be absorbed.  At the very least my surmounting my difficulties is going to make me uniquely positioned to help another alcoholic down the road.

There are some irritating people out there.  There are a ton of irritating people out there.  Most people are irritating.  I'm irritating most of the time.  Stop focusing on what you find irritating and, more importantly, stop trying to fix the other person.  That person is fine - the problem is with you.

Pausing when agitated.  Pausing is good.  Pausing is not overrated.  I've saved myself more problems by waiting a beat and then not saying or doing what I want to say or do.  Nobody wants to hear my opinion about anything.

Human nature steers us to problems and difficulties.  I really believe that unlike most of the crap I write.  It must be some innate, in-bred coping mechanism.

Sometimes when I pray I'm just saying the words.  I don't always believe what I'm saying or believe that the prayer is going to change anything.  The words - often used and much beloved - come out flat and listless.  No matter - it's like taking a bad swim.  A bad swim is better than no swim.  Even when the words don't have any real meaning I think saying them helps clear up a channel to my Higher Power that may be clogged with fear and frustration.

Do Be Do

"Psychologists are turning to religion because just knowing about ourselves is not enough.  We need the added dimension of faith in a power outside of ourselves on which we can rely.  And clergymen and rabbis are turning to psychology because faith is an act of the mind and will.  Religion must be presented in psychological terms to some extent in order to satisfy the modern person."

"Of necessity there will have to be discussion of matters medical, psychiatric, social, and religious.  We are aware that these matters are, from their very nature, controversial.  Nothing would please us so much as to write a book which would contain no basis for contention or argument."  Big Book, "There Is A Solution," P. 19

The founders must have spent a couple of hours bent over laughing uncontrollably, tears streaming down their faces, when they put these words down.  If you try to change the brand of coffee used at a meeting there will be much swearing and hard resentments, and a couple of bare-knuckled fistfights.  I can see members stiffen noticeably if someone says Jesus or Muhammad or The Buddha.  I hear intractable people maintain that any kind of medication, even those prescribed by a physician and given to people with a serious mental illness, disqualifies that person from sobriety.  So this is why we don't identify as a member of a particular religion or political party, we don't opine on gun control or abortion, we don't let any of these outside issues in.  We're amazed that this whole wonderful movement doesn't spin out of control and crash into the sun when we stay away from controversy - we can only imagine how short-lived A.A. would have been if we had been less strict.

Be:  To exist; to have real existence, to be alive.  (Ed. Note: I really like that the definition uses "real existence."  I assume this is to differentiate from fake existence.)

Do:  To perform the tasks or actions associated with (something).  (Ed. Note:  I really like that they add "something" to the definition.  Do something!  Do anything!  Just do it!)

"Refilling with the spirit is something you need every day.  For this refilling with the spirit, you need these times of quiet communion, away, alone, without noise, without activity."

Writing about my struggles with slowing down and waiting is going to be an eternal task.  It is deeply satisfying and deeply frustrating to go slow.  It feels like I'm not accomplishing anything.  I feel better when I go from here to there or when I can see tangible results of my efforts, like a poorly stained cedar deck. And this is even when the meditation, the sitting, the being, produces such great results.  I feel better even when I think I've done a shitty job of it.

Bupkis

 It has been quite a wild ride here.  Everything has been quite the wild ride.

I have been talking to people about the trip cancellation and their responses, by and large, validate why it is that we need to talk to people.  We introverts - we introverted alcoholics - cannot be trusted to be left alone with our brains.  I don't know what's going on up there, that's for sure.  It's a crappy neighborhood.

In my enfeebled state I've been picking up the pace on phone calls to my Alcoholics Anonymous friends.  When told of my plans to cancel our trip the response has been uniformly positive; as in "I'm glad to hear that" or "You're doing the right thing" or "I wondered if/when this was going to happen." 

"The serenity to accept the things I cannot change."  Makes me laugh at all my efforts over the last few days to make this happen.  I pushed and I pushed and I fingaled and compromised and tried to find wormholes to squirrel through to get my way and . . . pfft! . . . bupkis.  Now, in my defense, it is not a problem to keep after something - the problem is when you can't find a way through and up and over but you still insist on forcing the issue.   When I was laboring over the computer last night, frustrated and tense, it was as if a giant spotlight flicked on: "Huh.  I don't think I'm supposed to do this."  Like it was some giant revelation.  Like I was at my tenth baseball game when I hate baseball (not really - I love baseball), complaining that it wasn't a football game, when the realization came that I should stop going to the baseball stadium.  No amount of work or compromise could change this fact.

Willie Says!

 So . . . I'm having a little back issue here, not unheard of in a man of my advancing age.   Still . . . . I don't like it.  It is not what I want to have happen . . . to me.  Whenever anything like this happens I think of one of my favorite family of words: forever, never, always, etc. etc.  I can be a dramatic dude with a limited ability to put things in perspective.  Makes me think of that expression  ". . . the serenity to accept the things I cannot change."  It's a good expression.  Irritates the hell out of me most of the time because I'm a guy - we fix things.  We don't wait for things.  We're in ACTION.

We have a cactus in our front yard called an ocotillo.  It's a thin cactus that puts out a number of thin arms from its base that shoot straight up.  There is a humming bird that has decided that he or she is going to periodically sit on the very top of the tallest strand and look around as the cactus sways in the wind.  It's preposterous to look at but I think that ruby-throated hummingbird may be god.

I am also in the throes of cancelling a much anticipated hiking trip to England.  The entry requirements are just too onerous and malleable and confusing.  Take this test, take that test, self-quarantine, quarantine in a government approved lodging for 10 days at $1800 per person, everything changing almost day by day.  What happens if I test positive for CoVid before we leave or get the bug while I'm there or run into someone sick on the plane who is asymptomatic?  It reminds me of driving around without a seat belt on: I've never had a car accident so I assume my next trip will also be accident-free but - boy - what a chance to take with some potentially horrific consequences.

I was sitting at the computer yesterday trying to figure out how to navigate through all of the tests and requirements, frustrated as hell at all of the conflicting evidence, and I thought: ". . . the courage to change the things I can."  I started to cancel shit this morning.  I know, I know - dude doesn't get to go to England boo hoo hoo.  Still, a quality problem that is affecting me deeply.

I've told a few friends that the trip isn't happening.  On the phone today Willie says something along these lines: "Yeah, well, that's probably a good idea.  You're probably making a smart move."  This is why I talk to people - something that I can't see past or through is blindingly obvious to someone else who doesn't have any skin in the game.

Let There Be Light

God:  A deity or supreme being; a supernatural, typically immortal, being with superior powers, to which personhood is attributed.  E.G, Gawd!

Spiritual:  Of or pertaining to the spirit or the soul.

Soul:  The spirit or essence of a person usually thought to consist of one's thoughts and personality.  Often believed to live on after the person's death. (spooky.) 

This is a rabbit hole of ineffable dimensions and depth.  A most enjoyable rabbit hole.

From a treatise I've been studying that is discussing the connection between god, spirituality, and tech-generated Artificial Intelligence:

"Spirituality, whether pursued via faithfulness, tradition or sheer exploration, is a way of connecting with something larger than one's self."  I gotta tell ya . . . that is one of the best descriptions of spirituality I've ever heard.

"At the end of the day, A.I. is just a lot of math.  It's a lot, a lot of math.  It is intelligence by brute force, and yet it is spoken of as if it were semi-divine."  Tech worker.  It's interesting to think about computer algorithms, learning at the speed of electricity, watching you type on your computer, learning, learning, remembering everything, everything, then taking that information and delivering content back to you to influence how you behave.  Is that god-like?  Is it smarter than you?  Or are you merely being overwhelmed by the brute force of electronic computing power?  In any case something more powerful than you is directing how you behave and how you react to things.  That's pretty powerful.

Issac Asimov and an adapted science fiction story:  "A group of scientists create an A.I. system and ask it, 'Is there a god?'  The A.I. spits out an answer: 'Insufficient computing power to determine an answer.'  They add more computing power and ask again, 'Is there a god?'  They get the same answer.  Then they redouble their efforts and spend years and years improving the A.I.'s capacity.  Then they ask again,"Is there a god?'  The A.I. responds, 'There is now.' "

"One of the fundamental functions of A.I. is to create groups and to create categories, and then to do things with those categories.  Traditionally, religions have worked the same way.  You're either in the group or you're out of the group.  You are either saved or damned."  So is your computer your god?  Is it telling you how to think?  Are you trying to please your computer?  You're telling me you have trouble with the concepts of powerlessness and a power greater than yourself while you blithely stare at your computer screen?  Please.  Can you even hear yourself talking?

In the Bible the first act of God was to create light.  "Let there be light."  God did this.  God created this light.  Today, I can lounge in my barcalounger and tell Siri or Alexa to turn on the light and the light is turned on.  With my voice.  Am I god?  Am I God?  All was in darkness and then there was light.

I might be god.  I don't think I'm the only god but I may be one of them.