Let me make a quick note on the connection between alcoholism and Passover. It is a language lesson.

In ancient Hebrew there is no way to say "sobriety" outright. It uses odd phrases like "let the wine out of you!" (get sober) or "The wine was let out of him" (he became sober). The key word is "yatzah" which means "let out". There is another phrase in which this word "let out" is used.  In English it will be translated in various ways to make it sound more lyrical. They will say, "let out", "leave", "go out from here", or "send out" but essentially we are talking about getting "let out".  It is during Passover when we use this phrase, "G-d let us out of Egypt, out of bondage."

This reminds me of the story "Freedom from Bondage" in the Big Book. In that story she was freed from resentments. All she had to do was to wish the best for her enemies. In fact during the Exodus, a Midrash says that when the Egyptians drowned in the Sea of Reeds, the Angels sang. G-d rebuked them by saying, "My creations are drowning!" or words to that effect. G-d showed compassion for the Egyptians even though Pharaoh defied His will.

But remember that even though G-d let us out of Egypt, He did not actually lead us into the freedom to do what we wish. He led us to Mount Sinai and gave us commandments and a job to do, to be a light unto the nations. That means we care for ourselves by following certain rules and we show others the way to this particular type of freedom.

Most mothers know this freedom when they walk into their kid's room and see a mess. A mother will reason with her child, "If you clean up as you go along, you can have more fun, more room, you will be happier."

If you follow a few simple principles, a good life will flow out from there.

Be well. I will be off-line later today for Passover until Saturday night.

I am an alcoholic and an Orthodox Jew.

Alex H.

Someone on an email AA meeting mentioned Peeps, the marshmallow treat that so many people love to eat at this time of year.  He mentioned that Peeps were kosher. Indeed they are but not kosher for Passover. It is simply too expensive to switch the factory over (and change the formula). It makes no economic sense. Peeps are kosher the rest of the year though.
 
I promised to post something for Passover regarding alcoholism so here we go...

Passover is observed by more Jews than any other holiday. It begins with the Passover Seder. It is more than a formal dinner. It is orchestrated. Certain things WILL happen during the dinner because the people at the dinner will read out of a booklet that will GUIDE them toward those things. You can't avoid them by ducking out to the bathroom.

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Alex H.

(All names have been changed to confuse the critical. :-))

In a lot of AA meetings there is a time imposed. This is usually done because there are so many people waiting to share that the meeting wants to get as many people in as possible. But other meetings will only impose a time limit on certain people in the meeting.

I think time-limiting certain people who are over-talkative seems fine to me. For example, when I first got sober I noticed that when the sharing came to me, the leader always said, "Five minutes, Alex." He never put a time limit on anyone else. Just me. :-)

I felt fine about it. I knew I was rambling. Much of what I said in those early days was nonsense. But I learned something: I'll give anyone five minutes. I don't care how silly or insane they might be. Five minutes.

I remember a woman who had a lobotomy. Her sharing was incoherent at times. She used full sentences but it was not clear how one sentence linked to the next. She was a kind and gentle soul with a delightful smile, but no one would ever call on her in meetings. It seemed cruel to me but she never even noticed.

One day I was leading and she raised her hand politely as she always did. I called on her and saw several people roll their eyes. Their shoulders drooped in dismay.

I wagged a finger in her direction, smiled playfully and said, "Now Wanda. You're a wanderer." Then I pointed to my watch and said, "Five minutes."

I let her go.

As she painted a scattered portrait of her life, the meeting relaxed. Not only was Wanda happily wandering, but the meeting was actually listening. She didn't make a whole lot of sense, but the meeting had a sense that I would call a halt to it regardless of whether she got to the point or not. My job was to keep the discussion moving and I took that job seriously.

Wanda suddenly ground to a halt. Without rhyme or reason she had simply stopped herself. Three minutes had passed. She smiled that big smile of hers. We were friends for years. I have no requirement that my friends make sense.

I was in another meeting where the leader had lost control. It was a lunch meeting and I dropped into a club out of my normal area. A woman was sharing and she didn't shut up. She was talking about her electric bill and how the devil kept turning on her porch light. After about 15 minutes of this %$$#, I called a halt to the meeting and confronted the leader.

"How long am I going to have to sit here and listen to this?"

I was most unpleasant. The leader became defensive, explaining that some people needed to share.

"I'll listen to anyone for five minutes, but this is a load of..."

He disagreed.

Finally I turned to the woman who had been sitting quietly waiting to continue and asked her, "How long have you been sober?"

"Oh", she thought carefully, "Since this morning." :-)

At that point all opposition collapsed and we moved on. After the meeting, several guys (the old hands from the meeting) approached me. They apologized and hoped I would keep coming back. I waved them off. No big deal. It happens sometimes.

The leader has to lead and keep the meeting moving. He may even have to cut off people he likes.

Alex H.

An alcoholic buddy on an email online meeting declared that sin does not exist and that AA never addresses the idea of "sin". Right and Wrong, "Yes" but sin, "No."

Well... the problem is that the word "sin" is overburdened with meanings never intended by the original word.

"Sin" in Hebrew is chet [CHEHT with ch as in Back or loch]. It means off course. There is no distance suggested by the term so you could be slightly off or WAY OFF. :-) And no judgment is made. No emotion is attached to the term. It is like the word "incorrect".

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Alex H.

While I continue to make changes to my blog, I thought I'd share this posting I made on an email list.

This is a stream of consciousness. Beware. I know some of some are sensitive to anything I write, anything at all, and my love for you compels me to warn you. I write what I think.

When I was over a year sober, I moved to Orange County, CA and began to pull my life back together. I wasn't only doing the AA thing (though I was hitting that pretty hard). I had to build a life for myself, a new life. I took classes just to find out what I wanted to do. There was a clown class. I spotted one class in script writing for plays and TV. It was run by a famous writer so I took the class (along with another class on how to run an AB Dick! :-)) It was through that writer's class that I became a writer for a show magazine. It was also through that class that I met a director who was putting together a new comedy show, an improvisational comedy group. I signed up with him. I wasn't all that good but I learned a lot. I developed a stream of consciousness that serves me to this day. Thoughts and ideas flow out of me unbidden.

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Alex H.

An AA member wondered about how some folks could be intolerant of religion when so many religions are based on love. (paraphrase)

Hmm... I am glad that that such an opinion exists because it reflects a better world but it was not always a loving world, not even with those religions that are professing love today. Perhaps the change is because the children have learned from the mistakes of the fathers.

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Alex H.

A Jewish alcoholic from New Jersey writes the following. I have his permission to reprint here though I have removed his name, not by his request because he said he didn't care but out of love for my fellow alcoholics who might think I would be sloppy with their anonymity.)

Hirhurim - Musings

I was reading the blog of Rabbi Gil Student (not an alcoholic) and he mused on the idea that sometimes hard work is required to obtain one's freedom. Often sitting on the couch enslaves us. It is the enslavement of the "messy room" that restricts us from making use of the room. By working to it clean up, we are thereby freed to make use of the room. But to maintain this freedom, we must do the work.

It reminded me about the 12 Steps and "working the steps". It seems as if we are enslaved and I get this implied complaint from the guys I visit at jail. They seem to be saying... "Do I have to go to AA meetings? Can't I work these steps and be done with it?"
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Alex H.

My buddy reminded me of how helpful those early morning "Attitude Adjustment" meetings were for him.

Thanks for the reminder. That was over twenty-five years ago when we started it up.

You wouldn't believe how hard it was to get that meeting going. My friend (a guy with about a year of sobriety or maybe two. I'll call him JB.) had this idea to get an early morning meeting going and I was looking for a new project. G-d placed JB in my life. He had barely a year of sobriety as I recall and he was pushing this new-fangled idea of an early morning meeting. I could see he was going to piss off a lot of people if they weren't approached correctly so I made suggestions on changing his pitch (slightly but significantly) and resistance was reduced significantly. The idea caught on and spread across Orange County, CA. (JB was a good salesman.)

Folks thought we were trying to turn AA into a religion, but it was positive readings from the Big Book, 12 and 12 and 24 Hour book. It wasn't our fault that the Big Book is so religious-sounding. :-) I loved it.

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Alex H.

I am sometimes asked "Which is the best meeting?" They are asking me to pick out the best local meeting in town. I tell them that I don't know because what I am looking for may not be what they are looking for. Most newcomers are looking for a meeting they can get something out of. I am looking for a meeting I can put something into.

That sound a little too nice and I'm not all that nice.

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Chanukah is going on now. It is a minor Jewish holiday about as religiously significant as Cinco De Mayo or Flag Day. :-) However, because of it's proximity to Christmas, it has taken on the flavor of Christmas. I don't like that but no one is asking me. It is so.

It is strange to be a non-Christian during Christmas. It is a different kind of "otherness" one feels. I am not alone. I am not lonely. I don't feel compelled to join with family, eat or drink, yet every time I turn on the TV I am told (nay, shouted and cajoled) to join the family, eat a hearty meal and drink, drink, drink. It gets a little weird this time of year so I turn the TV off. It feels like Sunday.

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Alex H.

An alcoholic is dying.  She says that she dresses herself each day. That act looms large in a world that is becoming smaller and smaller for her each day. She says "I make [the world] as large as I can."

Very good.

My world is larger due to this computer. I am limited to my bedroom with the drapes drawn. It is difficult for me to get around, but easier than for you. Today, I am preparing for a seminar on Drugs, Sex, and Integrity. I am joining a Reform Rabbi in speaking to middle school kids and their parents. He wanted an Orthodox perspective. I had to blow off the Jail meeting I usually attend on Wednesday so that I'll be in good enough shape to attend. I can't do both in the same day.

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FYI, the person I quoted is not from the email list that is asking me to edit these postings. Their request seems odd to me but I comply nevertheless because I love and accept them as they are.


Alex H.

A non-Jewish alcoholic wrote that in thinking about Christmas there was a nagging worry about being alone.
One way to prepare for Christmas is to realize there is a large part of the world that does not celebrate Christmas at all and suffers no psychic damage from ignoring it entirely. I am Jewish and I don't celebrate Christmas. In fact I go out of my way not to do so. However, it is a little difficult to get away from the message at times. Isn't it?

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Alex H.

Good point.

But it is not the responsibility of others to catch me. It is my job to be honest.  A company has a duty to due diligence, but a detailed background check takes money and a company won't invest in that unless they are sure the person they are investigating has some chits in the pot too.

I volunteer at the local Jail. I've seen innocent people's lives ruined simply because the police wanted to be sure. But as the wheels of justice turned slowly, the person investigated watched their lives go down the drain. Bills went unpaid. Jobs were lost. Vehicles repossessed. By the time they were released as an "innocent man" what difference would have it made if they had been guilty? They were punished just the same.

One guy was philosophical about it. He said he hadn't done the crime he was convicted for, but he had done many other crimes so "I guess this counts for that."

Alex H.

An alcoholic wrote that AA has taken away his prejudice of other races, colors and backgrounds and that he is grateful to AA for that.
When I came into AA someone told me that Mexicans couldn't get sober. He was looking at me, an obvious Mexican straight out of the barrio. I converted to Orthodox Judaism years later so now I look like an Orthodox Jew. (I'll leave it to the reader to decide if this was a big step up.  :-))

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Alex H.

A message from an alcoholic with her permission. I omit her name not because she requested it but out of compassion for those who might fear I would reveal their identity. (I won't but I understand the fear. Really. I do.)

My first day of continuous sobriety began November 14th, 1977. I am now 31 years sober, grateful and a little fearful. I now have as much sobriety as one of my early sponsors had. He died of "extreme lead poisoning" to the head. I don't want to end like that. I'd much rather die in my sleep, a sober, peaceful, and grateful man. I am told that we should not think of our own death until we are nearly the age that our father died. Charlie was 31 years sober. I believe he died because he wanted to believe he was all the wonderful things we said he was, but he knew he was not. We placed him on a pedestal and we placed him so far up that when he fell it was fatal. I don't let people place me too high on that pedestal. When I sense I am too high up, I step down while it is still easy enough to do so.

I used the steps to lift myself up and now I use them to step down.

Alex H.

I put together a video and submitted it to Alcoholics Anonymous in their Youth Video contest. I'm no longer young, but they were asking for videos of people who came in when they were young. I was 22 so I qualified according to the rules. Here is the video I submitted...



Alex H.

A fellow alcoholic wrote about the wisdom of AA's steps 8 and 9. We have no power over the past. What is done is done. What we can change is the present. As he mused over this he decided to place his own name at the top of the list of people to make amends to. It was selfish, perhaps, but the truth nevertheless.

It makes sense to me too but I remember a time when it wouldn't have made any sense at all. I lived a life in fear of the past catching up with an uncertain future. Never for a moment did I live "in the now". I could not experience living "now" without fear, it so overwhelmed me. I almost died, but I lived.

Steps 8 and 9 will not make much sense to those who have not done Steps 1 through 7. What was true for me was that when I completed a step, the next step changed. I thought I knew what the next step would be, but my understanding of what would be involved changed because I was different now. I was the man who had completed the step before and before that time I was a man who had not.

The steps changed me, one step at a time and as I changed, so did the steps.

Alex H.