In the basement of a church...

"I know a sickness ancient and cross
No crucifix could ever fix enough
But in the basement of a church, these people they talk
There is a line that must be walked
If you want to make it stop
Then stop."
--From the song "Stop" by Ryan Adams


That song lyric, from my favorite male singer-songwriter, is very appropriate tonight. Because tonight my wife and I joined my son in the basement of a church for an open Alcoholics Anonymous meeting.

Just before I started cooking dinner tonight, my son came into the kitchen and said to me, "There's an open AA meeting tonight at 8:30 if you and mom want to come with me." It caught me kind of off guard, but I was very happy to get the invitation.

The meeting was only about 35 minutes long, but it gave my wife and I the opportunity to join our son in a part of his life that is usually only his. We met a few of his group's members and listened to the featured speaker, a woman who is a recovering Vicodin addict. We also had people tell us what a nice son we have and how serious he is about the program. That was nice to hear. But the most memorable thing I heard tonight was the reading from the AA book Twenty-Four Hours a Day:

"AA tells us to forget about the future and take it one day at a time. All we really have is now. We have no past time and no future tie. As the saying goes: 'Yesterday is gone, forget it; tomorrow never comes, don't worry; today is here, get busy.' All we have is the present. The past is gone forever and the future never comes. When tomorrow gets here, it will be today. Am I living one day at a time? "

One day at a time. Word.

Thanks, son.