What they say is true. There is something magical that happens when one alcoholic talks to another. Or perhaps it's in the listening where the magic most lies.
I don't mean to diminish in any way the magic that happens when "just" friends talk to each other, (or comment on blogs), or when therapists and patients talk to each other, or mothers and daughters or lovers or nuns, for that matter. But there is something very special that occurs when people in recovery meet for the common purpose of staying sober, and in the conversations we have before and after.
I don't do prayer and meditation well, I suppose it's a function of my impatient, A.D.D. brain. But I can ALWAYS do something kind for someone today, several times a day in fact. I can always mean it when I say "How are you?" and really listen to the answer. When I have something from my experience that might help, I can share it. And sure as shit, I can always find something to laugh about.
When I make this my primary purpose (not my only purpose, but the one I put above others) it's amazing how the rest of my life works--at least on the inside, where it counts. And it doesn't depend on getting the desired result. I've been working with one sweetheart of a chronic relapser, and it's been an amazing spiritual lesson to not take the fact that he keeps picking up as some sort of referendum on me. It's an opportunity for me to take a deep breath and send him a loving or nudging text--in this case, "Come Back Little Sheba." And he does come back, and I truly believe one day he'll stay. And if he doesn't, it still won't diminish the love we exchange one whit, and that is its own reward.
Last night I was enjoying an old episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation, which I used to so enjoy watching with my brother when we lived together in San Diego in 1989. It was the perfect marriage of my love of good writing and his love of fantasy fiction. I don't know if I ever felt more his brother. I'm so grateful to have that memory.
MCO 2008
P.S. Champaigne is the Nuns, Corot the background
I like the word "communion." It goes beyond the exchange of words or even ideas, it's an extraordinary moment of identification with another human being that alters both of you in a significant and permanent way.
I also like the power of memory, the way that shared connections can resurface and transport you, however briefly, to another place and time. The image of you and your brother watching TNG together made me smile.