Book of Jamez

55 y/o malcontent, something of a writer

Category: Phoenix

  • Getting Around

    I’m finally to the point, I hope, where I don’t have to use my GPS every time I want to go somewhere here. I know how the city works and can find my way to most places with little trouble. It’s even reached the point where I am getting to know stupid intersections that I want to avoid as much as possible. I know that’ll be challenged over the next few days, I’m going to have dinner at a friends in Chandler, not really been down there. Today I get to go over to one of the school, Grand Canyon University for a trade show type thing for work… joy, of joys.

    IMG_2895

    Traffic still kind of baffles me, and probably would where ever I happen to be. I keep waiting for the Onion headline that explains why everyone in front of me is traveling 10 miles under the speed limit in all three lanes… and why it happens every day. I see the speed limit sign, “Look there’s another” I say as we creep along… OK, creep along might be pushing it, but I just can’t figure this stuff out… how and why?!

    Turning and turn lanes I don’t get either – when I turn I turn into the lane that I want to be in, unless there is another turn lane or obstruction that I can see – but many people turn into a lane they don’t want and then rush over to get in the lane they should have been to begin with. WTF… OK, this could be a slow GPS thing for them or something… I’m not really sure. They have turn lanes in the center of the road here which you would think people could use and it would help traffic flow better, but what happens is they don’t know how to use them or they go in cockeyed with their ass hanging out and people have to swerve around them… and swerving way out to make a turn onto a regular street, why do people do that?

    The lack of signal use drives me crazy… you’re cruising along and then someone slows down, and sometimes for blocks at a time. Then they either turn or finally put on their signal. How hard can it be?

    As you can imagine I spend a lot of my driving time waving my hands in the air, screaming like I just don’t care… oh wait… no, I often talk to them even though they can’t hear me and try to explain how stupid they are. I do it in a nice calm voice most of the time.. ok, not really.

    This driving thing is still pretty unusual for me… I do my best to be careful…

  • Answering the Phone 101

    I almost forgot, this is one of those things that I wanted to write about.

    Photo on 10-10-13 at 6.52 AM

    Yesterday I called to schedule an initial appointment with the surgeon (more on that later – is this getting annoying or what?), they were supposed to call me and didn’t so I initiated the call and it went something like this.

    “Hi my name is Jamez and I have a referral to call you.” I said

    “What for?” she said in a not to friendly voice

    I specify why I’m calling, the referral and that I’d like to schedule an appointment.

    “An appointment for what?” she asks “just to see the doctor? surgery? what kind of appointment?”

    “I can schedule surgery without first seeing the surgeon?” I inquire

    “Why didn’t you say that to begin with?” she barks “which location do you want an appointment?”

    “I wasn’t aware you had more than one location what are…” I start

    she shoots off the two addresses before I can even begin to understand thats what she’s doing.

    This is an example of bad customer service, this is an example of how NOT to answer the phone for your job. She was not the least bit friendly, not the least bit helpful and maybe was having a really, really bad day (it was only 9 how bad could it have gotten by 9?).

    When I answer the phone at work (I do this for a living) it’s like this:

    “Good morning thank you for calling [insert workplace here], my name is Jamez how can we help you today?” and then I listen… and then I go out of my way to help that person get what they need… sometimes I have to put them on hold to think to myself “had this person just read the email they wouldn’t have had to call” but I don’t tell them that…

    My job is to be of service, to be friendly and to make them feel like they were listened to and cared about. If you answer the phone for your job that’s what you’re supposed to do, don’t be all bitchy to them no matter how bad a day you are having… You’ll actually find that when you’re grumpy or not up to the task that faking this kind of thing actually helps you to feel better… because those people sometimes say thank you, those people need to feel like someone is listening and most of the time they’re human..

    Remember that golden rule thing… treat them as you would have them treat you. And smile, it helps to make you less grouchy

    I’m keeping the doctor appointment, but I might be overly, syrupy cheery when I get to their office!

  • Weekend Musings

    It was a weekend full of AA stuff, and there wasn’t even a round up.

    ImageFriday I attended the 5:30 meeting at Prince of Peace – they have a meeting there everyday at 5:30 I guess and the format is different on each day maybe… on Tuesday I spoke there and heard the Friday was a call-up ticket meeting so I told Cliff about it and we both attended. It was a very full meeting, saw many faces I know and enjoyed the meeting. Afterwards Cliff and I had dinner at a restaurant across the way – not bad at all.

    Saturday morning I headed to AHWATUKEE for the morning Men’s stag, it’s open discussion. It’s really a birthday meeting, they let celebrants share and then pick the topic. Saturday a gentlemen picked up his 40 year chip and the topic wasn’t too bad. Afterward Cliff and I had breakfast, then I met his dog Gunner. Cliff was also kind enough to bring my new bicycle home in his truck and I went riding almost right after I arrived home. I rode about 10 miles and then was ready to go to sleep for the rest of the day, but I didn’t. 🙂

    I’ve been watching the TV show Warehouse 13 on Netflix and one of the characters is in AA and that’s been interesting to watch, in one episode he switches bodies with his partner and she’d been drinking and it kind of throws him for a loop. I like that he’s a regular guy in AA and still able to deal with the world – as weird as it may be – without being so different or a stick-in-the-mud.

    Sunday morning was another meeting, i even went to the fellowship before the meeting at Starbucks. My friend Roger picked up his 18 year chip and talked about his recent trip back to NY where he first sobered up many years ago. There was also someone who just moved to the area who picked up a 2 year chip, she moved here from Virginia Beach and her sponsor told her to find a meeting to make coffee at and she asked for help to find such a place. Over all it was a good meeting.

    After the meeting Sunday I did laundry and then took the bicycle out for a nice ride, there are nice bike paths all over here so lots to see and do.

    This morning I’m going to work, some meetings and a doctor appointment in the afternoon – more on that later.

  • Loads

    The apartment complex where I live has three separate laundry facilities – the one closest to me is not far so hefting a basket down there to wash isn’t a big deal. The machines can all be used with coins OR credit cards, which I really like. One heaping basket of clothes is usually two loads of laundry – sure i could mix it all together but I separate lights and darks (I’m a clothes racist and believe in segregation). I’d still prefer to have a washer and dryer in the unit, but this works, I can always find two machines next to one another.

    This particular time was no different than the rest – laundry in the basket, detergent capsules on top. As I approached I could see two other people in the facility, nothing new there. I went in and said hi to the person closest to the door – she just glanced and me warily and then towards the other person there. I looked back there and didn’t think anything of it and said hello to him as well. As I was loading the washing machines I noticed the woman kept looking past me at the guy in the back, so I took a better look at him.

    The man was really skinny, with a short hair cut. He was wearing a blue short sleeved shirt and tan shorts with flip flops. His eyes were hooded and he wasn’t there. Very slowly, slow-motion like,  he would pick up a piece of clothing, hold it to his chest an fold it. I think I loaded two washing machines in the time it took him to fold that one piece of clothing. He was shaking as he moved and every once in a while I’d hear a loud “sniff”.

    “None of my business” I thought and proceeded to pay for the machines, set the timer on my phone and headed back to my apartment. But the man gnawed at my thoughts on the way back – he must have been on something, maybe he has mental issues – again, none of my business was the thought that rose to the top.

    When the timer went off I headed back to start the drying cycle, thankful that the odd one would be gone, but as I approached I could see he was still there in the back of the room, his basket where it was when I left. As I approached I saw he was still moving at a snails pace, even the simplest of motions.

    It wasn’t until I was on my way out that I noticed the clothes he was folding were dirty. I could see dirt, red stains and what I hadn’t noticed before was the smell from back there – a mildewy scent wafted from that side of the room.

    This was several months ago now, and I’ve not seen that guy in there since. But I wonder what’s become of him sometimes and what he was on. A small part of me wonders if he was enjoying himself – it was hard to tell what he was feeling when I would look at him.

  • Like Passengers of a Great Liner

    I attended the SRI Roundup this weekend – well as much as I attend roundups: I went to the Friday night speaker, the Saturday banquet and Saturday night speaker. I would have attended the Sunday morning speaker which I normally associate with the “spiritual” talk, but they do it differently here – here it’s a local person on Sunday’s and I figure I’ll hear them ranting eventually in a meeting so I can stay home and do chores.

    Friday nights speaker was the energetic Katie P from Austin, TX. She told a very powerful story and it hit all the right points, I really appreciated her talk. She was funny at times, told of tragic happenings and stressed the importance of the Big Book, the Steps and even the Traditions. During her talk she talked about having “meeting based sobriety” which is different than “solution based recovery” and it was just right.

    “The feeling of having shared in a common peril is one element in the powerful cement which binds us. But that in itself would never have held us together as we are now joined.” Alcoholics Anonymous, page 17

    The fellowship is not sufficient on it’s own for real recovery from alcoholism was what she was relaying to us. In her experience she spent decades going to meetings for the sake of going to meetings before she needed something more. When she finally hit a spiritual bottom while sober for quite a while she found real solutions in the Book.

    I myself never found a need to go to more than a few meetings a week, it would seem odd to stop going to bars and hangouts only to now to to AA houses and fellowship things. To be recovered we become a part of society again and that’s all society not just the rooms of AA.

    Here in Phoenix I hear people say they are going to meetings two times a day, seven days a week and it just baffles me, these people have 20+ years and say they have to do that to maintain their sobriety… I say, there is a real solution in the book that will show you precisely to recover from alcoholism – and that solutions doesn’t mention 4 hours each day in AA. Going to meetings every day is “meeting based sobriety”, going every day to get a small spiritual fix in a meeting when a real solutions is in the action described in the book is insane.

    The AA program is threefold: Recovery, Unity, Service – we need all three.

    The Saturday night speaker was a “slogan slinger” he had a lot of slogans and stories to tell, most of them not his. It brought lots of laughs and claps, but it wasn’t his story really and that would have probably been a better talk.

     

  • Finding a Home Group

    Walking into new meetings the first thing I notice almost every time: OMG they’re so young! Where are the old people? It’s at that point I realize I consider myself old and that my age prevents me from remembering that I was one of the young people when I came into the rooms. Which makes me say out loud, almost every time, “Well crap”. Last night at my friend Cliff’s home group we were talking about that and he said “if they’re lucky some day they’ll be as old as us and still going to meetings” or something to that effect.

    Cliff has made that meeting his home group recently and people have been asking me recently where my home group is and I just haven’t decided yet. It was so much easier when I was new to find a home group: my sponsor said “this is your home group” and I nodded and made coffee, set up chairs, greeted or whatever they would have me do. Oh… you might not know what a “Home Group” is …

    Excerpted from “The A.A. Group . . . Where It All Begins”, a pamphlet published by A.A. World Services and available online here http://www.aa.org/en_pdfs/p-16_theaagroup.pdf

    The A.A. Home Group 

    Traditionally, most A.A. members through the years have found it important to belong to one group which they call their “Home Group.” This is the group where they accept service responsibilities and try to sustain friendships. And although all A.A. members are usually welcome at all groups and feel at home at any of these meetings, the concept of the “Home Group” has still remained the strongest bond between the A.A. member and the Fellowship.

    With membership comes the right to vote upon issues that might affect the group and might also affect A.A. as a whole—a process that forms the very cornerstone of A.A.’s service structure. As with all group-conscience matters, each A.A. member has one vote; and this, ideally, is voiced through the home group.

    Over the years, the very essence of A.A. strength has remained with our home group, which, for many members, becomes our extended family. Once isolated by our drinking, we find in the home group a solid, continuing support system, friends and, very often, a sponsor. We also learn firsthand, through the group’s workings, how to place “principles before personalities” in the interest of carrying the A.A. message.

    Talking about her own group, a member says: “Part of my commitment is to show up at my home group meetings, greet newcomers at the door, and be available to them—not only for them but for me. My fellow group members are the people who know me, listen to me, and steer me straight when I am off in left field. They give me their experience, strength and A.A. love, enabling me to ‘pass it on’ to the alcoholic who still suffers.”

    It was definitely easier when someone assigned me a home group and when I was ignorant about the things that matter so much to me now (Traditions, knowledge, Big Book, steps, history…). Now it seems I start dismissing a groups chance before I even attend a business meeting. I think a part of me will always want the Northside Group to be my home group, or the Eau Claire Pacific Group or the Tuesday Night Big Book Group… Those groups hold special places in my heart and are the model for me to find a new home group where I feel like I belong… All of those groups had flaws, some more glaring than others, but each of them felt like I belonged there.

    What I want in a home group isn’t that much, I don’t think…

    • knowledgable people talking about the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous
    • knowledge and working of the 12 Traditions
    • regular business meetings
    • structure
    • reliability
    • greeters (this one is just a hope… but it was a part of some great meetings I used to attend)

    There will always be a part of me that wants old-timers and big book thumpers to be armed with stun guns to shock people who are off topic and or rambling on and on… I’ve had that desire since I started attending and it’s never going to go away. But really, I want to be at a meeting where they aren’t afraid to call someone on their bullshit and ask them to shut the fuck up.

    So, for now I’m still without a “Home Group”, but i haven’t given up looking and I haven’t given up hope to finding one. It took me almost 14 years to find a home group in DC and being the type of alcoholic that searches for loopholes to slip through I’m glad this sentence is the first in the Home Group portion of the pamphlet:

    “Traditionally, most AA members through the years have found it important to belong to one group which they call their ‘Home Group.’”

    That “most” keeps me looking and keeps me from settling for second best when the right group is probably out there for me to find.

  • Misreading People

    I’m not very good at reading people I guess. Recently two things happened that I didn’t expect based on how a person reacted with me.

    When I interviewed for my current job in Arizona I did video (Skype) interviews and on more than one occasion my interviewer (now one of my bosses) leaned away from the camera and crossed her arms – I thought for sure she didn’t want me to have the job. Having been on this job for a couple of months now I see that she does that in all kinds of different circumstances and I’m not sure why.

    Saturday afternoon I had a date and I told the guy he was handsome – he didn’t respond… I’m like WTF am I hideous? Then later he did the same thing as my boss – he leaned away from me and crossed his arms and I thought it was over… five minutes later he invited me to his house to go swimming and the rest is censored… 😉

    I think its easy to look at something and see something that isn’t true at all about it, I should know better. I’ll have to judge people based on their actual actions not just their body language in any given situation.

    On a side note a woman on the sober bowling league last week pulled me aside and said: You’re gay aren’t you.

    I wasn’t even wearing a rainbow shirt or anything… but yes, I told her – I’m gay. I think she and I will become friends over time here, she’s crazy and that’s the type of friend I tend to attract (no offense intended if you’re a friend reading this… but honestly… your crazy 😀 )

    I’ve had a couple of dates here and only one that I really enjoyed. I will continue to have dates and see if there is anyone I like enough to see more than a few times but I don’t have any expectations.

     

  • Big Book Quoters Don't Stay Sober – Oh Really?

    I heard in a meeting this morning “people who quote the big book don’t stay sober” and saw heads nodding along in agreement. Then I heard “you can be too smart to get the program, I hope I stay a dumb”.

    My first thought was “Fuck off”. Then my next thought was that what he really meant to say was you can get trapped in intellectualizing the hell out of the program and it’s really simple – clean house, seek a higher power and help others.

    I can’t count on both my hands and feet the number of people I know with long (double digit) sobriety that regularly quote the Big Book in their shares, stories and every day life. It’s our text book, it has directions “To show other alcoholics precisely how we have recovered is the main purpose of this book“. So discounting those who know it is like stabbing yourself in the foot.

    Knowing what’s in your Big Book is vitally important to recovering from “a seemingly hopeless state of mind and body“. If you were diagnosed as a diabetic, you wouldn’t just start injecting yourself with insulin all willy nilly – you’d learn about your disease, what to eat, how to eat, warning signs – and you don’t get that information from your next door neighbor or a person on a bus – it’s given to you in information packets and meetings with your doctor or health professional that understand what you’re going through.

    The same is true of alcoholism. We have a “common solution” that has worked for countless people who were once just as hopeless as I was – I can choose to follow that path to recovery or I can choose to go a different route or skirt the edges of the Happy Road of Destiny and get what was promised when we practice half-measures: nothing. Our book says time and time again “further on are clear-cut directions showing precisely how we have recovered” and “Here are the steps we took which are suggested as a program of recovery”

    On remaining dumb:  “Our next function is to grow in understanding and effectiveness”. Page 84

    Our book tells us also that self-knowledge is not the answer, so just knowing you’re an alcoholic and doing nothing about it isn’t going to get you far. You can quote the Big Book in meeting until your blue in the face but if you fail to enlarge your spiritual life it won’t help you at all – I think this is what the gentleman was trying to convey (actually I don’t really think this, but I kind of hope that it is, because remaining ignorant shouldn’t be a goal of anyone).

    The common solution I talk about here isn’t the group therapy you see where you come and talk about whats wrong with your life, the common solution is a program of action – getting out of yourself and helping others, specifically alcoholics, but all others “Our real purpose is to fit ourselves to be of maximum service to God and the people about us.”

    “…there was nothing left for us but to pick up the simple kit of spiritual tools laid at our feet.” page 25 We don’t use a jack hammer when a hammer will do, but we also don’t use a hammer when we need the jackhammer, we use the tools that are given to us.

    Read your book, talk to your sponsor, find the solution in the book and work our program of action. Lastly I’ll quote the back of the book twice:

    “To those now in its fold, Alcoholics Anonymous has made the difference between misery and sobriety, and often the difference between life and death. A.A. can, of course, mean just as much to uncounted alcoholics not yet reached.

    Therefore, no society of men and women ever had a more urgent need for continuous effectiveness and permanent unity. We alcoholics see that we must work together and hang together, else most of us will finally die alone.

    The “12 Traditions” of Alcoholics Anonymous are, we A.A.’s believe, the best answers that our experience has yet given to those ever-urgent questions, “How can A.A. best function?” and, “How can A.A. best stay whole and so survive?” AA Page  561 (4th edition

    and (I guess this one is Herbert Spencer not AA)

    “There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance–that principle is contempt prior to investigation.” AA Page 568

  • Adjustments

    May already, wow how times flies.

    Having to drive every day is a big change from life in Washington DC where I could walk or Metro almost anywhere. The morning commute is pretty easy and relaxed, my work day starts at 7:30 (so I’m there by 7:15) and traffic is still pretty light that early. In the afternoon I get done at 4:00 and that traffic is pretty heavy. I manage to avoid freeways and my commute home is a little over 20 minutes, the way to work is about 15. Buses, at least on Thomas Road don’t always have pull offs and more often than not just sit there at the stop they arrive at until they’re supposed to leave… unlike DC buses which depart seconds after arriving and loading… so it blocks up some of the traffic.

    Everyone here speeds, I know everyone every where speeds… but here its extreme to me anyway. 50 in the 35 zone is typical, most people do at least 10 miles over the limit and it gives me issues 🙂 I usually just go along at the speed limit but sometimes I can just sense how annoying I am to others and go faster, they still pass me. I brought up the speeding thing to my insurance agent and she said “the speed limit is just a suggestion.” Really…

    I have finally stopped waking up at 3:00 a.m. and just lying there in the dark… now it’s about 4:15 or so that I wake up… but that’s a whole lot better really and I feel like I have extra energy and am less tired.

    I’ve found some good AA meetings here, well at the moment I think they’re good… One is a traveling Big Book meeting that goes from house to house and I was all excited about it – until I came and they were reading the stories in the back… /sigh. The other two are Big Book meetings also, one follows along to the Joe and Charlie CD for 15 minutes and then discusses what they heard and relates, mostly they stay on topic, but there is a lot of new or recycled sobriety here and not that many folks yet that have over 5 years. The other is a step meeting, big meeting – reminds me a bit of Pacific (the size and personalities) and Northside (the literature aspect and traditions), the lead shares their experience strength and hope but can only use the Big Book for reference… I’ve only been to the Step 8 and 9 meeting so far… I wonder how Step 6 and 7 did… we’ll see next round. Every meeting I’ve been to here I hear the Traditions read and it sounds like such a simple thing… but it makes me feel better.

    I haven’t done too much “fun stuff” outside of work or AA… but there is a new Sober Bowling group starting and I’m going to try that. I’ll be seeing Iron Man this weekend and I’m looking forward to the Comic Con here at the end of the month. Next weekend I’m going to a baseball game for work.

    So far, I’m pretty happy with moving here… I know summer is coming but so far the weather has been spectacular.

    Love and miss friends and family, but happy to be here.

  • One Week in Phoenix

    I arrived in Phoenix a week ago today and all seems to be going well. The weather has been really nice mid 70s – 90s and all of it comfortable heat – everyone keeps telling me I’ll wish I had never moved her in the summer.

    My one bedroom apartment is really all that I need and moving in means I had to do some shopping. I’d go buy all the important things like the shower curtain and liner and not realize until I arrived home that I forgot the shower curtain rings and i’d run out again to get those and remember a slew of other things too. At this moment I think I have almost everything I need – maybe I could use a frying pan and a spatula… but I’ll be ok for a good while. For the first few days I didn’t do a lot outside of shopping, eating and driving around – oh, and I tanned by the pool every day, which is really a nice thing to be able to do.

    Everything is cheaper here – except gas. It’s an amazing concept, but when people make less money they have to sell things for less i guess.

    I didn’t have my Passport, which I need to get an AZ license, until yesterday (I shipped it UPS instead of taking it with me like a doofus) so I don’t have that yet. I do have a nice car that is quiet and gets me from A – Z very well. The amount of emails I’m getting now from Allstate and  VW makes me wish I had stayed carless. I’m sure I’ll figure out the settings for that soon.

    I tried out two meetings so far, one on Thursday night and one on Sunday. Each had things that I liked about it and each had things I didn’t – the Thursday night step study was the winner so far, I plan to keep looking but that one is close and the people friendly.

    Monday was the first day of work so of course I didn’t sleep well. I was at work at 7:00 – a 15 minute car ride and my day starts at 7:30 there. The boss and the other new person were there to meet me and they showed us the ropes of how to open up (making coffee, drawing drapes, turning on the printer) and before you knew it we were taking notes in the board meeting. To be honest I didn’t take many notes I was really interested in what they were talking about. For lunch the boss got us tacos and burritos. The day went by really fast and before I knew it it was quitting time – 4:00 p.m. It had been a really great day and then I checked my voicemail (See this story).  So it was an up and down day mostly up.

    My Desk at Work
    My Desk at Work

    Tuesday I spent good quality time with my boss going over how I’m going to help her – she’s never had an assistant before and she’s excited and wary about it. I put some of those cares to rest right away by giving here items that she had been expecting but didn’t ask me for and then pointed out three errors on the website and in email signatures that should be addressed ASAP. They said the appreciated it I hope so I was only trying to help and get used to everything.

    Wednesday, today I started to discover how unorganized the office is – there are all kinds of documents in the “Forms” folder that don’t resemble forms at all and the “Inventory” folder has mostly letters about events. *sigh* Well at least I wont be bored.

    My protector at work
    My protector at work

    As it stands today I’m pretty happy here in AZ. I know the weather will change and the job will get incredibly busy in the summer – but i’m ready.