Hi Gman, yes, we're kind of awesome - and nuts (well, Big and I are :-))
It's very easy to think we've 'failed' over the years. I do that - thinking I've failed - all the time. But I've noticed that quite a few SR people are quite well educated, up to college level (or what we call 'uni' here in Aus), and beyond, into what you Yanks call 'grad school' and we call 'postgrad'.
I too went back to uni at about age 35, did a bachelor then Honours degree, then most - BUT NOT ALL - of a PhD. I still think in one way that I failed. In other way, I have to remind myself that yes, I got a first class Honours, a government scholarship into the PhD, and managed a few publications and conference papers as well. All this, even while drinking and dealing with multiple horrible life circumstances.
It's quite incredible what we somehow manage to do, even in the worst circumstances. I like Dee's analogy of antiques (I have a couple myself), where it's good to remind ourselves of the patina on them, the bumps and scrapes and such. That's us.
Whilst I know that I'm just not up to doing anything remotely study-related (in terms of going back to institutional type courses), still, even in my darkest moments (of which I've had a few even today, really dark and hopeless), I still believe in us doing lifelong learning.
It may be an institution-based course, or it may be just doing our own research, reading, keeping curious about numerous parts of life, history, science, spirituality, addiction (!) ....whatever takes our fancy.
Drunks / addicts are and have been shown by recent studies to be largely intelligent people. Some of us had some ed-ew-kation; some, street-life; some, well frankly, some traumas. To put it bluntly. Some have endured all three, and even more.
Yet, look at, say, Mizzuno - doing so much; Big, about to embark on some serious overseas volunteer work...and so on. Read around these boards of the things people are trying to do, to reclaim a new life - with the bumps and scrapes, yet somehow having a go. I wish I had their kind of enthusiasm! But you can find it in yourself.