July 28

July 28 – AM

Page 3-4, Bill’s Story, Chapter 1

In 1929 I contracted golf fever.  We went at once to the country, my wife to applaud while I started out to overtake Walter Hagen.  Liquor caught up with me much faster than I came up behind Walter.  I began to be jittery in the morning.  Golf permitted drinking every day and every night.  It was fun to carom around the exclusive course which had inspired such awe in me as a lad.  I acquired the impeccable coat of tan one sees upon the well-to-do.  The local banker watched me whirl fat checks in and out of his till with amused skepticism.

July 28 – PM 

Page 124-125, The Family Afterward, Chapter 9

It is possible to dig up past misdeeds so they become a blight, a veritable plague.  For example, we know of situations in which the alcoholic or his wife have had love affairs.  In the first flush of spiritual experience they forgave each other and drew closer together.  The miracle of reconciliation was at hand.  Then, under one provocation or another, the aggrieved one would unearth the old affair and angrily cast its ashes about.  A few of us have had these growing pains and they hurt a great deal.  Husbands and wives have sometimes been obliged to separate for a time until new perspective, new victory over hurt pride could be rewon.  In most cases, the alcoholic survived this ordeal without relapse, but not always.  So we think that unless some good and useful purpose is to be served, past occurrences should not be discussed.