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 you see me okay on zoom. All right. All right. Thanks you for asking me to share tonight.

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 It's an honor and a privilege to share in a meeting. Thank you for your 10 minute share.

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 Welcome new folks. I saw a lot of hands first 30 days. I've been there as well. Statistics

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 for me, my sobriety date is May 10th, 1988. And I was just, I just turned 19 years old

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 when I got sober. You can do the quick math on that. Actually that's what my first resentment

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 was. My, my birthday is April fool's day. So I got picked on a lot for that. And you

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 know if you're new you know, I was told I was new, try to listen for the similarities,

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 not so much the differences and you know, try to take away maybe a couple of things

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 that you remember that you identify with. Cause for me, you know, my experience has

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 been, it's that, it's that identification, you know, I thought I was different. My case

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 was unique. He didn't understand. And you know, coming in these rooms, you know, I think

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 in the, you know, within the first week after going through detox, I sat in a room very

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 similar to this. And you know, we, we were doing a, I mean, just reading the big book

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 and this guy next to me was sharing and I, it's the first time I identified and heard

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 someone say out loud the way I felt inside. And you know, that's where the magic for me

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 started to happen. I'm a local, I'm a, what am I, a second generation Los Angeles, Angelino.

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 My dad was born here in LA. Grew up in Culver City, the West side. Any West sides around

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 here? I think I heard something. Yeah. Went to Culver High School and you know, just kind

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 of you know, I was just, I got picked on a lot. I, I was a smart aleck kid, always a

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 liar, cheat and a thief. You know, that's kind of my motto. That's how I rolled. I started

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 lying early, you know, at an early age, maybe four or five years old. You know, I was getting

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 molested by an older boy in my neighborhood and you know, I had to lie and cover that

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 up, you know, cause I felt ashamed about that and did a lot of lying to cover that up. I,

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 I you know, would lie about, I remember I accidentally in sixth grade, I'd accidentally

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 broke a friend's, you know, their chair, you know, I just kind of stood on this chair and

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 broke the bar across the feet. And I said, well, you know, let's make up a story of why

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 it broke. And they just looked at me like, why? It's like, it was an accident, you know,

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 but I always just felt I got in trouble. You know, I remember in school I gave a teacher,

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 maybe sit on the bench, you know, during recess because she thought I was doing bad behavior,

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 but it was this other kid. It really was this other kid. And I gave the teacher the finger

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 when she turned around and they said more, you know, and then some kid ratted me out

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 and they said, Morgan, you know, did you did you do that? And I was, you know, flashing

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 back to like a Brady bunch episode where, you know, they said, you know, they Peter

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 Brady don't lie. Don't ever tell a lie. So I didn't lie. I told the truth and I got suspended

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 for three days. So I was like, well, I'm not doing that again. And you know, just like

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 a typical, you know, kid of the seventies, my parents split up when I was pretty young,

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 you know, by eight years old and my mom went off for like a year.

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 She went like, she was gone, you know, she went back to New Jersey and you know, don't

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 remember it too well, but you know, more of it came back in sobriety when she started

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 going through all these letters that my dad wrote to her when she was when she moved out.

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 And yeah, that's, that's about the time where I started ditching school, eight, eight years

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 old, I'm ditching school you know, taking the city buses home and, you know, I got kids

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 and you know, we're helicopter parents these days, but you know, back in the day, it's

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 like, you know, we just, we were out wild, you know, just roaming the streets and and

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 you know, just grew up with a lot of fear, a lot of fear growing up. And you know, like

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 I said, I got picked on a lot. So I, my defense mechanism was to make you laugh, you know,

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 maybe if I made you laugh, you wouldn't beat me up. You know, there were a couple of bullies

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 like that my elementary school and in junior high and high school, so I'd always try to

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 make them laugh. I actually heard it's funny, I was such a disruptive force in an elementary

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 school, my, my fifth grade teacher said, Look, I'll make a deal with you. Like, I'll give

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 you one minute before lunch every day to get up and entertain the class. And then you have

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 to promise, you know, to leave us alone for the rest of the day. So I'd get up there,

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 you know, entertain the class with some skit I saw on Saturday Night Live or I remember

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 my dad taking me to Venice Beach and seeing this bong salesman on Venice Beach, I thought

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 he was the funniest thing ever. And I, you know, was selling the kids bongs, you know,

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 in fifth grade and doing the skit. And, you know, for me, alcohol, alcohol has always

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 been around my house, you know, my dad was a heavy drinker. You know, there's always

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 alcohol lying around, I take a sip here, there where I could get it. And, you know, wasn't

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 until, you know, dad would say, Hey, go get me a beer, you know, take a sip of his beer.

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 Then like, next time I take two sips or three sips and chug a mug and then we're stealing

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 a beer in there. He'd get hard alcohol for like a Christmas present. He's not really

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 a hard alcohol drinker. And, you know, my brother and I would, you know, siphon that

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 down and water it up a little bit. And, you know, but my first like drunk drunk, I was

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 13 years old. I was, my friend's parents were out of town and, you know, we knew we wanted

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 to get drunk. You know, we knew like this drunk thing was supposed to like, make you

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 feel good, make you laugh. I mean, again, growing up in the 70s, I watched a lot of

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 TV shows, watched, you know, Adam 12 and ships and all these police shows where, you know,

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 if you got drunk, you couldn't like touch your nose and you couldn't walk a straight

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 line and all these things. And, and my idols, you know, one of my idols was this guy named

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 Hawkeye Pierce from the show called Mash. And, you know, everybody loved him. The women

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 loved him. You know, he was, you know, he was getting back at Frank Burns, the bully

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 and, you know, he was saving lives. So I'm like, yeah, that's my guy. And, and so there's

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 this one episode where, you know, these guys had a still in their, in their tent. And one,

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 one episode they were playing checkers with the martini glasses that every time they jumped

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 they take a shot. So my buddy and I, we said, that's a great idea. So we got this checkerboard,

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 these shot glasses. As Paris, we're out of town and we said, "We're going to get drunk

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 playing mass checkers." We set up the board and we jump and take a shot. Every time we

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 took a shot, we get up, try to walk a straight line, we try to touch our nose because we

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 knew this alcohol is supposed to do something to you. My first drunk, I had 13 shots of

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 whiskey. I love the feeling that alcohol gave me. That fear, that emptiness, that hole that's

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 inside of us, that just filled up. The room was spinning. I remember it vividly. I love

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 the effect produced by alcohol. I love the effect. It's like, "All right, well, how do

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 we do this again?" We're 13 years old and it's not readily available. There was a liquor

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 store up the street there, an old downtown Culver City that we would stand outside. Depending

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 on who worked that night, it was owned by this lady and her sons, these biker sons.

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 If the sons were working that night, they didn't care. They'd sell us booze. If the

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 old lady was working, she wouldn't sell it to us. We'd stand outside and get someone

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 to buy us booze. Favorite thing for us to do is what would get us downtown quick would

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 be Bacardi 151. My buddy and I, we'd buy that 151. Back in the early '80s, Westwood was

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 the happening place to be on a weekend night. We'd go into Westwood and there was a Taco

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 Bell there. We'd get a 32-ounce big gulp, sip just enough so we could pour in that half

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 pint of 151 each. We'd just walk around Westwood just drunk off our butts. We would do that

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 weekends, weekends. Then the alcohol started getting into the weekdays and started interrupting

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 with school a little bit. In high school, well, actually in junior high, there was a

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 period in junior high, a 10-week period, one quarter where I ditched school for eight weeks.

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 This is before modern technology. There was no automated texts or voice calls or internet

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 where you could check and see. My parents could see what the heck I'm up to. I just

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 forged their signature on notes and got out of class. That's how we used to do it back

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 in the day. I got caught and I made up all that work. I got straight Bs for the two weeks

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 that I did show up. My brain said, "Okay, I can do this and get away with just enough

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 to pass, just enough to get a good enough grade." That was good enough. I started drinking

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 more in high school, started losing, missing a lot more school in high school because alcohol.

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 We used to go to the park. We'd go on the bike path down to Marina del Rey. We'd stay

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 at my buddy's house and just wait for the parents to leave and go right back home. Whatever

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 it is, we were just trying to get inebriated. Other things started presenting themselves.

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 My buddy's dad was a musician and he had these big garbage bags of just junkweed. We'd go

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 into the garage and smoke this god-awful marijuana and get high. That's just how he did it. One

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 of the big turning points for me was when I turned 16, my alcohol really took off. I

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 got a job. Some of you might remember, there used to be this semi-famous nightclub on Overland

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 Avenue just north of Venice Boulevard back in the '80s called Chippendales. When I was

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 16 years old, I got a job working at Chippendales. It was great. Every night, women were giving

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 me money and I was working up a nice sweat. Now, you have to remember, I was just a parking

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 attendant. I wasn't a dancer. I was 16. I'm 16, so I'm parking cars. You got to mention

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 it there. There was these big, muscular, good-looking guys with the friggin' rock star hair that

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 you had in the '80s. I drank to feel like they looked. I wanted to be like them. I'd

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 get like the leftovers in the parking lot, so to speak. It was a three-drink minimum

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 at that club. You'd have the regular show where they do their little strip club stuff,

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 but then it became a regular nightclub afterwards. It was actually on, I think it was Netflix

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 or YouTube. They just did a whole docuseries on it. It was almost 100% right. It just became

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 a regular nightclub. I'd park your car drunk. I was a drunk driver parking your car, stole

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 off from cars, stole a lot of money, sunglasses, radios. If it wasn't tied down, we were grabbing

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 it. I got to discover heavier narcotics there at that location. One night, the Mater D came

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 up to me and said, "Hey, our drug dealers aren't here every night." He's like, "So why

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 don't you and your buddies go buy some drugs? Then I'll come to you in the parking lot.

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 You give it to me. I give it to the customer. I'll give you the money. You don't have to

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 deal with them direct. It'll be great. You'll make some money." We're like, "Yeah, sure.

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 Why not?" I think we did that twice. I think one time we made some money and then the second

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 time we became our best customers. That's kind of how that worked. It really accelerated

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 my alcoholism. More so, I had no spiritual path or God in my life. God was mentioned

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 earlier. God's up there. If you're new and you're all about this God thing, it's like

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 I didn't have any formalized religion growing up. For me, I'd only went to church growing

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 up if I was spending the night at a buddy's house and they went to church the next day.

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 Then they'd take me to church and I would run a riot. I'd say, "Hey, I was awful. If

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 we play hangman, I would just write bad words for the hangman answer and stuff like that."

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 Another time I was looking for, actually, my junior prom date. This one girl I asked,

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 she dumped me. She said, "No, I'm going to go to the senior." My buddy said, "Hey, man.

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 I'm going to Hebrews class school in Beverly Hills a couple of days a week because I want

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 you to come to my Hebrew school class. There's some good-looking girls there. You can find

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 your prom date there." I went to Hebrew school for a couple of times and found my prom date.

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 For me, it was like there was no God, no higher power, nothing spiritual. My high school friends,

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 they tried to send me over to there's a thing called Young Life in high school back then.

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 "Hey, come to Young Life." It just wasn't sticking. It was just a lost cause. With school

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 back at that time, too, I'm just not showing up. I'm doing enough for the regular classes.

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 I'm doing enough just to get by. I'm getting the Cs. I'm getting some Bs. That's about

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 as good as it got. PE. PE in California, you only need four semesters of PE. I took PE

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 eight times in high school just because I would not show up and I get failed. My senior

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 year, I had PE three times. Twice in one semester, I had PE at second period and sixth period.

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 It was just from not showing up. I just wouldn't show up.

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 What happened was I just got worse and worse in that parking lot. I started stealing money

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 from my bosses. The alcoholism, it got progressively worse where I knew that if I kept going the

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 way I was going, I was going to die. On the other hand, I felt like if I stopped doing

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 what I was doing, I was going to die. I was just caught in that dilemma of just hopelessness.

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 What happened was I had been dating this girl a couple of years in high school. I broke

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 up with her because she couldn't put a Band-Aid on my finger. That's a good reason to break

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 up with somebody. I said, "Okay, I'm free. I can do what I want to do now." I was back

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 in that business at the parking lot, that illegal business.

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 It just so happened that my ex-girlfriend was friends with the girlfriend of my business

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 associate. They started talking about what I was doing. My ex-girlfriend called my mom.

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 I come home one day and my mom's on the phone with her going, "Uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh."

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 She's like, "Hey, I just heard all this stuff. Is this true what she's saying?" I'm like,

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 "Yeah, it's true." She's like, "Well, what are we going to do?"

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 I'm pretty quick on my feet. I know about getting the heat off and not trying to get

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 in trouble. I said, "Hey, I'll get help." It was like 50/50. 50% said, "Yeah, I need

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 to get help." 50% of me didn't want to get help, but I wanted to get the heat off.

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 I had had episodes in the past where I was successful at circumventing trouble. I had

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 forged my ID when I went to Hawaii at 17 years old back then. The drinking age was 18. Some

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 guy said, "Oh, I can make that ID into an eight-year-old ID." He butchered up my California

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 driver's license. Then I got caught for speeding one day and the police officer said, "This

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 is a doctored driver's license. I'm taking this and confiscating it. You'll have to go

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 to court." In court, I told the judge, "Oh, I just got it washed in the washing machine."

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 Another time I had gotten several ... I had been in court too for some moving violations

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 before I even had a driver's license and been in there with my mom because I was under 16

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 and stuff. Then my buddies and I got caught smoking weed down in Santa Monica on a parking

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 structure and they said, "Well, you're going to have to go to court with your parents."

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 That court date came, didn't tell my parents, so I called the court. I'm like, "Yeah, my

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 court date was this morning. I can't come or I've missed it." The guy's like, "All right,

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 well, you're going to have to go to the Inglewood Court now." That just sounded scary, going

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 from Santa Monica to Inglewood Court. He's like, "Hold on, kid." He puts down, he came

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 back and he said, "Hey, kid, weren't you in here with your mother for that moving violation?"

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 I'm like, "Yeah." He's like, "Tell you what, kid." I said, "I want you to write in your

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 best handwriting, 'Possession of marijuana is illegal 200 times,' and get it on my desk

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 first thing tomorrow morning." I said, "Thank you very much." That's kind of how I roll.

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 That was my Teflon Don, so to speak, ways of staying out of trouble. With my mom, I'm

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 like, "Yeah, I'll get the heat off." With her works insurance, they sent me off to detox

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 four nights a week. Two of the nights was parent night. I'd go with the parents. They'd

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 be there two of the nights. It was just me and some other sober guys trying to get sober.

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 I'd go to this place. I drive from Culver City down to Crenshaw Boulevard right off

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 the 405. It wasn't helping. I would go in, and they would talk about ... I can remember

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 them just talking about charts and graphs like, "Here's this bell curve, and here's

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 death down here, and here's a happy life here. This is where the direction you're heading

191
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 and stuff if you don't change your ways. Yeah, there's these step things, but you're not

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 ready for it," is kind of what I heard. He said, "Yeah, maybe you should go to those

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 meetings or whatever in your neighborhood. Here's a list of them, but I never went."

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 I would just go back to the club after those outpatient things. I had to quit, so I had

195
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 to quit. It was my 19th birthday. Basically, right when I turned 19, I had to quit the

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 club. For the next month, four nights a week, I was going to this outpatient place. It wasn't

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 helping. Sometimes, I'd start to drive. If it wasn't parents' night, 50/50 if I would

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 make it or not, and I'd start to drive the car and turn the car right back around because

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 I'd start driving, and this hole would fill up in my gut. I felt this hole put up in my

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 gut, telling me, "This isn't helping. This isn't helping me," and I'd just go back and

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 get drunk. Sometimes, I'd show up drunk. I can remember one time, I had this beautiful

202
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 1965 Mustang convertible. I'd pull up in the parking lot. The guy's office is right there.

203
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 The window's right up on the second floor. I'd pull in the parking lot, and I'd open

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 up my trunk. I'd have a quart of Miller beer. I'd just lean down into the car and just drink

205
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 it right out of the straw and then go up into the outpatient place, and I'd do that a lot

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 too. Finally, it just kept going that way. I just felt like this isn't helping. Maybe

207
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 I need to go somewhere else. At the time, I heard about going to a retreat in Lake Arrowhead.

208
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 I'm like, "Yeah, that'll fix it." If I go to Lake Arrowhead, that's what I need. I need

209
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 to get out of town. Finally, what happened was just after one more time of trying to

210
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 control and enjoy my drinking and not having any control, I had this one scenario where

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 it's a funny story. My buddy had it. My best friend's cousin was living with him, and he

212
00:19:02,820 --> 00:19:07,620
 was a FedEx driver. Somehow, him and his FedEx buddies happened to come along in an ounce

213
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 of cocaine in the FedEx packages and confiscated it for themselves. He had his share, and he's

214
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 working the night shift, so he's like, "Hey, Morgan, I got to go work the night shift. Here,

215
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 hold on to this eighth of an ounce of cocaine for me, and when I get off in my shift in

216
00:19:24,620 --> 00:19:32,500
 the morning, we'll go party and stuff." Needless to say, that eighth of an ounce was gone.

217
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 I consumed the whole thing overnight. Then he shows up in the morning and says, "Hey,

218
00:19:37,640 --> 00:19:43,500
 come on over." I went over, and I'm like, "Well, I got some good news, bad news." I've

219
00:19:43,500 --> 00:19:49,100
 heard these things they talk about in that outpatient thing, so I said, "I got some good

220
00:19:49,100 --> 00:19:53,700
 news, bad news." I said, "The bad news is all your stuff is gone." I said, "But the

221
00:19:53,700 --> 00:20:00,200
 good news is I think I'm ready to admit I'm powerless." He didn't care. He was pretty

222
00:20:00,200 --> 00:20:09,020
 upset, but that was the turning point. I drank all that day. I started driving that outpatient

223
00:20:09,020 --> 00:20:13,140
 thing that night, and that pole was opening up, and it was telling me, "Turn the car around.

224
00:20:13,140 --> 00:20:17,220
 Don't go. It's not helping you." Some kind of car made it into the parking lot that night.

225
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 I'm like, "Well, I'm just going to stay in my car." I just sat in my car and thought and

226
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 think and said, "Oh, I'll go inside." Somehow, I made it inside into the stairwell, and I

227
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 sat in the stairs. I said, "Please help me." I wasn't talking to him. I don't know who

228
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 the hell I was talking to. I know today I was talking about him because right after

229
00:20:33,980 --> 00:20:39,140
 I had said that, he came down to the counselor, and he's like, "Yeah." He's like, "This ain't

230
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 working out. You need to go to a 30-day detox." I said, "Yeah, I think you're right." He's

231
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 like, "Well, it was a Tuesday night." He's like, "I can't get you in the night. I can't

232
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 get you in tomorrow night, but maybe Thursday, Friday, we can get you in." I'm like, "Okay."

233
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 I went back to the club. "Hey, everybody. I'm going to detox. Who wants to buy me? I'm

234
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 getting locked up. Last chance." No one wanted to play with me. I had lost all my friends

235
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 by that time. I found some lower companion. I bought like a pint of rum. Then I drank

236
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 that. Then the next day, I went to outpatient. It wasn't parent night that night, but somehow

237
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 my parents were there. There was my bag packed, ready to go. They're like, "Yeah, you're going

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 to night." I'm like, "Oh, man." The look at my parents' face, I never want to forget that.

239
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 It was that look of, "I love you. I hate you. I'm afraid for you." All those emotions wrapped

240
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 up into just one look on their face. Off we went down to Long Beach. I got sober. That

241
00:21:45,820 --> 00:21:50,980
 was May 10th, 1988. We drive down to Long Beach. They put me through this place called

242
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 Pacific Health Systems. Back in the '80s, right about then, they had a little hospital.

243
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 They'd send you there for detox. Then once you got through your seven-day detox, they

244
00:22:03,100 --> 00:22:08,940
 owned these very beautiful Victorian rented, these Victorian houses down in Long Beach.

245
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 That was where we would live during the night. Then during the day, we'd go back over to

246
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 the hospital and do our class. I just remember going into that place that night. I just had

247
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 this big grit on my face. The intake person's like, "Morgan, people don't come in here smiling."

248
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 I don't know. I don't know. I felt like, "Okay, maybe this will help. Maybe this will help

249
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 me get the heat off and take away the obsession, the desire to drink and use." They gave me

250
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 lots of vitamins and stuff that first couple of days, walked around my PJs. In that place,

251
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 within those first five days, I went to my first alcoholics anonymous meeting. I can't

252
00:22:52,060 --> 00:22:57,020
 tell you exactly. I'm pretty sure the main speaker was a gal, a woman named Pat Wai.

253
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 I can't remember exactly what they said, but I remember there was laughter. I remember

254
00:23:01,260 --> 00:23:06,760
 there was some identification. It's about it. That's about what I remember. Then I remember,

255
00:23:06,760 --> 00:23:11,180
 like I mentioned earlier, getting out of that mandatory detox phase before they sent me

256
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 into the group. They said, "Here's your big book." I'd never heard. I kind of heard about

257
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 alcoholics anonymous before. I think in the '70s, Linda Blair was in a ABC TV movie like

258
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 Teenage Portrait of a Teenage Alcoholic, and Mark Hamill was in that too. In high school

259
00:23:31,620 --> 00:23:37,920
 too, my buddies and I, there was a bunch of us. Rap music, early '80s rap was just getting

260
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 real popular, so we formed our little rap group, and we called ourselves the Boozers.

261
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 We've made these raps. The only thing I remember at all from all that stuff is there was this

262
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 one chorus where the lines were, "No alcoholics are allowed. No AA members in our crowd. They

263
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 lie, they cheat, they rob on the street. That's why they attend three meetings a week." I'd

264
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 never been to an AA meeting before. I don't know where I got this information from, but

265
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 that's what I knew about alcoholics anonymous. I'm reading this book, and like I said, this

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 guy was sharing this corporal. He was a corporal, a Marine Reserve sharpshooter. I have nothing

267
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 in common with this guy. He starts reading and then reading a paragraph, and then he

268
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 shares about his own, how he relates to that paragraph. I was like, "Yeah, me too." It

269
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 was the first time I ever said, "Yeah, me too." I've been, "Yeah, me too," for 35 years

270
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 now. That's where the magic started to happen. Then I started reading things in there. They

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 crammed me through the steps pretty quick in those 30 days. They put me through the

272
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 first three steps. I learned, yes, I saw where I was powerless over alcohol. My life was

273
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 unmanageable. The easy thing was like, "Morgan, normal people don't go to alcoholics anonymous.

274
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 You might have a problem with alcohol. Normal people just don't show up here just to hang

275
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 out. You probably have a problem." Then I saw how throughout my life, just all the unmanageability.

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 The first time I got drunk, drinking those 13 shots of whiskey, I had this cool poop

277
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 moped. You would turn the handlebars, and you had this lock to lock the steering wheel

278
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 like in this position so someone couldn't steal your moped. That first drunk, I lost

279
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 my key. I'm having to do wheelies like this up and down the street to get back home after

280
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 that first drunk. That was like first unmanageability in my life.

281
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 Then they talked about coming to believe that a power greater than myself could restore

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 me to sanity. They just said, "Morgan, do you believe this broom of alcohol synonymous?

283
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 If they all decided they wanted to beat the crap out of you, could you stop them?" I'm

284
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 like, "No. Well, that's a power greater than yourself." It's like, "Can you stop a wave

285
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 from crashing on the beach?" I'm like, "No." It's like, "Well, that's a power greater than

286
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 yourself." I started to hear these things in meetings and hearing my higher power from

287
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 the podium, from people talking, from people sharing with me.

288
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 Like I said, I had no religion growing up. I had trouble with the whole God thing, but

289
00:26:37,980 --> 00:26:41,940
 they would say things like, "Well, it's good orderly direction," and this and that. "Just

290
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 use the group as your higher power for now and take it a day at a time." I did.

291
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 After that 30 days, I got out of that detox. I had done my first three steps. They said,

292
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 "Okay, go get a sponsor and start doing that inventory." I'm like, "Okay, you've got it."

293
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 I didn't exactly follow that direction 100%. A lot of you folks raised your hand to being

294
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 new. I decided, "Well, I want to chase her over here. I want to chase her too." I knew

295
00:27:15,340 --> 00:27:21,900
 these sponsors didn't like that so much, having relationships and stuff in your first year.

296
00:27:21,900 --> 00:27:28,500
 I just did my self-will run riot. Now, I was fortunate after that 30 days that that facility

297
00:27:28,500 --> 00:27:34,100
 also had sober living. I was smart enough to say, "Yeah, I need to stay in a sober living

298
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 and stay down here in Long Beach with the people I got sober with and still go to these

299
00:27:38,900 --> 00:27:41,580
 meetings," because they were taking us to meetings every night in that first 30 days.

300
00:27:41,580 --> 00:27:48,900
 I'm like, "I still need to do that." My roommate in the sober living was that jarhead marine

301
00:27:48,900 --> 00:27:57,300
 corporal. He had a sponsor, and he didn't have a car. I had a car. I didn't have a sponsor.

302
00:27:57,300 --> 00:28:01,220
 We'd drive to meetings together, and I'd have to wait for him after the meeting. He's out

303
00:28:01,220 --> 00:28:06,980
 there talking to a sponsor. His sponsor's got all his guys listening. He's giving them

304
00:28:06,980 --> 00:28:12,940
 insight and wisdom and stuff. I'm just sitting there taking it in and doing sponsored by

305
00:28:12,940 --> 00:28:19,460
 osmosis. I wasn't willing to surrender 100%. I liked this guy. I would have asked this

306
00:28:19,460 --> 00:28:24,020
 guy to be my sponsor, but the problem was down at our group down there in Long Beach,

307
00:28:24,020 --> 00:28:29,540
 this guy was known as the celibate sponsor. No relationships in your first year, not even

308
00:28:29,540 --> 00:28:38,380
 with yourself, if you know what I mean. That's how hardcore this guy was. I did myself well.

309
00:28:38,380 --> 00:28:43,620
 I was benefiting from my roommate would come home and say, "Oh, man. My sponsor's making

310
00:28:43,620 --> 00:28:47,460
 me write about this and that and that and this." I'm like, "Maybe I should do that too.

311
00:28:47,460 --> 00:28:52,100
 If he's telling him to do that, maybe I should do that too." I was doing the same things

312
00:28:52,100 --> 00:28:59,300
 and doing the footwork that this guy was telling my roommate to do, but I was doing it indirectly.

313
00:28:59,300 --> 00:29:04,980
 Finally, the pain got great enough. I was chasing some girl and I sold her my car and

314
00:29:04,980 --> 00:29:12,180
 I said, "Sure, you can make payments." You know how that went. I knew I wasn't doing

315
00:29:12,180 --> 00:29:17,980
 this inventory. I was going crazy. I'm like, "I got to do this inventory." I surrendered.

316
00:29:17,980 --> 00:29:25,260
 I asked this guy to be my sponsor and did my inventory. The magic started happening

317
00:29:25,260 --> 00:29:30,580
 after that. I eventually moved back up to the west side and moved back in with my mom,

318
00:29:30,580 --> 00:29:34,520
 went back to Santa Monica College. I had dropped out of Santa Monica College, took a whole

319
00:29:34,520 --> 00:29:40,420
 bunch of incompletes that spring of '88. I said, "Well, I want to go back to school."

320
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 Went back to Santa Monica College. At the college on Tuesdays and Thursdays, they had

321
00:29:45,580 --> 00:29:49,540
 AA meetings during the day. I'd go to those AA meetings and I started meeting all these

322
00:29:49,540 --> 00:29:56,980
 other young folks. There were some young guys and gals that were part of the Pacific group.

323
00:29:56,980 --> 00:30:00,940
 At least down there at the time, it seemed like the Pacific group people kind of like,

324
00:30:00,940 --> 00:30:05,860
 "Yes, I'm attending all my classes and I'm doing my homework." Some of these other guys

325
00:30:05,860 --> 00:30:10,660
 that were kind of doing self-will run riot on their own without any sponsorship or anything

326
00:30:10,660 --> 00:30:14,460
 were just kind of like crazy and not doing homework and I'm bailing in it.

327
00:30:14,460 --> 00:30:17,640
 I'm like, "Well, these guys are more of an attraction over here. I should do what these

328
00:30:17,640 --> 00:30:23,100
 guys do." I started hanging out with these guys. There was a guy from my high school

329
00:30:23,100 --> 00:30:27,020
 too, this guy named Jim that went to high school with me and he got sober 90 days before

330
00:30:27,020 --> 00:30:30,460
 I did. I happened to see him in a meeting down in Long Beach one time. He's like, "Yeah,

331
00:30:30,460 --> 00:30:34,260
 when you move back up, let's get connected and go to meetings." I was hooking up with

332
00:30:34,260 --> 00:30:39,460
 him, going to some local meetings around the area and just kind of not finding a home group.

333
00:30:39,460 --> 00:30:46,660
 One night we went to sober dance and he took me there and saw a bunch of people I saw from

334
00:30:46,660 --> 00:30:51,740
 Santa Monica College and some cute girls. They're like, "Oh, yeah, we go to Pacific

335
00:30:51,740 --> 00:30:55,700
 group. Why don't you come to Pacific group?" Jim's like, "I don't go to that friggin meeting."

336
00:30:55,700 --> 00:30:59,340
 He's like, "But I'll take you there." So he took me there. The only time he had never

337
00:30:59,340 --> 00:31:05,900
 been there, he's still sober 35 years. The only time he was there was to take me there.

338
00:31:05,900 --> 00:31:11,020
 I fell in love with the... There's a lot of young folks. There was a lot of old timers

339
00:31:11,020 --> 00:31:17,340
 with long-term sobriety and they were into action. That's what I needed. I needed action

340
00:31:17,340 --> 00:31:26,780
 and activity to keep me moving and... What did my A brother call me? Keep me busy because

341
00:31:26,780 --> 00:31:32,940
 my brain's a bad place to be. It's like they say, it's like a bad neighborhood. Don't go

342
00:31:32,940 --> 00:31:42,360
 in there alone. I changed sponsors and I got a Pacific sponsor in about 11 months of sobriety.

343
00:31:42,360 --> 00:31:47,140
 I've been a member ever since. I got involved with action. I got involved with being a general

344
00:31:47,140 --> 00:31:54,580
 service representative, central service representative, took panels into hospitals and institutions,

345
00:31:54,580 --> 00:32:00,440
 got very active. I also... After a couple of years hanging out there, I saw this cute

346
00:32:00,440 --> 00:32:05,400
 girl one day at the... We played. So I got really involved with sober softball. I was

347
00:32:05,400 --> 00:32:11,740
 an athlete growing up and I love to play sports. So they had softball. I was talking about

348
00:32:11,740 --> 00:32:16,540
 playing... We were talking about golf. I'm a big golfer too. And we were talking golf

349
00:32:16,540 --> 00:32:22,140
 and I said, "Yeah, let's go play golf down in..." I saw an ad for this resort down in

350
00:32:22,140 --> 00:32:27,980
 Pala Mesa, Fallbrook. It was like $79 for a hotel and two rounds of golf. What a deal

351
00:32:27,980 --> 00:32:33,620
 back in the '80s. And so 27 of us went down there and we've been doing an annual tournament

352
00:32:33,620 --> 00:32:39,860
 now for 35 years. Because again, it kept me busy. I had a couple of years sobriety. I

353
00:32:39,860 --> 00:32:43,620
 had sworn off women. I was dating this gal in the group and she's like, "I need time

354
00:32:43,620 --> 00:32:47,860
 to be by myself and figure myself out." And then a week later, she's with a different

355
00:32:47,860 --> 00:32:52,100
 guy. Then two weeks later, she's another guy. I'm like, "Forget it. I'm just going to date

356
00:32:52,100 --> 00:32:56,740
 and be casual. I'm not going to get serious." And then after one of our book study meetings,

357
00:32:56,740 --> 00:33:01,500
 so we were going out to coffee and I'm like, "I don't know where that place is." And they

358
00:33:01,500 --> 00:33:05,700
 said, "Oh, Andrea does. I don't know if she got on or not. She might." Yeah, there she

359
00:33:05,700 --> 00:33:15,500
 is. There's my wife. But they said, "Andrea knows where it is." And that was 1991. We've

360
00:33:15,500 --> 00:33:20,400
 been together ever since. We got married July 1993. So we'll be coming up on 30 years of

361
00:33:20,400 --> 00:33:27,220
 marriage this year. Yeah. And we had a great life. We had ups and downs. It's like that

362
00:33:27,220 --> 00:33:34,120
 movie Parenthood. There's a rollercoaster ride. It's going to be scary and suspenseful

363
00:33:34,120 --> 00:33:40,380
 as you're going up and then they're coming down and then there's the exhilaration. Life

364
00:33:40,380 --> 00:33:47,420
 is like a rollercoaster. But we've had a great life, adopted a couple of kids because

365
00:33:47,420 --> 00:33:53,140
 we couldn't have kids on our own. And then ironic enough, she's sober just one year less

366
00:33:53,140 --> 00:33:59,860
 than me. And then this past June, she gets diagnosed with cirrhosis of the liver. So

367
00:33:59,860 --> 00:34:07,460
 now we've been dealing with that. But I get the pleasure of being a service to her. I

368
00:34:07,460 --> 00:34:12,800
 was a very selfish, self-centered person in the way I treated other people and especially

369
00:34:12,800 --> 00:34:19,780
 women in my drinking. And so having been coming to the relationship with how can I be a service

370
00:34:19,780 --> 00:34:24,740
 to you, how can I give without asking anything in the receipt, without asking anything in

371
00:34:24,740 --> 00:34:30,980
 return has been magic for me. So I think my time is up. Yes, it is. So thank you again

372
00:34:30,980 --> 00:34:36,360
 for asking me to share. And if you're new, get a sponsor. If you don't have a sponsor,

373
00:34:36,360 --> 00:34:41,900
 do what they tell you to do without debate. And one day at a time. Thank you. There you

374
00:34:41,900 --> 00:34:48,920
 go. There you go. Actually, after our second tournament there, we were down there having

375
00:34:48,920 --> 00:34:53,540
 a big banquet in one of the ballrooms and Johnny Harris was there and Johnny Harris

376
00:34:53,540 --> 00:35:02,340
 says, "I was here in 1970 whatever for Chuck Chamberlain's new pair of glasses talk. Chuck

377
00:35:02,340 --> 00:35:06,760
 Chamberlain did his new pair of glasses talk." He's like, "Yep." We're like, "What's that?"

378
00:35:06,760 --> 00:35:13,740
 They kicked us out after about 13 years because of alcohol. Maybe every once in a while we'll

379
00:35:13,740 --> 00:35:14,900
 go back there.