I was thinking that it’s been a little while since I’ve written, and there really hasn’t been much “recovery” going on with me lately, so I wasn’t really sure that I had anything to write about at all. Then a funny thing happened: my wife wished me a “Happy 27 Years Clean, Bam!” And then it hit me. Everything that’s gone on since I last wrote really is all about recovery.

Lemme ‘splain: When I was using, like everyone else I know, I used any excuse to get loaded; it was raining, it was sunny, I failed at something, I aced something. Hell, I used if you failed or aced something!

So, this is how my last few months have gone:

We went to visit relatives for Thanksgiving. Actually, we added the visit to the relatives to explain the other thing that we were doing. Y’see, we planned a trip around a UNC football game in Blacksburg, Virginia, followed 5 days later by a UNC basketball game at the Dean Dome. Then we added a visit to my cousin, my sister-in-law and an aunt, in various places around North Carolina.

Then we headed to New York for Thanksgiving with my wife’s mother-in-law. And on the way home we stopped at the Crayola Factory in Pennsylvania and the Safari Park in Virginia for my daughter (and her mother!).

Then, what should have been a quiet, relaxing ride back to Austin, was anything but. We made it to Alabama just in time for the traffic heading home from the Alabama-Auburn football game; and it was dark and rainy. Then in the stop and go of I-20 traffic we get rear ended by a kid in a big pick-up truck.

Thankfully, he told me and the investigating officer the two things you probably should not be telling the other party and the investigating officer: “I’m so sorry. I know it’s my fault. I had just told my mom I was 20 miles further down the road and was just trying to hurry up and get there because I was with my girlfriend, who my mother doesn’t like.”

Everyone was relatively all right, for being in an accident; and we drove home, only to be told by our insurance that the truck is totaled and we can’t drive it anymore because it can’t be insured. Then fighting to get a check from the insurance company, so that we could make a down payment on a new truck; and making appointments to see doctors and chiropractors and lawyers. Oh, my.

After a few weeks of hassle, we decided to go to Shreveport for the UNC Bowl game, to relax a little. We end up spending enough time and money on the tables that we got our room and food “comped” for the whole weekend.

And once we get home, we get a call from the Sheriff’s office that our neighbors are once again complaining that we aren’t feeding our horses. Don’t you just wish people who have no idea what they’re talking about would just shut the hell up and drop dead!

In case you’re worried, there’s nothing wrong with the horses – in fact, the vet was out this week and gave them a new Coggins, updated their vaccinations and deworming meds, and gave them a clean bill of health.

And then it’s New Years Eve and New Years Day and I’m another year “clean.”
So, as I look back on all of the things that have happened, all at the same time, I can’t help but think that any one of those little things, all by themselves, would have been enough to get loaded over in years past. Yet, here I am, having lived through them all, in just 2 short months, and I’m celebrating another year clean. Not for nothin’, but that really is recovery.

I love this program.