Another Bleeding Deacon (the Danger of Reminiscing about the Good ol' days..)

I almost exploded tonight after sitting through an oldtimer's chair where he repeatedly reminisced about the good ol' days of his early sobriety (1985) when AA apparently was being done right and according to the one true "the way it was written in the Big Book" program of AA: newcomers were not allowed to talk (if they did, they were told in no uncertain terms to take the cotton out of their ears and put it in their mouth...); there was no whining allowed; no psycho-babble; etc. I oftentimes find this reminiscing about the good ol' days and pining for a return to such days to be somewhat baffling: I mean, the reason the old days have gone the way of all old days is that people got tired of them and began doing things somewhat differently! I suspect that people didn't like being told to shutup or being treated like children when they first came into the meeting rooms of AA....and so they changed.

Now, normally "this" sort of whining would have been mildly discomforting to me, but that sort of bland response didn't happen tonight because this bleeding deacon went even further and after his chair kept the meeting hostage to his supposed orthodox view of AA by calling only on his trusted friends and never opening up the discussion period to volunteers (you know, ME!) except until the very end, five minutes before the meeting was over. When I wasn't called on, I thought I was going to implode.

I suppose that I (and the meeting) was lucky when I wasn't called on, that I didn't speak anyway or yell out of turn with some fraudulent "burning desire". It probably would have been less than helpful to the newcomer and to my now undeserved reputation as a rather nice and nonjudgmental sorta guy.

Hoping to avoid a pestering resentment for not being afforded a chance to present a counter view to this narrow minded and one-sided view of this miraculous and ever-evolving program of Alcoholics Anonymous, I went up to talk to him after the meeting was over... In the past, I would have just left the meeting to go outside and chastise him behind his back.... But I've been trying to avoid gossiping recently and thought that since I had a problem with what he did that night, that I should talk to him rather than to others outside of the meeting.

What saved me (and him) though was that before I was able to go up and talk to him (to explain to him what he did wrong!) I got interrupted by a woman who came up to me to thank me for saying something in a meeting a few weeks before---when she was attending her first AA meeting. Apparently whatever I said was something that struck her to the core and gave her hope that maybe one day she'd be able to get and stay sober. All of a sudden, it became more important to me to talk to her and help her deal with the immensely difficult task of getting and staying sober than it was to correct the old bleeding deacon.

I know from past experience that such bleeding deacons love the program of AA as much as I do, they are just attempting to reach out in service in ways that they believe are most helpful. I know that not everyone responds well to the sort of unremitting kindness and acceptance that was so important to me both in my early recovery and today. There are those who need some sort of "tough love" before they can extricate themselves from the grip of alcohol and other drugs. My reaction to this oldtimers was as much a bleeding deacon response to life as his was and that is not something I'm all that proud of. You know why we bleeding deacons bleed, don't you? It's because we keep falling off our high horses!

Oh well, back to the drawing board...

Take care!

Mike L.