MIndfull Mondays

On my 14 th AA birthday, we went to Founders Day. My sobriety date is June 12, 1990. That year(2004), they were preparing to open the Gate House on the Seiberling Estate, to the public. We went up and took pictures sitting on the stoop of the place where Bill W and Dr. Bob met for the first time. It felt like an historic event, at least for me. Going to Akron, Ohio for the first time is something no one should miss. For me it was almost like a holy day, lol...there were thousands of people there for Founders Day. It was crazy. Luckily, I am blessed with good friends who live in Akron, so we got to see everything from the perspective of residents. Sober residents, mind you. All the back streets and the cool stuff the week before everyone showed up, so we were free to peruse the city. The hospital and the Sister Ignatia wing. Dr. Bob's house. The Akron Intergoup Office. The cemetery where his grave is, where the big bikers parade goes every year on FD. Later on the weekend, we got to look at the archives display that was up. It was all so incredible. I celebrated my birthday there at a meeting in Akron, and got my coin. I will never forget it.

When I was about 15 minutes sober I went to an AA campout. It was so much fun being with other sober people, doing one of the things I dreaded because I always did it so drunk. I had a ball. When I was 2 years sober, I went to the 32nd annual AA convention in Hawaii. I felt God in that room at the Waikiki Sheraton, when about 3000 of us stood in a circle and held hands for the Lord's Prayer. Every year I attended conferences and conventions, dances and potlucks, campouts and picnics. I have traveled around this country attending AA functions of various kinds. I have met sober friends of Bill from all over the world. I start almost every morning chatting via internet with a sober friend from Australia. As I'm starting my day, she's getting ready for bed. She's physically housebound for the most part, and it is imperative that she be in contact with other alcoholics, just like it is for me. I adore her, and consider her one of my favorite people, even though we have never met face to face. We have a common bond. I am actively involved in my own sobriety. I have been able to stand by friends going through severe health issues, deaths of spouses, loss of children. I have been able to be there for struggling newcomers and open my heart and my home to them as well. I have had crowds of sober people in my home for spaghetti dinners and board games, bbqs and Christmas parties. I have been able to provide a place for people in a recovery home to go during the holidays, when they had nowhere to go, and be family to ones who have no other family.

I have been blessed beyond measure with a richness and fullness that I would never have believed possible. Today someone called me up just to say how much they loved me and how blessed they were that I was their sponsor. Understand this: these kinds of things DO NOT happen to people like me. None of this stuff. It is the absolute gracious blessings in my life that make it possible for a low bottom drunk like me to live a life of joy and usefulness. A desperate, hopeless condition of mind and body has been transformed into a loving and helpful human being that sits at this keyboard tonight. This was made possible by the love of a bunch of drunks for another drunk. It was made possible by these 12 Steps. It was made possible by the peace of God which surpasses ALL my understanding.

Today, I am glad to be the woman I am. I don't care to be anyone else, I am not jealous of any other life.

Today I am grateful. And today, I am Especially Blessed. And I am in love with Alcoholics Anonymous...forever.


Namaste.