A long and tiring day

I spend the best part of yesterday (28th) and today (29th) speaking with Phil Valentine the guy behind the Connecticut Community for Addiction Recovery (CCAR). We clicked from the outset and it’s been as if I’ve always known him. We’re both of us at critical stages in our spiritual developments and we’re being challenged in differing ways to ‘let go absolutely’ and to trust the process come what may. I think we’re helping each other in this and being true to the basic precept of the 12 Step programme: i.e. that recovery occurs when two alcoholics sit down and talk to each other. Before retiring to the On the Border Mexican Grill & Cantina for lunch we’d long conceded that beneath us both were God’s everlasting arms bearing us up and that all distractions, all temptation, all evil thoughts and desires, all our anxieties and hidden fears would be cast out by His perfect love.

And what did we eat? Phil had a chicken Fajita and I ate a steak one. Bliss!

Earlier I’d recorded Cheryle Pacapelli, the Director of Operations at CCAR, who gave me an overview of the services they provide. Cheryle it is, incidentally, who has helped plan my itinerary whilst in Connecticut; she’s also arranged for me to hire a car; provided me with a BlackBerry; treated me to lunch yesterday; has escorted me hither and thither and has generally mothered me! I don’t know where I’d be without Cheryle!

Curtis Kolodney is Recovery Housing Manager at CCAR, and he recorded a piece for me about the Recovery Housing Coalition of Connecticut. At a time when access to affordable, quality recovery options has been significantly diminished, the Recovery House movement is a bright light on the horizon. Across the state individuals in recovery have quietly created a number of dignified, safe recovery environments where people in early recovery as well as those who have a history of recovery, are given the time needed to rebuild their lives. Recovery Houses not only help to develop the tools necessary to embark on a life of recovery, but also positively impact on the quality of that recovery.

Curtis also introduced me to the writings of Steven Levine and, in particular, a piece that had been and still is of great comfort to him following the recent death of his beloved mother. Meetings at the Edge: Dialogue with the Grieving and the Dying, the Healing and the Healed. The piece which Curtis read out to me was a letter written by Lobellia’s mother’s best friend at the time of Lobellia’s mother’s death. The letter ends:

“Your mother and my mother can never leave us; the temple of their lives may change, but the theme of their vast love, still throbbing in us, will only be continuing somewhere, and it is my simple, strong faith that we are never, never to lose contact with that love motif. Somewhere again our hearts are to stand still in ecstasy as we recognise those familiar, lovely notes of our beloveds and find them – a little farther along in their scores than we, perhaps, but intrinsically the same fine symphony.”

I then drove to Willimantic to appear in a live TV public service broadcast by CCAR. Before that, however, I met Diane Potvin, Director of the Willimantic Recovery Community Centre (WRCC) and Kathy Wyall, Volunteer Coordinator at WRCC. They seemed fascinated by my Welsh accent – in particular, Kathy who began imitating me! Suffice to say I had the time of my life with these two wonderful ladies. Two who are totally dedicated to recovery advocacy and are grateful, living examples of what can be achieved when we surrender our self-will to a Power greater than ourselves.

As Diane concluded “A grateful drunk will never drink again. And I truly believe that. I was homeless; I was unemployable. I came into recovery with black eyes, cracked ribs and I have not had one single day that I have not been grateful. And it’s as simple as.... not gagging when I brush my teeth. It’s all of these little things ….that I still, every day, when I go to brush my teeth, I realise that…I’m not gagging, where before I used to do that all the time.”

I was privileged to present Diane and Kathy with a Sir Winston Churchill Commemorative Crown and a tea towel, a gift from Churchill Fellows Wales, in appreciation of the wonderful work they are doing in Willimantic and as a thank you from me to them.

As I finish this blog at the end of a long and tiring day I’m listening to the dulcet tones of Michael Buble singing Cry me a River.

Incidentally, Markus, Kathy's boyfriend, has invited me to go fishing with him next week. It can't get any better can it?

Nos dawch pawb, a diolch am ddarllen y blog. Good night everyone and God bless.