Coming to the Table

February 23

COMING TO THE TABLE

For many years, decades even, I stacked the table against myself and others.  I piled the sacred next to trifles; I deposited item after item and built towers to confusion.  After years of sobriety, I sorted the piles in earnest.  I made a place for myself at the table.  It is amazing what I can accomplish with a seat and a surface.  Over months, tediously separating the needed from the useless, I made a place for others at the table. There is a whole world of life I had missed while trying to keep myself safe from unrealistic expectations---expectations of who I am and what I can do, what I should do and who I should do it for. 

Having strong boundaries and a clean table is like a homecoming.  I am coming home to me. The good games and happy meals had at this table are unexpected and surely welcome.  The wall I built held good times at bay because I could not keep the flood of trash from spilling in from every direction. I had to learn to hold my head up before I could look around.

Invent a new language to talk to yourself in.

*

Ace

Like an ace in my pocket

step one is the beginning

and end of my step work.

This step carries the high and low count;

its rise is so near to the ground

I didn’t have to lift my chin to clear it

as I crawled my way in here,

Its appeal so exalted that it is all I hear

when I finish the twelfth

and am on my way back around.

the high and low of any hand.

Plus the card I keep up my sleeve for emergencies.

The greatest blessing is I don’t need four of a kind,

not even a pair; as long as I have step one.

I am guaranteed a full house, full heart and full life

between you and me that’s just how I like it.

You are reading selections from Sober on the Way to Sane and More Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault

http://www.amazon.com/Sober-On-The-Way-Sane/dp/1440417342/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1388576888&sr=8-1&keywords=sober+on+the+way+to+sane

http://www.amazon.com/More-Lines-From-My-Life/dp/1448677203/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1388576956&sr=8-1&keywords=More+Lines+From+My+Life

Gravity Works All the Time

January 14

GRAVITY WORKS ALL THE TIME

Limits and boundaries are a drag.  I hate feeling tied to the ground.  I know I could fly if not for unseen forces.  I sense myself lightening, smoothing, I drop my burdens; I pick up speed.  Fourth dimension!  Hell!  I’m proverbial vapor trails.  At this time I should explain.  When I get moving this fast, I inevitably wind myself into a position where my head is up my in my nether regions, a place it does not belong. 

I have slowly grown to love my limits; no restraint holds me back.  In reality, I am supported, rooted as it were.  I am not a hydroponic.  I can live in the real world.  I am me.  Encouraged by the wind and the rain, I am not the hot house flower.  I am truly free.  I can walk where I was born to walk.  I forget life has not been found outside my little world, and when it is, I’m still better off being me.

Introduce yourself to a new vegetable.

*

Specks

Spectacles are for specks;

tiny things that must be watched.

Commotion is nothing but a congregation

of minutia with an audience.

How many small things

do I strain my eyes to see;

then seek help to pursue further?

Some of these are put on display fishing for voyeurs.

Others are secreted away

only to be ferreted out through magnification.

Whether curiosity or contempt drives me

to these pinpoints I must search my motives

before I scan the plain.

For truly if I am not careful

I, myself will end up either speck or spectacle.

You are reading selections from Sober on the Way to Sane and More Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault

http://www.amazon.com/Sober-On-The-Way-Sane/dp/1440417342/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1388576888&sr=8-1&keywords=sober+on+the+way+to+sane

http://www.amazon.com/More-Lines-From-My-Life/dp/1448677203/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1388576956&sr=8-1&keywords=More+Lines+From+My+Life

Bound

April 21

Bound

The reason the sleeves of my disease wrap around and tie in the back is so that I will struggle with change. Alcoholism is my straightjacket and my goal is that ‘loose garment life’ I’ve heard so much about. The sweat I work up from railing against my confining existence causes petulance. Frothing and enervated, defeat is the landing on which I collapse, acceptance a flight of steps away. My ailment leads me to believe I have nothing to hold onto as I adjust; and though this isn’t true, the fact remains that this is still a process of letting go.

Have a parenthetical lunch with a friend

*

PINK CLOUD

When the pink cloud lands in my valley

My task is to walk

The pleasure of its presence can never outweigh

The practice this cloud affords me.

Walking in a haze of cherry blossom lightness

The future is a blur I do not fear

Forward motion seeds my inertia

I will keep on.

When the test begins

And I must proceed in the obscurity of night

The lively steps of pink-cloud days

Will cheer and empower me.

I can imbed my future with right action

And bank the confidence I feel today

Saving it for the rain swept days which come to everyone

Progress is positive even when made in bliss.

Bowman Beach

October 17

Bowman Beach

The swirl with the flash of teeth that I backed away from turned out to be dolphin, but that didn’t make me safer, strangers are strangers no matter who their PR team is. When I am out of my element fear grows long leads and I am bound by these limits. Who I am under new circumstances is a discovery I make as time flies by. Can I swim and play with exuberance or will I drown trying to catch up? I am able and disabled, the line is tied from the back and I don’t know its length. I unreel as much slack as I can and test my reach, but still I must keep my wary eye and be careful of the deep.

Think of something nice to say about a pigeon

*

MISS DIRECTED

I called and rambled at my sponsor.
After a significant time had past she stopped me
And asked--with a tone in her voice--
Why are you calling me?

Startled I replied, for your advice?
Are you sure that’s why you called?
Because I can give you my advice
But I have given advice to you before
And received only a severe case of the
Yeah Buts’-----in return.

I was about to say, yeah but, you don’t understand,
When she cleared her throat to quiet me
And continued what she was saying.
Seems to me you want more than a sober ear-
You want Magic.

You want me to take your crazy dramatic thinking
Put it in a hat and pull it out formed as all your dreams
And then you want credit for making it happen.
But Kitten, I have news for you I’m not Mr. Roark
And this is not Fantasy Island.

This is sobriety and you can’t just have your way.
This is when I realized I was a dry drunk.
I don’t know what the first signs are
But I do know when your sponsor asks-
And you’re calling me why? The jig is up.