Personal
I'd like to begin my story with my ninth step experience with my father
My father found sobriety in AA when I was eight-nine years old. He remained sober for twenty-two years. By the time I found AA at age forty he had been back drinking for several years.
One day I found him sober and began, ''Dad, when I was ten I stole some money from your pocket''. He cringed. He could tell a ninth step was coming and dreaded it more than me.
I told him how I regretted the incidents of that night in 1964 at the senior keg party on Tally Lake. Dad was a deputy sheriff in our county. His car was equipped with a removable red light, siren, and two short wave radios, one for the Sheriff's office and the other for the Highway Patrol. There was a handgun and ammunition, issued by the Sheriff's office, in the glove compartment.
I and my date thought it would be hilarious if that car came into the party with siren and red light going. We did that. Some people just froze in our headlights. Two people were heading into the woods in different directions each with a keg of beer under their arm. Susie and I got out of the car and laughed heartily.
My friends held a quick meeting and decided to let us live. Then I proceeded with my usual overindulgence, this time passing out.
Some of my friends got on the police radios in Dad's car and explained their positions on law enforcement to the dispatchers at the Sheriff and Highway Patrol offices. Given their underage inebriated state, these positions were not flattering.
Somehow, I and the car made it home. I don't recall what happened to Susie. Dad went to work at the Sheriff's office and returned home about 10am. He woke me; I'd never seen him that angry.
Dring the ninth step, after I relayed the story about the keg party, Dad told me something I had not known. When he came home that morning, it was so the Sheriff and others could make a decision about whether he should be fired.
We talked more about past incidents, some funny and some heart-wrenching. Dad began talking about Bill Wilson and Dr Bob's stories, the famous coffee pot in Bob & Ann's home in Akron. I thought, why is he telling me this? I know these stories. Most are from ''AA Comes of Age'', ''Pass it On'', ''Dr Bob and the Good Old-timers''. Then it occurred to me. Dad had never read those books. In early sobriety he'd traveled to New York and had heard those things directly from Bill Wilson. He'd been a guest of Bill and Lois in New Bedford.
Dad and I had lost any sort of meaningful relationship when I was about thirteen years old. Here was a realization of something I'd known. My father had been deeply involved in the early days of something that I literally owed my life to. During this ninth step all those years of animosity melted away. In the space of a few hours we became friends.
After this experience I'd go talk with Dad every chance I got and found him sober. He told many stories about the beginning days of AA in the Flathead Valley and Montana. He also told about several AA's traveling to Conrad, Choteau, Havre, or some other town as they were starting a group there. He mentioned many names. A regret I have is that I did not write down any of those names or stories.