Charming is the Word for Alcoholics
By Fulton Ousler
Down at the very bottom of the social scale of AA society are the
pariahs, the untouchables, and the outcasts, all known by one excoriating
epithet-relatives. I am a relative I know my place. I am not complaining.
But I hope no one minds if I venture the plaintive confession that there
are times, oh, many, many, times when I wish I had
been an alcoholic. By that I mean that I wish I were an AA. The reason is
that I consider the AA people the most charming in the world.
Such is my considered opinion. As a journalist it has been my fortune to
meet many of the people who are considered charming. I number among my
friends stars, and lesser lights of stage and cinema; writers are my
daily diet. I know the ladies and gentleman of both political parties; I
have been entertained in the White House. I have broken bread with kings
and ministers and ambassadors and I say after that catalog, which could
be extended, that I would prefer an evening with my AA friends to any
person or group of persons I have indicated.
I ask myself why I consider so charming these alcoholic caterpillars who
have found their butterfly wings in Alcoholics Anonymous. There are more
reasons than one, but I can name a few.
They are imaginative, and that helps to make them alcoholics. Some of
them drank to flog their ambition on to greater efforts. Others guzzled
only to black out unendurable demons that rose in their imagination. But
when they have found their restoration, their imagination is responsive
to new incantations, and their talk abounds with color and light, and
that makes them charming companions too.
The AA people are what they are, and they were what they were, because
they are sensitive, imaginative, possessed of a sense of humor and
awareness of universal truth. They are sensitive, which means they are
hurt easily, and that helped them to become alcoholics. But when they
have found their restoration, they are still as sensitive as ever;
responsive to beauty and to truth and eager about the intangible glories
of this life. That makes them charming companions.
They are possessed with a sense of humor. Even in their cups they have
been known to say damnable funny things. Often it was being forced to
take seriously the little and mean things of life that make them seek
escape in a bottle. But when they have found restoration, their sense of
humor finds a blessed freedom, and they are able to reach a godlike state
where they can laugh at themselves, the very height of self conquest. Go
to the meetings and listen to the laughter. At what are they laughing? At
ghoulish memories over which weaker souls would cringe in useless
remorse. And that makes them wonderful people to be with by candlelight.
And they are possessed of a sense of universal truth. That is often a new
thing in their hearts. The fact that this at-one-meant with God's
universe had never been awakened in them is sometimes the reason why they
drank. The fact that it was at last awakened is almost always the reason
why they were restored to the good and simple ways of life. Stand with
them when the meeting is over, and listen while they say the "Our
Father." They have found a power greater than themselves which they
diligently serve. And that gives them a charm that never was elsewhere on
land or sea. It makes you know that God, Himself, is really charming,
because the AA people reflect His mercy and His forgiveness.
Source: Liberty Magazine 1940
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The Legacy Group of Alcoholics Anonymous © 2005