literary commentary & stories for remembrance

Today is a special day for me – a real Ebenezer, in fact. It’s my anniversary, but I doubt it’s the kind you think it is.

It’s the 35^th anniversary of the day I put the plug in the jug – the first step toward building the stories that will unfold here as I write my memoir.

Thirty-five years ago, I began the journey into recovery from alcoholism.

Arduous at first, it was to become a story of steps – as in two steps forward and one backwards (and sometimes even the reverse of that).

The journey’s map was also a set of steps – the Twelve Steps that I know some of you reading this are as intimately acquainted with as am I.

They work, as we say, if you work them.

But wait. I’m not going to wax eloquent about the power of the recovery movement – it is what it is, and thousands of others are already writing about it.

I’m just going to tell a few stories of what happened along the way…and how the implicit messages of those stories helped me on the journey…and, I hope, how they can help others, too.

*

I was recalling one of those stories today as I went about my business.

Economic recovery was a long time coming to me. And as I drove along today in my relatively new car, I was remembering a time when I had a “recovery-mobile,’ old, with a zillion miles on it.

R-mobiles are easily recognizable. I went to an AA meeting one night at a huge Episcopal church in the Foggy Bottom area of the District of Columbia. The parking lot just about encircled the building. There were clusters of cars at each door. The question was: through which door was my meeting? The clusters were all of fancy late model cars – except one. It was a mixture of everything from the latest Mercedes to r-mobiles. I knew that was where my meeting was, and I was right.

But I digress. Sorry.

I was recalling today one of my r-mobiles – an ancient Oldsmobile that was so on-its-last-leg that I could not even sell it for the $750 I advertised it for in the paper. Had a dozen lookers,  but no buyers.

The next day – a rainy, cold pre-Christmas day – I was resigned to taking a hundred bucks as a trade-in for the r-mobile in a “buy-here-pay-here” used car lot. That was about all I could afford to do. And my job situation at the time was – politely put – shaky.

So as I sat at a yield sign waiting for traffic to clear that dismal morning, I was a little down in the dumps about the whole car thing.

Then it hit me.

I saw stars, in fact.

I had been rear-ended by a lady in a Suburban who was late for her aerobic-dance class.

God works in mysterious ways, and this one was one of his classics.

With nary a dent on its bumper, the Suburban demolished my Olds. I got a rental from the insurance company.

Then a friend told me I ought to buy a used Volvo, one with over 100,000 miles on it. They were good deals, he said.

I found one. It was being fixed up by a guy who did that for a living – fixed up older Volvos and resold them. He wanted $2,650 for the one he was working on when we met.

An insurance company rep had estimated that I would get roughly $2,000 for my totaled r-mobile. But coming up with the difference was going to be a challenge.

When the Volvo man called a couple of days later, he said the car was ready. “Come drive it.”

I did and I loved it. The perfect care for me at the time – a time when Volvos were still very safe reliable bricks on wheels, as opposed to the over-engineered yuppyfied suburban status symbols they became.

But where was the money going to come from? I mean, I had prayed about the whole thing, and all.

The answer came that afternoon. The insurance check was in the mail. The settlement was … $2,650.