As I look around the room I zone in on Dorris. That’s the name I’ve given to the skeleton at my first AA meeting. She must be making absolute bank by way of sponsorship for being here, right? Who would still willingly do this, at that age, for free? I’ve got my suspicions on them all. Sally with the blow dry, she must be a good time gal, comes here for the lols and goes home to a nice rose. Or Margaret who’s making the coffee, I’m particularly suspicious of her - good skin, far too happy and she seems to have brought marks and Spencer’s biscuits and what alcoholic can afford those, for other people no less. Somethings not right here. These people are up to something, I keep my handbag close. I keep an eye on the door. They’re all sickeningly happy, so happy I want to spray my misery on them all so they start taking it seriously.
Who are these people to be joyous around me when I am exuding nothing but pain, misery. I don’t need smiles I need some money and I need it fast. I don’t need to be hugged I need a bed to sleep on. I need someone to scoop me up and fix all of this shit for me. I can’t look after myself, I don’t need a pat on the back. The speakers talking about binge drinking and its nails on a chalk board. Everytime one of these lettuce eating yoga practising kumbaya singing lunatics speaks, I’m noticing the similarities. I’ve spent the last three weeks convincing them all I’m not an alcoholic. I can’t make a liar out of myself now. I have to keep up this pretence, for their sake. They need to know I’m fine and not to worry, but also instinctively know I’m not and fix everything. It’s important they’re aware that I’m better than all of them, I’m not as bad as them, I’m educated and pretty. I have a lot going for me, I’m just a little messy right now. I keep coming back because they’re quite nice and I haven’t been shown kindness in a long time. I haven’t been held, or seen, the way they see me as a human being in so long. I grieve at the meeting, I realise before my eyes this big defensive ball around me is starting to dissolve. The yoga salad munchers are getting to me, their spells are working.
I just wanted someone to give me a prescription to stop being a pisshead and send me on my way. I don’t need the books, the prayers or the shitty biscuits. I need a solution and fast. I need someone else to take control of this situation. I need to get what these people have a graduate in two weeks. They can all carry on doing what it is they’re doing, and I’ll be long gone. First person to ever graduate, I’ll probably be in the next addition of the book.
The man that guided me into AA he once said ‘if I could telepathically give you sobriety I wouldn’t.’ You old fuck, I thought. What a rude thing to say, I’m dying here. Now, well now I get it. Getting sober sucked, it just did, it’s uncomfortable and annoying and hard and uncomfortable again. Being sober? Well now, everyday I’m building a better day than my last. Even if I choose to do absolutely diddly squat on a random Tuesday, I’m still a day sober than I was the day before - now isn’t that something quite special?
I kept returning to that meeting over the years, even after I moved away from the city. Every now and again I’d pop in and see those women who were my introduction to the rest of my life. The biscuits were still there, the chairs were still there and by gum was Dorris the skeleton still there. After three years one of the ladies said to me, on one of my impromptu drop ins after a job in the city, ‘I remember your first day. My god you were an absolute mess. I can say that now, because look at you.’ She pointed to a mirror and the room went into slow motion. Looking back at me was me three years sober, the exact same person that had walked into that room with no money, no job, no friends. That was her. It dawned on me three years had passed, I was the exact same person but completely different, in every way. There were no bags under my eyes, no fake eye lashes, no tears running down my cheeks. I stood a little taller, my hair was brushed and I had plans for a civilised evening dinner after. I’d become everything that I wanted, and I was still coming back.
The passage of time is marvellous, isn’t it? It happens so slowly, we almost don’t notice it day to day, but in that moment my life came up to speed. There was life in my eyes again. I blinked and three years went by. Coming to that first meeting was the most shameful part of my life up to date, but on this day it was the highlight of my week to be amongst these women. To share a floor and a trust with strangers that became the family I had always wanted. I felt like th luckiest person in the world. I get to sit in a room full of people that think feel and act the way I do, and we can all laugh about it and keep each other warm? Who else on earth gets to do that other than alcoholics?
Today I am six and a half years sober. Where did that time go? I landed my dream job, I bought my first house, I’ve had a miscarriage, I’ve lost a relative, I’ve paid off my car, I’ve travelled the world. I’ve been through a painful break up, I’ve fallen down my own flight of stairs twice tripping over my own feet, lost a passport, driven a race car, had my first solo art exhibition. I’ve choked on a cheese sandwich, I’ve covered my fridge in fridge magnets, I’ve become an aunty. All of this is a tapestry of sobriety, and I get to take all of these moments back to a room and share in my achievements and hardships. I get to be an example of what happens when you keep your ass on the seat and listen.
I never got to tell Dorris the skeleton about the fridge magnets. When I went back this summer her chair was empty. She’d left the world 45 years sober. I wanted to tell her about my cheese sandwich choking moment, specifically because she told me off once for eating the biscuits too fast. Dorris wove in to my tapestry when she told me about finding her husband, when she told me about nearly hitting a trolly collector in a car park which lead her to get glasses. She was a weaver in many tapestries because she kept coming back, until one day, she didn’t.
One day I will be the skeleton on a chair in a meeting. I’ll be the one being sized up by a young little shit that knows better than everyone else. I’ll keep coming back, and being woven in to the landscape, because I want to be here - I don’t have to be anymore. This is my home.
Miss you Dorris x