July 27, 2003

• No More White Nights

  
  

  It was dark driving home tonight, up the valley–dark and wet, blinding rain.  This year’s midnight sun is gone; the white nights are over.  It seemed that the reflections of oncoming headlights off the rain-slick road were several times brighter than the headlights themselves.  I had to keep the speed down to keep from hydroplaning, because the rain was falling faster than it could drain off the road.  Hills were the easiest part of the drive, because every flat area was scattered with puddles that dragged at my tires and made controlling the car tricky.

  
  

  Usually, I make that drive alone, but tonight Doug was with me, riding shotgun, asleep most of the way.  It’s his birthday now, today, this new day not yet dawned.  As we carried groceries in from the car a while ago, before he went to bed, I wished him happy birthday and said, “It is your birthday now, past midnight….”  Then I looked at the clock and realized it was almost the exact minute of the 22nd anniversary of his birth. 

  
  

  In what I suppose is a typically maternal instinct, I felt an urge to talk about the night of his birth, but I stifled that urge.  He was half asleep, and he has heard the story before, and he has also heard the story about the next day, when I was wakeful at 4:30 AM in my hospital bed, watching the live broadcast of the English royal wedding of Charles and Diana… and now, somewhat, so have you.

  
  

  I took him to town this time to celebrate his birthday, and so that he could help me with the task I’d volunteered to do:  setting up the tables and chairs for the big monthly 12-step potluck.  *teehee*  Maybe I’m giddy with sleeplessness and a relative lack of caffeine (making progress at kicking that last of my drug addictions), but the thought of 12 steps to deal with a potluck made me laugh.  The steps work for anything, I guess.

  
  

  When Doug commented on the lack of organization in the setting up, I informed him it was traditional, and showed him where it said in the book, “…ought never to be organized.”  That got some laughs from a few who overheard us… in-joke, so don’t feel bad if you don’t get it.  Here’s another, even more obscure, that could only have made sense to Doug and me (I told it to him privately) and to Greyfox when I retold it.  Early on in the setting up, before many people were there, when things were pretty crazy and hectic, I looked around, gave it some serious thought, and said, “Here’s something that doesn’t happen often:  I think we’re probably the sanest people in this room right now.”

  
  

  Later on, though, some of my insanity came out, big time.  One of the crazy people there kept answering my direct, pertinent and (to me and my group) important questions (work-and-program-related) with tangential questions and evasions.  The head game he was playing triggered something in me that I have not indulged for a long time.  Later, as I talked it over with Greyfox, we agreed it was a real regressive episode. 

  
  

  For a few minutes there, I had bounced around that room playing head games with various people, including the one who had triggered me and anyone else I could feasibly pull into our game, five people in all, and who knows how many other innocent indirect victims it could all trickle down to.  I did it all in the very worst way, with total honesty, undeniable factual sincerity, and devastating skill.  If there isn’t a 12-step program for those of us addicted to mind fuck, there ought to be.  …and I thought I was over that shit!

  
  

  It was a learning experience for me, humbling and motivating.  I hope that at least some of the others get some positive effects from it.  I suppose that whether they do or not depends on how hip they are to the game, and what system they use to keep score.  I would have been the total loser there, having sown so much doubt and confusion, if I hadn’t gotten some vital insights from it in retrospect.  Pulling my own covers to Greyfox afterward was good for me, and the reflection I’ve been doing as I’ve been writing this has been even better.

  
  

  I realize that there is a dark side to this newfound joy I’ve gotten from moving out of my isolation and into that fellowship.  There are new challenges there.  I will be seriously tested and it will take vigilance and mindful self-awareness not to slip back into my old addictive behavior there in the company of all those addicts.  I don’t see myself slipping into drug use… in fact, the fellowship strengthens me in that area.  Where there is danger for me is in those processes that build up the ego and kill self-esteem:  the manipulation and mind games that were for so long such a big part of my life.

  
  

  Fiddle-dee-dee, tomorrow is another day… but, wait… it’s tomorrow already.  G’nite.

  • 7:47 am
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