Six years for C.

The rain yesterday was peaceful.  I stayed home for the entire day.  We cooked some delicious salmon for lunch, made a blueberry dessert for C.'s meeting tonight, read, worked on paperwork for her parents and the financials with that, and took a nap.  When my wife left for her doctor's appointment,  I decided to head to the gym for an hour of lifting weights and treadmill work.

I had to force myself to leave the cocoon of the house.  We have lived in several homes over the years but nothing like this one that we had custom built.  There's something special about each house where we lived because we had experiences, good and bad, in each.  I can remember every room and all the things that we did to make each one attractive and "home".

But this house that we put our own hand in building is special.  We painted every room, varnished all the doors, put up sheet rock and insulation, helped install the wood floors that are throughout the house,  cleared the debris from building, and  designed and planted the gardens.  And I believe that what makes the house most special are the quiet surroundings of the woods and fields.

Out of every window I see green--trees, gardens, ferns, bushes and lawn.    This is a subtropical climate so lush vegetation is common.  And the animals seem to find a particular haven here.  There are deer that sleep near the top of the drive, wild turkeys that cross the dirt drive, the "raccoon tree" where babies crawl up and down and out on limbs,  and the birds that come to the multitude of feeders set up on a maple tree in the back yard.

And this is the house where we finally came to a decision about our lives together.  It was either going to be a life where C. got sober or where we parted ways.  Her drinking had escalated over the years to the point where she was drunk most every evening.  She wasn't sloppy drunk every night. That was reserved for special occasions when we would go to a social event, or people would come here.  But evenings she would sip wine, saying that she needed to unwind or relax.  I believed her for a while but realized that she was drinking more and more.

I remember her telling me that I should keep the house and she would move out.  And I said that I wanted to go because there were too many memories here.  Thankfully, it didn't come to either of us leaving.  She went to her first AA meeting six years ago this week.  Today she will celebrate that at her home group meeting.  I am glad for her.  Glad that she found a fellowship of men and women who share their experience, strength and hope with each other and who are sober and productive people.

I'm glad that she got sober in AA and in this house.  No treatment centers, no detox but in a house that we built together and with a meeting in the basement of an old country church.  I am grateful for so much.