Long Distance

It was the day before Christmas when a front page headline in a New York newspaper caught my attention: "New Way to Treat Alcoholism Discards Spirituality of AA." My whole body reacted as if a shock wave had hit it. Wow! A voice inside me was fairly shouting. This is what I've been trying to cope with for years. At last somebody sees it the way I do. My eyes flew over the four columns that followed. Like an expert berry picker, I focused only on the juicy phrases that leapt off the page: "meetings once or twice a week," "the individual has the power," "[they] wean themselves off alcohol, and then from the group." The article included many well-known facts about AA but these statements I skimmed over. I was searching for the possible good news. I was sure I'd found it when I read that adherents of this new group believe that "AA's Twelve Steps foster dependency." Well, by God, who needs that? I'm an independent, one-of-a-kind, recovering alcoholic who thinks for herself. Yes siree Bob (and Bill)! And hey--maybe, just maybe, this new group could teach me to drink safely again. Now, where was that phone number?