I went to a 45th Sobriety birthday party last night. It was a great deal of fun and also somewhat amazing. This person used to carry a gun, deal drugs and generally fuck up your shit just for looking at her wrong. But last night and for a long before, she has been a beacon of light to so many who have wandered, lost in the darkness.
Another fellow traveler gave a lovely speech about her since he knew her before and after. He knew the gun toting, drug dealing lunatic that reigned her dark realm. He knew because he was there to buy drugs from her. But last night they both stood on stage each with over 40 years of living in the light, in the soulution. And we all marveled at how this whole thing works.
It is like this for us, those of us blessed enough to move close enough to the light to catch flame. To burn in this new way, not this destructive, life killing force that seems to come so naturally to us. But in this new way, where the light within us hollows out our dark centers and replaces the shame, the guilt, the sadness, the trauma with a program of action that works when nothing else will.
We stood there all last night in our finest getups to get down. And we did...we laughed, danced, ate, fellowshipped and worshipped at the only altar that will have us - the altar of love and service. And it was a good time.
So much recovery in that room. I wish we would have taken the time to add it up. Several people with well over 40 years, many in their 30s, lots in their 20s and even more under 10 and a great many others barely over a year. But last night, the time that mattered was hers. Because hers is what caught fire in so many others, who in turn lit the torch of recovery in the hearts and minds of still others. We are saved, not just so that we are saved, but so that our salvation can be of service to others. Last night was a great example of that. Love and service in action.
Love and service can change anything and everything. And last night that is what I witnessed, a woman rearranged. A whole entire ballroom of people hell bent on self destruction, out there on the dance floor laughing and loving and supporting each other each and every day through all the perilous life we survive, daily.
As I was driving home last night, I was reflecting on this life of mine. This sober little life that is in reality not little at all. I am a mother. And my son is now sober not because of me, but not in spite of me either. I am good employee, daughter, friend. I show up most of the time and can be counted on by those who love me to be there for the good and the bad. And everything I am today is because there were some women, and a few men, who took the time to give me the light. The light that has literally and figuratively changed everything for me.
And so my life, all of my life, is about making sure I tend to my own light so that I may ignite a similar flame in others who cross my path...one day at a time.
And remember...don't let anyone steal your joy, not even your own self.
