I just came home from a meeting and you'll never guess who was there!!!!!!!!!! Well - just to let you know - I grew up in a TEEENSY TINY little town here in Wisconsin about 100 miles from where I live now, and where AA is something people scratch their heads at and wonder what the heck happened to the other A. Seriously - it's like 300 people, and then this EVEN SMALLER town about 10 miles from it had to bus into our tiny little school so we would have enough kids to pay for a teacher. So I had 20 kids in my class growing up, and about 100 in my whole school.
I had 2 friends in my class. One of which I just decided I am outgrowing and actually shared about randomly tonight. I normally never share about these kinds of things from my childhood friends or anything... it was weird. Well THEN - this other girl shares that this is her first ever meeting. She says her name, but I can't see her from where I'm sitting.
After the meeting - I see her and she recognizes me. YUP YOU GUESSED IT - it was the other friend. Now mind you - these are friends from grade school. The one I kept for the whole 31 years since, and the one that was there tonight - well you guessed it again - we grew apart. Actually, if I remember right, my mother wouldn't let me be friends with her after a while because she suspected there was alcoholism in the house!~ YUP! Her mother.
Well. She comes up to me after and says - so you were talking about "michelle" right - and I'm just about ready to faint. This is all so crazy.
I mean seriously crazy. I asked her to come to another meeting with me. She did. She - like me, never went to treatment, just came in on her own which NEVER happens around here! I got her a big book - wrote a little in it - like me - never heard of it until the meeting, didn't even know alcoholism was considered a disease like me.
These are things I never see. I have always felt like the only one who walked in completely like an idiot. I had you guys, and that was it. She had her boyfriend talking to her about it, and that was it.
Well - I guess it's just a big deal to me because I'm from such a flippin small town and to even SEE someone from my town is crazy - let alone someone I was once friends with. She remembered coming to my house and watching a cow give birth and how we had to tie baler twine to the leg to help pull it out together. I know it's gross to you guys - but I'm a farm kid and this was normal stuff. I dared her to drink cows milk straight from the... um... can I say it or will you guys be too sicked out?? LOL
She did it. I had forgotten all about it LOLOLOL
Oh my oh my - the meeting was on HP and most people shared how there are no coincidences....
YUPPPPPPPPPP Seriously - that is no lie!!! Okay I just had to share this!!!!!!!!
She's going to go with me to another meeting tomorrow.
__________________
Thanks for everything. Peace and Love on your journey.
((((Sis)))) you know the "Just For Today" pamphlete...the blue and white book marker one or the little 2X2 foldout. Betcha do. Remember the prayer on the back of it and have you ever prayed it? Starts out..."Lord make me an instrument of thy peace..." Just got answered if you've ever prayed it. For me HP's phone rings when we say that prayer and the 3rd step prayer also. Yay for her!! She's got a winner. (((((hugs)))))
What a great share! And I thought the town I grew up in was small! How great you have been reunited with a friend from your past and now you can help each other on your fabulous journeys!
And the cow story isn't gross to me at all....in a couple of days I am going to be pulling the innards out of a turkey's ass.
Wow Tasha, what a great share ... ... ... no coincidences ... it's all part of God's plan ... and His timing ...
Oh, we had a prego cow get stuck in the pond mud once and found her a day later ... her hind quarters were paralyzed by then ... she went into labor and yep, the calf was breach ... we did the exact thing you described above ... Dad went up inside and tied a rope to the calf's legs and we got back and just started pulling (it ain't as easy as it might sound) ... and yes, milk from the udder is warm and full of cream ... a taste unlike any other ... then we had to put the cow down and had a big bucket with a large nipple to mix cow formula to feed the calf with ... we had no barn at the time and it was Winter ... so we raised the calf in our 'Basement home' we lived in for the duration of the cold weather ... cleanup was a 'bit*h' ... and the smell none too pleasant ... LOL ...
2 years later, we butchered him for food ... My Mom and Sis could hardly eat the meat ... Dad & I, well, it's just what farmin' is all about ... and I agree, city folk my not have the stomach for such things ... LOL ... (they don't know the half of it, do they? ...) ...
__________________
'Those who leave everything in God's hand will eventually see God's hand in everything.'
I feel like there is a TON I'm going to learn from this - and I have a LOT of expectations about it - I thought about it all night. I'm already noticing how much I'm learning about how I am thinking and treating this person differently from an average newcomer that I don't know at all. Even if I never see her again - I will have learned so much from this one day!
Also - I have all these expectations - such as - I am quite sure she will stay and it will teach me a ton if we get to go through the steps together, or even if I just get to hear her speak some day or whatever. But I have NO question in my mind that she will not stay. Which is weird, because normally I go into these relationships assuming I only have this one day. I don't feel like that with her at all. I am not upset with myself in the slightest for having all these expectations either - because I'm learning so much about they way I think, and have though about things! I'm just letting it roll like the streaming of the stock market going by and it ROCKS my SOCKS off! I love my life.
__________________
Thanks for everything. Peace and Love on your journey.
Hey Tash, ... I just had to say that this moment is special with your old friend, ... but I would call what you're experiencing 'dreams' rather than expectations ... we all know where our expectations can lead us ... and it usually ain't too good ... I don't know, maybe I'm just not reading the whole story you're sharing here ... oh well, ... I just feel like a protective dad with YOU now and I want you to enjoy this moment to the fullest with prayers that things work out just as you dream they will ... for her sake ...
I think I'm trying to say to be very careful with expectations because they 'can' lead to very big 'let-downs' ... I know you can handle that now, but I just don't want the pain of 'what might have been' to visit you, cause it'll visit me too ... they way you share your heart here makes me feel everything you do ... amazing how I try not let things here affect me ... no matter how hard I try they still do ... especially with you ...
Love ya and God Bless, Pappy
P.S. I just reread this and probably should have PM'd you ... oh well, I'm tired of having movers in the house all day packing up everthing I got ... tomorrow they return and finish up ... meaning my computer is going in a box ... will try and get my laptop up and going by day end ...
__________________
'Those who leave everything in God's hand will eventually see God's hand in everything.'
LOL.....OK, I am going to have to start pricing Depends if I keep reading things like that, stepchild.
I had to LOL when I read this again BTY ... I may be wrong, but I think they makes those things in a brand called 'Serenity' ... and wondered why you wouldn't use those over the Depends ... Ha!
__________________
'Those who leave everything in God's hand will eventually see God's hand in everything.'
This is way off topic, BUT ... while sitting here at the keyboard, i'm listening to Pandora ... and a song came on that turns on the 'waterworks' in me everytime I hear it ... this is sung by Alison Krauss ... AND what the bigger part of the story behind the story is, it was written by Keith Whitley who lived near me while recording this and other songs in Nashville ... He was married to Lorrie Morgan (a Star in her own right) at the time he wrote this and she was threatening divorce because of his heavy drinking ... ... ... a short time later, Keith was found dead from alcohol poisoning ...
If you have an emotional bone in your body, listen at your own risk. LOL ... ... ... 1st Keith's song by Alison, then by himself:
__________________
'Those who leave everything in God's hand will eventually see God's hand in everything.'
I always tell my sponsee's..."tonight, some is out there taking their first drink, the party is just beginning. In 3-5 or whatever number of years ahead, they will enter the rooms... beaten. The party is over. Your history and your forthcoming recovery is God preparing YOU, not me or any one else to carry the message of AA to them. They will hear it from many, many people as they venture into our meetings, and interact with us before and after them. But it won't reach them until it comes from YOUR lips, and touches their heart."
Tash, you have been prepared, with history and recovery and more yet to come forth... God is sending you a gift in this lady's arrival. So you have the opportunity to use what He blessed you with, for the betterment of another.
"She walked in the door like an idiot"... nah, she was guided by Him... to YOU. Just like you were guided by Him to us, back when...
Hi Tasha!!! Loved your story. Glad you shared it with us. What I've seen in this Program is that God puts certain people with certain people for certain reasons that we don't understand and cannot comprehend in our little uncertain human minds. While God has His purposes for everything He does, He has given you a purpose. That makes you blessed! It wasn't random.....He did it on purpose. There are few things better than being one of God's Instruments of Peace. Again, thanks. Blessings, Mike D.
: ) It's been incredible to say the least this past week. Couldn't fathom this 2 yrs ago as I was approaching my bottom and recording lullaby's and nursery rhymes so that my kids could hear their Mama's voice after she was dead. I was that sure I was going to die drunk and soon. I could no longer live without alcohol or with it.
Now I couldn't imagine anything that a drink would make better! I want my clean mind! I want my life! I CAN'T WAIT to Get to use my coping skills! I LOVE living and I look forward to watching my kids grow... but mostly - just THIS one day I have right now ;) Thanks everyone for the support - love love love you! xxoxoxoxoxxoxo
__________________
Thanks for everything. Peace and Love on your journey.
