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I remember once talking to a new guy who started coming to meetings and flirting with the idea that he might belong in a 12-step program. He had lots of curiosity about sobriety but not a lot of interest in doing it himself… yet.
One thing that blew his mind was the idea of just dialing up other sober men. He said to me several times, “Wait, so you just cold call people?” I hadn’t ever heard it put like that but I guess it’s accurate.
“Yep,” I said.
“So in the middle of the day, you’re having a hard time, you just start calling people?!?!?!”
He couldn’t believe it, and it was one of those things where it had become so commonplace for me in recovery that I didn’t understand why he was in disbelief. I was in disbelief about his disbelief.
But he started to talk to me about his drinking and his overall life, and I remembered how the concept of calling other sober men every day was a foreign concept to me in the beginning, too. He described a life hidden indoors, isolated from the world, door locked and blinds closed, trying to manage his drinking while also trying to hold down a job and any remaining relationships that weren’t broken… and I flashed back to when picking up the phone was the weirdest, scariest thing ever, too.
He kept coming around for awhile, and he even called me occasionally. He would schedule it like I was his accountant or something, with a text asking if I was going to be around next Thursday at 3:30 pm. I always chuckled and said yes. But he came out of his shell over time, and as far as I know, he lived happily ever after. I moved away from New York/New Jersey in 2011 and haven’t spoken to him in a long time. I like to think he is on the phone right now with somebody.
It was a good reminder to me about picking up the phone. I still talk to a lot of alcoholics and addicts every week… but not as many as I used to. I get sucked into texting back and forth with guys some days, and it just isn’t the same. I certainly couldn’t email or text myself into sobriety, and I don’t think I can keep myself sober by FAX machine and texting, either.
So I will push myself to be a cold calling warrior in the new year!
This newsletter is a place of joy and laughter about the deadly serious business of sobriety. So, as I will often do, let me close with a joke:
A traveler was checking in at a large hotel in Detroit. Observing hundreds of guests milling around the lobby, he asked the desk clerk, "Who are all these people?"
"They're members of Alcoholics Anonymous, here for a convention," was the reply.
"AA, huh?" said the new arrival. "I wonder if it really works."
"Mister," replied the desk clerk fervently, "I hope so! I surely do hope so!"
(Credit: Grapevine, July 2009, C.M. of Michigan)
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