I don’t know about you, but in my drinking days, the picture above is how I would often fantasize about a drink. Looks cool and refreshing, eh? Sitting in a bar with friends who are engaging in great conversation. Great ambiance. Lights are dim. Jokes are being told by all. Music playing. Laughter everywhere! Of course, I didn’t honestly care about how it looked or even tasted… it’s where the drink “took” me that counted.
Oh yeah, It’s Christmas Eve, and I’m a day late with this… forgive me.
Merry Christmas to all!
The Story…
It’s the week before Christmas, and I’m in Boston for work. While on this business trip, I was asked to do a bit of stand-up comedy for a group of business people, and yes, as some know, I am a humorous fellow. Now, in Boston proper not far from the Old North Church, is the Boston Commons and within the Commons a great Irish Pub called the Black Rose. This all happened in the early 1990s, and yes, the Rose is still there today!
Its website describes its location as…“…located on State Street just steps away from Faneuil Hall – Quincy Market.” Faneuil Hall–Quincy Market. Dang, how I loved Boston. I had been to the Black Rose many times before. Hey, I’m an alcoholic. And their Guinness Beef Stew is to die for! And of course, I went there for the food! NOT!
Add the Irish ambiance with “Danny Boy” playing in the background to what I described above about fantasizing the drink, add the Christmas decorations and lights throughout the Pub, and I was set… ready to fly!
Well, I never ordered the Beef Stew after the first couple of Guinness’s. Why spoil the night while having to stop to eat? I was entertaining the other drunks at the bar with my Irish wit while running up a pretty good bar bill. I had come up from Philly early in the day, having flown into Logan Airport. I was due to meet the business folks I was to entertain that night at 9 p.m., but… I was having too good a time at the Rose. So, I called my contact person and told them I’d be unable to make it that night as getting out of Philly had been a mess… (meaning I lied)… and well, they said they understood. So… this alcoholic drank the night away the week before Christmas.
Waking the next day with the Irish Flu, as we called a good hangover, after breakfast, I ventured to the Old North Church and sat on a bench across from where Paul Revere and William Dawes may have saved a fledging nation. And by lying to my contact the night before, while drunk, I was just saving my ass from embarrassment.
And that is where alcohol took me… sorry to say… not just that night but many nights before and after those few Christmas days in Boston. And if you’re wondering, I was never asked to entertain those people again. Looking back over all these years, I probably didn’t care at that moment in the early 1990s. Hey, their loss… the great George DeFrehn would do his comedic routine somewhere else… Now… how arrogant does that sound?
Where I got sober in Buck County, PA– I had a friend who we sometimes called Gandhi because the wisdom that came from him was at times earth-shattering to most of us newly sober alkies. One day, Gandhi raised his hand and shared, “When I got into fookin’ trouble I wasn’t always drinking… but when I was drinking, I always got into fookin’ trouble” (fookin’ is Irish for… well, you know)…
I remember thinking right then and there… I could relate. Gandhi had maybe an 8th-grade education. I had a Master’s degree, and he was teaching me about humility. I had much to learn.
Today, at 27 + years sober, I’m still learning in the rooms of sobriety and out… while drinking, I was not a good listener. Not sure I am today, but the difference is… I try to listen and learn from others.
The title of this newsletter, as seen above, is from another author named Caroline Knapp, who was from Boston! How appropriate for me. She wrote a book titled Drinking… A Love Story! Caroline was a bit more eloquent in her rendition of what Gandhi had said, “Bad things didn’t happen every time I drank, but every time something bad did happen, drinking was involved.” It was Caroline’s book that I read on August 30, 1997, that I attribute to my sobriety. That is my sobriety date. Who’d a-thunk these two drunks would be such a huge part of my recovery?
Caroline died sober several years ago of lung cancer. Her New York Times bestseller saved my life. Gandhi saw me years ago after reading my memoir, Is Anybody There? Memoir of a “Functional Alcoholic.” He said, “Not bad, George, not bad at all.” I told him he, along with others, saved my life. By then, we both had tears in our eyes.
I’m not sure if Gandhi is alive or not, but he still lives in the memory of this alcoholic.
And to all a Good Night!
Did You Know?
Alcohol and drug addiction affects millions of individuals and families in our country and around the world. The list below comes from a recovery website. In 1997, when I got sober, I did not go to a recovery house. I went to AA meetings every day for two solid years. Regardless of how one does it, meaning getting sober and staying sober… there are avenues available to all who need it. AND I’m not just talking about alcohol and drugs. Food, gambling, sex, workaholics, smokers, pill poppers, and many more.
So… Did you know that…
Spiritual Awakening
Being Irish, meself, after getting sober, I wanted to know who was the patron saint of us drunks in recovery. I discovered it was an Irish lad named Matt Talbot. So, if you are Catholic or NOT… talk to Matt when you are at wit’s end with whatever addiction is calling your name… I understand in heaven he’s a good listener!
Here’s a bit about his life… and his spiritual awakening.
Venerable Matt Talbot (1856–1925) is the patron saint of alcoholics. He was one of twelve children born into extreme poverty in the tenements of Dublin, Ireland. His father was a heavy drinker who could not provide for his family, and so he moved them from place to place. As a result, Matt attended formal school only from the ages of eleven to twelve and could not read or write.
When Matt was twelve, he got his first job as a delivery boy for a beer bottling company and also took his first drink. This unhealthy combination seemed to seal his fate. By the time he was sixteen, Matt was a confirmed alcoholic. He was spending all of his money on alcohol and not supporting his family, who remained desperately poor. Matt recalled reaching his lowest point “when he and his brothers stole a fiddle from a blind street player and sold it for the price of a drink.”
While these hardly seem like the actions of a man on his way to sainthood, God had another plan! One fateful Saturday afternoon, after twelve years of hard drinking, Matt found himself without a job, without a drink, and without a friend to help him get one. As he walked home that day, he experienced a moment of immense grace. He suddenly saw with an intense clarity in his mind and heart that he had been wasting his life. At the age of twenty-eight, he saw himself for what he truly was—a fool who had nothing to show for his life.
By the time he reached his home, Matt had made the decision to quit drinking. That very day, he walked to Dublin Seminary and made his confession to a priest, who helped him “take the pledge” to renounce alcohol for three months. He returned at six months and then made the pledge for life—but it was not easy! There were no twelve-step programs or counselors or support groups to help him. Nevertheless, Matt maintained sobriety through a recovery program that centered on daily Mass, devotion to the Eucharist, a love for Mary, and spiritual reading. (He learned to read so that he could read the Bible.)
Matt Talbot is often referred to as an “urban ascetic.” After his conversion, he lived a life of quiet devotion, holiness, and extreme generosity in spirit and material goods in the midst of the flourishing city life that swirled around him. He offered a pious contrast and example of austerity and charity for those he worked with and those in his neighborhood.
Although there is no cause for sainthood presently open for Matt Talbot’s mother, Elizabeth, perhaps there should be! In addition to her husband, all but one of her seven sons were alcoholics. She had no money and barely a roof over her head but managed to remain steadfast in her prayers for her family. She took in work and held out hope that her family could be cured of its problems. Thanks to Matt, she was able to live the last twelve years of her life in relative peace and stability when he moved in to care for her after his father, who never appeared to convert, passed away.
“Never be too hard on the man or woman who can’t give up drink,” Matt Talbot is often quoted as saying. “It’s as hard to give up the drink as it is to raise the dead to life again. But both are possible and even easy for our Lord. We have only to depend on him.”. . . .
(https://wau.org/resources/article/venerable_matt_talbot_patron_saint_of_alcoholics/)
OR depend on your Higher Power, whoever that may be.
Odds & Ends and Other Stuff…
Again, Merry Christmas to all, and Happy Holidays with many blessings!
Please scroll down and leave a comment if you enjoyed this Newsletter or if you did not. As noted above, I plan to do this every other Monday, barring any of the hiccups of life that are thrown my way.
Caroline Knapp’s book, Drinking: A Love Story, can be found at this link.
Click HERE: Drinking: A Love Story
If you or a loved one is suffering… I recommend it highly…
Lastly… I’ll hopefully see you all again in the New Year!
Wow… 2025!
PEACE
Hi George, I like your idea of a single focus, that is, addiction. It is so critical a topic in just about everyone’s life. So, thanks! I am in a group reading Richard Rohr, The Universal Christ. His thinking speaks to my heart! Keep on keeping on with your newsletter.
Karen: I love Richard Rohr’s writings! I will look this one up. Love ya and miss ya a bunch. Merry Christmas to you and your entire family.
Peace.
G
Merry Christmas George,
I appreciate your wit and honesty as you share your personal journey. You have been very helpful and supportive to me and my family.
Rick:
Merry Christmas to you and yours. I’m so glad we connected after all those years from HS graduation.
My love and best to you and your family in the New Year, too.
May the Christ Child continue to bless you.
G
George – Merry Christmas to you & your loved ones … hope the New Year is a good one for you.
This was a well written & honest story …THANKS !
Never heard of Matt Talbot .. thanks for sharing.
Hank: Merry Christmas to my good buddy and his family! Love to Rita, Megan, Colleen, et al!
Blessed New Year, too.
I’m glad you’re in my life, brother.
Peace in Christ.
G
George, you always find a way to touch my heart and bring a tear to my eye.
Thank you for including me in the distribution list, I think the new format will be encouraging to many.
Take care, God Bless and Happy, Healthy New Year to you and all you hold dear.
Peace, love, & prayers,
Susan
Susan: Thanks for your comment and always I cherish our friendship. I’m glad God brought you into my life all those years ago!
Happy New Year to you and your clan!
Peace, Love, & prayers back at you!
G
Comment for KAREN — great you are reading Richard Rohr!!! … 👍
I am almost done reading his book “Falling Upward” … it is wonderful .. AND .. I picked it up due to a Comment on George’s last Newsletter ..
Best to all & hope 2025 treats us well 🤔
George – another Christmas, another year!
God does indeed have more work for us to do! And how grateful I am that you continue to “carry the message” to the likes of me.
May the coming year bless us all with God’s Grace – One Day At A Time ! 🦋 mike
Mike:
Happy New Year to you and your entire clan! Yep… one day and sometimes one breath at a time.
Peace my good friend.
George