Wellington's Ooze

Behavior:  A manner of behaving; actions; conduct; manners.


Behavior is hard to change.  Good behavior, bad behavior, and everything in between.  When I've been behaving the same way for ever and ever I seem to be on auto-pilot as far as my actions are concerned.


And it's the behaviors that I don't like - the vast majority of my behaviors - that cause me more problem than the good behaviors, which may be one of the stupidest points that I've ever tried to make.  It assumes that I'm behaving well and that I'm then trying to change that behavior.  In the rare instances that my actions are sound and healthy believe you me that I try to go with it, although I can take something that's good for me and run it into the ground.  Take for instance waking up on Take A Hike day and finding that I have a broken leg, Wellington's Ooze, and there's a hurricane-blizzard a-blowing outside but I still Take A Hike.


There's a great Simpson's episode where Homer has an inclination to say something stupid and he's negotiating with his brain.  He asks for help so that he doesn't say something stupid.  The next words out of his mouth are the stupid ones that he was trying so hard not to say.


I can definitely identify.  I can convince myself that some topic or concept is off limits yet I'm drawn to it over and over.  I don't even know it's happening most of the time.  Stuff comes out, it FLIES out of my mouth.  It's as if I have no control over what I'm saying.  This is why I'm better off not talking than saying anything at all.


Sponsor:  "Seaweed, if someone thinks that you're stupid, open your mouth and remove all doubt."

Pause When Agitated or Doubtful

Agitated:  Shaken; perturbed; excited.
Doubtful:  Strong uncertainty as to the probability, value, honesty, validity, etc. of something.


"Pause when agitated or doubtful."  I'm not sure that I have ever even heard the "doubtful" half of this familiar and incredibly powerful phrase that I have read dozens of times.  The agitated part I get - when I'm upset, especially when I'm angry-upset, then I know to keep my mouth shut, and I'm able to accomplish that superhuman feat at least some of the time.  I pause, not because this is natural for me, but because I'm aware that I usually make an ass out of myself when I speak or take an action when I'm upset.


But the doubtful part.  I should know better.  Good advice has been dropped on my head many times.


"What do you think I should do?" I ask my sponsor.
"What do you think you should do?" he replies, cleverly.
"I don't know," I say.
"Then don't do anything," he tells me.


It's good advice.  I'm always plunging recklessly into and through any problems or doubts that come my way.  It's easier for me to take a stupid step quickly than to wait until something seems right to me.


It's uncomfortable waiting.

Propel

Self-Propulsion:  To push, drive, or impel oneself onward, forward, or ahead.


As god is my witness I have no idea how people make it through their lives without the support and strength of some kind of spiritual program.  I have no idea.  I work my butt off trying to grow my spirituality and trying to be of service to my fellow man, in the midst of a large, supportive group of men and women who are trying to do the same thing, and I'm STILL an asshole half the time.  I don't know how people can navigate life without this kind of support structure.  I realize that most folks are better equipped to deal with the vicissitudes of life than a garden variety drunk but still . . . no idea.


And I marvel at the differences between The Program and organized religion.  My mama is one of the best people I know, a woman with a strong spiritual faith that she finds at church.  But her support structure doesn't have the same tentacles that mine does.  I'm immersed in a group of people who are on the same spiritual path, however haltingly we move down that path.  I spend way more time trying to grow spiritually than she does, and she spends a lot of time on it.  I guess it's the proximity to death that is so motivating to the drunk.  I certainly don't want to sound like I'm blowing my own horn.  I do this stuff not out of choice, at least not at the start, but rather because I was killing myself.  Pain and suffering and jails and death are very powerful motivators.


I like the phrase "self-propulsion."  It sure describes me and I sure see it in a lot of people I run into.  Folks who are plowing ahead into their day, thinking about themselves and what they can take out of life.  It's pretty natural.  Seeing what I can pack into the stream of life instead of what I can take out of life is most unnatural.  But how great are the benefits to this unnatural way of living.

Dudes and Chicks

Trudge:  a walk or tramp, especially a wearying, tedious one.


I was fooling around on the Internet yesterday - usual stuff: porn; outrageous political sites featuring lies and misrepresentations; researching medical sites promising to greatly increase the size of my endowment and . . . well, that's the only medical site I was researching - when an add popped up that had a guy on it that I thought looked like me.


"Hey," I yelled at SuperK.  "Come check this out.  This guy looks like me."


SuperK trudged in wearily.  She's a pretty good sport - she always comes in pretty quickly when I have something stupid that she just has to see.  


"You always show me pictures of guys who are way better looking than you are," she said.

She's right.  I took no offense as none was intended.


"That's a girl," she pointed out, walking away.


D'oh!

Some Bad Dudes

I spoke on the phone yesterday to my friend Willie.  He had told a small lie.  He wasn't feeling very good about it, which is as it should be.  Our tolerance for pain - limitless when we're drinking - just keeps going down as we try to live a spiritual life.  And I love the thought process I see in so many drunks: he had told a small lie -- it really was pretty harmless and inconsequential -- and he was sure he was going to be caught which would lead to this and then to that and then he would die on the streets, homeless, destitute, miserable, unloved.  I am familiar with this kind of thinking.  It is strangely near and dear to my heart.


I try to be supportive to my friends who are in pain.


"You're going to hell," I said.  "You know that."
"Really?  Hell?" he replied.
"Well, maybe not hell," I conceded.  "But wherever you end up there are going to be some pretty bad dudes there." 


Lying is one of those actions without nuance.  You are telling the truth or you are not.  I realize that some lies are more reprehensible than others.  "You're the best lover I ever had" or "No, that dress doesn't make you look fat" are lies that most of us would sympathize with.  We're not out to make anyone feel worse than they already do.  The acid test for me is to gauge how my behavior makes me feel.  If I feel bad then I have to do something about it.  If I don't think that I'm behaving well I don't need to have someone else confirm this.  It stands on its own merits.


My advice to people who are upset - the serious advice - is to pause for a minute.  Things that are unclear right now frequently clear up when I don't act rashly.  But the really important thing for me to remember is embossed on our anniversary coins: "To thine own self be true."  If it's eating me up I have to deal with it.


The thing about Willie's lie was that it wasn't meant to harm anyone.  There was absolutely no malice in it toward anyone.  It was one of those lies that you tell because you're afraid that you're going to lose something that you already have or that you're not going to get something that you want.  It was self-interest distilled down to its purest essence.  We laughed about the fact that, no matter how hard we try to be honest, sometimes something comes out and we can't stop it.  It breaks free.  


"Why the %$!! did I say that?" I'll think.  I have no idea most of the time.  Some thought will have reconnoitered the defenses, waited until the darkest moment of the darkest night, and made a run for it.


Some pretty bad dudes.

Holy Cow!

Gratitude is not something that I enjoy doing, particularly.  It is an alien concept.  It makes me uncomfortable.


The corollary is that I spend too much time in my head.  i convince myself that my thinking is real and if that isn't enough bullshit to choke Godzilla, I convince myself that my feelings are real.  Holy cow.  This is why I talk to other alcoholics.  Not so much because they give me clear answers to my problems but rather that it frees me up when they say: "Yeah!  I think that way, too."


It's a relief.,

Super Fun Lady

Passive:  Offering no opposition or resistance; submissive; yielding; patient.
Aggressive:  An unprovoked attack or invasion.


SuperK and I went swimming this morning and then out to coffee.  It's July 22 so we decided to sit outside at the coffee shop, an eminently reasonable thing to do during the dog days of summer.  It's also in the 50s, cloudy, and the wind is blowing briskly.  We shivered for half an hour or so, then threw in the towel and left for home.  As we approached our building we saw the So What Do You Do For Fun! couple standing near the front entrance.  Initially, I was relieved that it wasn't Entitled Parking Lady but quickly remembered that, while this couple is less directly offensive, they're more subtly irritating.  Kind of like a tooth ache.  It isn't killing you but you know it's there.


"Don't say anything about the weather," I mumbled to SuperK as we walked up to the building.  People in The New City are a little touchy about the weather.  I guess when you have to listen to anyone who isn't a native bitch constantly about the weather it gets a little tiring.  Personally, I think bitching about the weather is our nation's constitution.  It's an Unalienable Right.  


Super Fun Lady informed us that they were going to a Tai Chi picnic.  I know . . . I don't what that is, either.  She looked like she should probably go to the Don't Eat Any Potato Salad picnic but I'm trying to be non-snarky here.  You can see that it isn't working very well.  This is why, despite my nearly 25 years of sobriety, I have to go to meeting nearly every day.  It keeps me just slightly out of the Asshole Zone.


Keeping the tone light, SuperK, the more normal of the Seaweed twins, said: "Well, don't get carried away and hurt each other."  It was a joke.  It was a pretty inoffensive joke.


Super Fun Lady LOVES it when she can tell you how much more she knows about something than you do.  It doesn't make any difference to her that this is often not the case - she simply assumes that it is, despite reams of evidence to the contrary, and begins to Inform Us.  She  took some time to preach to my wife about what Tai Chi is and what Tai Chi isn't, validating the theory that there is nothing more appreciated in the world than unsolicited advice coming at you in a condescending manner.  As if we thought that this woman was going to put on a leotard and throw someone over her shoulder.


When she was done lecturing us she asked about our plans for the day.  She mentioned an outdoor jazz festival that was going on.  I was trying to get inside so I could take a hot shower and put on my long underwear.  I sure as shit was not going to go back outside and spend the day in a park, freezing my ass off.


So I mentioned the weather.


"Oh, I see," she said.  "It has to be sunny and warm."  This was way snarkier than the Tai Chi 
lecture.  It was brilliantly passive aggressive.  I know because I have a Masters in passive aggressive.  Pretend that you're not pissed at someone when in fact you're REALLY pissed at them, then make them try to figure out why you're angry, neither confirming or denying anything.  Stretch this state out as long as possible.


We got back inside.  


"Good job with the weather comment, " SuperK commented.


I laughed.


"Why did you even stop at the front door?" I said.  "You should have keep moving, at a brisk pace."


"So now this is my fault?" she asked.


"Of course it's your fault," I said.  "That's how it works around here.  You should know that by now."


"Unfortunately," she replied.  "You make it difficult for those of us who try to get along with other people in the real world, those of us who have a conscience."


She's got me there.