Pubdate: Mon, 24 Nov 2003
Source: Daily Times, The (TN)
Copyright: 2003 Horvitz Newspapers
Contact:  http://www.thedailytimes.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1455
Author: Steve Wildsmith
Note: Steve Wildsmith is a recovering addict and the Weekend editor for The 
Daily Times. His entertainment column and stories appear every Friday in 
the Weekend section.

LEARN TO LEAN ON EACH OTHER

Just For Today

Once again, a group of recovering addicts gathered at a funeral home on 
Thursday night.

Once again, we laid to rest one of our own.

It's been a brutal year so far among the rooms of the recovery program to 
which I belong. I can rattle off the names of almost a dozen people who 
have overdosed, and at least three who have died from the disease of addiction.

One of those was a guy I sponsored. Rusty, whom we remembered on Thursday 
night, was nothing more than an acquaintance, a guy who briefly stayed at 
the halfway house where I got clean, and the nephew of a dear friend who's 
also a member of the program.

Thursday night, we turned out for Randy as much as we were there for his 
nephew. Grief-stricken and overwhelmed, he didn't need to say a word, and 
neither did we. He needed us. We showed up.

That's how the program works. One of the guys I sponsor saw a Discovery 
Channel documentary on penguins that he likes to use in comparison: When 
one of the flock is ill or injured, the other penguins gather around and 
huddle close, sharing warmth and holding vigil until the sick penguin is 
well again.

It's a simplistic comparison, but an accurate one. Recovery teaches us, 
first and foremost, that we accomplish together what we can't do alone, and 
that includes getting through the bad times.

Because the bad times are what we have trouble with. That's what we run 
from, what we try to avoid as much as possible, when we're in our active 
addictions. We can't face life on its own terms, and rather than trying to 
accept what's handed to us and dealing with it, we run. We use drugs to 
keep from thinking about it. We stay high and hope the world and all of its 
problems pass us by.

That's probably what terrified me the most when I first got clean: Learning 
to face life on its own terms. For years, it was all too easy when I was 
stressed or frightened or nervous or agitated to just swallow a few pills, 
have a few drinks or, later on, to just find a bathroom and shoot up. The 
drugs made everything go away, I thought.

In reality, all they did was make me go away. Instead of facing my fears 
and walking through the flames of turmoil, I did my best to go around them. 
It never worked, and all I ended up doing was creating more problems for 
myself.

After getting clean, I had to face reality, and the harsh fact that life 
just ... well, it just sucks sometimes.

It's like standing in waist-deep surf at the beach: Sometimes, the waves 
are gentle and break before they get to you; other times, they're towering 
monsters that crash down like a load of cement and drive you to your knees.

Living is hard sometimes. Life isn't easy -- we're going to face crises, 
catastrophes, problems, tragedies. But I can't think of a single problem or 
tragedy that using drugs is going to make better. Usually, it only adds to 
my problems and makes things worse.

More importantly today, recovery has taught me that just as often, life is 
wonderful. My greatest hopes and dreams have just as good of a chance of 
coming true as my greatest fears. Life can be beautiful today, as well.

I thought about those things while I drifted by Rusty's casket, seeing the 
young man taken far too early, and about all of those good things he'll 
never get to experience again.

Sunshine. The wind whistling through an open window on a spring afternoon. 
Snowfall at midnight, when the streetlamps throw off a holy glow and the 
ground is perfectly sculpted, unmarked by footprints and tire tracks. The 
smell of mom's cooking drifting out of the kitchen. The pleased smile of a 
father opening an unexpected present on Christmas day.

The contented sigh of a friend's child, head on my chest and resting in my 
arms. The flutter of the heart when I'm stopped at a red light and look 
over to see a pretty girl in the next car looking back at me. The exquisite 
joy of driving fast with a favorite song turned up on the radio. Laughter. 
The smell of the ocean.

Yes, life is rough sometimes, but that's just life. And it's guaranteed 
that sometimes, perhaps most of the time, it goes the other way, too.
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MAP posted-by: Terry Liittschwager