Some Service Suggestions.

Serve: To do services or duties for; give service to; aid; assist; help: as, he served his country as a great statesman.


Yeah, that's the ticket. I'll serve as long as I can do it as a great something. I don't want to serve in a mundane fashion, helping someone unimportant as a humble and invisible servant, not receiving any praise or money or sexual favors. I'm always a little suspicious of the "great statesman as a servant" theme. I see men and women on TV, with their names in the paper, getting a lot of attention and public acclaim to be great servants, then leaving their service to the people of this great land to take a highly paid consultancy lobbying the people they just left. Not exactly the master washing the feet of the disciple.

SuperK and I were talking last night about how we can be of service to others. We aren't going to actually do anything, of course -- we're just going to talk about it, terribly impressed with our theoretical selflessness. We hypothesize it will be easier to do without the time constraints of a job, which is kind of true but also a convenient excuse for not being of service. She mentioned a friend who started to volunteer once he retired.

"Yeah, Ricardo went downtown and volunteered to read for the blind," she said.


"Read for the blind? What does that mean?" I asked. "Do you mean he read to the blind?"

"You are such a jerk," she said.


"It sounds like he is substitute reading for the blind," I replied. "It sounds like maybe the blind are tired or pissed off and don't want to read so he's stepping in and reading for them."


"I thought the blind had Braille," I continued, making my situation steadily worse. "Are the blind even there when he's reading for them? I don't see why they would have to be there. Maybe they could go do something important. Maybe Ricardo could just stay at home and read for them there."


"Shut up," SuperK said. "I'm trying to read the travel section of the New York Times."

I thought about it for a minute. "Maybe you and I could volunteer to hear for the deaf. Maybe we could smell for anyone who has lost the ability to smell. The possibilities are endless. I think we're really getting somewhere!" I shouted.

It was at that point that I noticed I was alone in the room.

This is going to be a little trickier than I thought.

Rational Lies

Rational: Of, based on, or derived from reasoning.
Lies: False statements or actions, especially one made with intent to deceive.
Rationalize: In psychology, to devise superficially rational, or plausible, explanations or excuses for (one's acts, beliefs, desires, etc), without being aware that these are not the real motives.

That may be the definition for rationalizing for a normally insane person but that is not how I approach the concept. I am perfectly capable of rationalizing what I know to be pure, unadulterated crap whipped up in the lab of a mad scientist. It's not often that I'm unaware that I'm doing it. I'm totally aware that I'm doing it. I enjoy doing it. It's my favorite hobby. It's a clever form of lying, and I have previously stated that I'm a great liar. If I could get paid for rationalizing my often ridiculous behavior I wouldn't even give notice at my current job, and I work for myself! I'd go right to Kinko's and get my business cards printed.

And while I normally pretend to allow other people to live their own lives and find their own way, I'll tell you that I see this in plenty of other recovering alcoholics. Maybe it's better when we know that we're doing it but, then again, maybe it's worse. How many times have I listened to some new guy try to spin some junk by me and thought: "No sense saying anything here because this dude believes what he's telling me. He's not lying -- he's delusional."


This is why I talk to my posse on the phone or over coffee so often. I want to see that look on their faces, that "You're going to do what now?" look. Man, do I ever know that look. It's not my favorite thing to see. But it's a look that tells me I'm trying to pull the wool over my own eyes.

Rationalize. Rational Lies. Not my play on words, actually. I read it in "The Grapevine," which is a great magazine.

I Hate . . . er, Love This Program

Honesty: A refraining from lying, cheating, or stealing.

Sometimes this Program blows me away.

I ran into Shorty and Mrs. Shorty while I was walking to the park this morning. Shorty abandoned his wife to join me which probably wasn't a good choice on his part. Although Mrs. Shorty looked quite relieved to escape his company so maybe I did her a big favor. Maybe he wanted to hook up with someone older so that he could show how fit he was. That wasn't happening mano a mano with his wife.

We were discussing pocketbook honesty. He told of having to call a retailer who mistakenly shipped an extra pair of pants with his order. I was having trouble with a situation where I was accepting a gift that I didn't have any intention of keeping. He thought that was dishonest on my part. I tried to get away from him but he was able to keep up. I didn't want the gift but didn't want to hurt the gifter's feelings. I didn't tell the gifter this, preferring to rely on my telepathic ability to talk to people without speaking. I figure if I think something with enough intensity everyone will pick up on my vibes. I can read your mind so you should be able to read mine.

We parted ways so that I could go to my Saturday morning meeting and out to lunch with a group of guys afterwards. I bought some bread and cheese and a yogurt, and a bottle of crap called Butterbur. I suffer from time to time with seasonal allergies and read in one of my hippie magazines that this alleviates symptoms. Probably not. I probably spent $20 on capsules filled with talcum powder or pencil shavings. I grated my teeth at the cost of the "medicine" but figured if it works it'll be better for me than ingesting manufactured chemicals. I did the math -- 30 cents a pill. A lot cheaper than the Quaaludes I used to buy.

So I got home and the dude behind the counter didn't charge me for the Butterbur.

I hate this Program sometimes.

I Must Be Doing It Wrong

I was reading the travel section of the New York Times today. I like to read and I like to travel so, naturally, I like to read about traveling. Not as much as the actual traveling but it's still pretty enjoyable. I'm not sure you could travel about reading. I'm not even going to try.

The great thing about reading is that you get to create your own mental image of something. Movies are great, too -- good ones, anyway -- but you are force fed the imagery. If the guy is skinny, the guy is skinny. The director wants you to see a skinny guy. The printed word lets you hallucinate up your own images. Now that I think about it, I like to hallucinate and I like to travel. I used to like to hallucinate while traveling but I don't do that anymore.

The writer was very good. She was describing a villa she rents every year in Italy. She describes the beautiful view and the wonderful day trips to impossibly cute towns and the fantastic meals of fresh food prepared simply and enjoyed with an endless stream of intimate friends.

I want to do this. I want to have the time and money to do it, and I want it to turn out exactly that way. Perfectly.

The author doesn't talk about mosquitoes or lumpy mattresses or boring dinner guests or how fucking expensive it must be to rent a villa in Italy, the bitch. And I don't draw that picture in my mind's eye. When I project myself out into the future, everything is a catastrophe. When I imagine someone else's life, I see no flaws.

That's messed up. I need to quit doing that.

Tree Man Redux

Nothing about Tree Man, then back to back posts.


One of the things that I have learned to do in my recovery is to try to take an interest in people I know. This is remarkably hard. I am in my essence concerned only with myself. Sometimes I feign interest in the affairs of others but not too often. I can generate some tepid interest when I think that someone else can do something to make my life easier or can remove some obstacle causing me pain. Otherwise, I can't manufacture much enthusiasm. Other people aren't me which is a flaw that is very difficult to overcome.

I've always liked the phrase "Walk the walk." I also like the concept of "Fake it 'till you make it." I've learned that if I put my intentions into action then my thinking starts to change. It's not clear to me when this happened. It's very subtle. It's like what occurred when I realized that I had overcome all of my huge objections to the idea of a god. I pretended like I believed and woke up one day, surprised that the concept had taken hold.



So Tree Man and I were chatting about life after a meeting. I'm older than he is -- a lot older, he would say, quite accurately and most irritatingly -- and have been sober longer so I was asking a lot of questions and I was genuinely interested in the responses. It's still weird for me to think that's the case. After a bit Tree Man asked:"So how's the swimming going?" Some of you may recall that I learned how to swim a while back and it was not pleasant going at the start. It was quite humbling, in fact.



I thought: "Aha! A question!" It was a beautiful thing. I believe that I should be able to walk into any A.A. meeting that I attend even sporadically and know a little something about most people there. It shows I'm listening to someone else instead of thinking about myself which is my favorite past time. I care about some people more than others -- a natural thing in this dude's world -- but I make the effort. And -- Voila! -- I find myself caring.


Then Willie called me yesterday and said: "It was weird, man. We have this dead tree in our front yard and I read your post and looked up and there he was in my front yard. A tree man! Really weird, man." Not The Tree Man, but a tree man of some kind or other.


As if I could give a shit . . .

Tree Man!

I was talking to my friend Tree Man after a meeting this week, which I can only assume he needed more than I did, and I needed a meeting in the worst way. He mentioned my blog to a dude who strolled by, then suggested that he does so much blog promoting that I should pay him a retainer. That wasn't a bad suggestion, actually. If people only knew how much it meant to me when they read what I write. You can tell me what you think of me, or you can show me by your actions. I much prefer the actions. Talk is cheap.

"Tell you what," I said. "I'll split my profits with you."

"Deal," said Tree Man.

"I wanted to ask you something," he said. "I've noticed that even though I read this crap faithfully you've never written about me."

"I'm trying to get more people to read, not drive them away," I replied. "If I lose a couple of readers my circulation goes down by, like, half."

"I see," said Tree Man.

"Maybe you should do something interesting every now and then," I suggested.

"I'll see what I can do," he said. "But I did a lot of interesting things before I got sober, and to tell you the truth, I'm kind of done with interesting temporarily."

"Fair enough," I said.

One day SuperK stuck her head into my office as I was finishing up a typical phone call with an A.A. buddy.

"Why do these people even call you?" she asked. "You're such an asshole."

"You ought to hear what they say to me," I said.

Only in The Program.

Easy Come, Easy Go

Con: To swindle (a victim) by first gaining his confidence.

I was on the road early a few days ago, cradling my $3 cup of coffee between my legs, eyeing a set of railroad tracks on the other side of the red light that was delaying my progress, pondering whether to move the coffee to a less sensitive part of my anatomy, chuckling as I remembered the phrase "Beer Balls." I mean, it would be better to scald the shit out of my hand and not my . . . well, you get the idea.


Crouched at the side of the road was a scruffy guy holding a sign that said: "Homeless. Hungry. Please help." Funny that my initial reaction as a privileged guy -- as an incredibly privileged guy -- is to be suspicious that someone wants to take advantage of me. I don't want to get played. Mostly, I think, this is because I spent my entire pre-sobriety life trying to game the system. I was almost never what I seemed, except when I was in the back of a police car or leaning over a toilet. Then the phrase "What you see is what you get" rang true.


The guy probably has a hell of a hard luck story. It wouldn't be surprising to learn he has alcoholism or a drug addiction. That gets a lot of us onto the streets. The way I figure it if he was trying to screw me out of the price of a dangerous cup of coffee he didn't have a very good plan. I think most con artists can come up with a better con than sitting in traffic with all of their stuff in a backpack.

I reached into my wallet and pulled out some money. It was more than I wanted to part with -- which is none -- but not as much as I should have given. I rolled down the window and the guy scurried over to accept the bill. "Thank you, sir. God bless you," he said. I took his blessing. I take all of the blessings I can get these days. You can never have too many people blessing you.

Funny, too, how we enter The Program on a long, long run of cons. If I really didn't want to get conned, I wouldn't talk to anyone with under ten years of sobriety. We're telling tales most of the time. We can't help it. It just comes out of our mouths. I'm not suspicious of people in meetings. Sometimes we get better when other people help us. I used to sit at a coffee shop in Indy and think: "Why is this guy with a job and a family and a home to go to sitting here and listening to me lie?"

Maybe the homeless guy bought a bottle of wine with that money. Maybe he bought breakfast and a cup of coffee. Who cares, really?


I'll tell you this: I felt good about myself all day. I felt like I was part of the solution. I felt like I made a difference. I felt like the world was a better place.

All for the price of a very expensive cup of coffee.


It was $5. BMOC, remember?