2000th Post

Two Thousand times I have sat down and started to write something for this blog.  Probably One thousand five hundred times I have had no idea what I was going to write.  And probably those five hundred other blog posts are the ones I regret.  It is much better when I am just sharing my experience, strength, and hope - and not trying to make a point.  If I happen to make a point while sharing my own experience, so much the better, but it is better to not set out to do that.

This blog was pretty much an accident.  I just wanted to communicate with someone who was irritating me on another blog I had at the time.  I knew he was an alcoholic and I wanted to talk to him about that, so I made an anonymous blog.  It was the very week of Katrina.  The date of my first entry is September 7, 2005.  I was suffering from a broken rib after a bike accident, so I was not able to run, feeling homebound, and the computer was occupying my time more than it should have been.

I only posted intermittently until just after Thanksgiving that year when a wonderful (now) former blogger named "Trudging" discovered my blog.  We used to be a great big solid community, so when she found me, they all came over.  Suddenly I had readers!  It was so much fun!  I started posting every day and reading the other bloggers religiously.  Most of us posted early in the morning and we all read and commented.  On a day when I had less than 10 comments on a post, I considered it somewhat of a wasted effort.  I may have only had 30 to 50 hits a day (whereas now I have 120 to 150), but they were mostly all bloggers who commented.  We were really a community.

In 2006, I got to take a trip to Texas and met Pammie, Dave, Scott, Zane, Ricky!!!, Boston, and so many more bloggers I cannot even think of them all.    THE most amazing thing about meeting those people was that they were all exactly as I had imagined them.  I felt I knew them from reading about them.  I visited Dave's house and saw familiar sights from photos on his blog.  I got to blog from Dave's house on more than one occasion!

To say I came to really care about some of these people would be an understatement.  And then there were problems too... as there inevitably are when you put people together.  But that is life.

Skip forward to the International Convention in San Antonio in July 2010.  I attended a workshop on AA and the internet - or something - several of you were there, you might be able to recall exactly what it was.  My face may have actually turned red as I realized how wrong-headed my blog is.  I decided at that time that I would discontinue it - as soon as I could muster the courage.  It took me until December.  On December 1, I wrote what I thought would be my last entry on this blog.  But I was wrong.  

The line that hit me between the eyes at that workshop was "we feel it is best to let our friends recommend us."   I knew my blog flew in the face of that good advice.  I was "promoting" AA with my blog.  And I have always known that my blog was within the letter of the law of the eleventh tradition about personal anonymity, but that it really is not within the spirit of the twelfth tradition about spiritual anonymity - humility.  My blog is about me!

This may be rationalization, but there is a dearth of positive information about AA on the internet.  AA as a whole has made the decision not to "fight" that.  I have decided that it really isn't too terribly wrong for one person to put her own experiences out there - as long as I couch them as such.  They are my experiences.  So now when you search "does AA work" my blog comes up as well as all of the negative stuff.  When you search for information about why people hate AA, my blog comes up as well as all the horrible stuff.  People get here by those searches and then they find some information about getting to AA.  I think that is a good thing.  I am not selling books, I am not promoting my own philosophy, I am not pushing my own religion - I would like to let people know that AA truly works if they are willing to try it.

So, that is why I returned to my blog in June and am still blogging.  Even when there is a small community of us, and few comments every day.  I love to write.  And what better to write about than my own experience, strength, and hope?

I thank God for my sobriety every single day.  And I am also grateful for this blog. And especially the wonderful people I have met along the way in the 6 years and 2000 posts.

xoxoxoxox,
mc