So, in the last episode, I drank my way out of the service and began a life that I could only describe as a life of insanity. After all, every single time I drank, it was like a means to an end that was never a good one. The cycle during those years was usually coming off a drunk, usually ending up in some sort of rescue facility, or a cheap room somewhere, getting a job, possibly attending 12 step meetings and becoming involved, (at least on a surface level), and always meeting nice, helpful people. Finally I once again arrived at the point where I felt I couldn’t play this charade any longer, and began to drink once more. No matter where I was or what I was doing, as soon as I took that first drink, all was over. Thus began the cycle once more.

As I said, over those years, there were periods of deep involvement with the 12 step program, and eventually, slightly longer periods of sobriety, enabling me to do some work as a therapist and counselor as well as attend three or four schools to learn about addiction counseling. When my drinking brought me to yet another program of therapy as a patient, I had already learned so much about myself, about alcoholism, and about the 12 step program, that I really tuned myself out, yet still went through the motions.

Finally, during my last drunk, I was so far at the bottom that I actually was considering ending it all, something that never seemed possible for me because I thought it would completely remove any connection, however slight, I had with God. I asked the bartender for a phone book so I could look up auto supply stores where I could buy along to run from my exhaust. As I thumbed through the A’s in the “A” listings in the phone book, my finger landed on a phone number for AA. I decided to call the number and they told me where a meeting would be that evening. I believe that bartender was my first “angel” that evening. I also believe that moment in that bar was the first moment of my troop Enlightenment, the gift associated with the first step.

In this episode, I will continue the story as I describe my next two angels.