Blog entry for:

what this program of recovery has given me?
of course not! oh, i could fart a rainbow here and say that gratitude is what i feel every day i wake up clean, and that is true, but it belies the point of whether or not i feel and express my gratitude for so much more. the analogy i seem to come to this morning, is our newest member of the pack. her short life was about to be cut very short, and through the kindness of others and some suffering on her part, she received the chance to have a life beyond the kill shelter. she is oblivious about what was about to happen, and as she adapts to our lives and integrates into the routine of our pack, she expresses her joy every single time she sees one of us, come back into the house. is that gratitude? i do not know, as i have very little insight into the mind of a four month old pup. what i do know, is that she expresses what appears to be joy and a desire to be with us all the time.
what does that have to do with me? when i was first exposed to recovery, i saw it as an imposition on my life style. my denial of who i was and the lifestyle i was living was no different that a pup in a kill shelter. each day, i walked blindly down the trail of death, each day ticking off, to the day that sentence would be carried out. and each day, i did what i could to stave off that realization. like little Miss Daisey, i was rooted out of that shelter and put on a journey that included life in a cage, physical discomfort and giving up all that i thought i had, to embrace a future. when i finally reached the jumping off point, i was fostered by two different 12 step fellowships and finally allowed one of the to adopt and start to teach me how to live, drug free, but more importantly because of where i landed, in a state of freedom from active addiction, with the opportunity to proceed down a path of active recovery. yes i went through all three of those states in a matter of months, longer than some, briefer than others, but i finally did arrive in my new life, with my new pack, accepted for who i was, and promised the chance to become someone different. which when i think about it, was what i always wanted from the get go.
as the days pile on, i remember less and less about those painful 18 months of transition from just being clean, to becoming a fully participating part of my life and my recovery, so my gratitude wears a bit thin. for me today, it is a good thing to remember where i cam from, and as i look at what i have today, including the opportunity of bringing a throwaway being into our home and giving her a second chance, i can feel moire than a bit grateful that i escaped the kill shelter of active addiction was adopted, untrained, rowdy and angry, by the fellowship that is now my home.
so it is off to the showers and out into the world for another day of this incredible gift of life, thanks to all of those who were here when i got here and all of those who have come ever since. as my friend Joe is apt to say, it is a good day to be clean.

∞ DT ∞