Here's praying that God continues blessing Scott Redman at that big meeting in the sky, for his magic, for all the service work he did and will continue to do, living through sponsorship and CD's. If you haven't heard the four CD series of Scott doing the Twelve Steps, you have missed something special. I will try to find out where you can buy them. It was a valiant fight Scott, thanks for trying so hard to stay with us.
Sober Vacations
By Snow P.
A sober vacation is a holiday anyplace, anytime, in which you plan on staying sober. You can book a “sober vacation” with a company that specializes in this type of trip and that means the tools of sobriety will be close by. You still have to use the tools in order to stay sober. There is a popular term called “sober cruises” which is a misnomer as there is no such thing as a ship without alcohol. The term only defines a fellowship vacation organized by a sober travel company who brings a group and sobriety tools onboard.
Since I specialize in “sober cruises,” I have people who call me and email all the time asking if there will be any alcohol onboard. That is the right question if you are conscious about staying sober, finding out where the obstacles and alcohol are in your path. For registered guests, many annoying obstacles have been taken out of the way. I got one email recently admonishing me for saying there are bars on ships. It would be a disservice to pretend there is no alcohol on ships, as it is not true. Also, many people like to come on cruises and bring their regular families for a vacation, kids, in-laws, aunts, grandmothers, and it is very comforting for them to know that we are all close by if they need us.
I’ve had several people who call and ask if I know of an isolated resort or island that they can go on vacation to that has no alcohol so they will be safe. I tell them, no such place exists, especially for an alcoholic. I have been miles and miles away from alcohol, but if I wanted to drink, time and space could never stop me. I tell them to wait until their sponsor says they are spiritually fit enough to go on a vacation.
Here is what page 101 in the Big Book says:
“Assuming we are spiritually fit, we can do all sorts of things alcoholics are not supposed to do. People have said we must not go where liquor is served; we must not have it in our homes, we must shun friends who drink; we must avoid moving pictures which show drinking scenes; we must not go into bars; our friends must hide their bottles if we go to their houses; we mustn’t think or be reminded about alcohol at all. Our experience shows that this is not necessarily so.
We meet these conditions everyday. A alcoholic who cannot meet them, still has an alcoholic mind; His only chance for sobriety would be some place like the Greenland Ice Cap, and even there an Eskimo might turn up with a bottle of scotch and ruin everything!”
I just spent 11 days in Europe and took 35 alcoholics touring in Spain, Italy & France. It was amazing to tears. To be with people who have been brought back from the dead and have the good fortune to travel in safety together and see the beauty we all missed due to drinking is truly special. This was a group of tourists wearing the God glasses and seeing the whole trip differently than the regular tourists. There were so many moments when God’s presence was evident all we could do was nod in silent recognition to each other. As I looked up a the Sistine Chapel, the ceiling of all ceilings that I have only seen in books my whole life, all I could do was weep. How did such a lost kid like me get so found? How did I get so lucky? How awesome is the Higher Power that saved us all? It seems like just a short time ago I didn’t think I was going to live through yet another hangover from hell, and now I awake at dawn hungry for the next assignment from Him. It keeps getting better and deeper and better.
Staying sober anywhere in the world takes conscious thought. Plan your meetings and you plan your sobriety. If you are traveling for business or pleasure and have optional travel dates, go to www.aa.org and see what conferences or conventions are happening in the area that you are traveling to so you can make a fellowship event the centerpiece of your trip. If you don’t think you will have time for meetings while away, take the meeting schedule and intergroup office phone number of that city with you anyway. You can print it off of the Internet. Call when you arrive just to let someone know you are in town and that you want to check in. That’s what I do as it makes me feel like I am not alone in a hotel room. If you are in an airport and feeling wonky, ask them to make an announcement to have “Friends of Bill W.” meet you at the ticket counter. Even no one shows up, you are not alone, as God will meet you anywhere.
Snow@sobercelebrations.com
As we entered the Sistine Chapel today to see the ceiling of all ceilings by Michaelangelo, all I could do was weep. How overwhelming to see such majesty, talent and tribute to humanity's grace and God's gifts. I was and still am speechless. How did we get to be so lucky to be able to visit the Vatican? I know it's not unusual for most people to take a trip, but for 35 alcoholics to be on this trip of a lifetime, experiencing it all with the amplified eyes of gratitude is truly wonderful. We gap at the channels that housed hungry lions in the Collesium, we are astounded at the mosaics in St. Peter's Basilica, we drool over the home made lasagna we have for lunch. Thank you God.
GRATITUDE CRUISE TO MEXICAN RIVIERA WITH CLANCY I. AND CYNDI M. FEBRUARY 22-MARCH 1, 2009. (Deposit for group rate due July 15, 2008)
Alien spacecraft did not abduct us. We took trips in airplanes.
That statistic from the Federal Aviation Administration – more than thiree-fourths of the human race up in the air – may be difficult to get our minds around. Even allowing for the fact that one person could have made two or three or a dozen trips in airplanes in that twelve-month period, the number is still staggering – and meaningful.
All travel is, ultimately, inner travel – all the travel we do in the outer world is really a metaphor for the travel that we are doing at the same time inside ourselves. Every journey we undertake in the world outside ourselves is also an inner journey into the deepest parts of our psyches, our hearts, and our souls.
Given that all travel is a journey within, it is encouraging that so many of our human family are leaving the comfort zones of home – our present state of awareness – and venturing out and into the wild blue yonder: the hidden, yet undiscovered parts of ourselves.
Making a journey is always about going from where we are now, to another place, a higher realm of consciousness. Seen this way, all our travel has a spiritual character – and all our travel is sacred.
So, as a species we appear to be embarked on a spiritual quest of vast and unprecedented proportions, searching for the “stranger” – us, undiscovered – at the most profound levels of our individual being.
Looking at travel as a spiritual experience is not new. As far back as we have recorded stories, heroes have left their homeland to perform some mighty feat or find some lost treasure. Pilgrims, too, have left home on journeys of faith, and their tales have become the subject of great literature. Sages and spiritual leaders have compared life to a journey, and have likened us to travelers along a path to higher consciousness.
We are the hero of every journey we take, and all of our journeys are spiritual forays into the unexplored center of our being. Every time we go there, we have the opportunity to bring back the great prize – for the hero it might have been the head of the Medusa or the Golden Fleece or the Holy Grail, for us it is self-knowledge, self-awareness.
Once we begin to see travel as an inner journey, it’s possible to turn every trip we take into a spiritual practice – a hero’s adventure that enlivens our hearts and enlarges our souls.
* * * *
Travel becomes a spiritual experience for us when we are conscious every moment that our physical transportation from place to place has a metaphysical counterpart. Understanding that, the road takes us inexorably to an encounter with the “stranger” at the heart of the journey – ourself transformed.
Undertaken with awareness, travel surely is one of the most available and most effective means to nourish, broaden, and quicken the soul. The destination does not matter as much as the attention we give to the understanding that all travel is inner travel. Seen this way, all our travel has a spiritual character — and every place we go is sacred.
When we venture out into the world (into ourselves) with that knowledge, we are giving meaning to even the most mundane trip – and giving ourselves the opportunity to grow our life of the spirit in ways we might never have imagined.
I believe we do this even if we are not fully awake to it yet. This is why when I see travel statistics that indicate we are evolving into a race of travelers, it is cause for joy. To me, the numbers mean that our species is flying back to the Creator with the news of our dawning spiritual awareness – and we are doing so at supersonic speeds.
Joseph Dispenza
Romans take their recipes as seriously as their ruins — and often they're just as old. New restaurants tend to disappear within a year. The ones that survive wisely craft menus loyal to the old country.
Sud, as the name suggests, specializes in southern Italian cooking: crunchy panella (fried hummus), deliciously garlicky spaghetti alla vongole (spaghetti with clams and mussels), and potato-encrusted sea bass. Situated in the well-heeled Trieste neighborhood, it also makes for excellent people watching.
Uno e Bino may be surrounded by college bars (it's in San Lorenzo, next to Italy's largest university), but it's an entirely different world inside — one that's small, quiet and softly lit. Dishes like fazzoletti, or handkerchief pasta, filled with fava beans and chicory and tagliatelle with red snapper epitomize the simple, elegant food that reinvents the traditions of Roman cuisine without abandoning them.
A recent design makeover at Il Pagliaccio attracted legions of food critics and travelers, but it's the food that keeps them coming back. The menu is traditional Italian, by way of the Far East, with dishes like fried prawn and seaweed rolls with coconut milk and peach sauce.
The area Piazza di Spagna is the newest hub for hotels in Rome — each of them small, chic and fit for royalty.
Lungarno Hotels Portrait Suites, at the base of the Spanish Steps, is owned by the Ferragamo family (Italian for really nice shoes and scarves) and opened its 14 rooms in July 2006. As beautiful as the leather-bound elevator and wall sketches are, the real prize is the rooftop lounge with its open fireplace and honor bar.
The name says it all. The Intown Luxury House is elegant, intimate and smack in the center of all things fancy. Open since April 2006, this quiet, tastefully decorated narrow town house is comprised of six modern suites, some with small terraces.
The Radisson SAS Hotel is a sleek, 235-room, glass tower extravaganza next to Rome’s bustling Termini train station. Receptionists and concierges stand in futuristic white capsules; the rooms are equally modern. The Zest bar and rooftop pool are popular with fashionable Romans and foreigners alike.
(old timer 40 years or more of sobriety)
By Snow P.
I listened to a recovery radio program on my way up to Port Canaveral several weeks ago. Dr. Drew was being interviewed, the host of “Celebrity Rehab” a TV show about watching celebrities getting sober. I called in when he was there and was put on hold. I was in the car geared up for the 3 hour ride and had free minutes on my phone, so I stayed on hold and listened.
After Dr. Drew left, another man who owned a treatment center and was the sponsor of the show came on for an interview, and the topic was “Relapse.” The people running the show had the authority to speak on it because addiction had taken them all places no precious human being should go, but airwaves cost money so they had a sponsor. The sponsor happened to be in the billion-dollar treatment industry, which is presented as one of the perfect solutions to relapse. They were even giving away a 30-day treatment gift to some lucky winner like it was a basket of fruit. Who do you give that to if you win it? Do you really need to enter a contest to save your life?
By the time they got me on the wire live, I asked the first question on my mind, which was more or less this; When you wake up in the morning with the hangover from hell and look at yourself in the mirror you can hardly be honest with yourself and no one else is in the room. How can you possibly do it on camera? The response was bluster and billowing that I did not expect when the host said that these people are used to being on camera and that Dr. Draw’s show has helped a lot of people and more importantly “Dr. Drew does not need the money!” He went into big time defense of his sponsor, and it was not his recovery sponsor.
I didn’t care whether Dr. Drew needed the money or not, all I was wondered was how could even one human being possibly be helped on a stage? If we loose one alcoholic because of a convoluted TV show whether they are famous or not, isn’t that one alcoholic too many? Should we endorse someone’s need for fame, money glory by watching such a show and applauding its producer? Will even one of those celebrities be sober a year from now, three years from now, five years from now? Does anyone actually believe they will? Isn’t it just a good premise for a new reality TV show?
They cut to a commercial quickly and when they returned went to the topic of relapse. They were interviewing the man who owned the treatment center and he said they had 100% success…. if you count when the people were in treatment. He was a little flip about it, knowing that no one in any treatment center at any price can guarantee long term sobriety at all. Then the host got me back and asked if I ever had a relapse. I said no, I haven’t had a relapse yet. He asked how long I had been sober. I said 33 years and 8 days, but who’s counting? He asked why I thought I didn’t have a relapse. I told him I ask myself that all the time and wish I knew. I always think back to the beginning and said I think mostly because I went through cold turkey in the rooms and could not ever go through that again.
This was in direct conflict with the sponsor who is pushing an expensive treatment center. The host went immediately to the sponsor and as if to trump me with authority, said “You are in the treatment business for 40 years, tell us…blah, blah, blah” Was he in recovery? I don’t know and I don’t care. Sobriety is not a contest. No one wins anything more than today. All I know is that TV shows, treatment centers, waving a black cat over you head may work for a day, 30 days or a season, but what about next year? What about three years from now? Where will all those people on TV and in the treatment centers be? Will even one of them stay sober? If you rob people of the excruciating pain of sobering up, is sobriety worth keeping? I know I almost died from the alcohol and drugs I was coming off of, but ignorance and God kept me safe from convulsions and death. I believed I could shake through it because the people in the rooms kept telling me I could do it. My arms and legs flayed uncontrollable for many months. It was not a pretty site. I didn’t have a lovely room surrounded by faux nurses making it easy for me. I did not get a white chip; I got a cup of coffee and a smile and people telling me I only had to do this once. I did a funny thing… I believed them. I had the gift of desperation.
This treatment industry has people believing you have to go to treatment in order to get sober. If you don’t have the money, you don’t have a chance. Then after one treatment experience, it seems to get in people’s minds that they can just go check their disease at the door and let someone else handle it for them and medicate them until it goes away. And if they drink, well, they can always just go check in again and get into that costly revolving door of false hope. It’s a negative badge of honor and a club amongst some young people as I hear them trading stories and proud about how many treatment centers they have been in. The more treatment centers you’ve been to, the worse you are than the next guy. Terminal uniqueness strikes again. If we don’t find the one thing we have in common, we’re all dead.
What’s sad is that I see people in the treatment industry playing the “Emperor’s New Clothes” because they just don’t want to jeopardize their income. Staff members are dying from untreated alcoholism in the middle of treatment centers and desperately need intervention. They are just like the celebrities on TV being robbed of their chances for recovery because it’s not good for business.
I pray for all those who are lost in the pain of addiction. I pray that they can break through for a moment and reach for the solution Bill and Bob found in 1935 after all the “treatment centers” in the world did not work for them. The God they found will still meet any of us anywhere.
More than two years after announcing it would build two 5,000 passenger ships, Royal Caribbean International finally offered a sneak peak at what the Project Genesis vessels might look like. The ship's central area, called Central Park, would be a massive, midship open-air promenade filled with canopy trees, grass, tropical flowers and bars and restaurants with outdoor seating.
Imagine a balcony cabin inside the ship where you look below to people enjoying life on a ship a cobblestone street with live plants and trees and where you look up to the tropical sky! At night, the promenade has alfresco dining, concerts and street performances. What pleasure! There will be five decks and 254 balconies overlooking the park.
There will be a moving bar, The Rising Tide, a bar that ascends and descends a three deck span of the ship. The bar will stop at each level to let people on and off. (For those friends and relatives who can, and those who know how to just take a special architectural tour)
There will be several new restaurants, upscale boutiquest, an art gallery and a photo studio.
Royal Caribbean will slowly disclose more details of the ship in the coming year before its 2009 debut. Next reveal scheduled for June 18.
Royal Caribbean long has been an innovator in cruise ship design, unveiling the first atriums at sea in the 1980s and the first indoor promenade in 1999. Other firsts include rock climbing walls, ice skating rinks and, most recently, a pool for surfing. The gigantic size of the coming Genesis ships has led to speculation that the line planned more ground-breaking new features, but until now the line has been mum on its plans for the ships.
Royal Caribbean says the Central Park area is one of seven "neighborhoods" that the line plans for the ships, part of a new strategy to divide up passengers based on their personal tastes and interests. The line will unveil other neighborhoods over the next year.
Royal Caribbean has the most innovative ships at sea. We always like the way they address our temperament by providing "more!" We will have a wonderful Gratitude Cruise onboard this ship and make arrangements as soon as deployments are announced!
Project Genesis
Fast Facts
There is something so wonderful about being rocked like a baby on a ship in the ocean, and enjoying such a fabulous journey to the Caribbean in fellowship! This trip was inspirational, relaxing, adventurous and moving. We watched the dancers at the top of the fort in San Juan, Puerto Rico, and brought another meeting onto St. Maarten, and brought a merry band of pirates to a meeting in St. Thomas to Shakey Acres. We helped Bill from Boston celebrate his 34th anniversary in the sweet tropical day and brought three more March celebrants along for a total celebration of 79 years!
The entertainment onboard was wonderful! There were extraordinary performances in exquisite costumes by the ice skaters doing a full production on a rink 1/8 the size of a regular rink.
In a lovely tribute to Ricky Nelson, his twin boys Matthew & Gunnar, 33 years old, flew in to to perform for the night and sang some of their Dad's tunes like "Travelin' Man," "Lonesome Town." Ricky was a teen idol in the 50"s. They also stitched home videos together to share with us. Their grandparents "Ozzie & Harriet" had the longest running sitcom in TV history and Royal Caribbean played reruns on TV in staterooms all week just for fun!
The Nelson's are the only American family in history to have three generations of #1 hit songs.
The food onboard was delectable, and many lobster tails, shrimp cocktails, swan pastry desserts were consumed!
Our Keynote Speaker. Lorna K., was very special and gave us all a boatload of gratitude from her experience, strength and hope. To have had eight months of life threatening medical anomalies and yet to be determined to get on the ship and just show up is a tribute to our precious program! Her time spent in India with Mother Theresa surely reinforced our goals; Mother told her to "Hold onto your precious gift."
Just for today, we can hold onto it anyplace in the world.
Looks like the manufacturer of Paxil may have failed to disclose that an early Paxil found that the drug was associated with increased risk of suicide:
An inappropriate analysis of clinical trial data by researchers at GlaxoSmithKline obscured suicide risks associated with paroxetine, a profitable antidepressant, for 15 years, suggest court documents (897kb, requires Acrobat Reader) released last month. Not until 2006 did GSK alert people to raised suicide risks associated with the drug, marketed as Paxil and Seroxat.
An analysis of internal GSK memos and reports, which were released to US lawyers seeking damages, suggests that the company had trial data demonstrating an eightfold increase in suicide risk as early as 1989. Harvard University psychiatrist Joseph Glenmullen, who studied the papers for the lawyers, says it's "virtually impossible" that GSK simply misunderstood the data - a claim the company describes as "absolutely false".