Standing at my own empty tomb

Today is special for me.  On August 8, 1985, I took my last drink.  I was 28 years old.  Today, I've been sober half of my life.  I can only begin to describe the gratitude and wonder I feel.

When I stopped, I wasn't fully convinced I was an alcoholic.  I did know a few things, though.  I knew that I was from an alcoholic family.  I had watched my father struggle to go to work, be part of the family, hold up his end of life while alcohol ate at him.

I knew I was miserable.  I had dropped out of graduate school and was working at the local Kmart.  That left me plenty of room to drink, but it wasn't much of a life.  I had a partner, who had just stopped drinking.  I had no idea how to make and keep friends, how to feel a part of things.

What made me show up that day was the realization that if I didn't change my life I would end up like my father.  I would not be lucky enough to die young.  I was facing another 50 years of isolation and misery.  Whether I worked at Kmart or the university, I would be alone and desperate.  And I wanted to be happy.

I didn't believe in God.  All I knew was that people in the rooms I went to were happy and loving, and I was not.  I wanted what they had.  So I did what they said to do.  I got on my knees, and prayed to whatever it was.  Gradually I was able to see where I had been carried, where I had been saved from myself.  And one day, in my room, I felt God's energy of love and peace flow through me.  I knew that was God, and it knew me.

That was a long time ago.  But from that beginning, I have found a life so rich, so powerful, so joyful that no words suffice.  Eucharistic prayers come closest.  Icons of the Transfiguration, of Jesus filled with light, come close.

Every day I give "glory to God whose power working in us can do infinitely more than we can ask or imagine."  And every day I offer myself to that God, to work with me and through me and on me.

And now I know, no matter how good it is, it will get better if I keep going.

It gets better.  Really.

Thanks be to God for all of you who carried me at every stage - to Bob, Skip, Kaile, Pam, Fran, Anne, Suki, the Daytop kids, and all of you who carry the message every day.  You saved, you save, my life.