Early last Saturday morning, I attended an AA meeting online—
6:00 am!
My stepson was chairing (telling his story of recovery) celebrating 15 years of sobriety. What a privilege to show up for him and for the other recovering alcoholics online and in the room.
The “room” being a local coffee shop that allows this meeting to gather and hold their meeting before they actually open their doors for breakfast at 7am. The coolest part of this meeting is that it was started by my stepson and his buddy right before the pandemic. Just the two of them. In the coffee shop. It grew and then, during the pandemic, when we were not allowed to meet indoors, they started meeting outside in the back parking lot. They sat in beach chairs next to the dumpster with a laptop. Then, adding more people online. They eventually moved back inside to the coffee shop and still remained online, from his laptop.
The point being, is that the persistence of these people trying to stay sober during hard times was quite amazing.
That morning, there were ten men sitting at a long table and six more on zoom with me. They were all there to celebrate my stepson’s 15 years of sobriety. What a gift. They all talked about how he had invited them to his meeting (by invitation only) and they branched out to other meetings after that. They talked of his example of how to stay sober influenced them to stay sober too. He was a model for all of these men.
I was in tears the whole time. So proud of him. He started his story talking about starting the meetings out by the dumpster in the parking lot and how it was a glimpse of our lives before we got sober—coming out of the dumpster—now trying to clean up the garbage that we had created in our lives. Great picture.
He also talked about coming to one of his first meetings and seeing a man who would become his sponsor. His sponsor was sitting in that meeting wearing a suit, dressed to go to work after the meeting. My Stepson saw himself in that person and identified. He saw others like himself and knew he belonged and was in the right place. He became “part of”… That is how our meetings work.
There are meetings everywhere.
Surrender to God and the process—come join us.
We’ll save a beach chair for you.
“And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—”
Hebrews 10:24-25
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