I have a friend that can't stop drinking even though alcohol had stopped working for her a long time ago. She has multiple large boxes of her stuff stored in my storage closet. I was going to help her move a couple of them to her new place today. We were off to a rough start since her cell phone was not working and she needed to get a prescription filled.
I drove to far North Seattle and picked her up. We went to the T-Mobile store. The clerk removed the battery from her cell phone, waited a few seconds and put the battery back. That fixed the phone problem. She spent about 100x more time bitching & whining about the problem than it took to fix the problem. I was going to pull the battery when I picked her up, but she would not let me do that since she was adamant the problem was far more complicated than that.
On the drive to the T-Mobile store, she showed me her latest scars where she had burned herself with a cigarette when smoking while drunk and medicated. They looked painful. One was a dime-sized 3rd degree burn on her thigh. There were two other smaller burn marks that still looked like it would have been really painful to a sober person.
We drove through nasty i5 traffic in Seattle from the UW down to the West Seattle freeway. Turned out some lady had crashed her car into the car in front of her and caused a 10-mile long traffic jam. I don't understand drivers that need to drive so close to the car in front of them that they wreck their car. There is no way that being one second faster on the freeway is ever going to pay out over the lost time, expense and injuries for people that wreck their car by crashing into the car in front of them. It is like that is not even an accident—it is simply the inevitable result of driving too close to the car in front of them.
We got to Costco and my friend got her Rx for an anti-anxiety medicine. I wanted to get a few things while we were there. My friend tried one free food sample and had to go outside because it made her nauseous. I finished my shopping and met my friend outside. Since I was going to my car to put my purchases in the trunk, she accused me of trying to leave her there. I explained that I would put the junk in the trunk and then go have lunch at the Costco Deli (cheapest place in the State for lunch at $1.50 for a polish sausage and soda).
Unsurprisingly, she smelled like alcohol after she going outside. My friend had snapped somewhere between going outsides and waiting in line to place our order. She was whining loudly about the family in front of us taking too long to get ice cream cones, she banged her ginourmous handbag on my wheelchair a couple of times, made some stupid surly comments to me, and then cut in front of the lady in the next line to get her food.
I sat and talked with a lovely old couple. My friend joined us after getting her pop and haranging a different cashier about a lid for her soda cup—which are conveniently place on both sides of the pop machines. I got a picture added to my Costco card and waited a couple of minutes for my friend. She did not come outside, so I left her at Costco. That is not as harsh as it sounds since she rides the bus, has neither a car nor license, and used to live on the same street as the Costco.
On the way home, I was still a bit annoyed and resentful at my friend for her behavior. I knew I would immediately write a blog story and feel better when I got home. I put the food away, took out the boxes to the trash, checked my email and vmail, and then wrote this post. There was a vmail from my friend, I deleted it without bothering to listen to her bitch about my boorish behavior.
In the 12-step programs, we are strongly encouraged to work with new people. One big reason why that is so important is that it helps us to be grateful for what we have. A couple hours with my friend and am damned grateful for the functional life I have today and assuredly want to not drink today.
I am grateful today that I am sober, that I don't throw-up every morning when I get up, that I have a car and a license, my land-line and cell phones both work, I don't have mold throughout my residence, I can wait in line without causing a scene, I don't smoke, I don't have burns on my legs and have healthy boundaries that allow me to leave bitchy ungrateful active alcoholics behind.
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