M3 Whidbey Island Blue Box group

Meeting 3: Friday 4th June 7:00 p.m.
Whidbey Island Blue Box Group
Speaker's Meeting

One of the reasons I wanted to start off my trip in Washington State was the chance it gave me to visit T and K. T is like my AA sister. Born within a few months of each other, we listened to the same music, took the same drugs and followed the same alcoholic path to AA. Her husband K was one of those members who always had the knack of saying the things I needed to hear when I first came into the rooms.

They were both there at my first meeting in the AA house on Misawa air base in the north of Japan. Misawa AA was a real force for good in the north of Japan. I always used to call it the 'mother ship'. A lot of the Japanese AA groups in Tohoku, the 6 northernmost prefecturs of the main island Honshu, were started by Japanese alcoholics who first got sober at Misawa.

A couple of sympathetic doctors working in mental hospitals would send alcoholics up to the meetings on the base. Although the Japanese hardly had any English, and the Americans couldn't speak Japanese they managed to communicate. It's living proof that recovering alcoholics share the same experiences and mindset, and even a language barrier can be overcome by the AA message.

After about three months of sobriety I started going to the Japanese AA meetings in my adopted home town of Morioka. Amazingly, the main meeting places were within walking distance of my apartment. This has never ceased to amaze me. Two drunks meet in Akron, Ohio in 1935 and 63 years later, when a crazed and very sick alcoholic Englishman needed the programme, there it was on my door step.

K has now retired from the navy, and he and T are living on beautiful Whidbey Island, south of the San Juan Islands in Puget Sound. Their home group is the Blue Box group.

Friday's meeting is a speaker's meeting. Like most of us, B the speaker was really nervous as he shared his story. Once he got going, it was abundantly clear that he was speaking from the heart, and he did a great job.

Though from a very different background to mine, he has about the same ength of sobriety as I do. He touched on things that I really needed to hear concerning the importance of sticking with the programme, not just to stay off the booze, but to keep chipping away at the character defects that continue to handicap us as we try to live sober lives.

Like me, B has issues with anger and temper tantrums. As ever in AA, just knowing that some one else shares similar problems to yours gives you the courage to struggle on.

The Blue Box group, with about 20 to 30 members, is a really warm and qwelcoming bunch of people. As well as its natural beauty, there's a precious sense of community on Whidbey Island, and its AA groups reflect that.

So thanks to T, K and B and all the members for a great meeting.