courage2

Glee, it sounds like your sober 'tude pulled you through your friend's wake well. Something like that can trigger all kinds of thoughts and feelings, and it's clear your efforts to have an experience that enhanced your sobriety paid off.

You gained a sober reference -- do other people know that term?

My take on the bands: I really don't like Eric Clapton. I don't care what anyone says about his musicianship. He's rubbed me the wrong way forever. I liked some Traffic a lot when I was a kid, thought it was super cool -- but I can't listen to it anymore. It started to sound phoney. Blind Faith is all album cover art.



A bunch of stoner men with big love for their instruments

I'm a very opinionated bunny, if you didn't know.

And I'm sober. If you're reading this, nobody twisted your arm

alyn528

I will not use today!!!

courage2

^^^

Gilmer

I don't know what a "sober reference" is. Can someone explain?

Dee74

I replaced the album cover Courage.
I'm all for art but I'm not sure that album cover applies.

What was (barely) acceptable in 1969 has the propensity to offend a lot more folks now.

D

gleefan

Hi all

I'm doing ok. I find that all of you are always with me in spirit, especially when I have to face something difficult. Maybe I have an active imagination, or maybe a higher power is at work, but I attribute my daily strength to the wonderful alcoholics in my life.

I'm grateful for another daily reprieve from drinking and/or using.

Just kicked off my shoes and about to settle in to a 3 day weekend. It couldn't come at a better time.

courage2

Hi -- Dee, I figured you'd replace it. If it's art, it was pretty cheap at 40 pounds. Of course, that's what they paid for the girl. The male photographer... he probably got a lot, lot more. Nobody ever mentions that when they tell the story.

To me, it's maybe worse now -- first world society has succeeded to a great extent in getting women to buy in to their own pornification. You don't see naked images of 11 year olds (not publicly anyway) but I see 11 year old girls dressing up like prostitutes every day, and their moms pay the tab, and other people's moms do the makeup and hair.

A few blocks from me, at a place I call Satan's Armpit, moms can sit in cupcake shaped booths drinking "Cotton Candy Cloud" martinis or, if they prefer, straight tequila shots, while their daughters get sugar highs beside them. Or vice versa.

courage2

Gilmer, I was told in AA that you create a sober reference whenever you make it through some trial or challenge sober.

When I first got sober I didn't know how to do *anything* without a drink -- mourn the dead, make friends, enjoy sex, work.... Slowly I'm building up experiences that establish a grounding for a sober life. Sometimes an experience is special and has a steep learning curve, and I can mentally refer back to it in times of hardship to remember that I got through it, and how. Ideally, I can use sober references to help others get through similar situations.

biminiblue

I didn't drink today but I did eat compulsively. Meh, I'll survive. It's only ice cream and popcorn.

When I was younger I said many times, "If Cream played for free I still wouldn't go see them." Not a Clapton fan either. I liked Traffic. I have some of their music still and listen to it. I'm not able to pull up a reference for Blind Faith, but I think they had a song I liked.

Didn't they?

Eagle baby flapped its wings and its feet left the nest today. Whew. It didn't fall over the edge, thankfully. (So I read, I didn't see it.)

biminiblue

C2, when I was a teenager I had a room that my mother let me decorate. It was the sixties/seventies, so I had black light and posters, and I painted on the walls with graffiti-like art using black light paint.

There were footprints on the ceiling.

I don't understand your signature, but it makes me think of that room. It was my spot. My little stereo, one of those blinky lights that flashed to the beat of the music



and of course a lava lamp. And troll dolls, and a furry throw rug. You know, teen-girl stuff. Stuffed animals. Ha.

courage2

Bim, I was a few years behind you, I think. My brother had a lava lamp and a black light. I just had a lot of plants I named after characters in Narnia and Middle Earth, and stuffed animals, and old Beatles records my big siblings left behind.

The signature line is from a song called Trouble by Little Feat. I don't know what it means either, but it always makes me say, well, that's a question I've never had to wonder about.

biminiblue

A lot of those bands run together for me...I like Steve Winwood, he got around. I liked him all the way through his solo career in the 80s.

Dee74

I figured there was a reason you posted it. Whats going on?

D

Gilmer

I painted mine apple green and my focal point was my big, yellow beanbag.

courage2

You're right. It wasn't nice. I apologize to anyone whom I offended.

We seem very safe here, and that's what the forums are for. The real world is crude. Few of us can edit out the reality of it.

Sometimes I feel hit over the head with sickness in society. I was looking for a song, which took me to a song, which took me to Cream and Eric Clapton and that album cover. The time I got to hate Eric Clapton was when his kid died under horrible circumstances and he made a ton of money out of a hit tune about it. Tonight walking home from Chinese my husband & I made an effort to avoid Satan's Armpit so walked by a high-end strip club instead, and there was a young woman on the sidewalk ahead of us who went in alone-- maybe to audition? (The clubs don't like attractive solo women who aren't the talent.) It's not nice to see young women aspire to dance naked in strange men's faces and on their laps for money.

There's an unhealthy combination of anxiety, bravado, and posturing in the air in NYC. I check the news only to find out if there's been an assassination attempt. No one is thinking straight -- hell, no one even seems to be thinking.

The meditation hasn't been happening.

But I don't feel like drinking. Screaming? maybe.

Dee74

I thought it might be a scream .

The world seems to have gotten stranger and uglier in the last year....which makes me all the more grateful for love, friendship, and places like this

D

gleefan

Courage - I get the stress over the world we live in. I observe my NYC academic friends' creative, engaging social and political debates unfold on social media. My straightforward, suburban, middle management, corporate perspective is not one that lends itself to practicing their level of discourse. But that's ok. I find that being straightforward lends itself to peace and serenity for me. That fills me up more than being right in a wrong world ever did.

Carlos - No wifi? The horror! Lol! I'm very intrigued by your decluttering project. It's especially relevant to me as I pack my belongings, and see how hard it is to part with things. I have this notion that I'll lay out my stuff on my front lawn and invite the Buy Nothing group in my city to pick up whatever they want for free! In reality, that would be a lot of work, so I'll prob post items to Buy Nothing box by box, as I go through their contents. Either way it's a healthy exercise in letting go.

Today I'm not going to use. I am going to try to be mindful if only for a moment or two.

Have a great day everyone.

tomls

I will not, under any circumstances, drink/use today!

biminiblue

Not drinking today. Sounds like the best plan.

courage2

Substitute "sober" in the dotted line. You're so right on, glee. That's the discourse I'm 100% expected to, implicitly paid to, and more-and-more demanded to practice.

Poor me, huh? Ooh snookums, I live in the real world, not an alcoholic fantasy.



Hell, a crazy drunk like me is lucky to have a job. Remembering my own hypocrisies, I'm not drinking today.