In my sobriety I spent years answering, “How are you?” with a litany of “self” that left little-to-no time to hear from the friend. For me to be responsible, I aim to step aside from my personal woes and resentment when I am graced with an opportunity to share. A challenge I set myself, as a responsibility to carry the message, is to reply with gratitude to what is, really, just a courtesy remark. “Thank you for asking. I woke up sober today. How about you?”
Taking meetings in King County jail before the pandemic, I would fret how to tailor my share, coming from my perceived privilege. I’m visiting the jail, after all, but I never had a DUI, was still in a marriage, owned my car, had a job that I showed up to. At the end of one meeting, a fellow said, “That’s where I know you from. You brought meetings into the treatment facility where I sobered up once.” My presence is more important than my share. “The AA program does not recognize walls. It is immune to the conditions which break down an individual relationship, the difference in social levels, of intellect, of experience. AA takes no heed of this. It has one primary law, help your fellow man and do it by example rather than by instruction.” “Prisoner AA,” Washington State Penitentiary, February 1955, AA Grapevine [GV Daily quote, May 9, 2025].
The Grapevine is on the tablets of 96% of people in custody. Persons in custody still appreciate the use of paper issues of the Grapevine, hence Corrections committees collecting past issues. Did you know you can purchase from AA Grapevine a bulk package of fifty back issues of the Grapevine? Also, the Carry the Message project allows individuals and groups to purchase a yearly subscription to the Grapevine which is then provided to members, often in custody, who can’t afford a subscription. In addition, per the concept of self-support, our subscriptions–to the app, to digital or print of the magazine, or to the great array of books, actually goes to the Grapevine, which exists separately from our monthly or quarterly distributions to the General Service Board.
What can I do as an appointed chair, what can the district and group Grapevine Literature representatives do, to extend the hand of Alcoholics Anonymous? I share what I have found useful to my daily reprieve through reading and listening to the Grapevine. I can tell you the topic of the theme of the new issue of the monthly Grapevine. Lately, I’ve been sharing jokes from one of the Grapevine cartoon books, partly because I perceive myself as serious and uptight. What better way to avoid being a lot-of-glum than by telling a joke? “AA’s greatest power is not in the program itself, but in the examples of the men [and women] who have followed it.” “Prisoner AA,” Washington State Penitentiary, February 1955, AA Grapevine [GV Daily quote, May 15, 2025]
