Like most people in AA, I have a few different meetings that I attend on a regular basis, but only one meeting that I consider home. My friend and mentor Les told me I had to attend 90 meetings in my first 90 days of sobriety, so out of necessity I’d learned where all the meetings in town were. But the Tuesday morning meeting in the basement of the First United Methodist Church was my AA home.
And like home, I considered it that because of the people there. Viv went there, Les went there, several other familiar and friendly faces were always around. And like home, there were also a few obnoxious faces I’d prefer to avoid if I could but could tolerate if I must.
Todd was one of those I could tolerate, but only from across the room and only for minutes at a time. He was just a straight up know-it-all, and he liked to share what he knew. He criticized everything with a condescending ‘don’t drink the Koolaid’ attitude. At the moment, the Koolaid he was complaining about was actual Koolaid. Koolaid and soda and chocolate cake, because we had a sober anniversary to celebrate at the end of the meeting.
We met in a small room that could be made into a slightly bigger room by folding back a plastic accordion divider. There was a kitchen at one end, and as soon as I came into the room that morning, I got excited because two things had lined up simultaneously to my advantage: I had weighed yesterday at my Fat Fighters meeting, and there was chocolate cake to celebrate Irene Drummond’s fifteenth sober anniversary.
Since I had just weighed yesterday, I didn’t have to worry about weighing again for a week. Plenty of time to eat the cake without guilt or fear of it showing up on the scale—I could walk some extra laps around Trailertopia or something. If I hadn’t just weighed the day before, I would still eat the cake. But I would feel guilty about it and then have dreams that I woke up and couldn’t fit through my bedroom door.
I settled into my chair, ready to get the meeting started so we could get to the very good part after. Freaking Todd sat down behind me. “Here we go again,” he muttered to no one in particular. “Ego cake time.”
“You can skip it if you don’t want any,” Viv said.
“It’s not the cake I have a problem with,” he said. “It’s the entire concept of celebrating a number. It’s–it’s asinine.”
“It’s not at all,” Viv said. “It’s encouraging to new members. We get a chance to show them that sobriety—long term sobriety, at that—is possible.”
“Don’t encourage him,” I muttered out the side of my mouth.
“Our lives should show them that’s possible. We don’t need a contrived benchmark for that.”
“Irene has actually been sober for 15 years. That’s literally the definition of not-contrived.”
“Celebrating it is. Treating that time like some kind of—some kind of social currency is. It’s contrived to make it a status symbol or to—to set some kind of hierarchy within the group.” He sneered. “How many people do you know who have a fifteen-year pin or a twenty-year pin and they’re the dryest drunks around? They’re white knuckling through every day just because they don’t want to lose their precious number of days? And they strut around the meetings like they’re the cock of the walk, not because they’re healthy, or whole, but because they’ve turned counting sober days into their new addiction.”
Viv turned to me and said loudly, “Salem. I am going to strut my sober self up to the coffee maker and get a cup. Would you like me to get one for you?”
“Yes, please,” I said. “With two cock of the walks, please.”
Todd muttered, but he got up and moved to another chair, so it all worked out.
Les came over then and sat beside me. “What was that about?”
“Just obnoxious Todd, waxing philosophical about the silliness of celebrating sober anniversaries.” I rolled my eyes.
Les sighed. “Yes, well…” He shifted in his seat. “He has a point. It’s good to celebrate our achievements, but we don’t want to forget that sobriety is about a lot more than just adding up the days.” He nodded toward some friends coming in. “My thinking is, it depends on the person with the anniversary. If they want to celebrate, we celebrate. If they want a quiet acknowledgment, we do that.”
“Yes, well, as you might remember—” He would remember because I’d brought it up at least four times over the past few months— “My two-year anniversary is coming up in ten days. And I want cake, and ice cream, and donuts, and good coffee. Not that stuff.” I nodded in the direction where Viv stood by the industrial size coffee urn, having forgotten about my coffee while she chatted with someone…. “I will take my pin and my accolades, and I will add a tiara and a feather boa, too, just because I know it will upset Todd.”
“As long as you’re learning humility,” Les said, but he smiled.
I sighed dramatically. I was not a fan of humility, or of Les’s reminders that it was supposed to remain important to me. Not that I didn’t understand the purpose of humility, or recognize how damaging an inflated ego could be. It was just that, good grief, how much more humble could I get? I lived in a run-down trailer park—okay, it wasn’t the worst in town, but it wasn’t the best, either—and I drove a 1970s model Monte Carlo. And not because I was trying to be retro, either—I’d found a deal because I needed a deal. I was a dog groomer. I mean, I loved my job, but it wasn’t like people went out of their way to impress me because of my social influence.
Honestly, if you had seen me two years ago, seen my DUIs and evictions and unpaid bills and ruined friendships and then saw me now, you’d be impressed by me. I couldn’t understand why I couldn’t also be a little proud of myself.
But remaining humble was a thing with Les, and rather than argue with him, I jumped a little like my phone buzzed, then pulled it out like I had an important message.
I moved out to the stairwell so I could pass the few minutes until the meeting began with my new guilty pleasure: a Reddit thread called Am I The Jerk?
Here’s the story about Am I The Jerk (or AITJ). People write in and describe arguments or situations they’re in with friends, family members, co-workers, etc, they tell what they did and why, and then ask the thread, Am I The Jerk in this situation? People from all over the world write in. Like, one woman wrote that she was working double shifts while her husband sat at home playing video games, and their dog ran away. She came home, exhausted, and he wouldn’t help her look for the dog, so she threw his expensive gaming system away. Am I The Jerk for that (I voted NTJ on that one—not the jerk). Another woman wrote that she refused to name her baby after her husband’s family tradition, because it was a really weird name that would definitely get the kid bullied (again, I voted NTJ but with a little less conviction. Sorry, grandma).
Normally, I try not to be judgmental about other people’s personal decisions. Live and let live, right? Keep your own side of the street clean. In AA, they call judging other people ‘taking their inventory.’ Step 4 of the 12 steps is to make a searching and fearless inventory of ourselves, and Step 10 is to continue to take a personal inventory and admit when we’re wrong. The point is, I have enough stuff of my own to deal with, I don’t need to worry about anybody else’s stuff.
But, I mean…in AITJ, they’re asking you to judge them. They posted a whole story just so you could judge them. Some of them don’t like the feedback they get (it can get brutal) and they argue with people in the comments section, but sometimes they get a new perspective and realize their mistake, and fix things if they’re able to. Often, they get support and encouragement from the responses when they’re so clearly NTJ and some actual jerk is trying to convince them that they are (I’m looking at you, Mr. I-laughed-really-hard-when-my-family-made-fun-of-my-girlfriend’s-facial-scar-and-now-she’s-overreacting-by-breaking-up-with-me).
Reading other people’s problems is just straight up fascinating. I don’t know why it’s so encouraging to realize how many screwed up people and screwed up families there were in the world. But it is.
It was so enormously satisfying—judging other people’s problems from a safe distance, objectively, with none of your own emotions involved. I wondered if this was what counselors felt like. I doubted it, though. As much as I loved AITJ, I recognized on some level that it was a teensy bit unhealthy. Like, the dopamine rush when I saw there was a new post—the crazier the situation was, the more thrilling it was. It was like watching a car crash. And the thrill when your own judgment lines up with the general consensus? When I entered a comment and it got a bunch of upvotes, the sense of affirmation was heady.
Maybe a little too heady. The urge to pile on the original poster once they’d been deemed TJ was very strong. That’s why I didn’t tell Les about it.
Above me, someone started clumping down the stairs. I scrambled to get out of the way.
“Don’t mind me, I’ll bet I can clear you.”
I looked up to see one of the new members about three steps above me, grinning and poised like she was about to leap over me to the landing below.
She probably could clear me. She was about five foot eleven or maybe even six feet, very fit, and a former Marine. Ash was her name, I remembered. If she didn’t clear me, she’d probably still just roll to her feet and be fine, whereas my head would sustain permanent damage from one of those big combat boots she wore.
“Maybe next time,” I said as I edged out of the way. I didn’t know her well enough to know if she was joking or not, but based on some of the stories she told about her drinking days, I didn’t want to chance it.
“Get in here.” Viv poked her head out the door and beckoned to me. “Todd’s in here drinking up all the Kool-Aid.”
After the meeting, I stood with Les and Viv, enjoying the cake—triple-chocolate, bless you Irene—while Viv went on and on about the new podcasting equipment she’d just bought.
“You wouldn’t believe it. I took my recorder down to the pool and interviewed Harv Barnaby during the women’s water aerobics class, then took it back up to the computer and I was able to isolate our voices like the Monday Morning Maidens weren’t even in the room! No splashing, no echo, nothing!”
“Wow, that is amazing,” Les said. I don’t think he was honestly amazed, but Les loves hearing what other people get jazzed about.
“And what kind of interesting intel did you get from Harv Barnaby?”
“Oh, the man’s a total snoozefest. Just droned on and on about the stock market. The point is, I can get quality sound with this thing.” She pulled a handheld recorder out of her jacket. “See?”
She hit a button. “The man’s a total snoozefest,” her voice repeated back to her.
“Oops,” she said. “I didn’t realize I was recording.” She hit a few more buttons.
I looked at Les, who was looking at Viv with wide eyes. “How long have you been recording?”
How long have you been recording inside an AA meeting? The unspoken question roared between us.
Viv looked uncharacteristically guilty. “No clue,” she said.
Les pointed at the framed sign by the door that said, “Who you see here, what you hear her, when you leave here, let it stay here.”
“I’ll delete it as soon as I get home,” Viv promised.
Les nodded, “Let’s do it now.” He took the recorder from her and scrolled through the tiny screen, tilting his head back to see through his trifocals.
Viv and I concentrated on our cake while he deleted the file. Viv definitely needed a safer outlet for all her energy, I thought. She was going to get herself into trouble.
“Maybe you should start a podcast on Belle Court,” I suggested. “Interview all the residents. I’ll bet there are some good stories there.”
“Are you kidding? Salem, when I say snoozefest, I mean it. What I need is a new case. Some crime. There are plenty of missing persons cases around here, and a few unsolved murders. Or we can go up to Amarillo. They’ve got them up there, too.”
“I’m sure they do.”
“Or, we could do a falsely convicted story, like In The Dark. Find some innocent person in prison and work to free them? We could do that.”
“Sure, we could,” I said, not bothering with the very obvious question of ‘how would we go about that?’ “I did talk to a guy yesterday who needs someone to find a missing person. Well, a runaway girl, actually,” I said, before I remembered that I was not going to share this information with Viv.
“Oooh, we could do that. We’d be great at that. Who is it?”
I shook my head. “Really, I don’t think it’s for us. I don’t know why I mentioned it.”
“Oh, I see how you are. You want it for yourself.”
I laughed. “No, I just think we should steer clear. It’s a sad story.”
“What’s a sad story?” Les asked as he returned the recorder to Viv.
“That Salem wants to hog all the action for herself.”
“Viv, you know that’s not it. I’d be completely helpless at finding anything without you.”
“Exactly. That’s why you need to tell me who it is we’re looking for.”
“We’re not looking for anyone. It’s just…” I sighed. There wasn’t any point in not telling, at this stage. “You know that big redevelopment project downtown? One of my grooming customers is heavily involved in that. He’s handling all the acquisitions for it, and there’s one holdout. A man whose daughter ran away last year, and he won’t sell because he doesn’t want her to come home and not find him waiting for her.”
“We could find her.”
“We could, but we probably wouldn’t, and don’t take this the wrong way, but sometimes you can be a bit…”
“What?” Viv lifted her chin.
“A bit insensitive, that’s all. I know it’s just because you’re focused on the objective, but sometimes you get blinders on and plow straight through without thinking about the feelings of the people around you.” Sometimes was actually all the time. “I don’t think this is a good case for the podcast. I think we should let the professionals handle this.”
Viv crossed her arms and sneered, “Let the professionals…after everything we’ve done together?”
I nodded. “Yep.” Yes, we had solved some crimes. We’d also had guns pointed at us, been kidnapped, accidentally set a few fires, and wrecked my car.
I was glad we’d done all those things—I didn’t regret one minute, even the fires. But lately I’d begun to feel like it was about time my life was headed in a slightly different direction. I had almost two years sobriety. My husband, Tony, and I were getting along well. Well, we were getting along well when we saw each other. He was working long hours lately, and I hadn’t seen him much. When I had seen him, he was preoccupied with work. But he would get that sorted out and everything would get back to normal. Tony begrudgingly supported my adventures with Viv because he knew I enjoyed it, and I’d needed something in my life to help me feel like I was capable of being a productive member of society. I’d met Viv at a time when I really needed to do some good.
But I’d done good, and I was doing well. I’d held my job for almost two years. I’d gotten my life back on track. It was time to move forward.
I’d said as much to Tony just the other night. After a decade of a most untraditional marriage, maybe it was time for us to think about moving in together. Starting our family. The idea of becoming a mother freaked me completely out, but then again, I never thought I’d have two years sober, either, and here I was, on the cusp of achieving exactly that. Plus, I’d have Tony by my side, and he would be the world’s best father. My alcoholism had already stolen ten years from us. We couldn’t afford to lose any more time.
Tony had seemed less than enthusiastic about all of this than I’d expected him to be, and that had bothered me at first. I realized, though, that he was just distracted from work, plus he’s naturally a closed book. Doesn’t get too excited about anything. I knew he wanted a family, though. He needed a wife. Not a true crime podcaster, chasing missing girls and getting shot at.
Plus, I hated talking into Viv’s recorder. Blech.
“What’s this guy’s name?”
“What guy?” I pretended not to know what she was talking about.
“The one with the runaway daughter.”
“I don’t know his name.” I hoped she’d leave it at that, but no such luck.
“What about the real estate guy? What’s his name?”
“Viv, I’m not going to tell you,” I said. “You should call Bobby and ask him about some unsolved murders here in town. I’m sure he’d love your help with that.” Bobby Sloan was a detective with the Lubbock PD, and my schoolgirl crush from fourth through seventh grades. He would not love Viv’s help with any such thing, but he was still a safer direction for Viv to go than the runaway girl’s family.
I looked at the clock on the wall. “Oh, shoot! It’s time for me to get to work! I’ll text Bobby and give him the heads up that you’re going to call him.”
“Come over tomorrow and listen to some music files I bought, for intro and outro tracks.”
“I can’t,” I said as I grabbed my purse. “I have work, and then I’m making dinner at Tony’s house. It’s the first date night we’ve had in three weeks.”
Viv frowned at me, so I grabbed her for a quick hug. “Love you, friend!”
She batted me away. “If I find out you’re looking for that girl behind my back I will mow you down with my Cadillac.”
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