Practice Makes Progress

ON A SATURDAY night in January 1943, I was drunk as a hoot owl, as usual. The next evening, my sponsor took me to my first AA meeting, on 24th Street in New York City. I remember little of it--my mind was foggy, my eyes swollen nearly closed--but I do remember some people getting up and telling about their drinking out loud, in front of all those other people! I had known that I had the problem for a long time, although I didn't know the word "alcoholic." But admit it to another person? I'd die first, I thought, even though I had been drunk almost every day for years, and for years had been trying every day to quit, and felt desperate and hopeless inside. But I knew they were talking sense, and I knew I felt at home for perhaps the first time in my life while sober.