It's a simple thing really. Give a little love and show some genuine care and concern for others as you treat them as though they have value. Good old Sneaky Pete did that for me and for others, and the legacy of that continues long after him. Today, I want to encourage myself and others to simply smile at someone who needs it and care that someone is there in our lives giving us an opportunity to give and serve and be an instrument of God's peace. I also want to remember my friend, so I am going to close with something I wrote in his memory and honor the day after he died. May we all live today in such a way that if we are gone tomorrow it is our smile, our service and our caring that people will remember and miss.
A Dear John Letter
Those who do not recover are people who are constitutionally incapable of being honest with themselves. There are such unfortunates. They are not at fault. They seem to have been born that way. They are naturally incapable of grasping and developing a manner of living which demands rigorous honesty. Their chances are less than average. There are those, too, who suffer from grave emotional and mental disorders, but many of them do recover, if they have the capacity to be honest.
I have an image in my mind of a skinny man in a hat that would fit well on most blues guitarists. His yellowed fingers fiddle with a cigarette or maybe a piece of gum as he tried to cut back. He's reclined as much as possible in a metal folding chair, and, here's what I remember most, he looks me in the eyes and smiles with his entire face as he sees me come in the door. The seat changed. Sometimes he wasn't leaning against the back of the chair.
Occasionally he wore a baseball cap that proudly told of his service to our country. Sometimes I beat him into the room and it was he who walked in. But what always remained the same, no matter what was going on in his life or with his health was the way he caught my attention, looked me in the eyes and smiled in a way that left me no doubt that he was glad to see me there.
I have been blessed to find true care and concern for me inside the rooms. There are several people who have gone above and beyond to make me feel a part of, to show me they truly care, and to help me get and stay clean and sober. But few have made me feel as cared for as John. His smile, which always made my heart feel like the clouds broke and the sun shone down on my inside, gave me more strength than realized until I heard the news that I would not be seeing it again.
John taught me the importance of the quote I opened with. I didn't always agree with him, but I knew I could trust that whatever he was telling me was what he believed was truth. He was the first man I met who talked openly of having received a two year sobriety marker and then publicly changing his sobriety date because during the first year he had been on the marijuana maintenance program to help him stay off everything else and keep the demons in his mind at bay. He spoke with me about the relief he had after he not only stopped that treatment and started working what works correctly but came clean about it. He taught me the power of honesty through example and by the freedom and strength I saw that he derived from it.
About three years ago I rode up into the parking lot of the club house on the motorcycle I had just purchased. It felt so good to be on two wheels again, and John, who was standing outside and saw me ride up noticed that. He always saw me. "Looks like you loved the ride," he said to me with that great smile. The next time I saw him he handed me a little gremlin bell. It has the American flag on one side and the words Ride Free on the other. He told me that he wanted me to stay safe while I was riding but that even more than that he wanted me to remember every time that I heard that bell jingle as I rode that I was riding free, not in the outlaw sense that I had always associated with ride free or die but truly free, free to love and be loved, free to have relationship with God, free from prison in my soul and mind as much as physically, free from the bondage of self and the chains of addiction. That little gift has given me so much, and I am grateful every time that I hear it to know that I am riding free. Want to talk about a gift that keeps on giving.
After 15 months clean and sober I relapsed. During the time that I was back out I had to take that gremlin bell off my bike. I've heard people say there's nothing worse than a mind full of program and a belly full of booze and a bloodstream toxic with chemicals, and I can attest to the truth of that statement. But I can also testify that hearing that bell was worse. Every time I heard it the hypocrisy of my life hit me full force. I had sent myself back to the worst of prisons and slavery, and I could not pretend to be free, not even on two wheels with the wind in my hair. With every jingle of the bell an alarm sounded with the message get back to where you belong, get clean and sober again or die. I took the bell off the bike, but I couldn't outrun or outride the truth.
When I returned to the program John was still there with his smile. We talked for hours. I don't think I ever expressed how much he helped me find recovery again. John's smile and the way he laughed when he spoke of his Higher Power, who he chose to call Bubba, will always be a special memory to me.
Yesterday morning I lost another friend. I am grateful that it was not drugs or alcohol that took him away. He lived the last years of his life free, and he died free. But loss is loss, and I hurt.
I know there are others who were closer to John than I and who hurt more. But I'm an addict, and it's all about me. I can't see past my own pain and fear at the moment. I'm not sure where the fear is coming from or the anger it is producing in me. I am so sorry that Leah had to suffer seeing me twist in the winds of that anger yesterday. I realized this morning that some of that anger, maybe most of it, was a product of guilt.
I haven't made a meeting in about two months, and part of the result of that absence is being isolated from my recovery friends and what is going on in their lives. Basically if it isn't posted on Facebook, I don't know about it. One of my dearest friends of the last three and a half years became sick, entered a VA Hospice and died in three weeks, and I never knew anything was wrong. I wasn't there for him. I feel that I have failed the friendship test, but I also know that John wouldn't and didn't hold my absence against me. If he thought of me at all, which is unlikely considering what he was going through and the fact that it really isn't all about me, he would have only hoped that I was doing well. That's all he ever wanted for me.
I also feel guilty because I owe him photos. He hired me to take some photos of him, and I enjoyed the day very much. I got some images of my friend that I love and kept for my portfolio. He loved them as well, and paid me in advance for another session. He was supposed to call me when he was ready for those pictures to be taken, and I was really looking forward to it. The call never came. And now it never will. But I can make amends for that one. First by providing the 8 x 10 print that his sister wants to use for the funeral and then by finding someone in recovery that needs or wants some photos and giving them services the value of what John paid me.
Part of the anger came from self-pity rather than guilt. The news of John's death came days away from the birthday of a special Angel I lost years ago. I have lost over 50 people to the grave in my 41 years. Sometimes the weight of that loss hits me and I grow fearful that I will lose everyone I care about. Fear and resentment rear their ugly heads once again. The anger spews from their mouths into my soul and burns everything around me.
On top of that there are spiritual questions and feelings of condemnation. I know that they don't come from God, but I haven't shaken them yet. I need to pray on that one, and probably get some counsel from my spiritual adviser.
Mainly I am just sad, and 27 months clean and sober is not long enough, evidently, for me to get used to or comfortable with feeling my own emotions. I don't like being sad. And like a child who throws a fit when he doesn't get his own way, I still get angry sometimes when I can't escape feeling and facing the emotions and situations that I don't want to feel or face.
John always encouraged me to feel what I feel and to be honest about it, especially to myself. I try to live by that today, but sometimes it takes me a while to process enough to even be able to understand what I am feeling. As crazy as it sounds, I didn't even realize how angry I was yesterday until Leah pointed out how I was acting. John taught me that just because I know my thinking is screwed up and or crazy doesn't mean it doesn't effect me in real ways. I have to acknowledge my thoughts and emotions and be honest about them, even as I fight not to let them control me and struggle to give them to God. And John reminded me often to "screw guilt." Guilt is a wasted emotion for the forgiven to feel. I must acknowledge my mistakes, learn from them, make amends when I can, but there is nothing to be gained and no progress to be made from beating myself up. If John taught me anything else it was the importance of being able to acknowledge and laugh at my own insanity.
So I will pray. I will cry. I will mourn the loss of my friend, and I will laugh at myself and the memories of my time with John. I will honor his memory by trying to be for others what he was for me. I will listen for the jingle of a little gremlin bell and let it remind me of a good and faithful friend and the fact that I am free. I will hear it, be grateful and smile.
Goodbye my friend. Thank you for all that you did for me and all that you taught me. Thank you for your smile.
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