They Had What I Wanted

My name is Bill and I'm an alcoholic. I'm also an Aboriginal Australian--a Koori. I got sober twenty-eight years ago in western New South Wales. I was desperate; I was at what the Big Book refers to as "the jumping-off place." The book was written more than fifty years ago, but I think these words still express the point I had reached: "He cannot picture life without alcohol. Some day he will be unable to imagine life either with alcohol or without it. Then he will know loneliness such as few do. He will be at the jumping-off place. He will wish for the end."