Emptiness Filled

My sponsor, Joe, and I live next door to each other in a gloriously overgrown, unmanaged backyard, he in the cottage and I in the converted garage, and over a period of three years we forged a relationship of neighborliness, recovery, and friendship that has kept his dog, his cats, his houseplants, my vegetables, my library, and ourselves happy and growing. We both possess well-thumbed dictionaries, which defined for us words like "admitted," "insane," and "moral," so we could talk about the Steps together, with mutual agreement of terms, no misunderstanding. These fine books defined everything for me, but understanding has come to me only through my experience.