Herding Cats

Intolerant: Close-minded about new or different ideas; indisposed to tolerate contrary opinions or beliefs; impatient of dissent or opposition.  

I was asked to chair the meeting this morning at my home group which is embroiled in a mild "No, you're doing it wrong" controversy.  I should probably characterize it as a series of controversies because there's nothing drunks like to do more than making an mountain out of a molehill.  

I read this passage from the 12 & 12: "Finally, we begin to see that all people, including ourselves, are to some extent emotionally ill as well as frequently wrong, and then we approach true tolerance and see what real love for our fellows actually means.  It will become more and more evident as we go forward that it is pointless to become angry, or to get hurt by people who, like us, are suffering from the pains of growing up.

We can try to stop making unreasonable demands upon those we love.  We can show kindness where we had shown none.  With those we dislike we can begin to practice justice and courtesy, perhaps going out of our way to understand and help them."

My intent was to help some folks who were behaving intolerantly to see the error of their ways.  The results were predictably hilarious.  The folks who took the most out of my brilliant, insightful, illuminating share were all of the people I find intolerable.  I was reduced to laughter.  I was trying to herd cats.

People hear what they want to hear.

Funny How It Works Out

I called up my Old City sponsor yesterday.  He was clearly sick and he didn't want to talk.  He always wants to talk so I knew he was really sick.  I called up today and he sounded a lot better. I think he was glad I called back.  I was checking up on him because he's not a young guy and he sounded pretty bad yesterday.  I sent a note to Little Westside Jonny, asking him to check in as well.  He's like two thousand five hundred miles closer to my sponsor than I am.  It's kind of what we do in The Fellowship - we take care of ourselves and we take care of each other.

It made me think of the difference in the relationship I have with my sponsor and with my own father.  I love 'em both but one of them has a whole hell of a lot of a better idea who I am than the other.  I think of the difference in attitude between the two guys and the sense of responsibility each takes for their part in the world.  My sponsor takes responsibility for his own actions while realizing that he needs help from time to time.  My dad does neither very often.

I'm very much like my father and not at all like my sponsor.  When I first started working with him we quickly found out that we disagreed completely on almost all levels whenever the topics of religion, politics, morality, or sociology came up.  We found out that these were areas best left alone and we developed a deep and effective relationship.  I'm much more engaged with my sponsor than with my father - some of this is my fault but it's mostly because one wants to be engaged with and one doesn't.  I'm not always behaving badly.

Just most of the time.

Entirely Ready

Entirely:  To the full or entire extent.
Ready:  Prepared for immediate action or use.

We read the Step today that contains the phrase "were entirely ready" for god to do something blah blah blah something or the other about removing defects or something like that.  I really don't know.  I don't have much of an attention span so I generally zone out after nine or ten words. I'm definitely a twitter generation kind of guy even though I've never used twitter.  That I'm aware of.

My lovely, lovely wife shares the story about the person who decides to go on a cruise.  This person is very excited.  She has always wanted to go on a cruise.

"Are you ready for your trip?" asks a friend.

"Yes!  Yes, I'm ready! enthuses the cruiser.

"Have you bought your tickets?  Do you have your passport?  Are you packed?" 

"No!  No, I haven't done any of that!" shouts cruiser girl.

This woman is ready.  She is not, however, entirely ready.

High Speed Dental Drills!

The dental work I had done recently involved the demolition of a major molar and the installation of a replacement.  I guess I could have passed on the replacement and left a big gap in my smile.  Might have looked kinda cool.  Probably would have been cheaper, too, but I have enough problems with my wife as it is.

Anyway, the new tooth felt weird.  There was a different feel relative to the surrounding teeth and my bite had changed and, frankly, the damn thing hurt for a while.  I did have a dude with a high speed dental drill excavate enamel awfully close to a whole lot of damp mucous membrane.  How could that not traumatize my mouth for a while?

The funny thing is that I had a sore tooth and I really did keep touching it with my tongue.  "Still hurts.  Wonder if I touch it again?  Still hurts.  OK, I waited 30 seconds, let's give it another try."  Ad infinitum.

I really enjoy  trying to make the worst of everything.

Judge and Jury

Judge:  To sit in judgment on; to pass sentence on.  

I have a couple of groups that I attend regularly.  I like both of them but that doesn't mean I can't find plenty to dislike as well.  It's what I do: find fault with things.  These things don't have to have any faults to uncover, either.  I can manufacture faults out of air.  It's a lot more fun than showcasing merits.  Who does that?  And why?

Today's meeting is my nominal home group.  The meeting has a lot of strong personalities, a fact that I like and that I hate.  Sometimes I wonder how we get anything accomplished at all.  We're opinionated and passionate and full of beans.  I'm not the only fault-finder attending meetings, either, I'll tell you what.  We're a prickly crowd.  We're people who would not ordinarily mix.  I've always liked the analogy of a lifeboat launched from a sinking ship - nobody looks around the boat, sniffs at the quality of the folks he sees, and slips back into the frigid, shark-infested, boiling ocean, even those who know that sharks don't hang around in frigid oceans.  Sharks are the beach bums of the large predatory fish.  You can either freeze to death in a frigid ocean or be eaten alive by a shark in nice, warm tropical waters - you can't do both.

This morning some of the more trying members talked and they talked too long.  It can be irritating.  There are some people I like to hear from and some I don't.  I try to remember that the meeting is a life preserver for the new person.  The meeting primarily exists to help the struggling newcomer.  The meeting isn't there so that pompous blowhards like me can dazzle the crowd with my wit and intelligence and wisdom.  I wasn't in danger of drinking today - I'm not sure that was the case for some of the people who talked, so I kept my mouth shut and tried to listen, as difficult a thing as that is for me to do.  I let people get things off of their respective chests.

And I have to remember that when I first showed up I was hip, slick, and cool.  I never acted like a pompous ass and everyone was thrilled when I raised my hand to talk.  They never wanted it to end. They hung on my every word.  They were saying: "Oh, please, Seaweed, keep talking about how bad you got it."

I thought there was a little not-so-subtle judging going on this morning.  Judging is another one of my favorite pastimes because I do it perfectly, whatever It happens to be.  My sponsor never listens to me bitch about another person.  Ever.  "Principles before personalities,"  he says.  And if I can't stop the bitching he'll tell me to go find another meeting or, better yet, start my own.  "Most meetings start with a coffee pot and a resentment," he says.  

There was a meeting in The Old City that I attended every week as did this woman who drove me completely, absolutely batshit.  It was like having a root canal every time she spoke - I could almost hear the whine of the high-speed dental drill start up.  One Saturday I got the bright idea to go to the bathroom and stand in there until the muffled sound of her voice ceased and desisted.  I enjoyed it so much I did it every week.  Until the Saturday  Little Westside Jonny waylaid me: "I know what you're doing," he said.  "I think you should stay in your seat and listen when she talks."  I ignored him, of course, because another one of my hobbies is ignoring good advice.  When I got up to pee the following week, if by "pee" you mean "go hang around the men's room," he caught my eye, tapped both of his ears, and jabbed his finger at his chair: "Sit down and listen."

I'm not sure I ever followed his advice but I never forgot it.

Up On My Soapbox

Soapbox:  A crate for packing soap, or, by extension, and inexpensive crude platform raised above the surrounding level to give prominence to the person on it, especially when used for speeches.

I don't say The Lord's Prayer at the end of the meetings I attend.  Here in the States it's very common to say this prayer when our festivities conclude although I understand, from correspondence with our Central Office, that it's rare in almost every other country.  I don't dislike the prayer.  I don't care if other people say it.  I'm just not going to say it myself.

There are a few reasons for this.  Mostly, I associate the prayer with my formal religious upbringing.  For the longest time this upbringing really burned my goat and stuck in my goat's craw, causing the goat to choke dangerously from time to time.  It really wasn't fair to the goat.  I objected to the rules and strictures of this organized religion.  I couldn't make myself go to church for the longest time and when I did I got really angry.  And this from a kid who attended church and a religious book study after I left home for college.  There weren't a lot of other college kids in attendance.  I was pretty religious.

A few years ago a group I attended decided to vote on whether we should close meetings with The Serenity Prayer or with the Lord's prayer.  Holy shit, were the grenades flying on that one.  People who never came to meetings were up on their soapboxes (soapbox: a crate for packing soap, or, by extension, and inexpensive crude platform raised above the surrounding level to give prominence to the person on it, especially when used for speeches) giving impassioned speeches that would make a country preacher proud.  The Lord's prayer supporters won and their behavior further irritated the Serenity Prayer advocates.

I wonder how those of us who support this prayer would feel if we had to attend all of our meetings in countries were the predominant religion is Islam or Hindu or Buddhist?  I wonder how we would feel if specific gods were brought up in the concluding prayer and if this prayer was unfamiliar to us?  

Here in Vacation City the meeting leader asks someone to close the meeting with a moment of silence followed by the prayer of their choice.  That's nice.

Scrupulous Seaweed

Honest:  Scrupulous with regard to telling the truth; not given to swindling, lying, or fraud; upright.  .

The topic of yesterday's meeting was honesty.  

I shared with a great deal of authority.  Everyone could tell that I was walking the walk, not just talking the talk.  I'm the Real Deal.  My voice is the Voice of Reason.

The people who live behind me have a tangerine tree which is loaded with tangerines.  The people next door have a series of small orange trees.  The woman right behind me has a tree that is full of ripening something or the others.  I'm not sure yet but they look to be spectacular.

Nobody in these houses appears to be interested in the fruit.  They fall off of the trees and roll into my yard, and I toss them into my compost pile.  One day I picked a couple of fresh tangerines and we had them for breakfast.  They were really, really good.  A few days later I picked several of them and a couple of oranges.  I had too many to eat at one sitting so I filled my vegetable crisper with the overflow.  I didn't take any of the mystery fruits but I have my eye on them.

I know some of my neighbors but not these particular neighbors.  Citrus fruit is no exotic specialty here and I'm willing to bet that if I knocked on their doors they'd cheerfully give me access.  I mean, the stuff is falling onto the ground.  I mean, it's going to waste.  It's almost a sin to see that beautiful fruit feeding the wasps.

The topic of yesterday's meeting was honesty.