July Articles Online
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A Gypsy LifeForced to her first meeting in restraints, a good-time gal gets the message.
Although I have not had a drink of alcohol for many years, if I pick up a drink, thinking
I am cured, I will revert to where I was when I had my last drink 48 years ago: in a mental hospital with a
wet brain and no hope of recovery. No matter how long we have been sober, whether a year or 48 years, the
disease is never cured and one drink can act as a catalyst.
As for me, I know that I will become the monster I was 48 years ago and I will die, for I had reached
the point of death. It will be an ugly death, in a gutter, in an alley, in a flophouse, in a jail. I will
be in great agony and will beg for a drink to ease my pain. there will be no loved ones
there to mourn my passing. When they hear of my death they will weep for the person I was and for the
futility they felt in trying to help me.
Alcohol changed me from a loving wife, mother and daughter, active in church, business and civic affairs,
to a crazed and immoral person. My husband and I owned a small airport in ohio. he taught me to fly, and I
earned my private pilot's license and was working on my commercial license, flying all over the state in my
own Piper Cub. then my drinking career began, and I began my steady descent into the hell of my making. I
tried many times to commit suicide, but without success. My beloved children had been taken away from me by
the court, my mother had banned me from her home, and my only sibling, my sister, had called the sheriff to
have me arrested. I ended up in a flophouse with the other drunken bums.
I was rescued from that hell-hole by the owner of a winery who knew me and—remembering my former beauty,
love of life and sense of adventure—came to the flophouse. he offered me a job in his winery,
even though the woman he saw was not the beautiful girl he remembered. I didn't remember him, but
I went with him, for I saw another drink, which I needed badly. he did not know he was signing my death
warrant. he bought me some new clothes, to chauffeur him, dressed as a gypsy, in his colorful truck painted
with grapes, grapevines and happy dancing people. We drove all over Ohio, Michigan and Illinois
delivering wine and taking orders. We made a colorful couple, with me dressed as a gypsy with lots of
bangles and beads and his towering figure, thatch of white hair, black-rimmed glasses, a
cigar in his mouth and his ubiquitous trench coat. he had many friends, and we were treated like royalty
everywhere we went. life was fun. My boss wouldn't let me drink beer, and I stayed pretty sober for a
while. But I started drinking champagne in secret and soon I was on the same path of
self-destruction as I had been before.
I was fired from my job as the big, colorful truck driver, and was given the lowest job at the winery—a
manure truck driver, picking up manure, shoveling it into the truck and hauling it by ferryboat back to the
winery and unloading it, shovelful by shovelful. My pay was all the wine I
could drink and a cot in the basement of the winery, where the rats shared
the scraps fed me from the kitchen. one rainy night, after picking up a
load of manure, I decided to retrieve my once favorite drink. I had stashed
a six-pack in the manure to smuggle into the winery, because we weren't
allowed to have beer. I climbed up into the manure truck, got my six-pack, opened a beer and started to drink. the manure was slippery and I fell off, catching my free hand on a nail as I tried to stop my fall. I
landed in a pile of manure, my beer still opened and unspilled in one hand
and my other hand bleeding profusely.
I lay there stinking, bleeding and laughing, for I was happy. I had decided that night to kill myself.
I had tried suicide before and was always rescued, so I decided I would be smarter this time and swim
until I could swim no longer and then sink beneath the waves. I headed for the docks, but when friends on the
ferry-boat saw me, they told me I had to go to the hospital for the injury on my
hand. I was taken to the local hospital but they would not admit me, as dirty
and stinking as I was. My friends took me down to the lake and threw me
in. Again I was taken to the hospital, my hand was bandaged, and my truck
and I were taken back to the island where I lived.
The next day I went down to the lake and took off all my clothes (I did not
want my body to be identified) and started to swim to an island far away.
I weighed over 200 pounds and didn't get far—a fisherman heard my cries for help, rescued
me, threw a tarp over me and took me back to land. he told me to go home
and sober up. No telling what kind of fish story he told his wife that night.
I was still determined to die, so I made other plans. The last time I attempted to drown myself,
I was rescued by the Coast Guard. I was gone from this world. I no longer knew
who I was or where I was. I was taken to the docks, handcuffed to an iron
table. My mother was sent for, but I did not know her and yelled obscenities at her, as I did to
everyone who tried to approach me. Since I would
not go with her, I was put in jail and the next day I was taken to court, and
my mother had me committed to a mental hospital. Several months later,
after many shock treatments and other horrible experiences, I was becoming catatonic.
My mother was told I had brain damage and would probably be institutionalized for the rest of
my life. My psychiatrist told me later that I was unable to do anything for
myself; I even had to be fed.
My psychiatrist, going against hospital rules, took me off my tranquilizers for a few days
and told me she was sending me to an AA meeting held in the hospital. That brought me
out of my stupor and I started yelling and screaming, so I was told later
by my psychiatrist. I told her I was too intelligent to be an alcoholic. She
had a straitjacket strapped on me, strapped me into a wheel chair, sent
an attendant with me and taped my mouth shut so I would not disrupt the
meeting. I went to the meeting struggling to escape my restraints.
I believe a miracle happened at that meeting—that God reached
down and touched me and healed me. I have not had a drink of alcohol
since that first AA meeting. I have had some terrible things happen in my sobriety,
plus some joyous ones, but except once, I have never felt the urge to
take a drink to escape or to celebrate. On June 1, 2009, I celebrated 48 years
of continuous sobriety.
Pauline B.
Tarpon Springs, Fla.
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