The Trick: Giving It Away!

At this morning's 6am meeting at the Lafayette Hut, the chair mentioned an experience he had when he first got sober two years ago when someone gave him a 24 Hour chip after a meeting and how much that meant to him ever since. It brought to mind two of my favorite "chip stories":

The first happened toward the end of my first year of sobriety, sometime before Dr. Earle went into the hospital and when he was still able to attend meetings on a regular basis. As I've mentioned before, Earle got sober June 15, 1953 and two days following, I was born. Since I was 48 when I got sober, I believe this story happened sometime after June 2002, when Earle would have picked up his 49 year chip. It was then that Earle decided to give me and another guy, Rich (who really was like a son to Earle and who had a couple of more years sober than me...but who had known Earle for much longer than I had...) two of the 48 year chips that he'd received the prior year. I suppose that knew that he meant a great deal to the both of us and that we were both simpletons-enough to find this gift of a 48 year chip really a big deal!

Anyway, I carried that 48 year chip around in my pocket for months, right next to my cheap plastic 6- or 9-month chips. I'd often reach into my pocket while walking and hold on to the 48 year chip as some sort of talisman or lucky charm. It was thick and metal and had a heavy feel to it. It also always reminded me of Earle and of some "Earleism" (e.g., "Self-disclosure is the currency of AA: it's the thing of value that we exchange with one another." or "We desperately, desperately, need one another!!!"). But I also felt somewhat self-conscious about having this 48 year chip in my pocket when I only had 6 or 9 months! I mean, what if I got run over by a bus one day and killed. Someone would find a 9 month AND a 48 year sobriety chip...probably give that to my wife who would then give it to someone in AA who would then announce to the group that Mike must have been going around pretending to have 48 years of sobriety when he really only had 9 months! Come on, give me a break! That would have meant that I got sober when I was 9 months old! But that's the sorts of thoughts I have sometimes, even now.

The self-conscious thought continued though until one day I was attending an NA meeting, which has never been a real part of my recovery practice. I was attending the NA meeting though because at that meeting my son Pat was chairing and he was also celebrating his second year clean... I almost said "clean and sober" but Pat doesn't say that: he's clean. Alcohol is really just a drug like any other drug. But I digress. I listed to Pat's chair and there's simply nothing more moving to a father with one and a half year's sobriety listening to his seventeen year old son tell his story and then receive a two year chip. During the time for chairing, I never felt so at a loss for words in my life. The only thing that seemed to come close to expressing how proud I was of Pat was to reach in my pocket and pull out Earle's 48 year chip. Pat had fallen for Earle also and even spend one night with me in the hospital sitting with Earle during one of my "Earle watch" commitments... Pat slept most of the time, but he was there for Earle nonetheless.

I knew that Pat would appreciate it, so I raised my hand and told Pat that I was giving him something now that meant a great deal to me: Earle's 48 year sobriety chip. I loved Earle a great deal and thought of him daily since his death. I wanted Pat to have Earle's chip. But I told him that if he lost Earle's chip, I'd kill him! Everyone laughed, including Pat....but I told him I was serious! Then I laughed. About a year later I was looking for something in Pat's room --- it looked typical: like a tornado had just blown through the room. I noticed a wooden box on Pat's bookshelf and opened it up (respecting another's privacy has never been one of my strong points!) and found all of Pat's clean chips and 24-hour NA key holders. There were many of them--it took him 5 months before something clicked and before the clicking happened, he wasn't able to get much more that 5-10 days continuous clean time. Anyway I dug through the chips with my finger and at the bottom of the box was Earle's 48 year chip. I smiled, glad that I didn't have to kill my son.

I was just about to tell you my second special chip story, when I realized that I've already blogged about it!!!

http://mikelrecovery.blogspot.com/2008/02/gift-that-never-stops-being-given.html

I'm so glad that I hadn't already told the one I just told today!!! I sometimes do that!

Take care!

Mike L.