August 1

August 1 – AM

Page 4-5, Bill’s Story, Chapter 1

We went to live with my wife’s parents.  I found a job; then lost it as the result of a brawl with a taxi driver.  Mercifully, no one could guess that I was to have no real employment for five years, or hardly draw a sober breath.  My wife began to work in a department store, coming home exhausted to find me drunk.  I became an unwelcome hanger-on at brokerage places.

August 1 – PM

Page 126-127, The Family Afterwards, Chapter 9

Sometimes mother and children don’t think so.  Having been neglected and misused in the past, they think father owes them more than they are getting.  They want him to make a fuss over them.  They expect him to give them the nice times they used to have before he drank so much, and to show his contrition for what they suffered.  But dad doesn’t give freely of himself.  Resentment grows.  He becomes still less communicative. Sometimes he explodes over a trifle.  The family is mystified.  They criticize, pointing out how he is falling down on his spiritual program.

This sort of thing can be avoided. Both father and the family are mistaken, though each side may have some justification. It is of little use to argue and only makes the impasse worse. The family must realize that dad, though marvelously improved, is still convalescing. They should be thankful he is sober and able to be of this world once more. Let them praise his progress. Let them remember that his drinking wrought all kinds of damage that may take long to repair. If they sense these things, they will not take so seriously his periods of crankiness, depression, or apathy, which will disappear when there is tolerance, love, and spiritual understanding.