August 24, 2004

• 

  Last weekend, August 20-22, I drove down
  the Kenai Peninsula to Sterling, to the Izaak Walton State Recreation
  Site, for the NA Campvention.  Friday evening as i drove through
  the campground looking for the NA group, it wasn’t hard to find. 
  As one of the others who arrived after I did expressed it, there was
  “this bunch of people who didn’t look like they belonged together,” a
  mismatched assortment of misfits.  There was also a clue in that
  car window decal above.

  There was no one there I knew, and just one familiar face:  that
  of Dale, the visitor from San jose who had told us about the campout at
  our Thursday meeting.  Almost everyone there was from Anchorage,
  with only a few from the local area around Sterling.  Being a
  stranger in that group is no problem.  They are programmed to
  welcome newcomers, and “You’re a member when you say you are.”  I
  put my old camp coffepot on their campfire, filled with water for tea,
  and shared my tea with those who wanted some.  There was spicy
  grilled chicken, and I enjoyed that.

  At twilight we held a meeting.  I read How it Works, the 12 steps,
  my favorite reading and really the only part of those readings I can
  get through without crossing my fingers and telling lies.  I
  didn’t start alienating people until near the end of the sharing, when
  there was a lull and I stepped into it.  I talked about how I’d
  kicked hard IV drugs thirty-some years ago by substituting an addiction
  to sugar and chocolate.  I said I had finally managed to kick that
  one, and am now clean.  I
  went on and said that I had kicked caffeine before I got into NA, but
  that the program had rereleased that addiction for me and I’ve now
  kicked it again.

  A bit later someone else shared, and alluded to the Third Tradition and
  the “mind-altering substances” section in our NA Basic Text, in
  reference to my mention of sugar,  chocolate and caffeine, and
  another person’s mention of nicotine.  It was a defensive
  response, another of those hypocrisies so prevalent in the 12-step
  programs.  NA is a “program of complete abstinence from all
  drugs,” except the prescriptions we can finagle out of our doctors and the legal drugs we prefer to ignore.

  Every religion needs its heretics and every institution needs its
  dissidents to keep it from crystalizing and growing
  moribund.   Just as organisms need to grow and change or die,
  so do organizations.   Jumping in with both feet and
  alienating a bunch of people who have just welcomed me with open arms
  is never fun, but it is far better than either of the
  alternatives:  staying away or parroting the party line.

  One
  other person who was there shares my view of drugs.  Mike, the one
  in the red shirt here on the bank of the Kenai River, and I spent some
  pleasant hours in camp on Saturday, talking about John Bradshaw with a
  group of young people unfamiliar with his work, and sharing our
  thoughts about the brain chemistry of addiction and a broader
  definition of “drug.”  Mike brought a case of bottled water with
  him and shared it around just as I shared my herb tea and sparkling
  water.  I also shared a watermelon, and through vigilance and
  fortitude avoided eating any of the various pastries, jams, jellies,
  candies, etc., that were passed around.  One of the young
  newcomers was even drinking beer.  When I saw the bottle in his
  hand, I simply assumed it was non-alcoholic, but later I found that
  bottle tossed under a shrub near my campsite.  It was the real
  thing.

  The man Mike is talking to there, in the beach chair, is Dale whose
  visit to our meeting led me to make that 450-mile round trip.

  There are no pics of the beautiful Cook Inlet and Kenai Peninsula
  country I passed through, because I did not trust my car to start again
  if I shut it off to take pictures, and it overheats if I let it
  idle.  I’ve got a problem with the alternator, voltage regulator,
  or something.  I got it there and back again through a combination
  of babying it along, disobeying the signs that say “drive with
  headlights on at all times,” and probably some divine
  intervention.  After I discovered that when the needle on the
  voltage meter drifted down toward the peg I could rev the engine up to
  the red line a few times and get the needle back up to the 12 volt
  line, I was okay.  That was on the way home.  Meanwhile, my
  vehicular dilemma caused me to worry my guys back at home.

  I had told Greyfox I’d call him if I was “close to a phone” Friday
  night.  Apparently, all he heard was the “Friday night”
  part.  The people in camp with cell phones were getting “no
  service” and “call failed” messages.  One woman said when she
  tried she got an automated voice telling her she was outside her area
  but that she could connect for $12.95 plus $9.95 a minute (I think
  those are the numbers she said.).  There was a bar across the
  highway from the campground, but it had no public phone.  They
  told me there was a pay phone at the grocery store a few miles back up
  the road, and Saturday evening after the speaker meeting, I decided to
  risk the drive up there.  That was the first time I noticed that
  revving the engine to the extreme would bring the volt gauge back up
  temporarily. 

  When Greyfox answered his phone, first he said he was glad to hear from
  me, then he gave me hell for not calling sooner.  When Doug woke
  up after I’d been home a few hours on Sunday, first thing he said was,
  “We were worried about you.”  With great self-restraint I avoided
  pointing out to those guys that I’d survived for 37 years before Doug
  was born and 46 years before I met Greyfox.  That self-restraint
  was facilitated by my remembering that I begin to get antsy if Doug
  takes an extra-long time walking the dog.  Since Greyfox got
  clean, he hasn’t given me cause to worry… and that’s as it should
  be.  Before he got clean he worried me enough for several
  lifetimes.

  So, here are the pics I did get:

  
  Saturday morning I was awakened at dawn by squirrels chattering and
  dropping spruce cones onto my car.  I slept in the car because the
  seats recline and I hate sleeping on the ground.  When I crawled
  out to go to the bathroom, the squirrels bombarded me with the spruce
  cones.  Later, I brushed three of the sticky things out of my
  hair.  The tree rat above is the female, and the prominent teats
  with the fur worn off around them indicate that she’s nursing little
  ones.  Her mate, below, was bolder in approaching me, but they
  were both throwing things at me and chattering.
  

  
  Their waking me early enabled me to get this shot of a spider’s web spangled with dewdrops.

  
  Ross, on the left above, did most of the cooking Friday night and
  Saturday.  He and Kevin, on the right playing cribbage with him,
  and Charlie (center) had gone down there Thursday night, reserved most
  of the campground and set up the shelter, then waited out the
  rain.  Several times during the weekend they expressed their
  gratitude for the sunshine.  Charlie did most of the organizing of
  the event, including a silver salmon derby.  I think the problems
  he faced with that derby are rather typical of most dealings with dope
  fiends.  There was a $10.00 fee to enter the derby, and several
  people tried to enter after they caught their fish, not wanting to risk
  doing it the orthodox way.  I lost count of how many times I heard
  him explain that you had to be registered before you could enter a fish.

  That cribbage game kept several people occupied for a few hours on
  Saturday afternoon.  On both Friday night and Saturday, a noisy
  game of Yahtzee at a neighboring campsite entertained the players and
  everyone for miles around.  Some of the talk around the campfire
  Saturday was about a peeping tom (one of “our own” dope fiends,
  according to some of those whose campers were peeped) who made the
  rounds on Friday night.  Another topic that got some emotional
  response from a lot of people involved a speaker the Fairbanks group
  had paid (with $500 they requested from Area) to import from outside
  Alaska for their summer “Blowout” this year.  The man did not seem
  to be aware he was addressing an NA group.  Someone said he used
  the words “sober” and “sobriety” 40-50 times, and “clean” not
  once.  He made many references to alcohol and none to drugs. 
  This pissed a few people off.

  
  Here Marie is putting some muscle into massaging Cheryl.

  
  I wasn’t introduced to the two dogs above, but the pup below is named Sweepea.
  

  
  This is the back of Ross and Kevin’s H&I Special Forces (hospitals and institutions, where some of us do outreach) shirts.

  
  Saturday evening, Ross and Kevin got into a little acrimonious dispute
  over a comfortable chair.  Ross wanted to switch chairs with Kevin
  “again”, and Kevin wanted to keep the one he had.  When Ross
  finally prevailed, he thanked Kevin and Kevin responded, “You’re not
  welcome.”  This led Michael (at left behind Kevin here) to share
  something he learned from the Soledad Brothers.  When the man
  offers you extras, perks or amenities like a radio in your cell, or
  posters on your wall, don’t accept.  That way when you screw up,
  there’s nothing he can take away.  You disempower the man by
  disencumbering yourself.  It made good sense to me, but I could
  see it sail right over the heads of most who were  listening.

  
  …and a final shot of the Kenai River.  So, whaddaya think? 
  Am I more a nature photographer, or more yellow
  journalist/papparazza?  I can’t decide.
  

  • 5:58 pm
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