This afternoon while I was working, I received a call to pick up a customer at our local hospitals emergency room. When I saw the customers name on the computer screen I said to myself "Hey I know a guy by that same name. You don't suppose it could be him?"
The call further instructed me that the hospital itself would be paying for the ride by credit voucher. This is a common practice when a person is brought to the hospital with no money for any one of several reasons. It is also used by the hospital to transport indigent patients to a mental or rehab facility of some kind. These instructions told me to drop the customer off at a certain intersection.
When I arrived I asked the receptionist if she would have them bring my passenger out to the car when he was ready.
Sure enough a few minutes they brought him out. It was the friend I was thinking it might be. I was almost knocked over by his smell. He was obviously coming off a several days drinking binge and was a total mess.
This person had been a close friend of mine from Alcoholics anonymous and the last time I saw him he had 21 years of continuous sobriety. He had been instrumental in helping me get sober when I first got clean and sober.
As it turns out he had been drinking now for 4 or 5 months. In that time he had lost his job, been kicked out of his home and his wife had a restraining order against him, hence the reason that I was instructed to drop him off on the street. He had no home to go to.
Not wanting to see him just waste away on the street I began calling some friends in AA to see If I could find him some place to go. He refused my offer to take him somewhere and said he preferred to get drunk instead.
After talking to a couple of people I found out that others had been trying to help him also but to no avail. They had to ask him to leave their houses because he just wouldn't stop drinking.
I was forced to drop him off on the street give him a hug and wish him well. In addition I gave him my phone number (which I'm sure he already has) and told him that he could call if and when he quit drinking. I would be more then happy to help him under those conditions. Before he got out of the cab he asked for some money to hold him over. We all know what that money would go for so I had to refuse.
I'm still taken aback by all this because I am reminded just how fragile an alcoholics sobriety is even after 20 years of not drinking.
There but for the grace of God go I.
That is all.
on edit:
Hmm how about that. This was my 100th post
There but for the grace of God go I
