Digital New Reporter Page 1 VOLUME 54 NUMBER 7 JULY 2017
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VOLUME 54 NUMBER 7 JULY 2017 Digital New Reporter Page 1 VOLUME 54 NUMBER 7 JULY 2017 Removing the Muck To me, that’s why Step Seven is a removal pro- A New York City junk dealer was cess. Under the cleaning out an old warehouse, layers of charac- among all the debris was a statue sit- ter defects and ting in a corner covered by years of other accretions dirt, grime and pigeon droppings. At of our alcohol- the end of the day, the dealer looked ism, we are really at his watch and realized it was too pretty cool peo- late to take the old stature to the ple, the people wrecking yard where he could have that God wants us to be. That’s why cashed it for junk metal. So he loaded we always ask God to remove out de- it in the back of his truck and took it fects of character. That’s why we back to his shop. He unloaded it and don’t ask God for the positive charac- thought, ‘This think looks cool.” He ter traits. turned a hose on it an attacked it with a scrub brush and a bucket of suds. When he finished, he stood back and You can pour maple syrup on horse said, “Shoot, this thing looks way cool!” manure, but it doesn’t make it French toast. You’ve got to get rid of the bad stuff first. Then the good stuff flows in The man was friends with an art deal- naturally as a result. er on 57th Street, so he swung by his Bob D. gallery and asked if he could have an Springfield, MA appraiser look at the statue. So he left it, then jumped back in his truck and Reprinted, with permission, from the took off. A week later he returned to Grapevine. his friend’s gallery. The art dealer just about jumped over the counter and said, “You know that bronze you dropped off last week? It’s a Rodin!” Digital New Reporter Page 2 VOLUME 54 NUMBER 7 JULY 2017 Alcohol and Alcoholics in the News Officer who gives breathalyzer needs it too! According to the AP, an Austin, Texas, police officer whose duties in- cluded administering Breathalyzer tests has been fired after a self- administered test indicated he’d reported for work drunk. Records show the officer arrived one day last October, then drove his patrol car to the county jail for a self-test required by his certification. Extrap- olated results showed his blood alcohol level was .084-.124 when he arrived at work, above the .08 limit for drivers. Drug use passes drinking in fatal crashes According to the Washington Post, for the first time, statistics show drivers are killed in crashes are more likely to be on drugs than drunk. Forty-three percent of drivers tested in fatal crashes in 2015 had used a legal or illegal drug, eclipsing the 37 percent who tested above the legal limit for alcohol, according to a report released Wednesday by the Governors Highway Safety Association and the Foundation for Ad- vancing Alcohol Responsibility. Of the drivers who tested positive for drugs, more than a third had used marijuana and more than 9 percent had taken amphetamines. Digital New Reporter Page 3 VOLUME 54 NUMBER 7 JULY 2017 75 Years Ago This Month or so—The Selective the Washington Service 7 (in part) to a May 24 letter Bill W. sent General Service to Selective Service Director Lewis B. Hershey Assembly. making the case for selecting alcoholics recov- ering in AA for military service, "It is the consid- 25 Years-Ago ered opinion of this office that, notwithstanding This Month— In the patriotic attitude of your organization and July, the AA of these individuals, it would be manifestly un- General Service wise to subject these men, who have appar- Office (GSO) ently made a satisfactory adjustment in their prepares for individual environment, [to] one where stress A.A.'s triennial and strain play an important part and where A.A. Member- the temptation to resort to their former inclina- ship Survey by distributing anonymous question- tions would be far more inviting." [Cf: Pass It On, naires to 496 Canadian and U.S. groups pp. 272-274] through their area delegates. The question- naires would be completed during the first two Yet, our stories disclose, ”…dependence weeks of August 1992 at a regular meeting of upon an AA group or a Higher Power hasn’t each sampled group to return to the delegate, produced any baleful results. When World War who would return them to GSO. II broke out, this spiritual principle had its first Since 1968 A.A. would conduct this survey major test. AA’s entered the services and were every three years. The General Service Confer- scattered all around the world. Would they be ence would approve taking the survey, deter- able to take discipline, stand up under fire, and mine the content of the questionnaire to keep endure the monotony and misery of war? A.A. members informed on current trends in Would the kind of dependence they had membership characteristics and provide infor- learned in AA carry them through? Well, it did. mation about Alcoholics Anonymous for both They had even fewer alcoholic lapses or emo- the professional community and the general tional binges than AA’s safe at home did.” [Cf: public. The survey serves to guide A.A.’s effort Twelve and Twelve, p.40] to reach those who still suffer from alcoholism. [Results from the 2014 Membership Survey are 50 Years Ago This Month— The Serenity Prayer the most current, published by the A.A. Gen- would become a regular part of the Grapevine eral Service Office]. format. The Colesville-Glenmont group separates into two stand-alone groups during the period A.A. History Corner, thanks to the WAIA Ar- of the ‘60’s AA growth surge. Colesville would chives Committee become the home group of Chad L. who would serve in AA archives for both WAIA and Digital New Reporter Page 4 VOLUME 54 NUMBER 7 JULY 2017 Mental Sobriety Means Spotting Danger Signals In 1940 I took my last drink. Naturally I hope I will never take another. But can I be absolutely certain? No, because I do not believe that I can ever accept my sobriety as an accom- plished fact. Yet, neither do I mean that I am, as in the early days of it, haunted by the fear of returned drunkeness. Than it was ghost always with me, casting its dark shadow across the way. What if the old patten reasserted itself? What if I get drunk? I, who wanted so desperately to stay sober. I thought much and with concern about it, and then one day, quite uncon- sciously, my son gave me what seemed to be an answer. He was a boy of 10, captain of one of those little boy football teams that play the game so very en- thusiastically and with very bad results. His heart was set on winning the game against the school’s great rival. As the day drew near I aske him how things were going and what the chances were. Earnestly he looked at me and said, “It’s a funny thing, Mummie, they all want to win the game, but they don’t want to practice!” Instantly it struck home! Had I wanted to win the game of sobriety without re- alizing that to do so would depend entirely on my own willingness to practice regularly those things in which mental sobriety has it origin? A certain pattern of physical sobriety had been established. There was no longer a definite physical urge to take a drink; but what about mental sobriety? From then on I began to think much less about a physical slip and much more about a mental one. I lost the fear that I could “catch drunk” as I could “catch cold.” In its place developed an awareness that if I remained mentally sober, I would never find myself physically drunk. This became a firm conviction and has remained one ever since. Digital New Reporter Page 5 VOLUME 54 NUMBER 7 JULY 2017 I determined to recognize all subversive thoughts. What better sign, for in- stance, that I am going off the A.A. track than to start feeling sorry for myself? That “nobody loves me” feeling and its companion, “no one really understands me.” Or the pressure signal. Here is a world to be remodeled. I and I alone, must do it, and that immediately or at the most within two weeks. Just as when the in- tolerance signal flashes. Then indeed must I lie on the alert for when I start worry- ing about another’s failure to practice the 12 Steps I can be quite certain I have mislaid it within myself. No stranger, either, to my impulses, is the one which prompts me to believe that I have never been fully appreciated; that circum- stances have cruelly diverted genius into mediocrity, that old ego aborting the truth. Nor does it stop there. It invariably leads to a sense of self-importance that is translated into terms of my wanting to play God. In my own life and the lives of others I want to be the director. How smoothly the show would go off, if only I was allowed to manage it all! This feeling is often directed primarily against the group – that intractable, obstinate body of men and women who surely, after all, do need me more than I need them.