What I remember from Dr. Robert Waterman

What I remember from Dr. Robert Waterman, Ed. D., LCC, and likely, a wandering sage or two. (The following list is not necessarily chronological.) Three sets of ten; take your pick.

I.

  1. He said, “You have a good grasp on self-love; that’s a good thing.”
  2. Let’s work on what you think is out of your grasp.
  3. You picked him (Amos’s dad); you can let him go.
  4. A light goes on! I can let him go.
  5. Find him. Tell him. Make sure he understands you are setting him free from your expectations.
  6. Your son’s and his relationship is up to them. You provide the dime for the phone call.(vintage)
  7. Get out into the world. Join. Meet people. (Make something of your life.) My grandma told me that too, to do something with my life. I joined Tai chi in the park, and yoga in a woman’s lovely home.
  8. Pot takes you, he said, from A to B, back to A, then to B; A to B, B to A, endless loop.
  9. Tell your friends not to smoke around you. You ought to give up recreational drugs and going with guys who are disrespectful, unkind, violent, drug-addled, or otherwise unsuitable for you.
  10. Golden Rule and get a phone. A PO box and ten miles out of town isn’t working for you.

II.

  1. When you wake up; get up. No wallowing in morning thoughts.
  2. Meet your life every morning with your best colors, food, hair, and attire. Focus on gratitude.
  3. Smile and listen. Make healthy plans. Make gratitude lists.
  4. Consider your own skills and assets. Make use of them to support your family of two.
  5. You picked him; you can unpick him.
  6. If you get lonely, ask yourself what it is that you want to share. When you have something to share,             someone will be there.
  7. If you don’t want to share a damn thing, then it’s not time for relationship.
  8. Work on feeling confident; you can do it. You can raise your son. (and later: kids, dogs, cats)
  9. Be responsible for yourself and your child and all that befalls you, all that comes your way. Your responses are you choice. It’s up to you how you feel, think, live, be.
  10. How you treat a spouse informs your children how to treat theirs. If you are kind, they will learn kindness, too.

III.  

  1. Love and honor your spiritual self, spiritual life, spiritual essence. Develop your beliefs and behaviors. (Only then will you feel whole, calm, complete, and prepared).
  2. Let your heart crack open to its inner fire.
  3. Don’t worry. To worry is to doubt god. Don’t worry about defining god. Be honest.
  4. Be honest.
  5. Take responsibility for your mood, your health, happiness, anger, fear, gratitude, attitude, etc.
  6. Nothing you have done is wasted, if you make use of it.
  7. When visiting people, friends or relatives, make yourself useful. Do actual work such as cleaning, cooking, childcare, wash windows, etc.
  8. Embrace honesty; seek solitude.
  9. He did say, “I’m surprised the universe allowed you a child; you are such a vegetable. It’s hard for a vegetable to raise a child. (I took that as a startling image meant to wake me and shake me.  It           did.)
  10. After taking Robert’s guidance, my path turned from down to up. I began to direct myself into the light, something even a vegetable can do. Consequences: a compass, a family, and                                    often a sense of purpose, and a fair share of happy.
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I don’t get around much anymore
The first twerking I ever saw was last year
at my grand-daughter’s graduation. Ms. Cardi-B!
Have a good time, baby. Have a good time.
 
I adored her and her show instantly. 
The family found it funny I was entertained. 
I saw buckets and piles of money. 
 
Saw them whupping the boys
at their own game. In shape and fit
all dolled up in chopped-up emeralds
 
ermines and pearls. They may or may not be
working on degrees in chemistry, business
or whatever. Theirs is a world where women
 
may do as they please, without domestic retribution.
Not knocked to their knees.
These women are hands down or up a pole
in charge of their own contribution, their solution.
 
And when it comes to love, it’s another
shot at the wheel. Love, romance, these
super stars feel it in their dance, in their bones. 
 
Make it reel, make it fun, shiny and wholesome. 
This revolution is won! Women power, 
motherhood, sisterhood, child care and kindness. 
Shake it up, Mamas, shake it shake it shake it.  
 
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Blanche and Charlie playing get the stick on the grounds at White Oak Plantation, or, How a Person with AIDs Plays Catch with his Dog.

Charlie and Blance playing catch at White Oak Plantation Yulee, Florida

Charlie didn’t write about White Oak. By the time this piece of heaven came into his life, he was too exhausted to continue his stories. White Oak was so amazing that the girls and I pretty much learned not to talk about it. The plantation was thirteen hundred acres of pine forest, at one time used to supply Howard’s paper company, a place that also bred million dollar race horses. 750 of those acres housed the Conservation Project. It was not open to the public in any way back then, but these days the program includes tours and internships studying and preserving species, 20 of them on the plantation in the special zoo, and home to about 200 animals.

I have very clearly in my mind’s eye a vision of watching Lena run back and forth on the path while a Siberian tiger ran just a chainlink fence away. You can research White Oak now–I got tired of telling people about it because eyes glazed over, or jealousy with a dash of ager and resentment sometimes arose. It was just a fluke for us. Hanging out with someone rich enough to save whole species Cheetahs at that time), sponsor Russian defectors (Barishnikov), and host movie stars was fairly amazing. Howard Gillman, the owner and Charlie’s boss, was so nice and hospitable–it was an unlikely slice of life. We were lucky to be guests there, to put it mildly and briefly. Charlie did tell us about being asked to sit in a lunch with the King and Queen of Spain to help Howard chat them up. Charlie said he asked himself how a kid from Eugene, Oregon, wound up dining with royalty. Good question. It was that he could talk and entertain that got him to such heights. And that he loved life closely, always looking for the irony and the best of reality.

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This photo is on my new link at Online Book Club (kindle shopping mall)

Hmm, I have no idea how to use this format but maybe I can do a quid-pro-quo or bribe someone to help me. I’m just getting started on marketing Notes on Serenity, even though it’s been out for over a year. The addiction epidemic hasn’t slowed down yet, but I wrote the dang thing in verse which may have a chilling effect. Honestly, I think parents and loved ones of addicts ought to broaden their horizons, learn some new tricks, try something different. Poetry is almost as old as the opium poppy–try poetry. There is almost nothing that can assuage the pain of watching an addict self-destruct. And that same self is the one who can sometimes get all their ducks in a row under a warm light, and POW–hope and health dance on the horizon. If you know an addict or family member or good friend of an addict, buy them my book for xmas. I’ll post some reviews here in a bit, or you can read them on Amazon. True, the book is not for everyone; it was written for me and about me and my son. The hope was that if I could recover he might get some benefit. And maybe he did. The benefit was kindness and compassion. It came to me as I wrote the stories and poems. What I really thought, felt, and needed became apparent. I needed compassion and kindness. And it had to be an inside job.

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And for All the Sins I Cannot Recall by Charles Milhaupt (my bro)

In the beginning . . .

The editing, prefacing, and after wording was harder than anticipated. Charlie lived 11 years with AIDS, a real achievement in the mid-80s. He wrote 25 little stories, linked congruently in time, until he was too ill to write. It was a pleasant distraction for him, and I’d say he had beginners luck. Always a story teller and fable-weaver, Charlie’s joie d’vivre infuses the stories, even though the reader can guess th inevitable ending. I loved him and I miss him, my friend and my bro. His stories of growing up gay when gay wasn’t even a word, when no one spoke of sex out of sheer politeness. The book is launching in a few days, Nov. 15 or so–almost on his birthday when he would have turned 70. I’ll be sending emails soon with previews of the book, And for All the Sins I Cannot Recall. Written by Charles M. Milhaupt. Edited by and with text by Merimee Moffitt.

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new book

The Charlie book, And for All the Sins I Cannot Recall, is in proofing now! At last. This memoir was sent to me 21 years ago and I put it away, almost forever. It’s been a work of deep nostalgia and was a far more emotional experience then I had anticipated. My darling bro, who passed away young, at 48, was a great story teller. We all knew that. But who’d a thunk he’d be so good at writing also? This collection of vignettes is his one and only written work. Before white privilege, before Gay Lib, before AIDS, before dropping out of college, before avoiding the draft, he starts the tale and takes us up to his circumstances in 1995. It’s a page turner with considerable humor. The Epilogue sketches in what happened after he became too ill to write.

            If you’re interested in the read, my website will offer the best price and the books will be signed by me, his editor. www.merimeemoffitt.com  See “Books by Merimee” in the menu. All proceeds after expenses will go to Gay Men’s Health Crisis and amfAR, the Foundation for Aids Research.

Launch date tba.

Charlie at Venice Beach, circa 1975
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Review of American Fix by Ryan Hampton, former White House staffer

I am so excited. While browsing through facebook groups I’d joined a while back (which generally get lost in the tangle of links and memories too large for me to organize) I checked into a closed group called TAP United, (the addicts parent–united) and there was a comment by Ryan Hampton, author of American Fix. This book is an excellent treatise from a lived-experience point of view on the hugeness of the opioid crisis, (not to mention the fabulously rich perpetrators who created then falsely advertised OxyContin). This drug was pushed into the medical practices of American doctors on the false premise that it was non-addictive due to its time-release coating. All hog wash. The drug is the instigator of 90% of people who are caught in the nightmare of opioid dependency today. Of course there are fine tuning issues about who gets the disorder and who doesn’t. But the fact is,  the numbers of disordered usage are multiplying like out of control cancer cells. The epidemic is a terminal cancer that has killed 140,000 Americans, the majority being young Americans, in the last few years. Another generation is being wiped out. Our kids, our neighbors’ kids, our friend’s spouses, our parents and friends. It has to stop. Votes, believe it or not, can make a change. Let’s vote in 2020 for those with real plans to help end the slaughter.

Mr. Hampton, as one slogan and plan on WHAT TO DO, is mustering up an army of registrars with the goal to register 1,000,000 recovery votes by 2020. It’s a brilliant and direct action.  I was an adult in the 80s and 90s when the country was facing AIDS. The first phase was to ignore it and blame gay men for their own demise. The cruelty was monumental; the interest in finding a cure or a good treatment plan from the top down, was minimal. It took noise and very brave voices. My beloved brother died peacefully at home, surrounded by family and friends with his kind and compassionate doctor nearby and on-call. He was 48. He had won a lottery pass to get the new protease inhibitor treatment, but it was too late. He was too far gone by the time the medicine that worked was available. If the nation had been more eager to do the research, my brother could have lived. WE need to get busy on what treatments work and how. Mr. Hampton has good ideas, based on his own determination to do something.

In the early days of HIV AIDS, ignorant people treated gay men with disgust and all kinds of hateful judgements, all over their faces and spewing from their thoughtless mouths. Much the same is happening right now, today, with the substance use disordered persons who are dying at a rate of one every four minutes in the United States. This has to stop and can be stopped and it will take a nation to slow down and cure and stop a national epidemic. At the rate we’re going, we will have lost 500,000 American lives to opioid overdoses. The number is roughly 50,000 per year, and every four minutes of my lousy typing, another American has died. From a lie. For corporate profit. Read Ryan Hampton’s book American Fix. Form some informed and intelligent opinions. Hampton documents all his assertions with fact-based research. It’s not too hard to count dead bodies. But it is hard to stop it from happening. Everyone needs to do something. Vote out non-providing representatives. We need much much more of the agreed upon care that is surfacing in various overwhelmed communities and proving itself effective.

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Merimee’s blog on Notes on Serenity: An ABC of Addiction

A hat from Abercrombie’s stockroom. 1950’s or so just waiting for a customer.

What is this book? A thought that comes to mind almost daily, now that I’m selling it, giving it, launching it, asking it to run and play with the other books. I’m happy that’s it’s been released ( though I expect one more upload down the road, to fix some  tiny issues); it feels like a graduation.

So far the response has been overwhelmingly kind and positive. Readers see their own world in literature, and my intention in creating the work was to sort through my feelings, emotions, and experiences with addiction. Though the large theme is the relationship I have with my son, I also touch on addiction in various other places (the sickness called greed for oil), people ( a rock star), and forms (my mother’s addiction to rage). All of this whirls in a blender, and then along comes big Pharma, Mexican farmers, traditional growers from Malaysia and such—and our country becomes a target for opiate dealers. Money and drugs, poverty and drugs, anger  and ignorance serve as fuel to the fire, and we’re burning down a generation! Who needs war? The war on drugs has backfired into the population and everyone knows someone caught in the pandemic, sadly, sorrowfully, entangled and drowning and dying in it. It’s too sad, too frustrating, too not funny at all, and yet the nation turns it’s back on the problem.

There is still the stigma and shame, still the belief that addiction is  a person’s moral weakness. Doctors prescribe opiates as if oxy in all its permutations is just a bump up from aspirin. It’s not. It’s a lethal killer as dangerous as playing catch with a loaded gun. American Roulette. Addiction by definition steps away from simple choice very early on. The illness rages like a cancer that lies about its intentions, and then goes viral.

The poems and stories in the collection attempt to cover the bases, mostly as experienced in my family: my heart, my love, my life. Alcoholism is not exempt, nor is tobacco—both are on the big five or six list of highly addictive, highly dangerous drugs along with coke, crack, meth, heroin, and opioids—now add Fentanyl and the creepy legal designer drugs: Spice? Ecstasy? Inhalants and high fructose corn syrup ??

I write about my son’s battle, my willingness to learn as fast as I could the ropes, the rules, and I found out that my addiction is an addiction to his addiction. I had to quit messing with it. It wasn’t mine! I have had to learn to live my own life, without expecting him to fix me. I learned a lot through 20 years in 12-step programs, medical lectures, books by experts, journalists, and other parents.

The stages of grief match the stages of recovery and acceptance. There is no denial, blaming, controlling, or bargaining that will influence an addicted person to quit using. That must come from them, inside, just as my recovery comes from inside me. I have had to set myself free from him and address my denial, anger etc., and my desire to live the life I envision for myself. I gave myself permission to check in with him, but not to enable him or remain possessed by his demons. I thank everyone who has helped me along the way: all the 12-steppers, counselors, friends, writers, doctors, and my patient, loving spouse.

My book seeks to convey through poems and stories, what I have gleaned, what I have felt and suffered, and the conclusions I have come to. I am very fortunate that my son is alive and in recovery. I finished the book at the same time that he found and accepted real help in a compassionate treatment center in Farmington, NM. He gave me an excerpt from his own writings that I have used as an epilogue. I knew people would ask me about him, and I am so stoked that he has spoken for himself and allowed me to share. He also did the art for the cover. The cover seems to have a magical effect on those who see it and hold it.

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FEAR OF ALL FEARS

FOAF              FEAR OF ALL FEARS

FOMO              FEAR OF MISSING OUT

FOBO              FEAR OF BETTER OPTIONS

FOGO              FEAR OF GOING OUT

FOSH               FEAR OF STAYING HOME

FUBAR            FUCKED UP BEYOND ALL REPAIR (VINTAGE, wordy)

FOGL               FEAR OF GETTING LAID

FOBU              FEAR OF BEING UNLOVED

FOBAB            FEAR OF BEING A BITCH

FOFBAA          FEAR OF FAT BELLY AND ASS

FODA               FEAR OF DYING ALONE

FOEM              FEAR OF EATING MAGGOTS

FONO              FEAR OF NOISEY ORGASMS

FOSP               FEAR OF SELF-PITY

FOPIP              FEAR OF PEEING IN PANTS

FOPP               FEAR OF PEE PUDDLES

FOFE               FEAR OF FLAT EARTH

FOLS                FEAR OF LOSING SHIT

FOBSE             FEAR OF BEING SOMEONE ELSE

FOSIO              FEAR OF STICKING IT OUT

FOTD               FEAR OF THE DAY

FOAD               FEAR OF ALL DIETS

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About Notes on Serenity: An ABC of Addiction

About Notes on Serenity

I was seventeen when I started writing my feelings whenever I had paper and a writing utensil. Following my counter culture decade and the hard scrabble years, I had a teaching career devoted to literature and writing, and two degrees in English, the MA in English/Creative Writing. I express myself better in writing than in speaking. When I was stricken with the news from my son about his serious problem with drugs, it didn’t take long to determine that breaking the silence, both in prose stories and in poetry, would be part of the path to my own recovery. It’s an on-going process, yes, but writing is an act of discovery.

Notes on Serenity: An ABC of Addiction is a collection of poems and some prose, loosely linked by addiction and guided by the alphabet like a trellis for a climbing rose. When I first started with my Addict’s Mom stories (not yet related to the group), I knew I’d need a form to help me navigate the six-year project. Going backwards isn’t highly recommended in the healing community, but for an older poet, reflecting is the source of story and image. When the task of getting enough pieces for a book became overwhelming, I’d take breaks. Long ones. But I couldn’t quit. I couldn’t bury or burn the manuscript without putting it out there to break the silence. I gave my son veto power over any part, word, phrase, or the whole book. He took the loving path and even allowed me to add his own words at the end.

 

Bright flowers drawn by him will stand out on a book table or shelf. The cover art is his, as his wonderful treatment center in Farmington, NM, provided time, a place and materials for healing through art. In the working title of the book, scheduled to go live May 2018, I had removed any mention of the A word, addiction, as it’s such a scary, off-putting word to many. But then, remembering that one impetus of the writings was to break the silence, to confront the painful prejudice, I decided on the final title and sub-title: Notes on Serenity: An ABC of Addiction. The narrative poems and prose pieces tell our story, hopefully going from the personal to the universal.  Being the mother of a child, now a man, for several years critically ill with addiction illness but now in recovery, I explore my own recovery through the lens of observation and feelings about our individual battles to survive, to be the persons we are meant to be. His eloquent words, written in rehab as part of his healing process, comprise a prologue to my collection he hadn’t yet read.

 

The book will be for sale on many on-line  sites, but for signed copies cheaper than new on Amazon, go to my website, merimeemoffitt.com, click on Books by Merimee in the above menu bar, then click on Notes on Serenity.  $12 includes shipping.

 

 

 

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