Happy Birthday, Dad

Daily Gratitude List 11.22.22

I’m grateful for my Dad’s birthday. I’m grateful for his kindness, love and patience. I’m grateful for his spreadsheets and the way he taught me to think and also to hit baseballs and make baskets.I’m grateful for the time I get to spend with him. I’m grateful to be sober today.

I’m here in Iowa City and it’s Dad’s 84th birthday. I’m pretty glad to be here. My dad was a professor at the University of Iowa for almost 50 years. He taught applied math-type stuff and statistics in the business school. He taught me how to play baseball and also how to do my Little League batting average on a slide rule.¹ He was a pretty serious Boy Scout and worked summers at Philmont—-the famous Boy Scout camp in New Mexico. When I was a scout, my dad was the one who came and taught us how to tie knots—the half-hitch, the clove-hitch, the bowline. My brother had a hip disease that required him to be on crutches for about two years when he was a kid—my Dad took us to the Rec Center 5 nights a week so my brother could swim.

My Dad is quiet and thoughtful and super analytical, here’s a spreadsheet that he put together recently to track his car expenses²:

When I called in 2010 to tell my parents that I was getting separated and had a drinking problem, my Dad set me up with an alcoholic friend who was my first Sponsor. Dad taught the Adult Bible Study at our church for years and years and years. He would spend evenings at his desk preparing the lesson plan for Sunday mornings, and he would laugh when I would cheekily point out that it seemed like a lot of effort for not much money.

My Dad had an insight that was one of the things that really helped me get sober. We were talking and I was lamenting my inability to stop drinking. He said something along the lines that he found me very confusing; he’d seen me succeed at a lot of things and wondered why this was so different. He pointed out the very analytical and methodical approach I took to work and wondered why that couldn’t help me get sober.

I started to think about it and he was exactly right. Why couldn’t I use some of the same tools and approaches. I started making lists and trying to collect data. I started thinking about how to “operationalize” the Steps, my sobriety. Now when I work with Sponsees we talk about the details around the Steps. What exactly does it mean to “turn your will and live over?” How do you communicate with the new management? What kinds of issues are for the new management to decide and which are for you? I came to the realization that saying the words of the Third Step is not enough—putting it into effect was an operational task and critical to my sobriety.

My Dad has been with me every step of the way—and there aren’t that many people that didn’t falter at some point in my long, long journey. I think it was pretty hard to stay connected with me during that long, hard struggle. Dad managed that just fine. I have a lot to be grateful for, there’s been a lot of love in my life, even if took me some time to see it, to feel it. One of the people who loved me the most and one of the people I’m most grateful for is my Dad. I’m lucky to be here in Iowa City today.

Happy Birthday, Dad.

Thanks for Letting Me Share

1. The slide rule, sadly, could not calculate why I couldn’t hit a curveball.

2. He has driven a hybrid car for a long time and is very proud of that