The Most Beautiful Thing You Can Think Of
A call for April check-ins!
Last week, a reader emailed me about my Sunday rundown, specifically the (“/5”) scoring system I use each week to assess my recovery. “Have you ever explained the weighting of the weekly sobriety rating before?” he asked.
On Sunday, for example, I gave myself a 2/5 for my recovery last week. Funny grade considering so many good things happened, including my actual birthday last Tuesday. What profound absence and stress derailed the second half?
Well, first — I have a couple of looming deadlines (possibly blowing them right this minute tbh), so the threat of failure is swimming through me like an eel each day I don’t turn them in. Remember that feeling from college or high school? Of not turning in a paper or not studying for an important exam?
I had an overly dramatic “Film Studies 101” teacher in college who could be a real hard-ass about turning in papers on time since he was a film reviewer for several news outlets to supplement his income. (He was an adjunct.) I asked for an extension on a screenplay assignment, which he said was fine but that I would be penalized severely — he would knock it down a full letter grade each day it was late.
He was unsympathetic towards whatever excuse I gave him. He scrunched his face up and shook his head, disgusted by my lack of discipline. “If I miss a deadline, my kids don’t eat!” he told me.
I delivered it to him two days after it was due — got a C+ on it. Did everything right except turn it in on time.
It’s been over 30 years, and I remember that line more than anything else I learned in college.
Also, and this is an obvious one as to why I gave myself a crappy rating last week — I only went to one meeting. Punted on my step study. And overall, I felt “meh” more than “yeah!” in the four days after my birthday, for no other reason than nothing about those days was exceptional.
But I gotta ease up on myself here and be more fair — my week was much better than a 2. And to be honest, my life is almost always a 4/5. If I’m sober, above the dirt, and not yelling or thrashing around over nonsense, I am in great shape.
So, what would a 5/5 look like for me? More service, mostly. I don’t need to drive around town stuffing food pantries with gourmet meals or building houses in Appalachia (worthwhile endeavors, for sure) but simply being available to someone who is twisted or has lost their way. Or maybe someone needs some assurance that the risk to improve their life is worthwhile. A long walk or a long lunch where I listen more than talk adds immeasurable value to a person’s day.
These are skills that I have acquired in sobriety that can be deployed more frequently to allow for that elusive “deepening” of human interactions I’ve heard so much about. Hopefully, that reverberates outside my circle and lands elsewhere in someone else’s life.
So now it’s your turn: April Check-Ins are due this week. We want to know how you’re living. Tell us what’s up with your recovery or anything else noteworthy. We want both the great and the gross.
One wrinkle: If you’re feeling uniquely awful, is there some way to remind yourself that there are good things in your life that are much more useful to focus on? We hear from so many readers who find the honesty seen here each month inspiring and helpful. Don’t give yourself a 2 because you feel like a 2 — tell us how you’ll construct a path to a 4. (BTW: You’re all 5’s in my book.)
The perfect length is 150-300 words. Here’s a great one from last month’s round-up to give you an idea of what we’re looking for:
I decided that when I cleaned up I would start going back to the doctor. It’s been 2 months and 2 days since I last used cocaine, and I’m seeing the doctor.
I never thought the hardest part of getting clean would be managing anxiety from doctor visits. When you’re waiting to learn how big the hole in your septum is (5mm btw) the gap between appointment check-in and being seen by the doctor is actual purgatory.
The nurse could tell I was nervous while she was taking vitals and drawing blood, and went out of her way to make small talk. “It’s Valentine’s Day and you didn’t bring me anything?” she asked. “If I had known it was you, I would’ve,” I said.
She told me I was doing the right thing by seeing the doctor again, and I think she was right.
EMAIL US HERE: tsbcheckins@thesmallbow.com SUBJECT: APRIL CHECK-IN
It will be published on TUESDAY, April 1.
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Let’s end with this: I was kind of stuck for an image this week and I asked Edith to “draw the most beautiful thing” she could think of and here’s what came back.
Thanks for your continued support of The Small Bow. Talk soon? — AJD
ALL ILLUSTRATIONS BY EDITH ZIMMERMAN
MORE CHECK-INS:
We Have No Choice But To Sit With It
"My mother died in December after a long bout with Alzheimer’s. I thought that by “pre-grieving” during the many years she was ill, I would insulate myself from the grief. But her death has hit me very hard and thrown me off-balance — a lot of unexpected weeping, for one."
I Can See the Edges of Everything
"I'm not in recovery yet, though I suspect I will need to be at some point. I've been cutting way back though, until last week when, "because it was a long week," I found myself pulling out one of my signature moves: getting absolutely shitfaced while the people I'm out with have a beer or two. When you do this after a few weeks of hardly drinking, though, the result is a migraine that lasts until Monday afternoon and forces you to cancel the fun plans you made with your friends."
*****
ZOOM MEETING SCHEDULE
Monday: 5:30 p.m. PT/8:30 ET
Tuesday: 10 a.m. PT/1 p.m. ET
Wednesday: 10 a.m. PT/1 p.m. ET
Thursday: 10 a.m. PT/1 p.m. ET (Women and non-binary meeting.)
Friday: 10 a.m. PT/1 p.m. ET and 4 p.m. PT/7 p.m. ET
Saturday: Mental Health Focus (Peer support for bipolar/anxiety/depression) 9:30 a.m. PT/12:30 p.m. ET
Sunday: (Mental Health and Sobriety Support Group.) 1:00 p.m PT/4 p.m. ET
*****
If you don’t feel comfortable calling yourself an “alcoholic,” that’s fine. If you have issues with sex, food, drugs, codependency, love, loneliness, and/or depression, come on in. Newcomers are especially welcome.
FORMAT: CROSSTALK, TOPIC MEETING
We’re there for an hour, sometimes more. We’d love to have you.
Meeting ID: 874 2568 6609
PASSWORD TO ZOOM: nickfoles
Need more info?: ajd@thesmallbow.com
This is The Small Bow newsletter. It is mainly written and edited by A.J. Daulerio. And Edith Zimmerman always illustrates it. We send it out every Tuesday and Friday.
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A POEM ON THE WAY OUT:
Try to Praise This Mutilated World
by Adam Zagajewski
*****
Try to praise the mutilated world.
Remember June’s long days,
and wild strawberries, drops of rosé wine.
The nettles that methodically overgrow
the abandoned homesteads of exiles.
You must praise the mutilated world.
You watched the stylish yachts and ships;
one of them had a long trip ahead of it,
while salty oblivion awaited others.
You’ve seen the refugees going nowhere,
you’ve heard the executioners sing joyfully.
You should praise the mutilated world.
Remember the moments when we were together
in a white room and the curtain fluttered.
Return in thought to the concert where music flared.
You gathered acorns in the park in autumn
and leaves eddied over the earth’s scars.
Praise the mutilated world
and the gray feather a thrush lost,
and the gentle light that strays and vanishes
and returns.
— “From Without End” (via Poetry Town Newsletter)
*****
We had my 40th anniversary last Wednesday, the 19th. I say we because the fellowship and Grace had most everything to do with it, “I just didn’t drink and didn’t die.” The actual last drink or drug happened 3/18/1985 @ 13:30 so 24 hours later I began the counting of days, celebrating that next day as is our custom now having that elusive day. The moment came with its usual host of ghosts, the lead up having been maybe the worst time of my life back then.
Since last week, I’ve chaired a couple of times, letting fresh sober air and light into where the ghosts howl, remembering how on that day, the color, flavor, fragrance and tingle of life began to return and grow into a previously cold, damp and aching, sepia tone partial subsistence.
Thank you most kindly to a tolerant and patient fellowship, a loving and forgiving Power greater than booze of my slowly increasing understanding “that saved a wretch like me.” There is a God, her name is Grace and she whispers to your heart. Slow to a stop on occasion to silence the din. You’ll hear her small, soft and eternally profound song.
“Look well, to this day.”
Love,
Terry 🙏💜☘️🌹☯️
The poem on the way out. Major mic drop. Just what I needed.