Did AA Hold Me Back?

IT HAD BEEN an amazing event, this 1982 reunion of eighteen World War II shipmates in Albany, New York. I'd attended with John, who lives in the Chicago area and had been my best friend aboard ship. Two of the other shipmates attending had turned out to be AA members, and at the small reunion banquet, I'd told about the troubles alcohol had caused me and how my life had changed dramatically after finding sobriety in 1950. There's almost no way I can describe the warmth and closeness of this reunion. Several men actually wept as we parted after this first gathering in thirty-seven years.