Where I've Been

I went on a retreat here at the Garrison Institute at the end of March. It was a silent retreat...I only went for the weekend which was the tail end of a 10 silent retreat for others. It was a beautiful location, restored monastary on the Hudson River. The food was outrageously good, the accomdations pleasant, even a hot tub in the communal bathroom. Thomas Keating was the speaker for the weekend..so it was wonderful to get deeper insight into the practice of Centering Prayer from the spiritual leader of the practive. This was not an AA retreat at all but I'll tell you, Thomas Keating quoted Bill W. so how's that for inspriration! Since Garrison, NY is about 4 1/2 hours from my home I ordered the CD The Comtemplative Dimension of the 12 Steps for the ride and had my own little mini retreat on the way to/from which helped to segue me into the monastary and then home. It was really a wonderful experience and one I hope to replicate. Last year I went on a silent retreat with a few friends. I must say that going alone was a completely different experience. Complete solitude, no shared glances or knowing smiles. The schedule was something like this:

wake up
30 minute sit...stretch....30 minute sit
breakfast
session with Father Keating
30 minute sit...stretch...30 minute sit
lunch
1 1/2 hour of solitude..to walk around, read, nap, whatever
30 minute sit...stretch....30 minute sit
session nwith Father Keating
30 minute sit...stretch....30 minute sit
dinner
session with Father Keating
bed

I might have an extra sit in there...I can't remember now but it was intense. I am so grateful to have had the experience. The first night (Friday) I was so exhausted....got there at 3ish and had about 2 hours before a scheduled sit before dinner. Walked the grounds and found a great spot on the Hudson to read and enjoy the sun. Spring had come earlier there..so it was warm...I slept with my window open the whole time...and you could smell flowers. Then the sit, then dinner, then a session with the retreat leader (Thomas Keating had not arrived yet). To go into the mediation hall where they held the sits and sessions you had to take off your shoes. I was wearing my easy to slip on and off puma sneakers. As I left to go to bed I grabbed them from the shelf and went up to my room without putting them back on. Decided to soak the drive off in the hottub for awhile and took a shower to avoid the morning rush....when I opened the door to my room I saw a pair of black converses by the door and thought I had the wrong room. Looked around saw my stuff and realized I had grabbed the wrong shoes. So I tiptoed downstairs, it was about 11 pm now, and found mine and returned the converses. The next day..just before the morning session...announcements....someone took the wrong pair of shoes...the converse owners raised his hand and said they had been returned. I couldn't speak to him but later I approached him...pointed to his shoes and gave him a namaste bow. How embarassing but then again, it made me smile and I like to smile.

The other kind of funny thing though annoying at the time was the guy who was sitting next to me. You can see me against the wall on the left in the first choir chair. I look kind of slumped and I had a green blanket over me. Well, the guy on the floor decided to lay down to do his meditation. They suggest that you keep your back straight...and NOT lay down..because why? Take a wild guess..you induce sleep and that he did. AND he snored, continously until he'd wake himself up. The first sit...I let it go...second sit....its a good discipline of returning to my sacred word.....third sit...I moved my seat. I thought to speak to him at the end of the retreat, gently suggest he sit upright for meditation. Maybe he didn't know he was sleeping. How would you know? But I didn't. A good lesson for me.

But all in all it was a wonderful experience but I must say I have not kept up my practice....and that is what I am working on now. And I am also working on not beating myself up about not keeping up my practice. I am here...and I am in consious contact every day....that is good enough. xo

Still Sober

Thanks, I needed that! Not sure why I needed a break but I did. Actually, in really looking at me, myself and I these last weeks, I think I realized that it was more of my meeting schedule that needed shaking up and not my writing schedule. Truth be told, I did not work a stitch on my fourth step. And leaving the blogging behind did not help me in that area. I thought maybe I had just lost my momentum, that because my ass wasn't on fire I was allowing my "busy" schedule to take over. This past weekend dealing with my Mom over Easter, reading the fourth step at my step meeting and talking to my sponser helped me to realize that really it was that I didn't want to deal with the feelings surrounding my mother. Yes I did my fourth step over a year ago and yes my mother was on it, but it was thorough and honest to the best of my ability at 4 months sober...I think I'm a little more insightful about my feelings now. So really it comes down to that four letter word FEAR. So yes, I need to write about this stuff, work it out. That is what's best for me.

What isn't best for me is sitting in a daily meeting at 7 am, just because that is what I have done for the last almost 2 years. I have been tired..meaning not getting enough sleep, in my case it provides too many opportunities to do 12th step work and it messes with my morning meditation time. One of my defects is the compulsion to help everybody...feel your pain......and I carry it with me. So at the morning meeting there is plenty of opportunity. The room is full of different levels of sobriety...newcomers, eager or kickin' and screaming, oldtimers, real and crusty, two steppers ( 1 & 12), three steppers (1, 2 & 3), chronic relapsers, and then, thank you God, the good old fashioned solution sharers, carrying the message. I try to be the last. But it is not always appreciated, that's okay I can take it but I need to be more discerning about who I bring it to and who I listen to. Anyway, daily? It was necessary for me in the beginning..I needed the consistancy...the family. But I don't think so anymore. And we'll give this schedule shake up a try and see if it doesn't help. I chair on Mondays so of course I'll go then...and then fill in when I can't make one of my evening meetings. That sounds like a plan.

And then of course, as my sponser has suggested, I will continue to pray on these bumps along the road. The bumps that cause me to feel unsettled, discontent, not really irritable, just edgy. These things are opportunities for growth, spiritual growth. I need to listen, make the necessary adjustments and continue along the path that leads to the road of Happy Destiny.

I know this blog, and your blogs, after a 3 week hiatus, were NOT something I could leave behind, not that I was planning to. For me, meditation, writing and service are necessary to staying sober.

Taking Stock

I just can't seem to get to the blog these days. Maybe its the fourth step writing. Anyway, I thought I'd leave you with a pretty picture at least and let you know I'm fine...just focusing my efforts in a different direction for the time being.

Road Trip

Has it really been a week since I posted? I've had to make some adjustments in my schedule just to maintain my sanity...skipping a few morning meetings, less blogtime, etc. I'm sane but I miss my blogging so I'm here. I won't try to sum up a week in one post but there was a lot going on. The mood switched that very evening Thank God. All it took was doing something for someone else. Imagine that! I checked out a cottage for a friend who lives in Hawaii. She's comiing back in April and is looking for a place to stay. Snowbirds we call them. Then I did a committment at a sober house. Between doing service and a favor the bad feelings disappeared. Funny how that works. Just as the full moon and stepping foot onto a property full of women caused my period to appear that I haven't seen since December 1st. Think that had anything to do with things?

I went to Wilson House (the birthplace of Bill W.) this weekend for a seminar on Sermon on the Mount. What a cool place nestled into the hills of Vermont. It's a Inn and they have a meeting room in the back and served meals family style. And you did feel as though you were a member of the family. Very comfortable, with cool memorabilia around. Went to the gravesite as well which is up the road apiece. I got very overwhelmed with emotion there. Just the bigness of it all. People leave things at Bill W.'s grave, particularly medallions and the tradition is that you can take on if you leave one. My friend has her 4th coming up next month so she left her 3rd and took the fourth. I"m holding it for her. Another person there took her third so that she could tell the person she was giving it to that she had met the person. We are all connected.

We stayed in a cottage at the motel across the street. 7 women in a cabin meant for no more that 4. Need I say more?

Just not in the Mood

I think I must be burning the candle at both ends because little things are beginning to bother me, things that I can normally roll with or that I don't usually even care about suddenly are affecting my mood.

Physically, my whole body is achy..my boobs are killing me...and I have a headache.

Noone bothered to buy coffee at the morning meeting for yesterday. Leaving it to me. Like they always seem to do. I really do not wish to be the go to person so I'm just not going this morning..(yes, I bought the coffee).

I'm just tired of people who cannot be bothered to say Good Morning back to someone. Go sit it the effing corner with your chair turned to the wall. I don't give a sh*t if you're not a people person or even if you don't like me personally..common courtesy would be nice though. And put the effing blackberry away during the meeting or again, go sit in the corner. And by the way, there is something to be said for the spirit of rotation...if you've been doing a job for more than a year...isn't it time to share the position? And if not, then do the effing job and if there is no coffee after your shift..go get some!

We have 2 alarm clocks in our bedroom. My husband only bothered to change one...the one he uses. I didn't even look at the clock assuming he had changed both when he called downstairs for the time. Thus I woke up late yesterday..throwing my whole day off. I know my alarm clock is my responsibility but really, if you were changing a clock in a room and there were 2, would you deliberately change only one? Just pretty much epitomizes our relationship.

As I sit here typing out my gripes, I find it ironic that one of them is when you are in a group of particularly alcoholics some people like to play top this...my problems are oh so much worse than yours. How about we all just keep our problems to ourselves??

Angry, lonely gay women should not make judgements on a heterosexual's long term marriage or husband. And for that matter, keep the sexual comments, catcalling of other women to yourself when you are with a group of heterosexual women. It's offensive. I wouldn't tolerate it from a man..why am I tolerating it from you.

I am not going to be the organizer of a group of women again...I don't mind doing things in or as a group but the organizer...not gonna happen. It's like herding cats.

My boss doesn't come in until around 10:00 or 10:30, leaves again at noon or earlier...is gone until 1:45 (fifteen minutes before I leave) and then talks about how busy he is...and wants to do an entire day's work in the 15 minutes before I leave. If you want to get work done while your employee is in the office then be in the office when your employee is there. That said, it is soooo much better when he is not.

It's friggin' cold and snowing. I'm sick of cold and snow. And I don't like daylight savings time. I like a bright morning and I don't mind if it gets dark at 6pm....

Or maybe its just that I haven't smoked in a week.

Whatever, I'm not going to drink over it.

Where has the Time Gone?

Wow...it's been awhile. I am doing a lot of writing lateley but not here. My therapist is a big believer in letters. So I've been writing those. To my husband, to cigarettes, to Terry,...and I'm sure there will be more. And then of course there is my fourth step..I've begun to write the resentments but this Big Book Step Study is pretty particular. I mean like, you've got to use a 5 subject notebook and black pen particular. And then, each page of my writing has to look like the example in the Big Book. So how I'm going to do that I don't know..I have more than a page worth for some people and it sounds like they want me to break it up so that I have 3 people per page. I've got to clarify that one. This stuff probably makes people balk. I don't really care. It's getting me to write a bit more. So that's good.

My computer is down..and of course nothing is backed up. I am using my husband's work laptop right now. Not sure I should be on blogger but it didn't block me. But I haven't wanted to abuse the privilege.

This is my last weekend home for the month. Next weekend a group of us go to the Wilson House in Vermont for a workshop on Sermon on the Mount. The following weekend my son is in a soccer tournament in western MA so we will go there. And the last weekend I take a retreat with Thomas Keating on Centering Prayer. So today I will try to get a month's worth of work done or at least set up.

My daughter is leaving today for an alternative Spring Break in Horse Cave, Kentucky. She just realized there are spiders in caves and is now completely freaked out.

My son has gotten into 6 of the 7 schools he applied to..and we're still waiting to hear from the seventh. Now its decision time which means visiting the schools and praying for money.

I shared the movie ONE with one of my book groups. It was not a good venue. Too much talking and not enough listening. They all think they are already very enlightened. One woman started asking what time it was and how long the movie was about 10 minutes in. It's okay. Doing it again with my other book group..I'll be better prepared this time.

Watched part of the movie Religulous last night before my cable box zapped. Personally, I think Bill Maher's questions are legitimate and in the movie he is often the only one making sense. The problem with Bill Maher and the movie is that he's not asking the questions to the right people. But then again for his movie and his premise he is. He asks them to people who will give him provocative answers and answers that confirm the igulous point he is trying to make. Let's see him go to Thomas Keating, Thich Nhat Hahn, Richard Rohr, etc. with these questions. The interviews he had with I think it was Father Coyle and another Vatican priest were right on. Watching that back to back with ONE was intersting.

Looking forward to a warm spring like weekend wathcing the snow melt. Spring forward tonight..yay! I like the hibernation aspect of winter..but it seems like around this time every year..it can't come soon enough.

I'll be around....

Seventh Step Prayer