Poe Gets Trashed. Survives With Difficulty

My heart feels like someone scraped it raw. I got trashed during a meeting last week. I was sharing on the third step when this guy interrupted me, very angry. The gist of it was that he wanted to share a second time and I reminded him of his mother.

Now I’ve been in Al-Anon long enough to have developed a lot of healthy behaviors, one of which is to not exacerbate a conflict. I do this by remaining calm (Well fairly calm in this case) and reflecting loving kindness. So despite my inclination to stomp out of the meeting or attack him back, I stayed, prayed, and basically worked the third step.

But I was pissed. The meetings are supposed to be a safe place, free from the alcoholic insanity, and nothing makes me crazier than cross talk, especially hostile cross talk.

I must stress that this is an extremely rare incident. In eighteen years I can only recall two similar occurrences, curiously both directed at me.

In any case, I decided I needed to assert myself, so later I called my sponsor and we rehearsed two short loving sentences. Next day I ask to speak with the guy in private after the meeting. I said, “What happened yesterday was very hurtful.”

He said, “Yes, it was.”

I thought, “Wow, he’d apologizing; that was easy.”

Then I began my second sentence about how the meeting is not the place to bring up the fact that someone is reminding us of our mother. He hit the ceiling. Apparently he had thought I had been apologizing to him! After that I couldn’t get a word in edgewise; he just stood there, attacking me, taking my inventory, interrupting, wouldn’t let me talk. In fact he reminded me of my mother.

I stayed pretty calm, but after awhile I just started feeling about 6 years old and my brain shut off. Twice I tried to interject love: “We have so much in common, can’t we get along?” But he didn’t want to hear any of it; he stomped off, calling over his shoulder that I was crazy.

So that’s what happened. I know the guy is nuts, not following the Al-Anon way. Why get all depressed?

I did talk to friends and with my sponsor (She said she would have decked him). I prayed a lot.

Here are my conclusions:

We are all captives of our culture, whatever it happens to be.
The alcoholic culture I grew up in had some Great Forbiddens:
You must never be weak.
You must always win.
You must never be stupid.
You must never make a mistake.
If even one person thinks you weak, stupid, mistaken, or a loser, then you are.
This makes you unlovable and worthy of contempt.

My codependent mind tells me I should have defended myself better—maybe if I’d said this or that, he’d realize the error of his ways.

So what to do?

I must recognize that living with the disease of alcoholism has made me vulnerable and when faced with my weakness, treat myself the way I’d treat a sick friend.

It doesn't hurt to do a 4th Step Inventory. Even before this guy attacked me, I had been secretly impatient with him. Who knows? Maybe he sensed it and was reacting in some fashion.
So I resolve to be more patient with everyone, especially those who don't deserve it.

Finally, I must love my own poverty. My weakness and my stupidity are as much a gift from God as my strength and intelligence and I lay both at his feet.

Small Things With Great Love

I’ve been feeling especially blue. The news seems full of evil goings-on. Like most good citizens, I vote, donate money, forward e-mails, etc. But I get freaked out when the nastiness is more powerful than us good citizens. In the face of this, what seems most sensible and mature is to do some act of violence, like blowing up the mall.('course then I realize this might not be the best idea, especially since my best friend owns the mall.)

Back in high school, I hung out with other hippie wanna-be’s, all of us dedicated to peace and love. Therefore we despised anybody who wasn’t with us. My catch phrase at the time was “When the revolution comes, your house will be the first to go.” (Meaning if you weren’t as loving and kind as we were, we’d burn your house down.)

This is the insanity of a culture that tells us the only sane response to evil is “getting back at them.” Like this is going to change anything. ("I well remember the day Lyttie Poe burned my house down. Suddenly it made me realize how wrong I’ve been, so I now will devote my life to peace, equality, and singing Kumbaya.”)

Years ago I finally got around to asking God what to do about all the evil in the world. The response I got was “Go thou and do the opposite.” (Yes, I know it sounds dorky, but I don’t control these things.)

I’ve discovered I can get a lot farther by becoming a loving person myself than by trying to make the world a loving place.

An example: four years ago I met a woman named Katie who is my polar opposite in religion and politics. Today I count her among my dearest friends, because we’ve learned to look past the differences and focus on what is beautiful about the other. (Besides, in every other way we’re exactly alike.)

Anyway, in response to all the horrible news items, here’s what I did: I wrote “You are a precious child of God.” on small strips of paper and wove them into a clay heart I found lying around the house. Then I went to a church parking lot, asked my Higher Power to guide me to someone who needed a lift, and put it on a windshield. I don’t know how the person reacted to it; when I came out later the car was gone. But that day I felt like I’d done my small part to go “Nya! Nya!” to meanness and violence.

To paraphrase my favorite philosopher Elwood P. Dowd, “In this world you must be ever so clever or ever so nice. I prefer nice.”