Tag Archives: AA

I Dream an Alcoholic’s Dream III

Posted in Houston, Recovery by

I dream an alcoholic’s dream

Of insanity.

With broken bottles at my feet

And a car wrapped ’round a tree,

Walking through Houston’s streets,

I wonder, how this can be me?

 

I dream an alcoholic’s dream

Of abhorrancy.

With no money, I cajole,

From my family I stole,

Within me there’s this hole

I wonder, where can be my soul?

 

I dream an alcoholic’s dream

Of serenity.

I dream this ride will finally end.

And of finding one true friend.

I wonder, can this life I transcend?

 

I dream an alcoholic’s dream

Of recovery.

With laughing children at my feet

And a house with blooming trees,

Walking through the shady streets,

I wonder, how can this be me?

When Sad Things Happen on Sunny Days

Posted in Houston, Recovery, Short Story by

It is somehow worse, Lydia thought, when sad things happen on sunny days.

Lydia sat by the pool, two ice cubes melting under the stare of the hot in her glass of bourbon. Any other day, any other time, one might have thought she was luxuriating under the elms in order to bring a rose hint to her cheeks. But today, unable to move, to move put one foot in front of the other, she was sitting.

He just left. He came home, packed a bag and left. There was no fight, no hysteria. She wanted to muster the energy to throw something or cause a scene, but a scene for who? Why? To what end? He had left a long time ago, or so it seemed. All he did now was occupy a space in the closet. Its good he’s gone. Lydia thought for a moment about the kind of fear, stagnation that caused a person to stay, against all hopes of happiness, for just a little longer.

Yes, there should have been an argument, Lydia determined. It would have looked better. It would have made a better story for the girls. Lydia imagined a handful of select women scattered around her den, sipping some sort of cocktail appropriate for the solemn occasion. Someone would pat her back as she sobbed and recounted the tearful accusations, the appeals to stay, the shattered Baccarat, and finally the pointed finger showing the way out.

But instead, he just left. He came home, packed a bag and left. Left a note. She wouldn’t have even noticed he was gone had he not left the note. Lydia looked down at the bonded paper she had been holding this whole time. There was no need to read it again. It held no answers. Nor did it need to. Lydia knew the problems. Had known it for years. She originally said she was staying for the kids, but they had left a long time ago, off to lived their own lives in distant places. But then she still stayed. With a sigh, Lydia realized she stayed because she wanted to. No, it was true; the marriage was over a long time ago. But Lydia loved the house with the trees and the sparking pool. She loved her place amongst their society. And she loved her husband.

As she put the rocks glass against her lips, she smiled. She loved the bourbon.

What Lydia did not love was being the subject of speculation. It was hard to contemplate Christmas while the shone so brightly, but she knew it would be here faster than she could imagine. Lydia squinted off into the distance as if this small change in perspective would somehow give her foresight into the future. In her daydream, Lydia saw women leaning conspiratorially over the dinner table to their husbands, “But we can’t invite both of them. It’s too soon. Do you think she found out?” Lydia and her husband had this conversation themselves many times over. They feigned concern, but in the light of the summer afternoon, Lydia admitted to only the trees that it was really just a way to pass idle gossip off as something more than it was. They would invite her husband, of course, save a select few.

Lydia looked down at the empty glass. She wanted more. But she usually wanted more. That was nothing new. Lydia hoisted herself up from the pool chair and walked towards the backdoor. That’s the odd thing about change, it seems to happen quickly, without warning. He just left. He came home, packed a bag and left. It felt like an instant, but in reality, it had taken years. One shirt in the bag this year, a pair of shoes the next, until twenty-five years later the bag was packed.

Lydia paused as she looked at her reflection in the glass of the backdoor. She was still young. Weathered, perhaps, but still beautiful in certain lights. Lydia knew one day she would have to sell the house and leave the neighborhood that she knew she could not afford by herself. But she will find a new house. And new friends. She will find a new lover, feel new fingers press into her hips. A sly smile crossed her lips. She might even quit drinking. Lydia took the bottle in one hand, the glass in the other, and walked further into the recesses of her dark house. But none of that would happen today. All she had to do today was this.

Of course, I would have people read more.

Posted in Houston, Recovery by

Hi Mrs. Ann!
Here are the questions. Thank you again for helping me out!

Questions:
1. Do you think that there is too much hate in today’s society?

I do think there is too much hate, but I think any hate would be too much. Hate is a powerful word that carries strong connotations. Hate is not annoyance or irritation. Hate is anger and fury and spite.

2. Do you think there is too much love in today’s society?

I have found through the course of my life, a surprising amount of love on the planet. It sometimes appears from the unlikeliest people and manifests in ways that never cease to amaze me. But, if you ask me if there is too much if it… No, I think we could probably do with a little more.

3. Is there any personal experience that is behind your opinion?

A little over seven years ago, I can to the realization and understanding that I was an alcoholic. My life was very sad. And especially lonely. I did not know what to do. I think now, that I could have probably gone to my family and asked for help; my family is kind. But at the time, that idea seemed too far-fetched, too humiliating, too debilitating.
So, I turned to complete strangers for help. These people, AA, showed me that I could live a better type of life. They taught me how alcohol manifests from the worst part of my psyche. Then they showed me how to be happy. I hated myself and who I was. I hated that I was a failure. That I let so many people down. But the women of AA “loved me until I could love myself.”
And they still do.

4. In general, what are some examples of too much hate and too much love?

I think one just has to look around to see examples of hate and love.

Drive down one of Houston’s freeways. You will see drivers cut one another off. Some drivers speed dangerously, swerving in and out of lanes, because where they are going is of far more importance than another’s safety. You will see drivers slow down to see if the accident is a fatality.

But you will also see people let others calmly merge. You will see people stopping at accidents to call for help and then stay to serve as witnesses.

5. Why would people in today’s society show too much hate towards others?

People have always had a fear of the unknown. There is a philosophy that says that people cannot know themselves. All one can know is what they are not. In other words, I look out in the world. You say, Ann what do you like? And there is too much of everything. How am I to know? Where do I begin? So I start by trying something, taking something, listening to something, seeing something. I say, I do not know what I like, but I know it is not that.

I think this philosophy is right.

People look out in the world and it scares them. And they see someone of a different race, who has a different culture. Rather than exploring or learning or understanding, they say, I do not know what I am, but I know I am not that. That mentality, the fear, that’s what spreads hate.

6. How would you think of solving this problem?

Of course, I would have people read more.

– Victoria

P.S Based on the answers you give me, I may make up new questions for my paper… thank you!

I Dream an Alcoholic’s Dream

Posted in Houston, Recovery by

I dream an alcoholic’s dream

Of insanity.

With broken bottles at my feet

And a car wrapped around a tree,

Walking through the city streets,

I wonder, how this can be me?

 

I dream an alcoholic’s dream

Of guilt and shame.

With no money, I cajole,

From my family I stole,

Within me there’s this hole

I wonder, where could be my soul?

 

I dream an alcoholic’s dream

Of serenity.

I dream this ride will finally end.

I dream of finding one true friend.

I dream my heart I can amend.

I hope, this life I can transcend.

04.09.14

Last week, I was talking to a co-worker. He said, “The reason writers drink is because they ca’t write anymore. Hemingway drank when he couldn’t write. He couldn’t express himself.”

I thought for a moment, cocked my head to the side. “Nope. No, I don’t think that’s right.”

I was a cute kid with chubby, pink cheeks, and a big mop of unruly blonde hair. Even though the only videos of me are the silent reel to reel kind, one can see me chuckling, my whole body shaking. What you can’t see in that silent reel to reel was my speech impediment. My Rs sounded like Ws. Till I was in fifth grade my name was “Ann Kwogwa.” While this added to my overall cuteness, it made me painfully self-conscious.

William’s Prize Winning Chicken

When no one can understand you, you stop talking. When you’re alone and silent, restless, irritable, discontent, you pick up a pen and start to write. My need to escape existed long before I found alcohol.

At thirty, I would get sober. I am still not sure how that happened. I sat in the back of a meeting and cried the whole way all through. At the end of the hour, I walked up to the front and got my desire chip. For the next several months, I attended multiple meetings a day. I did not think recovery would work. I just couldn’t think of any other place to go or anything else to do. I remember thinking, “These people seem fairly happy. Maybe it’s okay that I will never be able to go out to dinner or dance or write ever again.” That’s how intertwined drinking had become in my life. I just couldn’t imagine going out for dinner and not ordering a glass of wine. Well, I thought, sober people just don’t go out to dinner. (It’s when they invited me to join that I realized that sober people only eat in groups. That way they can keep an eye on each other.)

But writing was the hardest of all to give up. It saddened me. And yet, I knew writing was an impossibility. For the last many years of my life, a ritual surrounded my writing. It always involved me trying to reach, and maintain, a very specific level of inebriation. I needed the liquor to make the thoughts flow, but not so much to blur me into incomprehensible gobbledygook. While I would like to think that some days I was successful in this tightrope walk, I highly doubt I ever was.

See? It’s not that I drank because I couldn’t write. I couldn’t write because I am a drunk. And when I drink, I annihilate everything else around me.

For months after I got sober, I could not sit at a computer without wanting a drink. My hand would involuntarily reach for the highball which was not there. It made my palms sweat and my heart race. One day, I just stopped sitting at computers.

And I learned to talk instead. I don’t think my support group knows how little I talked before I got sober. Everything went on paper. Everything was processed through the written word. I remember my mom sitting me down one day and asking me to please stop saying, “You know what I mean?” after ever sentence. “Of course we know what you mean.” I didn’t ask that question so often because I thought the man next to me was an idiot. I asked because I feared the words coming out of my mouth were a jumble of random thoughts often supported by my mumble and odd vernacular. I’m not sure if what I am speaking is even English sometimes. Y’know what I mean?

In the fall of 2010, I went back to school. With a couple years of sobriety, I knew only two things. Be honest. Ask for help. My second week of school, I stayed after one of my classes. I approached my professor and said in the flurry of words that only the brave and the stupid use, “I don’t know how to write, I use to know how to write, but now I don’t know how to write, I got sober and now I can’t, I mean, I don’t know how to, and a five paragraph paper, I mean, see, I’m old and I’ve been out of school a long time.”

The teacher looked at me for what felt like an excruciatingly long and uncomfortable length of time. Skeptically, she quietly and slowly stated, “We don’t do five paragraph papers in college.” And somehow that is all I needed to hear. A giant smile crossed my lips. I knew what she meant. I could write how I needed to write.

I still struggle with my writing. I do not like showing to people. Or talking about it. It’s still something incredibly private and personal to me. I still live in fear. My dreams of writing are so soft and subtle, fragile and precarious; my insecurity is only barely kept in check. Some days I think one negative word will cause the entire house of cards to come crashing down.

But here I sit. Its 9:54 on a Tuesday morning. I am writing. And I am sober. I write to tell the newly sober man that sobriety can happen. I write to tell the woman with thirty days that she can go out to dinner and order a Coke. I write to tell the person with two years to continue asking for help. And I write to tell the woman in me to walk through yet another fear. For every day I proclaim I am an alcoholic. Today, I am also a writer.