1
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 Hello, I am Marilyn and I am an alcoholic.

2
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 Hi Marilyn.

3
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 Really grateful to Scott for the invitation to be at this good meeting where it's nice and cool.

4
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 And also, it was a real privilege to hear you, Greg. That was a powerful and beautiful story.

5
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 And it's just one of those things when I hear a story like that.

6
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 And it's not unusual to hear a surprising story, but you can't get there from here.

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 I mean, how can this happen?

8
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 Given the clientele of Alcoholics Anonymous, that we come in from the weirdest places

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 and yet we pass for normal now.

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 We got in the world, we form halfway decent relationships and get along with other people and keep jobs.

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 And so if I ever doubted that there was a higher power that had great pity on Alcoholics Anonymous,

12
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 I just have to go to an AA meeting and listen to a story like Greg's and be very grateful.

13
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 My story is different, but really the same.

14
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 I used alcohol just to get through life and then it began to turn on me and make problems.

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 I wanted to be a scientist. I wanted to be a great scientist.

16
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 I wanted to win the Nobel Prize and I had a lot of dreams and hopes.

17
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 And I also wanted to fit into the real world. I was always such a misfit.

18
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 I just didn't know how to talk to other people.

19
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 I went to school with other kids and they all seemed to form little groups of twos and threes and they had friends.

20
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 I had a friend. She was in one of those little groups.

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 And so she said, "Come into the little group that I'm in."

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 It was called The Talkative Tan and we have such fun.

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 So I was so happy about that, that maybe somehow I would even have a place among other people.

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 So Jane brought that up in the little group and they had a vote and they voted no.

25
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 I still resent them.

26
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 But anyway, that was just sort of the story of the way it always was.

27
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 And so I thought if I could just go away and study science and be a great scientist,

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 then at least I'd fit into a community and we'd speak that magic language and I would learn how to talk with other people.

29
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 And maybe they would not ask those strange questions like, "How are you?"

30
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 And I'd try to answer questions like that.

31
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 I mean, I would talk about depression and anxiety and they would just go away.

32
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 And it was just an endless, "My goodness, what is wrong with me? Why don't I fit in?"

33
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 I had a saintly mom who saved money so I could go away and study science.

34
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 And it was at the University of Chicago from Ohio. I was born in Ohio.

35
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 So I went away and had a roommate.

36
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 And again, it was just that social unease of just having another person in the room, not knowing how to relate to her.

37
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 But we were poor and so I had to get a job.

38
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 My mom would get into school and I went to a science institute, the Fermi Institute,

39
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 and I had to take a test to see if I could work there.

40
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 And I sat down to do the test and it involved a microscope.

41
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 And Paul, a very thin, very pale scientist, came out to give me this test.

42
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 And he had a white lab coat on and he had a slide rule in his pocket.

43
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 And he just, oh, he spelled science and everything.

44
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 And some of you are younger than I am in this room.

45
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 A slide rule is an old-fashioned calculator.

46
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 I actually did multiplication by moving two little words past one another.

47
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 And now, I mean, look at telephones.

48
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 Well, should I go on?

49
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 But anyway, back in the old days, a slide rule was a magic thing because you are a real scientist.

50
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 And he was helping me to take this test and I just looked at that slide rule

51
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 and, oh my gosh, I wanted to grab and fondle his slide rule.

52
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 And they got the job, by the way.

53
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 And I just thought, you know, now I can finally become a scientist and here I am in this lab.

54
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 But again, people were talking like the people in Ohio.

55
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 They would say things like, "How's it going?"

56
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 And again, you know, just these bafflers.

57
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 I just never, ever quite fit in.

58
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 But with the person who gave me that test, the scientist, Bill, tall, pale,

59
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 he looked like he had been in a lab all of his life.

60
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 Never seen the light of day.

61
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 But somehow we could talk to each other and he went off to Washington

62
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 and he sent me a postcard and I turned it over and it said,

63
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 "Dear Marilyn, I was thinking about what you were saying, but all I can come up with is,"

64
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 and he wrote out the elegant partial differential equation.

65
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 And, oh my gosh, no man had ever talked to me like that.

66
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 And he just was falling in love.

67
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 And we got acquainted and one day he said, "Do you want to get married?"

68
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 And I just said, "Yes, yes."

69
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 And off we went to Ohio where his dad was a Lutheran minister.

70
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 Now, Bill and I were atheists because we believed in science

71
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 and in those days I thought you could believe in science, which is reasonable,

72
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 or you could be out of your mind and believed in something supernatural,

73
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 which you couldn't do experiments on, so therefore it does not exist.

74
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 So nevertheless, we were in this little religious ceremony

75
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 and Bill's dad, the Lutheran minister, actually married us

76
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 and I just felt like now I can finally be a happy person.

77
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 And just to look into AA literature, there's a book called The Soul of Sponsorship

78
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 where Bill Wilson writes a whole bunch of letters back and forth to Father Ed Dowling.

79
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 And so much of that book talks about Bill Wilson's unhealthy dependencies

80
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 on other people, on situations, on jobs, getting one's worth from some lower power,

81
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 unhealthy dependencies, dependence on things that could really never make you happy.

82
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 And for whatever reason, I just had a kind of sick, unhealthy dependency

83
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 that made me want to attach to any warm mammal,

84
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 especially a human being that comes along, just like a tick in the forest,

85
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 attach and then suck out your life.

86
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 And so when Bill talked about unhealthy dependency, I just thought, "Yes."

87
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 At first I thought it was because my father was in a terrible auto accident

88
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 when I was a small child and play in a vegetative state for about 12 or 15 years.

89
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 And so I was always looking for a father.

90
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 But I realized that people and alcoholics anonymous that had wonderful dads

91
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 and played with them and were real dads

92
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 and developed these unhealthy dependencies on others.

93
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 So whatever it is, I don't know the cause.

94
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 But I certainly, certainly had that.

95
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 Always looking to be satisfied by some kind of lesser power of claim

96
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 or appreciated mission in science.

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 And certainly I attached that to Bill.

98
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 You have to make me happy. You married me and I'm unhappy.

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 So it's your fault.

100
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 You don't love me. You don't love me.

101
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 That's why I'm so miserable.

102
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 And he would say, "Well, why? What did I do?

103
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 What did I do that makes you feel this way?"

104
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 I would say something like, "You don't take me to Disneyland."

105
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 Not that I ever wanted to go to Disneyland,

106
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 but it was the first thing that came to mind.

107
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 And he would say something like, "Well, we could go to Disneyland."

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 And then I'd have to say, "No, no, because you didn't think of it."

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 So that was life.

110
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 And we moved to California.

111
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 Bill was older than I, eight years.

112
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 And he was finishing his education.

113
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 I was just getting started.

114
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 And we came to California.

115
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 And by that time I was in a lab.

116
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 I was a scientist.

117
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 And I had a graduate student.

118
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 Bill was a professor.

119
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 We were at the same university.

120
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 And I had a research project.

121
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 You know, I'm a great believer in sponsorship.

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 Always had a sponsor.

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 Sponsored women.

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 I'm a sponsor now.

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 I'm a sponsor of women now.

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 And men, two men.

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 And it's a great believer.

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 And it's just by chance in those days back in the lab.

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 Maybe now an advisor is often called your sponsor in graduate school.

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 That's because that person got a little bit of money for you, a stipend.

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 And actually sponsored your education and research project.

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 And so I was working on a research project with a wonderful director of a lab.

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 He was my sponsor.

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 But unlike Alcoholics Anonymous, I never took direction from my sponsor.

135
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 And just the same as in Alcoholics Anonymous,

136
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 if you have a sponsor and don't take direction,

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 then that is not pretty usually.

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 And it was not a pretty picture in the lab either.

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 He had given me a research project and would come by and say,

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 "How's it going?"

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 It's a question like, "What in the world does that mean?

142
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 How is it going?"

143
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 And I would just say, "Okay, do you need any help?"

144
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 "No."

145
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 I mean, I didn't know how to ask for help.

146
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 I was not making any progress.

147
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 But I couldn't put into words what was the problem.

148
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 And so life was just getting ever more painful.

149
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 It was painful at home, painful in the lab.

150
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 And then I was rescued.

151
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 And it came into my life when I was about 20,

152
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 almost legally able to drink.

153
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 But we had entered the '60s, and everybody seemed to be drinking.

154
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 I mean, there was alcohol right in our lab, 90% ethanol.

155
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 And that's a 180-proof drink, just like vodka, but stronger and very good.

156
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 And we just all began to drink that lab alcohol.

157
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 And then after a day of hard working, drinking,

158
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 we'd go out to bars at night.

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 In Venice, the Boar House, a great big old bar with boars over the door.

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 Here it burned down.

161
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 It's really sad.

162
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 And then the Matador, where people would get up,

163
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 L'Manco dancers would dance on the table with castanets.

164
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 And I just realized that alcohol has gotten me all of these things

165
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 that I so desired.

166
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 And that's what I mean, that I was able to use alcohol

167
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 to achieve those goals that I so desperately wanted.

168
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 I wanted to have success at work.

169
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 I wanted to have a happy family.

170
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 I wanted to be able to get along with other people.

171
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 I wanted to have their respect.

172
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 And when I began to drink, I felt happy.

173
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 I felt that people in the lab liked me.

174
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 I seemed to have no problems talking with them.

175
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 I mean, I had no idea what I said, that they could even get words out,

176
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 but it just gave me the illusion that we're communicating.

177
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 Wherever I felt like a real scientist now,

178
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 I just felt like the Nobel Prize is ever so close.

179
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 And I just knew that somehow I had gotten to that place in life

180
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 where I knew I would be a happy person,

181
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 and I kind of recognized that it was alcohol

182
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 that was getting me there and keeping me there,

183
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 helping me to become a great scientist.

184
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 Well, all of this is the illusion.

185
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 I think a part of that is covered in step two,

186
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 which talks about how insanity came to believe

187
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 that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.

188
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 Back in those days, you could call it insanity,

189
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 you could call it delusion,

190
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 but I felt that I had the respect of other people.

191
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 I was drinking a lot, not getting any work done.

192
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 I don't think I had the respect.

193
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 It just felt like I did.

194
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 And I felt like a great scientist now,

195
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 but I pretty much stopped working

196
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 because we were drinking all the time in the lab

197
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 or missing work and hanging out in bars.

198
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 And now I was happy at home,

199
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 and I just thought finally I have achieved

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 what I wanted, a happy family.

201
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 We're happy now.

202
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 I was drunk all the time.

203
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 I sat in a hanging chair and listened to folk music and drank

204
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 and thought this is happy family.

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 And that went on for a couple of years

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 because we were indulged in science in those days.

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 And then it came to a crashing halt

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 because the director said,

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 "It's time to write up what you've been doing,"

210
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 and that was the kiss of death.

211
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 I began to think, "What have I been doing here?"

212
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 And I looked through my lab books,

213
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 and there were some doodles,

214
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 and I'd write a few things.

215
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 I'd start an experiment, and there was no results.

216
00:10:59,000 --> 00:11:01,000
 Sometimes there would be a page of results

217
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 with a line drawn through it,

218
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 and I just thought, "What does all of this mean?"

219
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 And it meant nothing, and I had nothing to write up,

220
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 and I just left the lab.

221
00:11:10,000 --> 00:11:13,000
 And sometime later, I mailed the keys back to the secretary there

222
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 and quickly gave birth to what seemed like a lot of little children.

223
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 Now, my life was out of control, and that was all I planned.

224
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 Bill had always wanted a family,

225
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 so he seemed to be really happy about that,

226
00:11:24,000 --> 00:11:27,000
 but I was in no shape to take care of little children.

227
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 And the years that followed were depraved drinking,

228
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 scaring my husband to death.

229
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 And he's a scientist.

230
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 He didn't drink.

231
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 Kind of a man of action.

232
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 In his short order, he brought his mother in

233
00:11:37,000 --> 00:11:40,000
 because I was a clear danger to the children,

234
00:11:40,000 --> 00:11:43,000
 going out to get more to drink with children in the car

235
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 before there were seat belts.

236
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 I mean, that was back in the late '60s.

237
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 And my mother-in-law really scared me.

238
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 I got teased only when she got tired and went home.

239
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 Then my mother came, and I was so mean to my own mother.

240
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 I was just trying to help and say, "Go home, you horrible old thing.

241
00:12:00,000 --> 00:12:02,000
 You're poisoning the children against you," to my own mother.

242
00:12:02,000 --> 00:12:05,000
 And she said, "No, I think I have to stay here for a while

243
00:12:05,000 --> 00:12:08,000
 because you're still weak from giving birth to those children,

244
00:12:08,000 --> 00:12:10,000
 and I need to help out."

245
00:12:10,000 --> 00:12:12,000
 She was so ashamed of alcohol and stuff

246
00:12:12,000 --> 00:12:16,000
 that she just couldn't admit that I was drunk all the time

247
00:12:16,000 --> 00:12:18,000
 and just tried to hang on and take care of the children.

248
00:12:18,000 --> 00:12:21,000
 She'd get tired, more sad, more something, and go home,

249
00:12:21,000 --> 00:12:23,000
 and then my mother-in-law would come back.

250
00:12:23,000 --> 00:12:25,000
 My mother-in-law was a little different.

251
00:12:25,000 --> 00:12:27,000
 He saw that I was horrible as alcohol,

252
00:12:27,000 --> 00:12:29,000
 but give me encouragement.

253
00:12:29,000 --> 00:12:31,000
 Unless you get control of your life and stop drinking,

254
00:12:31,000 --> 00:12:32,000
 we're going to lock you up,

255
00:12:32,000 --> 00:12:34,000
 and you'll never see the children again.

256
00:12:34,000 --> 00:12:35,000
 Just some encouragement.

257
00:12:35,000 --> 00:12:37,000
 And she knew about AA.

258
00:12:37,000 --> 00:12:39,000
 She said, "I had to go to AA."

259
00:12:39,000 --> 00:12:42,000
 And it's because of her that I am sober tonight,

260
00:12:42,000 --> 00:12:44,000
 even though I loathed the kids at the time

261
00:12:44,000 --> 00:12:46,000
 and had to make a lot of romance to her.

262
00:12:46,000 --> 00:12:47,000
 She was it.

263
00:12:47,000 --> 00:12:49,000
 But that's been the story of much of recovery

264
00:12:49,000 --> 00:12:51,000
 as something that's so scary,

265
00:12:51,000 --> 00:12:53,000
 often is exactly what I need for sobriety.

266
00:12:53,000 --> 00:12:55,000
 And I don't know how that's so,

267
00:12:55,000 --> 00:12:57,000
 that I resist those things that are good for me.

268
00:12:57,000 --> 00:13:03,000
 But it also is an indication of why life went so terribly for me before

269
00:13:03,000 --> 00:13:06,000
 because I only did those things that I thought would be fun and wonderful

270
00:13:06,000 --> 00:13:07,000
 to get people to love me

271
00:13:07,000 --> 00:13:10,000
 and never giving a thought to another woman being.

272
00:13:10,000 --> 00:13:12,000
 So everything was backwards, and alcohol was anonymous.

273
00:13:12,000 --> 00:13:15,000
 I wanted Marian, my first sponsor,

274
00:13:15,000 --> 00:13:17,000
 to come out and sit on the curb

275
00:13:17,000 --> 00:13:19,000
 and listen to me about my depression,

276
00:13:19,000 --> 00:13:21,000
 which was my will, my judgment.

277
00:13:21,000 --> 00:13:22,000
 That's what I need.

278
00:13:22,000 --> 00:13:24,000
 I need a strong sponsor to pity me,

279
00:13:24,000 --> 00:13:26,000
 listen to me, and indulge me,

280
00:13:26,000 --> 00:13:27,000
 and tell me that she loved me.

281
00:13:27,000 --> 00:13:29,000
 Instead, she said, "You're in a depression.

282
00:13:29,000 --> 00:13:31,000
 You need to be in the meeting in the front row.

283
00:13:31,000 --> 00:13:33,000
 You need to listen to every word the speaker says,

284
00:13:33,000 --> 00:13:35,000
 and I'm going to give you a quiz afterwards."

285
00:13:35,000 --> 00:13:38,000
 And I just thought, "How could people be so mean?

286
00:13:38,000 --> 00:13:40,000
 How can they be so terrible?"

287
00:13:40,000 --> 00:13:42,000
 And yet somehow they knew,

288
00:13:42,000 --> 00:13:44,000
 somehow they knew that the antidote,

289
00:13:44,000 --> 00:13:46,000
 they knew to give what they had been given

290
00:13:46,000 --> 00:13:49,000
 so that there would be some hope that we could get sober and stay sober.

291
00:13:49,000 --> 00:13:51,000
 I did everything my sponsor said,

292
00:13:51,000 --> 00:13:53,000
 which was Unity Recovery Service,

293
00:13:53,000 --> 00:13:57,000
 come to meetings early, volunteer for a commitment at every meeting,

294
00:13:57,000 --> 00:13:59,000
 go to seven meetings a week, participate in all the activities,

295
00:13:59,000 --> 00:14:01,000
 go on panels.

296
00:14:01,000 --> 00:14:03,000
 Oh, my gosh, all of this stuff.

297
00:14:03,000 --> 00:14:05,000
 I loathed and hated it at first.

298
00:14:05,000 --> 00:14:07,000
 I was fearful of everybody because they yelled at me.

299
00:14:07,000 --> 00:14:09,000
 And I was in the big Pacific group

300
00:14:09,000 --> 00:14:12,000
 where it's kind of the boot camp of sobriety.

301
00:14:12,000 --> 00:14:15,000
 I think of it as the bad dog school of sobriety

302
00:14:15,000 --> 00:14:17,000
 because, you know, it's the 12 steps.

303
00:14:17,000 --> 00:14:19,000
 There's the 12 traditions.

304
00:14:19,000 --> 00:14:21,000
 There's the 12 concepts, which I see nicely.

305
00:14:21,000 --> 00:14:22,000
 You hang on the wall.

306
00:14:22,000 --> 00:14:24,000
 But in addition to that, in the Pacific group,

307
00:14:24,000 --> 00:14:27,000
 we have about 795 other schools.

308
00:14:27,000 --> 00:14:29,000
 But there's no handbook.

309
00:14:29,000 --> 00:14:31,000
 They don't tell you what they are.

310
00:14:31,000 --> 00:14:33,000
 No nice banter with all of us.

311
00:14:33,000 --> 00:14:37,000
 You learn what they are by breaking one of the rules.

312
00:14:37,000 --> 00:14:40,000
 Bad dog, bad dog, bad dog.

313
00:14:40,000 --> 00:14:43,000
 But in that process, I learned not to cut into line.

314
00:14:43,000 --> 00:14:47,000
 I learned not to do my commitments.

315
00:14:47,000 --> 00:14:49,000
 I learned many, many things.

316
00:14:49,000 --> 00:14:51,000
 I learned to come early to a meeting

317
00:14:51,000 --> 00:14:53,000
 and not save a whole row of seats.

318
00:14:53,000 --> 00:14:55,000
 I just learned politeness.

319
00:14:55,000 --> 00:14:57,000
 And I learned how to work.

320
00:14:57,000 --> 00:14:58,000
 I didn't know how to work.

321
00:14:58,000 --> 00:15:00,000
 I had a job, and if I didn't show up for my job,

322
00:15:00,000 --> 00:15:02,000
 my Gucci yelled at me, "Bad dog!"

323
00:15:02,000 --> 00:15:05,000
 And I began to understand that these 12 steps

324
00:15:05,000 --> 00:15:07,000
 are essential for recovery.

325
00:15:07,000 --> 00:15:10,000
 The first 11 are self-helpful, really.

326
00:15:10,000 --> 00:15:12,000
 They get you up and out into the world

327
00:15:12,000 --> 00:15:14,000
 and back into normal living.

328
00:15:14,000 --> 00:15:15,000
 If you were ever in normal living,

329
00:15:15,000 --> 00:15:17,000
 if you were never in normal living,

330
00:15:17,000 --> 00:15:19,000
 as I was never in normal living,

331
00:15:19,000 --> 00:15:22,000
 it somehow civilizes you to the point where, for me,

332
00:15:22,000 --> 00:15:25,000
 I was able to go back to school and finish that degree

333
00:15:25,000 --> 00:15:26,000
 that I started.

334
00:15:26,000 --> 00:15:28,000
 I was able to go out and work and have a nice job.

335
00:15:28,000 --> 00:15:30,000
 And I made amends to my family,

336
00:15:30,000 --> 00:15:33,000
 and we began to have a healthy, happy family

337
00:15:33,000 --> 00:15:36,000
 instead of a family where I was the center.

338
00:15:36,000 --> 00:15:38,000
 Meet my every whim, please.

339
00:15:38,000 --> 00:15:40,000
 And that came just because of alcoholics

340
00:15:40,000 --> 00:15:42,000
 and not listening to newcomers.

341
00:15:42,000 --> 00:15:45,000
 And yet the funny thing was that I had this emphasis

342
00:15:45,000 --> 00:15:47,000
 on the first 11 step,

343
00:15:47,000 --> 00:15:49,000
 but I was not deeply involved in the fellowship

344
00:15:49,000 --> 00:15:51,000
 in that I was not putting that first

345
00:15:51,000 --> 00:15:54,000
 after a while I began to put work really high on the list.

346
00:15:54,000 --> 00:15:57,000
 And I began to have these lesser goals.

347
00:15:57,000 --> 00:15:58,000
 As Bill Wilson talked about,

348
00:15:58,000 --> 00:16:01,000
 dependency again on the approval of others,

349
00:16:01,000 --> 00:16:03,000
 dependency on getting a better job,

350
00:16:03,000 --> 00:16:07,000
 dependency on money, getting more money in my job.

351
00:16:07,000 --> 00:16:10,000
 And if you have these lesser gods, you have a lesser life.

352
00:16:10,000 --> 00:16:14,000
 And thank God I recognized that when I was about 18 years sober

353
00:16:14,000 --> 00:16:16,000
 and recommitted to Alcoholics Anonymous.

354
00:16:16,000 --> 00:16:19,000
 And that's because I looked at the people who were happy

355
00:16:19,000 --> 00:16:21,000
 in the fellowship and they were the ones

356
00:16:21,000 --> 00:16:24,000
 that were super active, being of service.

357
00:16:24,000 --> 00:16:28,000
 And I went back to my first home group, the Pacific group,

358
00:16:28,000 --> 00:16:30,000
 and really threw myself into the fellowship.

359
00:16:30,000 --> 00:16:34,000
 I continued to work, but now the highest priority in my life

360
00:16:34,000 --> 00:16:38,000
 is Alcoholics Anonymous, putting that first for a change.

361
00:16:38,000 --> 00:16:40,000
 And I began to see that everything on the outside

362
00:16:40,000 --> 00:16:42,000
 was just a little bit easier.

363
00:16:42,000 --> 00:16:46,000
 It was so good that between 18 and near 40,

364
00:16:46,000 --> 00:16:50,000
 it was just really a smooth, smooth kind of thing

365
00:16:50,000 --> 00:16:52,000
 where I just thought I'm going to run out the clock.

366
00:16:52,000 --> 00:16:55,000
 By the way, this program has kept me sober for over 50 years.

367
00:16:55,000 --> 00:16:59,000
 I did not see my sobriety date, February 1972.

368
00:16:59,000 --> 00:17:02,000
 And at the 18th year when I had this,

369
00:17:02,000 --> 00:17:04,000
 it was really a real spiritual awakening

370
00:17:04,000 --> 00:17:06,000
 that I've been doing it all wrong.

371
00:17:06,000 --> 00:17:08,000
 They said I went back to my first meeting back.

372
00:17:08,000 --> 00:17:10,000
 Somebody says, "Can you come with me on my panel?

373
00:17:10,000 --> 00:17:12,000
 It's only 90 miles out of town.

374
00:17:12,000 --> 00:17:15,000
 And then somebody can you stay after the meeting

375
00:17:15,000 --> 00:17:18,000
 and help us scrape the chewing gum off the sidewalk?"

376
00:17:18,000 --> 00:17:22,000
 And some newcomer, "Can you take me home to North Hollywood?"

377
00:17:22,000 --> 00:17:26,000
 Sure. And it just became a full involvement.

378
00:17:26,000 --> 00:17:28,000
 And those were, they said, really good years.

379
00:17:28,000 --> 00:17:32,000
 When I was 40 years sober, I was just telling my story.

380
00:17:32,000 --> 00:17:34,000
 I had three children, which I was able to count

381
00:17:34,000 --> 00:17:38,000
 after I got sober and make amends to and grow up with.

382
00:17:38,000 --> 00:17:41,000
 And my sponsor, my first sponsor, Miriam, helped with that.

383
00:17:41,000 --> 00:17:44,000
 And now I had a new sponsor, and that was Clancy,

384
00:17:44,000 --> 00:17:46,000
 the founder of the Pacific Group.

385
00:17:46,000 --> 00:17:49,000
 Clancy used to scare me to death the first time around.

386
00:17:49,000 --> 00:17:53,000
 And yet when I came back, now I saw him in a different way.

387
00:17:53,000 --> 00:17:57,000
 I saw him as an example of total commitment to the fellowship.

388
00:17:57,000 --> 00:18:00,000
 And I just wanted to have that kind of example in front of me,

389
00:18:00,000 --> 00:18:02,000
 something to try to imitate.

390
00:18:02,000 --> 00:18:04,000
 And I could never be that active.

391
00:18:04,000 --> 00:18:07,000
 He just gave his whole life to the service of others.

392
00:18:07,000 --> 00:18:09,000
 But it inspired me to try to be better every day.

393
00:18:09,000 --> 00:18:12,000
 And that just led me into a life

394
00:18:12,000 --> 00:18:14,000
 that I was almost embarrassed to talk about

395
00:18:14,000 --> 00:18:16,000
 because we were a happy family.

396
00:18:16,000 --> 00:18:20,000
 I got acquainted with Bill, not as a scientist with a white lab coat,

397
00:18:20,000 --> 00:18:22,000
 but just plain Bill, because I learned how to talk to people

398
00:18:22,000 --> 00:18:24,000
 and alcoholics anonymous.

399
00:18:24,000 --> 00:18:27,000
 Our children were all doing well, as Greg talked about.

400
00:18:27,000 --> 00:18:30,000
 His children went out into the world, and ours did.

401
00:18:30,000 --> 00:18:33,000
 Our two daughters went out and got really, really good jobs,

402
00:18:33,000 --> 00:18:37,000
 all scientists, and started producing grandchildren.

403
00:18:37,000 --> 00:18:38,000
 They are a big joy in my life

404
00:18:38,000 --> 00:18:40,000
 because I kind of missed it the first time around.

405
00:18:40,000 --> 00:18:43,000
 And our son linked up with this professor

406
00:18:43,000 --> 00:18:45,000
 and started an artificial intelligence company.

407
00:18:45,000 --> 00:18:48,000
 And it was doing really, really well after 7/11

408
00:18:48,000 --> 00:18:50,000
 because they needed all kind of intelligence.

409
00:18:50,000 --> 00:18:55,000
 And so I was giving talks, as we do in Alcoholics Anonymous,

410
00:18:55,000 --> 00:18:58,000
 and I was almost embarrassed to talk about my life

411
00:18:58,000 --> 00:19:01,000
 because it was one of those things that sounded so good

412
00:19:01,000 --> 00:19:04,000
 that I just saw newcomers maybe gagging.

413
00:19:04,000 --> 00:19:07,000
 I mean, if you're that new, you have not had a good year,

414
00:19:07,000 --> 00:19:09,000
 and you do not want to hear about happy.

415
00:19:09,000 --> 00:19:13,000
 And yet it was my story, so I told my story

416
00:19:13,000 --> 00:19:17,000
 and just realized that it will be this way from here on

417
00:19:17,000 --> 00:19:20,000
 and was grateful to God for giving me a long life

418
00:19:20,000 --> 00:19:22,000
 because I had a lot of amends to make

419
00:19:22,000 --> 00:19:24,000
 to all these people I worked out on

420
00:19:24,000 --> 00:19:27,000
 to repay the university and that professor.

421
00:19:27,000 --> 00:19:30,000
 So that was tedious, but after that was finished,

422
00:19:30,000 --> 00:19:32,000
 as I said, you know, it just sounded very good.

423
00:19:32,000 --> 00:19:34,000
 So when I was 40 years sober,

424
00:19:34,000 --> 00:19:37,000
 I went to Las Vegas to talk at this big state line convention.

425
00:19:37,000 --> 00:19:39,000
 I was talking about step two.

426
00:19:39,000 --> 00:19:41,000
 When I got off the podium on Friday night,

427
00:19:41,000 --> 00:19:43,000
 there was wild activity on my phone,

428
00:19:43,000 --> 00:19:47,000
 and two daughters, our daughter-in-law married to David.

429
00:19:47,000 --> 00:19:49,000
 Our son said David didn't come home from work,

430
00:19:49,000 --> 00:19:51,000
 and they couldn't find David.

431
00:19:51,000 --> 00:19:53,000
 So I called David, just got the answering machine,

432
00:19:53,000 --> 00:19:55,000
 and we called one another,

433
00:19:55,000 --> 00:19:57,000
 and finally the police were drawn into it,

434
00:19:57,000 --> 00:19:59,000
 and they went to his workplace,

435
00:19:59,000 --> 00:20:02,000
 which they were doing top-secret work,

436
00:20:02,000 --> 00:20:04,000
 and so we couldn't just walk in.

437
00:20:04,000 --> 00:20:07,000
 They finally got, the police got into the institute,

438
00:20:07,000 --> 00:20:10,000
 and they found David, and he had hanged himself in his arms.

439
00:20:10,000 --> 00:20:12,000
 And we have no idea how that happened.

440
00:20:12,000 --> 00:20:14,000
 He was an elite athlete.

441
00:20:14,000 --> 00:20:16,000
 He seemed to have the kind of life

442
00:20:16,000 --> 00:20:18,000
 that everybody would want to have,

443
00:20:18,000 --> 00:20:20,000
 beautiful young wife.

444
00:20:20,000 --> 00:20:22,000
 They were both scientists. We'll never know.

445
00:20:22,000 --> 00:20:24,000
 And my world came to an end that night,

446
00:20:24,000 --> 00:20:26,000
 and this happy life that I thought

447
00:20:26,000 --> 00:20:28,000
 would just last until I went to the hereafter

448
00:20:28,000 --> 00:20:31,000
 was sheddered into a million pieces.

449
00:20:31,000 --> 00:20:34,000
 Luckily, I had a strong sponsor, and that was Clancy.

450
00:20:34,000 --> 00:20:36,000
 He was at Stateline that year,

451
00:20:36,000 --> 00:20:39,000
 and so I called him close to midnight,

452
00:20:39,000 --> 00:20:41,000
 and he could be drunk, but he won't.

453
00:20:41,000 --> 00:20:43,000
 I was asleep, and so then I told him.

454
00:20:43,000 --> 00:20:46,000
 And Clancy, I don't know whether you ever knew Clancy,

455
00:20:46,000 --> 00:20:50,000
 but he had this way of just being like Clark Kent,

456
00:20:50,000 --> 00:20:53,000
 mild-mannered, mild reporter on the Daily Planet,

457
00:20:53,000 --> 00:20:56,000
 and he'd go into a phone booth, take off his jacket,

458
00:20:56,000 --> 00:20:58,000
 out of clothing, and there would be this big suit.

459
00:20:58,000 --> 00:21:01,000
 And so Clancy just came out of the dole booth,

460
00:21:01,000 --> 00:21:03,000
 and he said, "You have 40 years of sobriety,

461
00:21:03,000 --> 00:21:05,000
 and you have a strong program,

462
00:21:05,000 --> 00:21:08,000
 and now your family is going to need you,

463
00:21:08,000 --> 00:21:10,000
 and you're going to be the support for your family.

464
00:21:10,000 --> 00:21:12,000
 I want you to go get in your car,

465
00:21:12,000 --> 00:21:14,000
 drive home tonight from Las Vegas,

466
00:21:14,000 --> 00:21:15,000
 and comfort your husband."

467
00:21:15,000 --> 00:21:17,000
 And like a hypnotic suggestion,

468
00:21:17,000 --> 00:21:19,000
 because I have been sponsored all these years,

469
00:21:19,000 --> 00:21:21,000
 and I believe in sponsorship,

470
00:21:21,000 --> 00:21:24,000
 and a sponsor's direction is a hypnotic suggestion for me.

471
00:21:24,000 --> 00:21:26,000
 I just do it, and I got in the car,

472
00:21:26,000 --> 00:21:29,000
 and I started that five- or six-hour drive across the desert,

473
00:21:29,000 --> 00:21:32,000
 and I had a CD in the car to listen to,

474
00:21:32,000 --> 00:21:35,000
 and it was the great Sandy Beach who passed away a few years ago.

475
00:21:35,000 --> 00:21:38,000
 And I use his last name because he's no longer with us,

476
00:21:38,000 --> 00:21:40,000
 and he had lost his two daughters, the yoga boy,

477
00:21:40,000 --> 00:21:43,000
 and he told me exactly what to do with the CD.

478
00:21:43,000 --> 00:21:44,000
 I listened to it over and over,

479
00:21:44,000 --> 00:21:46,000
 and he said that, "You have a little bit of time to react

480
00:21:46,000 --> 00:21:48,000
 when something like that happens,

481
00:21:48,000 --> 00:21:50,000
 and you go out to your higher power,

482
00:21:50,000 --> 00:21:52,000
 and you form that bond as never before,

483
00:21:52,000 --> 00:21:54,000
 and you say, 'Don't leave me. I'll never leave you.'"

484
00:21:54,000 --> 00:21:57,000
 And when you do begin to react, guess who comes back with you,

485
00:21:57,000 --> 00:21:59,000
 and I can tell you that that's true.

486
00:21:59,000 --> 00:22:01,000
 So I drove home and went in the house,

487
00:22:01,000 --> 00:22:03,000
 and there was Bill just like shriveled up,

488
00:22:03,000 --> 00:22:06,000
 destroyed. His beloved son was gone,

489
00:22:06,000 --> 00:22:09,000
 and I could see that we're going to have a couple of bad years,

490
00:22:09,000 --> 00:22:14,000
 and I'll tell you, those two years were grief and recovery.

491
00:22:14,000 --> 00:22:16,000
 But because of Alcoholics Anonymous,

492
00:22:16,000 --> 00:22:18,000
 I began to hear story after story

493
00:22:18,000 --> 00:22:21,000
 and realized that I am not the only person.

494
00:22:21,000 --> 00:22:23,000
 In fact, I think all of us, if we'd lived long enough,

495
00:22:23,000 --> 00:22:26,000
 I get to lose people, and we have tragedies.

496
00:22:26,000 --> 00:22:29,000
 And those of us who trust the program and trust higher power,

497
00:22:29,000 --> 00:22:32,000
 get through them with a kind of resiliency

498
00:22:32,000 --> 00:22:36,000
 and a story to tell that helps somebody who's just going through it.

499
00:22:36,000 --> 00:22:39,000
 As Sandy Beach helped me, he and I became friends,

500
00:22:39,000 --> 00:22:41,000
 and he somehow was able to contact me,

501
00:22:41,000 --> 00:22:45,000
 and I saw him down in Tampa Bay a couple of times to be out here,

502
00:22:45,000 --> 00:22:48,000
 and he was a great help, as were many others.

503
00:22:48,000 --> 00:22:51,000
 In the time that Valar went with Julie St. Jay

504
00:22:51,000 --> 00:22:55,000
 in our home group and lost her son 10 years before a terrible auto accident,

505
00:22:55,000 --> 00:22:58,000
 and she kept saying, "Accept, accept.

506
00:22:58,000 --> 00:23:01,000
 If you can accept, then you will find that there are blessings."

507
00:23:01,000 --> 00:23:03,000
 I could tell you now, more than 10 years have passed,

508
00:23:03,000 --> 00:23:05,000
 and I have a lot of joy in my life.

509
00:23:05,000 --> 00:23:07,000
 There will always be that scar.

510
00:23:07,000 --> 00:23:10,000
 But on the other hand, I experience much happiness,

511
00:23:10,000 --> 00:23:13,000
 maybe even before, because I've known the depths,

512
00:23:13,000 --> 00:23:15,000
 and I'm grateful for the life we have,

513
00:23:15,000 --> 00:23:18,000
 grateful for our two daughters, for all of our grandchildren,

514
00:23:18,000 --> 00:23:22,000
 grateful for all of my sponsors, the alcoholics and honest friends,

515
00:23:22,000 --> 00:23:24,000
 people on the outside.

516
00:23:24,000 --> 00:23:27,000
 My job, I was teaching in the Lifelong Learning Institute,

517
00:23:27,000 --> 00:23:30,000
 so I was elected president in the two years that Valar,

518
00:23:30,000 --> 00:23:32,000
 which was a great distraction.

519
00:23:32,000 --> 00:23:34,000
 It's a two-year commitment.

520
00:23:34,000 --> 00:23:39,000
 But that really got me out of self-obsession for many a day.

521
00:23:39,000 --> 00:23:42,000
 And in the years that have followed, there have been other losses

522
00:23:42,000 --> 00:23:44,000
 because I'm very old, and that happens.

523
00:23:44,000 --> 00:23:47,000
 But because I'm old, I think I've been given these clues

524
00:23:47,000 --> 00:23:48,000
 of the other side.

525
00:23:48,000 --> 00:23:51,000
 I know that we are just fine in the year and the year after.

526
00:23:51,000 --> 00:23:52,000
 I'm fine here.

527
00:23:52,000 --> 00:23:56,000
 And the wonderful thing is that I used alcohol to get those things,

528
00:23:56,000 --> 00:23:59,000
 good jobs, successful work, happy families,

529
00:23:59,000 --> 00:24:01,000
 friends, being able to talk with other people.

530
00:24:01,000 --> 00:24:03,000
 And alcohol let me down.

531
00:24:03,000 --> 00:24:05,000
 It took me ever farther from that goal

532
00:24:05,000 --> 00:24:08,000
 and shattered any possibility of ever reaching that goal.

533
00:24:08,000 --> 00:24:11,000
 And this program has given me all of those things.

534
00:24:11,000 --> 00:24:12,000
 But it's a funny thing.

535
00:24:12,000 --> 00:24:14,000
 I don't think of it quite in that way,

536
00:24:14,000 --> 00:24:16,000
 but it's just that feeling of, boy,

537
00:24:16,000 --> 00:24:19,000
 at last I finally got just what I always wanted.

538
00:24:19,000 --> 00:24:22,000
 And you would say, well, OK, what exactly is that?

539
00:24:22,000 --> 00:24:24,000
 And I would say, I have no idea.

540
00:24:24,000 --> 00:24:27,000
 It's just the feeling that I got it, and that's enough for me.

541
00:24:27,000 --> 00:24:28,000
 Thank you.