Commitment Issues (11 page)

"Oh, yeah,” he said. “Thanks for going with me."

"What'd you learn there?"

"Well, I learned that I need to take lessons on butching it up."

The next day was Sunday, and it was a big birthday celebration at our home group. Several people thought Wyatt and I were a couple, but I had to fix the story. I told them that I wished we were, but we were just friends.

A birthday party is when people with major birthdays get their chips. Annual anniversaries are marked with a nice metal chip. Most of the monthly chips are like poker chips.

There was a speaker at the meeting. It was an old man who couldn't stand for the entire hour. He was really old, so they brought the microphone down to let him sit in a chair to talk to us. I had heard him a couple of years ago, and I knew Wyatt was in for a story he wouldn't soon forget. He was in the area and had been invited to speak for the entire hour. When he introduced himself, he told everybody that he had been sober for seventy-one years. Wyatt went bug-eyed.

"Seventy?” he whispered.

"Listen to him,” I said back.

"I was there at the beginning, if you were having trouble doing the arithmetic. They give us old farts metal medallions with our number of years in Roman numerals. You have to be sober for a really long time just to decipher those letters. It's hard. One year, my Roman numerals were so wide that I asked if the medallion came with a bookmark. I told them that I couldn't possibly parse the entire year in one night."

Everybody laughed.

"A few years ago, somebody from
The Grapevine
... everybody know what that is?
The Grapevine
is a magazine put out by AA World Services. It has stories and quips and stuff. Anyway, this guy wanted to interview me because I was one of the last of the original members of AA. I was hardly original, but I was probably one of the first thousand. I didn't tell him that, of course, because I'll always go for hero-worship."

There were some chuckles. One guy said, “You go, girl,” from the back.

"So this guy asked me if there's a secret for long-term sobriety. Well, I didn't even have to think about that, because I already knew the answer. He thought he was asking me a unique question never thought up by the billion other people who have talked with me over the years. Why do we always think we're unique here? I don't know, but I told him that there are actually two secrets for long-term sobriety. Don't drink, and don't die."

He stopped, and some people probably thought that there was more to the story. I had heard him talk before, and I knew that was it.

"I guess I won't be around much longer. I'm in my nineties, and most of my friends are dead. All the guys who were around at the beginning are dead. Part of me is saddened by that, but part of me appreciates the extra freedom I get when nobody is alive who can contradict whatever I say. If I say so-and-so was a son-of-a-bitch, you just have to believe me, because so-and-so is long dead. I miss them. I miss Bill Wilson, one of our co-founders. I met Dr. Bob, the other co-founder. Dr. Bob wasn't from New York, so I didn't know him as well."

He drank from a bottle of water.

"You guys look really good to me. You're a much better-looking group than the vagrants and hobos and derelicts that were around for me. We really had hobos who really rode the rails. Lots of poverty and lots of booze. Nobody could afford a car, so there wasn't much drunk driving. I was a kid drunk, and I remember lots of those old-timers laughed at me when I told them that I had it rough. They told me to try being an alcoholic during Prohibition. They said you had to be really dedicated to your craft of alcoholism to do it well during Prohibition. They got rid of that stupid law in 1933, so I guess I had it easy."

He stopped and looked at the crowd.

"You guys look so great to these old eyes, but do you think you had it easy? Don't answer, because I'm sure you'd say you had it rough. Maybe you did; maybe you didn't. We all think we were the worst drunk ever, but back in the day, none of us had a way to stop drinking. It was a real mess back then. I was just a kid, but I remember so many guys just dropped dead. Something broke inside them. They couldn't drink, but they couldn't stop. Nobody understood. We were just rejected by proper people. Then along comes Bill Wilson and Dr. Bob. AA was spreading like crazy. Europe was just getting into World War II, and I was trying to get sober. I don't know why, except that I wanted to enlist and go fight Germans. I showed up drunk for the physical, and not even the army wants a drunk on the front lines. We weren't at war yet, but I saw it coming. I heard about this new organization that helped people like me: drunks. I was a wino. I was a whiskey-o. I was an anything-I-can-get-my-hands-on-o. And I found an AA group in my neighborhood. My family was Italian. I'm Italian. I was out on the street after Daddy caught me with a neighborhood kid. We were both sixteen, and I had lived on the streets for years. I was drunk, and I was gay. Everybody ran from the likes of me, even the hobos."

He looked around the room.

"So when I went to AA, I went to the group in my old neighborhood. It was the only one I knew about, and I got sober. It was all okay until there was a business meeting. Bill Wilson himself was there. I'd seen him a lot over the weeks, and I never knew he was one of the founders of AA. I just thought he was a regular drunk."

He thought about what he had said. “That didn't come out right. Bill Wilson was a regular drunk like the rest of us."

The speaker spotted Wyatt. “Hey, kid,” he said. “I forgot your name, but I was at the Trinity Group yesterday and heard you speak."

I saw Wyatt tense a little.

"Pardon me for being forward. We're anonymous and all, but I want to say how proud I was of you. So everybody knows, this guy looks like he ought to be in kindergarten or day care. Yesterday he went to the oldest AA group in town. Part of what he mentioned was his sexual orientation. Nobody ever is forced to share that with anybody, and it really isn't anybody's goddamn business, if you want the truth. Your friend here says he's been sober for just a few weeks, but this guy had the guts to stand up and tell the truth about who and what he is. I am so proud of you. What's your name?"

"Wyatt."

"That's right, Wyatt,” the old guy said. “Sorry, my memory fades. Everybody give Wyatt a hand."

Everybody clapped.

"I was hoping you'd be here tonight for two reasons. First and most important for me is that you're about the best-looking man I ever saw. I mean,
damn
, child. How do you even do that? You must be one of those men who get hit on all the time. You are stunning and gorgeous. You are adorable, Wyatt. When you smile, I almost want to fall out of this chair. Sorry if I was staring at you, but I couldn't help it. I don't mean to be forward, but I wanted you to know that I am grateful that you could be here as eye candy for a guy in his nineties. Thanks, Wyatt, and I really mean that. Does the group have one of those portable defibrillators? If so, you might keep it handy, because this young man is about to give me a heart attack. Somebody get their phone and dial nine and one, and keep your finger close to the one. Just be ready for me."

I saw every eye in the group turn to make sure they memorized Wyatt's face. He had been anointed as the group's official Pretty Boy by a ninety-year-old who had been around when AA was founded. The old man fanned himself and made a big show of blotting his forehead with a paper napkin that he found on the table.

"Okay, I'm better now. Wyatt, sorry. I hope I didn't offend you. I was serious about all that, by the way. You are truly eye candy for these ninety-year-old eyes. But the other reason I'm glad you're here tonight is that I have a story to tell you. It's a story for everybody, but I thought about you last night at the Trinity Group. I want you to know about how Bill Wilson made AA safe for people like Wyatt and me. It is safe for us everywhere, every group. Not just at a gay group. I haven't seen any anti-gay anything in AA for decades. Not even in the Bible belt. Bill Wilson was one of our founders. I use his last name because he asked me to use it. You are never required to use your last name because we are anonymous. One of our traditions is that nobody uses a last name on radio or TV or film or newspapers. If you read the Traditions, it only says we have to be anonymous in the media. We aren't on the air here, and Bill always wanted me to use both his names. Bill Wilson was a little gruff sometimes, but he was always friendly and funny. He always came across like he was trying to sell you something, and there was some kind of sadness in the way he talked. Nervous, maybe. So a business meeting was called after the regular meeting. I have to say that business meetings are rough. If you don't have at least fifty or sixty years of sobriety, I suggest that you stay away from business meetings. This meeting was called to talk about two topics. One guy was caught stealing money from the group. He was taking money from the place that was trying to save his ass. The group all voted to kick him out of the group with very little discussion. The other topic was sex. It wasn't that anybody was caught having sex with anybody, but they found out that there was a homosexual attending. That would be me,” he said as he raised his hand.

"Bill asked if there was any wrongdoing by this person, but nobody said anything. He asked if this person had made unwanted advances at anybody. The leader of the business meeting said it was necessary to make sure that the group's reputation stayed good so the group could continue to be a force for recovery. I was sitting right there, and everybody knew it was me. I was the one who was endangering the reputation of a room full of winos and hobos. There was almost no discussion before the leader called for a vote. Only four of us voted against the new rule. I was kicked out of the group, and I was put right on the same level as the thief. Bill Wilson was one of those who voted against the rule. It wasn't his home group, but nobody told him that he couldn't vote. After the rule was approved, Bill stood up and gave the address of his home group. It was the Manhattan Group on 41st Street. It isn't there now, but it was the first group in New York. Bill asked that both the thief and the homosexual be given the address. He said that both would be welcome there, and then he left."

The old man took another drink of water and looked over at Wyatt to make sure he was still listening. The speaker pretended to get a shiver from looking at Wyatt.

"Anyway, I followed Bill Wilson into the street and thanked him. He just smiled and walked uptown. I don't know if he was traveling by taxi or subway. He just walked away. I started attending the Manhattan Group on 41st Street. It was Bill's group, but I never saw the guy who had been caught stealing. Bill's group was busy getting out the book we now call the Big Book. It was published a few months earlier. The meeting hall was open all day, and guys were always busy with the Big Book. It really was big because he used the thickest paper the printer had, figuring that drunks would want the book more if it looked big. Within a couple of weeks, the leader at one of our meetings read a letter from the world office. Bill was a member of the group, but he was writing as the head of the worldwide movement. Nobody said anything about his membership there. The leader read the letter. Bill said that a number of groups had talked about membership requirements. He wanted each group to send him whatever rules the group had."

Another drink of water. I think the speaker wanted to let his words settle.

"A few weeks passed, and there was another business meeting at the Manhattan Group. We were lousy with business meetings back then because we didn't have... we didn't know how to run an AA group. When there was a question, the group had a business meeting. Thank God we don't have so many these days. Anyway, the leader said we had heard from the worldwide office. It was a letter from Bill Wilson, read like he wasn't sitting right there in the room. The letter had gone out to all the groups. It listed the requirements for membership from the various groups. There were more groups than I would have guessed. I knew about Dr. Bob in Akron, but I thought it was just Akron and New York. The letter said it was an attempt to draw out a national standard for AA membership, so everybody could know where they stood. According to the rules, you had to be male but you should also be a woman. Go smoke on that for a bit, but it gets better. You had to be Roman Catholic but you couldn't be Catholic. You had to be Episcopalian, but you also had to be Methodist. You had to be Jewish, but Jewish people weren't allowed. You had to be white, but you had to speak Spanish, Chinese, and French. You couldn't be homosexual, and you couldn't smoke cigarettes. I think we all smoked cigarettes back then, so we were out of luck. When the leader finished reading, it was clear that membership in Alcoholics Anonymous wasn't going to be as simple as you might think. We were all trying to get more members, but now we had a list that proved nobody would qualify. How do you be male and female at the same time? Everybody in our group was about to be banished. There was nobody anywhere who could be a member of AA. The solution, according to the letter, was the passage of a new principle. That principle says: ‘Our membership ought to include all who suffer from alcoholism. Hence we may refuse none who wish to recover.’ Period. We usually say that
the only requirement for membership is a desire to stop drinking
, but that wasn't the original wording. Now do you see? Bill got this principle passed because of me. I am here to tell you that I am a member of Alcoholics Anonymous, and I have been for seventy-one years. I have a desire to stop drinking. End of discussion. Where's that on the wall?"

Somebody pointed to the left of the podium.

"See? I didn't even have to look,” he laughed. “I knew that the Twelve Traditions would be on your wall. Every group in the world has these traditions. That includes the third tradition. I am here, sober for seventy-one years, because of my friend and mentor. Bill Wilson, for all his faults, stood up for me. I am here because of him. You are here because of him. You are welcome at any AA group on the planet because of the wisdom and courage of our founder. He didn't make a big deal out of what he did. You probably didn't even know about your connection to the third tradition, but you know now. So Wyatt, I know it took more guts than I ever had to go over to that straight group and say what you said. You didn't have to do that, but you did. I saw that you broke through some issues that other people had with sexual orientation. You were there being yourself, and I want you to know how proud I was of you. I want everybody here to know about our third tradition. I want everybody to know why it is in place. We have the third tradition because of me and because of Wyatt and because of everyone here. Wyatt, you keep coming back and keep being honest. You guys keep coming back because it works if you let it. It works. I'm living proof of that."