Writing for my recovery and writing about my recovery are separate matters.                                                                                                                                         ~Roxie

When I was five years old, I wove tales with stubs of Crayola crayons on construction paper. I illustrated each story with stick figures families who lived in two-dimensional houses surrounded by red, orange and yellow flowers. Tall trees stood in the front yards with thick, brown bark topped with a large circle of green leaves against blue sky. I taped my adventures on my bedroom wall. At night, after I said my prayers, I fell asleep wishing I could step into those pictures. I wanted to become the characters and live their lives, instead of mine.

In fifth grade, I won a poetry contest. My teacher, Mrs. Gerber, called me to the front of the class and asked me to present my prized penning. She handed me the yellow paper with blue lines and large cursive letters. Scared to look up, I stared at the paper and read with a monotone voice. I feared the gawking eyes of my classmates. My sweaty hands trembled. The paper shook. My voice trembled. I wanted the comfort of my desk. When I finally finished, Mrs. Gerber and the other students clapped, which made me feel even more nervous. Mrs. Gerber thanked me and instructed the class to get out their list of spelling words.

My black and white saddle oxfords clomped across the floor when I walked back to my desk. I wished I’d remembered my step-father’s warning: “Don’t be lazy. Pick up your feet when you walk.”

I was nominated class president that year, and with my position came the honor of staying inside once a month during recess to help Mrs. Gerber clean the  tropical aquarium in the back of the class. After the other students went out to play, the room was quiet except for the humming of the pump that filtered the tank’s cloudy, gray water. We went to the back of the class and Mrs. Gerber handed me a small net.

“Catch the fish and put them in this small container of water. Be careful or you’ll drop them.” she said.

She stood close beside me; close enough for me to smell the faint scent of her perfume. My mother smelled the same way sometimes.

The fish scattered like feathers in a pillow fight when I lowered the net into in the water.

“Roxanne, what do you want to be when you grow up?”

I chased a neon tuxedo guppy across the tank. “I want to be a writer,” I said. She held out the container of reserved water and I placed the fish inside.

“A writer? I’m glad you said that because you’re creative. Keep writing and get good grades and you can be a writer. Or you could be a nurse, or a teacher, or anything you want, and still be a writer too.”

My face flushed. Mrs. Gerber stood so close I saw the texture of her dark, gray skirt. I wanted to reach up and hug her, but didn’t dare.

After Christmas that year, my mammaw gave me an old Sears and Roebucks catalog. I taped together sheets of construction paper and created a large house then cut out furniture, appliances, clothing and toys and decorated them. The best part was searching page after page for models to create my families. I remember the pleasure of sitting on my cold, wooden bedroom floor on long, Saturday afternoons and writing vignettes about my cast of cut-out characters.

As I got older, the dreamed-up stories with pictures came down off my bedroom wall. I carefully placed them, along with my floor plans and paper-people, in a shoebox decorated with elbow macaroni and gold spray paint. It sat on a shelf in the back of my closet under the bulging hot-pink cases of Barbie, Madge and Skipper dolls, their stylish clothes, and teensy high heels whose mates had long been sucked into the vacuum cleaner.

I continued to write using expensive fountain pens and cheap, spiral notebooks. I wrote THOTS: the innermost tinglings of my heart on the cover of each journal and filled them with poems, short stories and letters I never intended to send.

High school afforded me new opportunities. The school paper published my poetry and commentary. I was editor of the annual chapbook Blue Suede Blues. I was well received at school, considered popular, and an honor student though the only subjects that interested me were English and Art.

While writing an essay on the social and political upheaval of anti-establishment ideology, I found drugs while listening to stacks of old Dylan, Hendrix and Joplin albums. Lots and lots of drugs. I was the first kid in my small rural town—a town so small it’s technically a village– arrested for a drug-related offense.

The judge declared me an addict in court and ordered me to treatment. My probation officer told my mother and step-father I needed a hobby, something to keep my mind busy. They drove me to a music store and my mother handed me a signed blank check. They waited outside in their new SUV while I went in and picked out a guitar.

I knew nothing about how to purchase an instrument, only that the Aria’s cherry sunburst body was prettier than the others hanging on the wall behind the counter, so I bought it.

A couple of weeks later, knowing only a few chords my mammaw showed me, I wrote my first song called Moods:

flower fields and sunshine days
make nice songs
but winter comes
and takes them all away

the good things never
last forever anymore
so I’ll carry all the goodness
I can hold today

maybe I’m a little crazy
but I wouldn’t have it
any other way

It was 59 seconds long, and the immethodical phrasing and irregular rhythm were inconsequential.

I continued use drugs, drink liquor, and write. I have an old, black, leather trunk full of my journals to prove it. I have no memory of writing many of the entries or of events mentioned due to frequent blackouts.

When I finally got clean and sober, I told my sponsor about interest in writing, and my aspirations of publication.

“That’s an honorable goal,” she said. “But what you know about writing won’t help you with your recovery. And it could possibly hurt you.

“When you write your step work, you aren’t writing for an audience. You’re writing to save your ass. Forget spelling, grammar, and sentence structure. What matters to your recovery is that your writing is thorough, fearless, and rigorously honest.  Tell your internal editor to shut-up and write your unfiltered truth from a visceral level.

“Even with Step Four you only need to admit to God, yourself, and one other human being on the planet the exact nature of your wrongs. Recovery writing is personal and private.

“Everything isn’t everybody’s business. “

At the time, as with most gifts I receive in recovery, I was unaware of the value of her wisdom.

Today, after plenty of practice, I can fire up my password-protected digital recovery journal, gag my internal editor, and write it real. My ass depends on it.

Recovery Rocks!

Roxie

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