Going on a mission

The first thing I heard was the sound of Gregorian chants coming from my alarm at precisely 4:30 am. I hopped out of bed and started getting ready, knowing this was going to be a super-long day. I did not mind the prospect of a twenty-hour day, knowing that this day would be a tribute to NA and recovery, not to fear and cynicism. Freddie and I would do our part, and the rest was going to be left to HP.

I did my morning routine of stretching and meditation, went for a two-mile run, and then took a much-needed shower. By the time I got to Freddie’s place, he was all ready to go. Grabbing a bottle of water, a CD case loaded up with music, and a warm jacket, we piled into my car and hit the road. Although rain had been falling steadily, the traffic moved smoothly as we headed up through the Grapevine and down into the San Joaquin Valley.

Our conversation drifted to familiar things that NA members tend to talk about on a road trip. We talked about the car and how grateful we were to have cars that were well serviced, had good tires, and were not about to fall apart at any moment. We shared about funny car experiences we had during our using days, and some that were not so funny. We each recalled a bad auto accident caused by our driving loaded, and how lucky we were that nobody had been killed in those addict-caused mishaps.

Denial is a funny thing. Reflecting on those days so long ago, we saw how each one of us had blamed everyone else in the world for being the cause of those accidents without ever attributing the responsibility right where it belonged—on our own shoulders. Even back then I knew I was an addict. I just never dreamed I would have to be responsible for what I did. I assumed unmanageability was a way of life that everyone experienced, and that no one was responsible.

We drove past Castaic, where a county correctional facility operates, and we talked about the first times we were locked up. For me, it was back in the early 1960s. I was sixteen years old and already getting loaded. In fact, I was already an addict, but I did not know it yet. My friend and I decided to run away from home in New York and head to California. We wanted “the beach life,” as we envisioned it: pretty girls, plenty of pot to smoke, sunny skies, and easy living!

We ended up in jail near Lake Charles, Louisiana, charged with vagrancy and being runaways. My dad was informed that I was in a “parish” in Louisiana and assumed that meant a church of some type. (A parish is the term used for county in the state of Louisiana.) He thought he would teach me a lesson—or let the priests teach me a lesson—and so he left me in there for a month.

Well, my dad was right; it taught me a lesson of how to survive in a tough jailhouse environment where no one cared that I was sixteen years old and did not know which end was up.

Freddie was also sixteen the first time he got in trouble with the law. A brawl in a local store in San Pedro, California, landed him in the city holding jail with an assault and battery charge. Of course, he, too, was loaded.

By the time we finished reminiscing about the start of our active using, the Aretha Franklin CD had finished playing, and we followed it with a Charlie Parker CD of some very cool 1950s bebop jazz. (By the way, that’s bebop, not hip-hop!) Looking outside the window, we noticed that we were passing Taft, home of a California Community Correctional Facility.

I asked Freddie, “When was the first time you were sent to the penitentiary?”

“1963, but I can’t remember which month,” he answered.

“What was the charge?” I asked, as if I could not figure that out by myself.

“Forgery,” Freddie replied, mildly surprising me, as I would have guessed possession or sale of drugs.

“Checks or prescriptions?” I asked.

“Checks,” said Freddie. “I started out in the California Youth Authority, but then I got transferred to the pen where I got an AY number. I was released in 1965, but went back in 1968 when I got my B number. Sometimes I can’t remember my own name, but I can recite my YA, AY, and B numbers without missing a beat.”

I stared out the window into the foggy, cool January morning. For me, the first real arrest (overlooking the Lake Charles episode—there goes that denial again) was early 1967. Some friends and I got arrested for smuggling a small amount of heroin from Tijuana across the border. I was offered prison or Synanon. Synanon was one of the first self-help fellowships, where many addicts stayed clean for long periods and lived in communal facilities. Many Synanon alumni finally found their way to NA some years later.

“On and on we drove, talking, laughing, and enjoying the day and the chance to spend some time together. Towns, farms, cattle yards, and truck stops flew past the window.”

Anyway, I went to Synanon in San Diego, California, but did not last too long. I had not surrendered, and the program was brutal. When they wanted to shave my head for an indiscretion, I opted for prison. I was sent to a federal prison camp in a mountainous part of Arizona. Not that I knew it at the time, but I would have to suffer twenty more years of addiction before I finally understood that I was powerless over my addiction and that my life had become unmanageable. Ironically, it was to be approximately twenty more years for Freddie, too, after that first one, until he was able to surrender once and for all. The beautiful paradox of “surrender to win” has always been one of my favorite slogans.

On and on we drove, talking, laughing, and enjoying the day and the chance to spend some time together. Towns, farms, cattle yards, and truck stops flew past the window. The cruise control was set at seventy-five miles per hour, and the little car was purring along like a contented cat.

We came to Shafter. “Another California Community Correctional Facility there,” Freddie offered.

“God, there sure are enough CDC facilities in this valley, huh?” I quipped.

“This is just the start of them,” Freddie added, with a sly grin.

I already knew Freddie had been up and down this stretch many times over the past years doing H&I, going to CDC twelve-step advisory meetings, and otherwise spreading the word of NA recovery with his tireless H&I work.

We gassed up and grabbed some lunch at a roadside diner. I think we were both anticipating where we were going and what we were doing, so we did not want to stop too long for fear of missing our appointment.

When we passed Wasco, I knew what the call was going to be. “State prison,” Freddie piped in, right on cue.

“You got that right,” I added. After Wasco we passed Avenal. “Another state prison,” Freddie announced.

“I’m right there with you,” I echoed. As we got close to Coalinga, we both chimed in almost simultaneously, “Pleasant Valley State Prison. Yes sir!” Without realizing it, we were taking a rolling tour of the CDC facilities in the San Joaquin Valley, California.

The afternoon wore on, and the miles passed under our wheels. We drove, and we drove, and then we drove some more. Another tank of gas, and we were starting to get close to our destination. I think we were both ready. The sun was finally setting as we turned west. We went over a long bridge, took the Main Street exit, parked next to the post office, looked up, and saw the sign:

We had arrived.

There we were, standing in front of the oldest and probably best-known correctional facility in California, ready to attend the San Quentin Friday Night Annual Anniversary Meeting of Narcotics Anonymous. We climbed out of the car and were looking up at the gate when Freddie turned to me with the strangest expression on his face.

“What’s up, man?” I said. “You look a little gray around the gills.”

“I’ve got a lot of butterflies in my stomach,” was his reply. “I don’t know if I can go in there.”

“What do you mean, you don’t know if you can go in there? Why couldn’t you go in there?”

“I was transferred out of there in 1972,” said Freddie. “I haven’t been back since.”

“Oh, man, I understand.” The gravity of Freddie’s comments sank in as I tried to envision the incredible tangle of feelings and emotions he have been experiencing—right here, right now—some thirty years later. “And you mean to tell me that you got clearance to go in tonight?”

“I passed the security check. My twenty years of recovery and NA’s clout here at the facility must add up to something.”

Then Freddie said, with a smile, “You know, back in my early recovery, my sponsor used to always tell me, whenever we’d go to a facility, ‘Let’s hit ’em quick, hit ’em hard, and leave literature.’” We both broke out laughing as we thought about the man who had sponsored Freddie for over twenty years, and the passion with which he carried that message to members in institutions. Sadly, he died just a few months ago.

The first thing that struck us, from that point on, was how well we were cared for, and how well the event was organized. The friend from Marin H&I who had invited us, and the entire Marin County H&I Subcommittee, are an awesome group of recovering addicts (more on them in a minute).

The second thing that struck us was the respect and courtesy with which we were treated by all of the corrections staff we met. We waited outside the main gate with a group of NA members who had also been invited by Marin County H&I to participate in this powerful recovery event.

The H&I San Quentin volunteer coordinator said hello to all of us and made us feel welcome. We were told that we would be processed into the prison ten people at a time. Approximately forty to fifty members from various NA communities and thirty to forty inmates were to attend the meeting.

One of the first things to impress me was the trust and acceptance that NA seemed to enjoy in this very famous—or rather, infamous—institution. Our IDs were collected and held to ensure that he who went in was he who came out. We signed in, but beyond that, it was virtually painless.

There were no searches conducted, no X-rays done. We were not questioned, except for our name, and we were treated like ladies and gentlemen. Our wrists were stamped with that purple Day-Glo ink for security, as if we were going to a club or rock concert.

It was nice to see every one of us from NA treat the staff in the same way, with respect and courtesy. All of the old malice, fear, suspicion, and aggression were gone. Freddie and I were very impressed, but all of this was only the prelude to the real gift—the socializing and the meeting.

As we awaited the start of the meeting, chatting and joking with inmates and guests alike, the overriding thought was so crystal clear: It is so true that in NA we do not care what or how much you used, who your connections were, the color of your skin, how much or how little you have, your age, or your gender, but only what you want to do about your problem and how we can help.

There were no “convicts and non-convicts.” For the next couple of hours we were all, plainly and simply, recovering addicts meeting together to help each other stay clean! A tear came to my eye as I realized that I felt as comfortable and welcomed there as I do at my own home group.

This was the San Quentin Friday Night Annual Anniversary Meeting of Narcotics Anonymous, and we had reached our journey’s end. There were two wonderful NA speakers at the meeting who shared their experience, strength, and hope. Their message was strong, and their recovery rang true. The clean-time countdown ensued. A new twist on the countdown was made, and newer members came up first, building to members with more clean time. The reason it was done this way was because there were gifts for the two inmates with the most clean time (both over twenty years). Each man received a copy of our newest book, Sponsorship. Everyone there received a specially produced paper “chip,” which marked this very special meeting with the date—28 January 2005—and the amount of clean time—in years and months—of the individual.

One of the gifts I will carry with me always from that night is the memory of men with over twenty years clean in Narcotics Anonymous who are serving life sentences in prison. To hear and see such profound recovery, spiritual presence, and simple affection coming from men carrying this type of burden on their shoulders is something I have never experienced before and will carry with me for the rest of my life.

I introduced myself to one oldtimer who had long, snow-white hair and appeared ancient. With a warm grin he informed me that he was the “oldest lifer in San Quentin.” I asked him his age. “Seventy-six” was his reply. I thought, “Seventy-six years old, clean, and enjoying recovery in a most unlikely scenario.”

I told him I was fifty-eight and how much younger than me he looked. The broad smile on his face told me he enjoyed hearing that comment.

After the meeting, we savored an amazing variety of cakes, pies, and super-premium ice cream (allowed in, again without intervention) and celebrated the joys of recovery and the thrill of an anniversary celebration together—white, black, brown, yellow, red, whatever. No pushing, no jockeying for position, no bullying or tough-guy shenanigans!

Those of you who have been locked up in the penal system at some time in your life know how unlikely it is that a story such as this could be true. And those of you who can envision doing a life sentence in San Quentin probably think it unbelievable.

But, believe me, except for a slight embellishment or two for artistic flair, there is not one lie told in this story.

After the celebration, Freddie and I went with some of our new friends and had dinner while we all processed some of our feelings. We joked and laughed and ate some more—much like any other late-night, post-meeting NA feeding. It was great. By now it was approaching midnight of a day that had started at 4:30 am with Gregorian chants coming from my CD alarm.

One of the (many) touching moments of this evening was seeing a plaque presented to Mitchell R, one of the very first pioneers of NA recovery meetings in San Quentin. Mitchell did this for fifteen years and had recently moved away. As a token of appreciation, a commemorative plaque was given to him as a surprise during the countdown celebration. Hearing him share his gratitude was very moving to us all.

In closing, we would just like to give a final thank you to the Marin H&I folks, present and past. Your groundbreaking accomplishments, your energy, your lasting commitment, and your drive for excellence in carrying the message to the addict who still suffers are a model to us all. What an event. What a life. Thanks, NA.

Jeff G and Freddie A, California, USA

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Did you know...   The first NA H&I meeting in San Quentin started in late 1982, and a meeting has been brought to the prison continuously ever since?

Did you know...   The Friday night NA meeting was started by the Marin County H&I Subcommittee in January 1997?

Did you know...   There are five meetings per week in three units at the prison? Two of the meetings are held in a higher-security part of the institution, where most of the inmates are serving life sentences without the possibility of parole.

Did you know...   The first known twelve-step H&I meeting was started by AA in San Quentin in 1946?

Did you know...   San Quentin is California’s oldest and best-known correctional institution? It was opened in 1852 and covers 432 acres.

Did you know...   The director of the California Department of Corrections was a former warden of San Quentin and is an ardent supporter of twelve-step programs? She has stated that “Narcotics Anonymous is essential to fulfilling our mission.”

Our readers write

Dear NA Way Magazine,

My name is Michael T. I am finishing the last year of my incarceration for drug distribution. It is only because of the generosity of the H&I Subcommittee from the New Dominion Area Service Committee and all the members from these groups that I have experienced the most profound and rewarding change in my life. This change is a direct result of the NA program.

If it were not for these strangers who were “hell-bent” on carrying the message of recovery, I might not be leaving prison with an enlightened point of view. As a result of working and living this program, I have had a spiritual awakening.

I find that I am not as self-centered as I used to be—which, in itself, is a miracle. I have a zest for life that I never knew existed. I am able to look at myself in the mirror and be proud of the person staring back. I actually can carry on a conversation with someone and not be motivated by anything negative. I now wake up in the morning with more gratitude. And I have a newfound eagerness to begin my day, instead of the dread that haunted me for years.

Mere words seem inadequate to express my heartfelt gratitude for the way of life and program of Narcotics Anonymous. I cannot thank all those caring, recovering addicts enough for giving so freely of themselves in order to teach me about recovery.

The purpose of this letter is to thank all those addicts for having the strength and courage to be in recovery and carrying the message that I do not have to be imprisoned by my disease of addiction any longer.

Humbly yours,

Michael T, Virginia, USA

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