Sobriety News
August 2002

STATEMENT OF PURPOSE

The Sobriety News is a publication of the Harrisburg Area Intergroup of Alcoholics Anonymous. It is written, edited, and read by AA members, and those interested in the AA program of recovery from the disease of alcoholism, linking one alcoholic to another.

Our desperation to find relief from the bondage of alcoholism has led us to this program as a new "design for living". Many members utilize meetings, sponsorship, self examination, amends, prayer, meditation, AA literature, service to fellow alcoholics, and many other tools to maintain their recovery. This publication is intended as one more tool to live a life of recovery. Because each AA member has an individual way of working this program, divergent views to recovery, within the concept of the Program of Alcoholics Anonymous, are welcome. An effort is made to print all viewpoints in this forum. Articles are not intended to be statements of AA policy, nor does publication of any article imply endorsement by AA or the Harrisburg Area Intergroup.

AUGUST Calendar of Events*
 

LOOKING AHEAD*

* Look for more information about these events in Sobriety News.
** See links page for flyer

To links and current events

Your Help for the Calendar of Events

A complete Calendar of Events depends on our active members contributing information about their coming events, participation of Intergroups in surrounding Districts, and our ability to gather information. We feel it is worth trying. Let us know what you think. Often, we miss opportunities within the fellowship because the message didn't get out. We all want to carry the message to other alcoholics. This will be one more way we can accomplish that.

OUR FACE IS CHANGING

We now have the capability to update Sobriety News during the course of the month, so events can be added to the Calendar. You may, therefore, find it helpful or informative to check back to the website periodically to see what has been added. Your group has access to a printed copy of Sobriety News through your Intergroup Rep. As changes are made to the Internet copy in http://www.aaharrisburg.org your group will have no way of knowing new information about upcoming events unless a group member with internet access brings the information to the group. This can be another option for service that members can perform to maintain sobriety through action.
    The HAI index page has various links which gradually will become more active. A link has been added to the Meeting Schedule so you can print out the schedule on a single sheet of 8 1/2X11 paper. This schedule is current with the latest information available. If you see an error, or information for your meeting has been changed, the schedule will be updated if you notify Sobriety News at asdungan@mindspring.com or if you notify an Intergroup Officer or mail the info to HAI, Fellowship House, 1251 S. 19th Street, Harrisburg, PA 17105. This current schedule can be duplicated for group purposes from this link at any time it is needed, and will be maintained in as current a state as possible to try to minimize the problems of accuracy encountered with the printed schedules of the past.
    Flyers will be added as they become available and removed when an event passes. If you are looking at this on the Internet, you will see that many of the insert pictures are links you can click on to get added information or flyers. Keep checking.
    The above suggested service opportunity to bring internet information back to the group could also be broadened to include flyers, and current meeting schedules. The printed schedules and flyers will still be available but may continue to have their current disadvantages too.

 

 

 

THINK = The Happiness I Never Knew.

 Pearl of the month  contributed by Jim M.  c: 2001, Alcoholics Anonymous, page 55
"We finally saw that faith in some kind of God was a part of our make-up, just as much as the feeling we have for a friend. Sometimes we had to search fearlessly, but He was there. He was as much a fact as we were. We found the
Great Reality deep down within us. In the last analysis it is only there that He may be found. It was so with us."
 

1st Firecracker Roundup in Philadelphia
"The Firecracker Roundup in Philadelphia was held July 4th through July 7th at the Renaissance Hotel Airport. There were marathon meetings, dances, a pool, hospitality room and banquet but its primary reason for being was to bring the message of the Alcoholics Anonymous program through eleven speakers and workshops. The event was well attended and is financially solvent, so you should plan now to attend the second annual Firecracker roundup July 3 thru 6, 2003. All of the speakers and workshops carried a very powerful message about what our program is, however the content would be too lengthy to carry here. A flavor of the events is briefly conveyed here to give you a taste.

 

Marty S from Levittown, PA
Having held many service positions which Marty knows helped keep him sober, he is appalled that AA Groups, Districts, and Areas have difficulty filling service positions. Doing 25 hours a week in service work gave him a lot more free time to enjoy family, friends, job, and life, none of which he had while drinking (anytime he was breathing and awake). And he remembers that Bill W told us the only way we and the Fellowship can survive is by reaching out to the alcoholic who still suffers.

Billy N from the Working with Others Group in Netcong NJ
'Not allowed out' is when you have to stay in until the parents are asleep. 'Not allowed in' is an entirely different thing. It sometimes lasts well into our sobriety. The Big Book doesn't define what tragedies we must cause or how low our bottom must be to be alcoholic; it says "we are men and women who have lost the ability to control their drinking". Eventually we are people who are not allowed in, and unless we work this program by taking the actions it demands, that will be our lot.

Tom F from the Harbor City Group
Everybody has a job in AA. Nobody is wasted in God's economy. There are only two jobs; those who have the job of showing us what to do; and there are those who have the job of showing us what not to do. The second group has the hard job. Tom doesn't want to be one of those.

Tom F and Billy N - Workshop on the Twelve Traditions
Billy started off with how he used to hear people say you can't be kicked out of AA. He found in New York City that you can be kicked out of an AA meeting, and in fact you should be asked to leave any meeting, in accordance with the First Tradition, if you are disrupting other people's recovery which destroys unity. Tom finished up by pointing out that the Eleventh Tradition is there to protect us from the public because we are so few, and the Twelfth is to protect us from each other, because we are so many. He paraphrased Bill W, saying 'Humility expressed by anonymity is the driving spiritual force and the great safeguard of the fellowship of AA'.

Vince and Pat Y - Workshop on Financial Amends
If you are married, it means you are equal partners who want to share your lives, including money. You therefore have a joint account with all the money and you discuss and decide how the money will be spent like adults. If one has debts and one doesn't, the debt belongs to both. If you don't trust one another enough to share everything, then you are just living together with bedroom privileges. This is all part of being responsible.

Vince Y from the Pacific Group
AA is about being willing to take action. He took the action of asking a man to be his sponsor. The man said that he was willing, if Vince was willing to concede that his judgment did not work, the sponsor's judgment was infinitely better and therefore he would follow the direction of the sponsor. He was and did, and as a result he has weathered triumph and tragedy, and everything in between, since that day in Oct 1974. And he wouldn't trade any of it.

Lebra N - Alanon speaker from Charlotte, NC
Al-Anon uses the same Twelve Steps as Alcoholics Anonymous. So one day when she was complaining about him to her sponsor, she was told that her life getting better does not depend on him getting better. Her life getting better depends upon her working the Twelve Steps. And isn't that the truth for all of us?

Clancy I - Workshop on Singleness of Purpose
Clancy reminded us that the long form of our Third Tradition says that "our membership ought to include all that suffer from the disease of alcoholism". He pointed out that in all the history of mankind the only two groups to have any significant impact on recovery of alcoholics were the Washingtonians, and AA. What these two had in common was the relationship of one alcoholic talking to another. This served to reduce feelings of difference so that the alcoholic can be willing to take actions he doesn't believe in. Sharing about other addictions the alcoholic doesn't suffer from is just so much information, interesting but different.

Dennis N from the Queen City Group in Charlotte, NC
Dennis thinks about all the people who have terminal diseases, who, if they had this chance to survive, would be overjoyed to do what we have to do. They would not balk at the prospect of going to meetings, getting a sponsor, working the steps, taking direction, and helping others. The only problem would be we could not go to meetings because they would be too crowded. But we do have a terminal disease.

Clancy I from the Pacific Group
The problem is that we have grown bodies, brains and abilities, all at the intermittent beck and call of childish emotions. There's a name for people like that, and the word is alcoholic. It is his opinion the number one reason for failure or slipping is letting the full concession to our innermost selves that we are truly alcoholic fade away.

Pat Y from the Pacific Group
The most important thing she learned, as a newcomer, was when someone told her he didn’t want to listen to her whining and crying anymore, and that she needed to reach out and help someone with less sobriety than herself.  She did it and found that it was the first time in a long time that she wasn’t crying and focusing on HER problems.  Being busy in the solution, instead of isolating and wallowing in the problem, is a tool she continues to use today and it continues to give her a daily reprieve from picking up that first drink.

Thanks to Elaine S for her contribution to this report

Acts of Recovery in Falls Church, VA

The Falls Church, Virginia, Acts of Recovery held on July 20th provided those who attended enough enthusiasm to carry through the summer.

The first speaker, Nancy P. from Richmond, recalled how one day she was nominated teacher of the year and after fifteen years of drinking she was living in an abandoned house and eating at a homeless shelter.  In between her mother kicked her out, threatened to shoot her if she ever came home, turn the dog loose on her and “have the deputy pick up what was left”.  Her bottom came when she had a heart attack while detoxing at her eighth treatment center.  Today she pays her bills, made amends to her mother and can look back and find humor in the insanity of her disease.

Chris E from the Harbor City Group had a delightfully humorous account of his many years of debauchery. His sponsor told him to get on his knees and say the Third Step Prayer, and he said he couldn't because he didn't believe in God. His sponsor said, 'I didn't ask you to believe in God, I asked you to do the Third Step Prayer. You see that skyscraper over there? If you jump from the top, you are going to hit the ground whether you believe in gravity or not. This program is about doing, not thinking, or believing, or wanting, or needing.' Chris didn't want to go back to where he came from, so he did it, and he says that saved his life.

Diane R from York built on Nancy’s message of hope and inspiration when she talked about “Spiritual Growth.”  She began with the familiar tale of many alcoholics about not fitting in, not feeling ‘good enough’ and searching for something external to fill the hole inside.  She finally found her way to AA but didn’t come happily.  She fought the program tooth and nail and found herself at two years sober (dry), miserable and on the brink of suicide.  Instead of reaching for the gun, her car drove her to a meeting and her life changed when she honestly shared for the first time.  Today, she finds her spirituality in others  - in watching newcomers walk through the doors of AA full of hate and anger…and seeing it gradually disappear; and in watching her sponsees grow and thrive on the steps.

Daytona" Duke told the story of a Chinaman asking Saint Peter for a preview of heaven and hell. St. Pete opened the first door and there were people with long chop sticks that were grown into their arms. There was abundant food, music, and opulence, but the people were skinny and miserable looking, because their chop sticks were too long to feed themselves. In the second door everything was the same, except the people were fat and happy and each feeding the person across the table. The second door could be an example of Alcoholics Anonymous.

Thanks to Elaine S for her contribution to this report.

NEW NATION-WIDE MEETINGLIST PROJECT

A new website is being created by optimistic alcoholics who believe the spirit of service lives in the fellowship, and that there will be a grass roots support to accomplish and maintain the accuracy of this source of meeting lists for the traveling alcoholic who needs to find a meeting. Read the text of the sample letter below, and if you'd like to see this happen, add your meeting to the site and send this or your own letter to AA friends in other Districts, Areas, or Regions of the country.

Dear Friends:

A new website has been established to create a national meeting list with complete information about every meeting in the USA. As you can imagine this is a large undertaking. It is doable however if someone from each meeting enters the information into the website, and this can be promoted word of mouth and through your General Service and/or Intergroup organizations. It will take a grass roots effort but need not take too long if word gets out. You can check out the site at www.aacompanion.com and see the bare beginnings. This site is by and for alcoholics who seek recovery through the Program of Alcoholics Anonymous, but has no affiliation with Alcoholics Anonymous World Services or any other organization

The goal of the AA Companion website is to create a single source for finding an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting anywhere in the United States, a national repository of meeting schedules in a common, easy to read format. We are also hopeful that someday soon, this information will also provide help to a fellow alcoholic in search of your meeting.

We are asking for your help and support, not only by asking you to add your local A. A. meeting group schedules to this web site, but also by soliciting other folks that you know in our fellowship elsewhere in America (via email). I guess you can call it another chain letter, except this time you are not being asked for money or being told that bad luck will fall upon you if you break the chain. You have the opportunity to help the alcoholic who needs to find a meeting, which may keep him/her sober, and isn't that How It Works?

For each district there needs to be a responsible recovering alcoholic to review meeting information to assure that inappropriate or inaccurate information is not placed on the site. There is a provision to contact the webmaster on the site so questions or volunteerism can be facilitated.

STUFF TO DO
Don't forget the Harrisburg Area Intergroup meeting Thursday the 1st  at 6:45PM. The District 36 General Service Rep meeting will be on Monday the 12th at 6:30PM; all GSRs or alternates should be there. Interested visitors are welcome, but may not participate in Intergroup or General Service business. Witnessing what goes on there is one way to help decide if you'd like to participate in this type of service work.

Mark your calendar for Saturday August 3rd so you remember the HAI 17th Annual Picnic at New Cumberland Borough Park. Get your tickets from your Intergroup Rep before July 11 so that a barbeque chicken will be waiting for you. There will be games for the kids, and for the adults. The doings begin at noon and clean up at 6:00PM. Bring dessert or salad if you'd like. Tickets will be available from your Intergroup Rep for $5.00 (Children are free). Barbeque chicken, hot dogs and hamburgers will be proffered. There will be an open discussion meeting at about 4:00PM. Bring a comfortable chair if you don't enjoy picnic benches. This is always a fun affair.

The 9th Annual Pennsylvania State AA Convention, "Release from care, boredom, and worry" will be held August 2-4. At the Clarion Hotel and Convention Center in Carlisle there will be alcothons, speaker meetings, discussion meetings, AA entertainment, banquet, dance, indoor pool, etc. They plan a scenic motorcycle ride, golf, and midnight bowling for those who want to participate. Registration is $15 (banquet, buffet breakfast and other activities extra). Click on the logo at left for the hotel and conference registration forms. Sounds like fun.

Click Here!!The 5th Annual Sunlight of the Spirit Conference at the York Holiday Inn will be here before you know it. Avoid the disappointment of finding it's already filled and register now. You can get the registration form from the links page, or by clicking on the picture.
     The speakers signed up so far are: Ted B (LaMarque, TX), Karen G (Venice, CA), Dennis N (Charlotte, NC), Dave D (Alexandria, VA), Don M (Louisville, KY), and Liz B (Hollis NY). This Conference is always an excellent enthusiasm stimulator.
     If you don't have internet access, you can call Bill or Linda M at (717)741-9021, or there is still time to write to SOS Conference, PO Box 3538, York, PA, for a registration form.

The Hershey Group's Annual Summer Picnic will be held this year at the Campbelltown Firehall on Saturday August 24. A Speaker meeting will kick things off at 11:00AM. The festivities will begin after the meeting with Hot Dogs, Hamburgers, Sodas, and hopefully, side dishes, salads and desserts brought by you. There will be softball, horseshoes, volleyball, and fun - bring you baseball glove.

The Intergroup Bookstore at 19th Street is still open Saturdays from 10:00AM till 11:00 AM for Groups to restock their literature cabinets with books and pamphlets.

*Many of the above have Flyers on the http://www.aaharrisburg.org/links.htm page. Some of these provide additional information. If you wish to print copies of the flyers, be aware that to reduce the enormous file size of scanned flyers for transmission on the internet, the physical size rather than resolution has been reduced. Therefore, to print you should adjust the print size of the document using whatever program your system uses to view these files (not the printer icon on your toolbar). It may take 30 seconds or so to download, so be patient.

The dance at Fellowship House on 19th Street is held on the third Saturday each month, starting at 8:30PM. It costs only $3.00 for adults, and please, no children under age eleven. Isolation is not a good alternative to enjoying the fellowship of dance. Come and have a good time.

Let's not talk prudence while practicing evasion.

Traditions Checklist
TRADITION EIGHT: Alcoholics Anonymous should remain forever nonprofessional, but its service centers may employ special workers.
1. Is my own behavior accurately described by the Traditions? If not, what needs changing?
2. When I chafe about any particular Tradition, do I realize how it affects others?
3. Do I sometimes try to get some reward-- even if not money-- for my personal AA efforts?
4. Do I try to sound in AA like an expert on alcoholism? On recovery? On medicine? On sociology? On AA itself? On psychology? On spiritual matters? Or, heaven help me, even on humility?
5. Do I make an effort to understand what AA employees do? What workers in other alcoholism agencies do? Can I distinguish clearly among them?
6. In my own AA life, have I any experiences which illustrate the wisdom of this Tradition?
7. Have I paid enough attention to the book Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions? To the pamphlet AA Tradition How it Developed?

August Speakers

The Friday 8:30PM speaker meetings for the 19th Street Group for August had not been posted by publication, but August 30 is Anniversary Night. The Sunday 8PM Bridge Street speakers are: August 4, Louis A from Elizabethtown; August 11, Karen from There's More To Life; August 18, James C from the Desire Group; and August 25, Jim G from 19th Street. The August 2 speakers at Hershey will be Bob H and Cheryl H, both from Middletown Groups. The Middletown Survivors speakers for August 22 will be Louise R and Kathy F and for August 29 will be Charlotte F.

Service to another Alcoholic

We can only stay sober ourselves by reaching out to another alcoholic. We can do that by getting our home group to volunteer for a particular 2 hour period each week, allowing group members a brief opportunity to answer the central office hotline. This will also provide the cell phone operator a two hour break which allows planning those things like going out in public where it is quite inconvenient to answer the phone (to say nothing of damaging to anonymity).
     You can help assure that help is available for the suffering alcoholic, alcoholics needing meeting schedule information, literature, or other assistance by volunteering to operate the central office hotline, or by getting your group to take the cell phone for a month. Why not give Tina H a call at home (238-3545), or Email (spicee308@aol.com), or you can volunteer through your Intergroup Rep. Central Office needs phone volunteers to handle the phone during the day to help reduce the burden on the cell phone volunteer. This is rewarding service work, and Central Office hours are pretty flexible.

"I have held many things in my hands,
and I have lost them all; but
whatever I have placed in God's hands,
that I still possess."
-- Martin Luther --

JULY Intergroup Meeting

Rich E, vice-chair, asked for a group to volunteer to host the Fall Intergroup Speaker meeting. Tina H asked that the people handling the cell phone complete the reports on use and see that they are turned in to her at the end of the month, instead of waiting until the next Intergroup Meeting. Representatives voted to send $54 worth of pamphlets to the Botswana outreach and pay mailing costs, and Jim M reports that the materials have been received and he sends his thanks.  The State Hospital meetings were covered by the Carlisle Area during July, Out of The Dark will attend in August, and Millersburg and Winding It Up will visit in September. The cell phone was the responsibility of the Women's Serenity Group during July, August is in the hands of There's More to Life, and September Hot Line will be answered by Out of the Dark.  All corrections meetings could use more support. Elaine S reported that the Picnic is progressing and she sought volunteers to help with areas not covered already. Warren M, representing District 36, announced the Elizabethtown Mini-assembly on Getting and Staying Sober Young, and that the Cumberland Valley IG was soliciting HAI involvement in a September conference on "Homegroups". The July meeting was attended by Reps from 19th Street, 40th Street, Ain't You Had Enough, Al-Anon, Bridge Street, District 36, Joy of Living, Keep It Simple, Millersburg, Rule 62, Survivors, Trudgers, Up the Creek, West Shore, Winding It Up, and Women's Serenity. Did you and your group have a voice?

STEPS = Solutions To Every Problem In Sobriety

Groups Continue Supporting Intergroup

Information about the amount and groups contributing to the Intergroup Fund during July was not available at press time. Of course, we still would like to thank all the groups and members who continue to donate time toward Intergroup's activities. These activities include speaker meetings, picnics, men and women's prison meetings, Internet Website, meeting schedules, literature, the AA Hotline, and the many other vital AA functions that help alcoholics recover in our community. Intergroup performs those services for our community which no single group is prepared to handle, and it coordinates activities between the 56 groups it serves. Remember that we can do together what none of us could do alone.

SOBRIETY NEWS is published monthly, and is usually available on the website the Tuesday night before the first Thursday of each month, so paper copies can be distributed to Reps at the Intergroup meeting. You can locate this newsletter, as well as lots of other stuff that would interest members of groups belonging to the Harrisburg Area Intergroup, at http://www.aaharrisburg.org