On the road...really

I'm traveling this week. This blog is coming from a hotel room in Port Jervis, New York. Road trips used to be really dangerous for me. Especially trips like this one where I'm solo. Alone in a strange town a thousand miles away from anyone who knows me, it's the perfect scenario for the addict to rise up and wreak a little havoc. This is when all the work in recovery starts to pay off. The healthy tools I've been developing can be pulled out of the bag and used to pound the addict down. It's sort of like the "Whack-A-Mole" game at Chuck E. Cheese. The addict pops up and I use my recovery tools to smack him back down. But, just like the game, there are lots of other holes he can pop out of so I have to keep on whacking.

This blog is one tool to help me. I brought my Bible and journal so I can keep up with that, too. I have my phone and friends have promised to call. If they don't, I can call them. I have plenty of work to do that's interesting and exciting so that's another tool I'll be using. It would be nice if, someday, I could leave my tools in the bag and the addict never came around again. Based on some of my friends in recovery who've been sober 20+ years and are still going to meetings, I'm guessing I should always keep the tool bag handy. Maybe the biggest tool of all, prayer.

The guys in my 12 step group have promised to pray for me while I'm on the road. That means a lot. That's a tool being used on my behalf. It's also a reminder that no one succeeds in recovery alone. This is a team effort and I love my team. People just like me who've been dragged into the darkness by their obsessions and addictions. People who've found the light of recovery and the genuine support of a fellowship. People who've given everything up to God because we know that, left to our own devices, we'd be lost. We know that because we've been lost. And I, for one, don't ever want to be lost like that again. So, even though I'm on the road, by God's strength I'll also stay on the road...recovering life.