| Welcome to Edition Thirteen |
| ALCOHOLIC REPRIEVE |
| On Saturday, April 15th, 2000, I participated in an uplifting experience to highlight my first 25 months of sobriety. As I approached a podium carrying a briefcase, I was to embark before 200 people a task with no fear. As I reached the podium, I placed the briefcase upon a table, and facing the people in attendance, I began my story of where I had been, what happened, and what my life was today. This is my story............. |
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| "GRANT ME SERENITY" |
| Hi, my name is Cliff, and I am an alcoholic. Thank you all for being here for me tonight. I grant you that I am coming off the greatest year of my life. With all my writings and speaking at meetings that I have done, I have been able to express my growth in sobriety for all to feed on. Alcoholics Anonymous has been able to do for me, what I could not do for myself for nearly thirty years. That is to stop drinking for one day at a time. Not in my wildest dreams would I have believed that the new Millennium would present for me such happiness, gratitude, and serenity into my life. I am being honest! You see...I had to become honest with the most important person in the whole wide world...ME! In order that I could become honest with you all. In my sobriety, I have discovered a Higher Power. A spiritual God of my understanding, that steadily talks to me through my thoughts as I am talking to you all through my mouth. As I reflect back on my life, the one thing that has been with me this past thirty-three years is this here BRIEF CASE! The only material thing! You see, my high school class ring disappeared in Crailsheim, Germany during a drunken street brawl back in 1970. My one and only wedding band with two diamonds was pond off so I could go to a tavern in 1991. By 1998, all of my material possessions were lost because of the disease of alcoholism. This here brief case contains my whole life. Amazingly, it does contain my birth registration form; my certificate of confirmation; my high school diploma; my honorable discharge papers from the US Army; all of my tax return forms; and God help me I am alive and sober today to remember. I have discovered in my sobriety...simplicity! This has made a huge difference in my life today. No longer do I have to complicate things in my daily affairs. No longer do I have to take mole hills and build mountains. In my sobriety, I have rediscovered three lost loves that I had lost in all my years as an active drunk. Reading, writing, and sports...and I am really pleased that I can read and write. That my brain did not completely turn to mush. If I were to write an autobiography today, I would entitle same, "The Three Phases of My Life." And I guarantee you all that today I am living the third phase...hopefully tomorrow and for all eternity. It is a phase of peace and serenity. A phase of having a clear conscious. And, most important, a phase of true sobriety of acceptance and understanding. I could not be more happier and blessed. Phase one of my life began on January 15th, 1950...the day I was born. This phase covered the first nineteen years of my life. It was a phase that I could label as full of fear. It was a period of my life of loneliness. And, a period of my life that I became filled up to my eyebrows with despite. My parents drank...all of my relations drank, and all the friends of my parents and relatives drank. Believe me when I say, I truly grew up despising them all. I told myself that I was not ever going to be like them. But being so immature, I did not know how to express my feelings. I would just stuff the feelings inside of myself and carry the load. I fell in love with sports. I followed and played sports religiuosly. It was at the top of my priority list on growing up. I considered my self good, but not great. And, if I ever had a chance to speak before an audience like tonight...I would have announced that my name is Cliff. I am a sports fanatic! I grew up in a small town of Norway, Michigan. I was looked upon as an 'All American Boy.' I did not drink alcoholic beverages, smoke cigarettes, or fool around with drugs. My life was engrossed in playing and following sports. This probably had a direct effect on I not applying myself in school studies. Upon graduating from high school: having no money in the family; not having from school a high point grade average; or, not being great in sports: I was unable to go to college. |
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