Gopher State XL

Pretty much all of the time I am aware of this feeling that I don't "fit."  Whether with close friends or at a gathering or in public, I almost always feel like an outsider... I often can't pinpoint specifically what is so different between me and "them" but there's something there nonetheless.  There are only 2 places that consistently give me a reprieve from this.

#1: The psych ward.  It's weird and humbling to say that, and maybe I'll write more about this another day.  But suffice it to say that I know I "fit" there.

#2: The fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous.  Put me with a bunch of recovering alcoholics and I'm okay because I "fit."  

One of my favorite weekends every year is an event called Gopher State.  Each year 8,000 (give or take a few hundred) alcoholics and friends/family of alcoholics (Al-Anon & Alateen) get together for a weekend.  I wrote a little about it last year (Gopher State XXXIX), and like last year, I'm pretty spent from the many, many hours of fellowship, food and excellent speakers, so I am going to be brief.

I just want to say that "normal" is relative to the community/people we are surrounded by.  In the psych ward, those of us with the mental illnesses are "normal" and the staff are the ones that don't seem to "fit."  At AA, those of us in recovery are "normal" and those who have been blessed to never experience the horrors of addiction are the ones who have a harder time "fitting."  This is just the way it is- I don't know if it's always good or always bad or always neutral- but it's the way it is  So what I'm learning to do is be intentional to spend more time in the places and with the people that help you feel "normal."  (Just for clarification, I still HATE the psych ward, so it's not like I'm trying to "spend more time there."  But I can seek out those who maybe have been there in the past, or should be there now.)  The majority of my life is still going to be feeling like an outsider, but these intentional experiences of be amongst and with people that I get and that get me help me to make it through the outsider times.  I am able to rest, get grounded in my thinking, see a little clearer, and maybe even enjoy myself a little bit.  And the less intentional I am about seeking out and embracing these things/people/places that let me feel a little dose of normalcy, the more aware I am of my "foreigner" status in the rest of life and how miserable it is to always feel like you just don't fit.  This weekend reminded me that it's on me to take advantage of things/people/places that remind me that I'm okay...

The rest of life can more or less be summed up by another previous post ("How Have You Been?")- minus the "having a job" part.  The days are mighty dark, and the fight seems endless... it is nothing short of terrible.

I leave you with an audio glimpse into how all AA gatherings end.  Imagine 8,000 alcoholics (that alone is impossible, seeing as how what you think of when you try to picture a drunk and what you think of when you picture someone that would never be a drunk and then every other kind of person... since this illness can hit anyone irrespective of age, rich, poor, colour or creed.) holding hands, praying this together.  I wish I would have recorded it the session that I was in the front of the room so you could hear the power of so many voices, but this is still pretty moving to me.