Back to planning, that's what alcoholics do. We make plans. Returning to the South Bay didn't work out as I torched one opportunity after another. Now it was time to pick up and move again. But to where? In recovery culture, they're called geographics. Find a new place, get a fresh start, always venturing out with the best of intentions. But it would always end poorly. For wherever I went, there I was. And going home wound up a disaster, my reputation picking up some heavy baggage, now worse than it ever was.
But where to go next? How about where they don't know me. Or know me less. I took on buckets of water my year in the South Bay, but reputations are a lagging indicator. Most people don't care for gossip, nor really care to know. They have enough of their own shit to deal with.
Reputations only mattered when the rumors got too hot to ignore. Problem with developing a reputation like I was doing was I'd lost control of the narrative. My secret life was no longer a secret, too many people knew too much. And the scarlet letters I accrued in my youth, they became capitalized in adulthood. I now wore two blazing scarlet letter A's across my chest. Addict and Alcoholic.
Unsure of my next move, I got on the phone to my old Coach Greg Patton. I asked him if he knew of any teaching positions in Southern Cal or if he had another Al. Instead, Coach asked me if I'd be interested in helping him with his UC Irvine team, coming on as a volunteer assistant coach. I could help with camps, pick up some lessons with faculty, maybe even get myself back in to school.
Perfect. I accepted immediately. Back on the 405 again, this time south, away from the home of my youth and all its trappings, away from junior tennis and all its toxicity, back to college tennis with a Coach I respected and a team I knew.
Coach Greg Patton. The General. Purest soul. Tall, lean, wispy blonde hair, looking like he walked off the cover of a 1970's Beach Volleyball Magazine. He lost an eye as a child in a freak accident, keeping him from ever pursuing tennis professionally. But he knew the game and loved his players. An upbeat inspiring joy to be around, he likely inhaled back in his youth. But no longer today. He was Rock and Roll Ghandi, a New Age coach before New Age was a thing.
Coach Patton became a wise fatherly influence in my life, always seeing the best in people. Even myself. A month on the job and Coach had detached retina surgery. I was instantly forced in to action, becoming the teams eyes and ears. I was now running team practice, reporting back to Coach at night about who looked good. It was fun, but I sensed I was in over my head. At least it felt that way.
But the team responded to me. In a flash, I was an important cog of a top 5 Division 1 program. Structuring practices by day, doing the office work by night, talking to the all the coaches I used to compete against. It was surreal at first, conversing with them as equals. But we would talk shop and small talk too. To the coach, they sounded genuinely happy to have me among their ranks.
One late night in the office, the phone rang. It was Coach Bassett. He wanted to talk about changing our match time. Above my pay grade I told him, but I'd move his request up the chain. In the evenings I would visit Greg at his house, opening his mail, reading to him, helping him make important team decisions. And he couldn't be more thankful, telling me I could have a future in college coaching. Politely I would thank him, but privately I had my doubts. But in a short few weeks, I'd found a sense of purpose in Irvine, managing all the team's responsibilities.
And for the first time in my life, I felt like an adult...
Back living by the beach, I picked right up where I left, but with a whole new cast of enablers. Coming back to Orange County. I had a small window to change my reckless ways, get a fresh start and not always party like a man possessed. But to no avail. A consensus soon grew around me. My partying was of concern. The people I drank with noticed. The people I worked with noticed. The bars that served me noticed. How I was acting was not normal, my lack of self control too obvious to ignore. Yet my friends remained patient, they still treated me with compassion and sympathy, for I wasn't hurting others, only myself and that I was hurting myself because at some deeper level, I was hurting, the source of my pain not abundantly clear, to them or myself.
But my social circles began referring to me by that term again. That I was an alcoholic. Better than a psycho I guess. But what did being an alcoholic mean? How could I be an alcoholic, I was only in my 20's, I had a job and a home and a girlfriend. Aren't alcoholics old and homeless, living under trees in the parks, muttering to themselves, a bottle in a brown bag in hand?
Yet it was near unanimous. But what did being an alcoholic mean? How come I wasn't taught about this alcoholism in school? Did I skip that day? Did I not get the memo, that a certain small percentage of the people who pick up a drink, no matter what their intellect or talents or social demography, will become alcoholics. Like everyone else my age, I thought I was just having too much fun. Now I have what? An illness? An incurable disease?
The important people in my life though knew something was wrong with me. Yet how much did they know? Our conversations about alcoholism and addiction never went deeper than a layman's level. And why would they not? It was the late 1980's. Alcoholics Anonymous still operated fully in the shadows. Beyond Betty Ford and a small smattering of others, few notable figures proclaimed their sobriety in any public way. And I certainly didn't know anybody in recovery, or at least anybody admitting to it. Public awareness was minimal. Private acknowledgement even less. But that aside, concerns were being voiced about my drinking, I was being called an alcoholic, apparently a condition I was going to have to resolve all by myself.
My team. The Anteaters. I connected with them instantly. I was one of them. Some were former teammates, some I
recruited. A great crew of kids and we started having fun. One Friday night, I took the guys out partying, to Mexico and Tijuana. It was a
sloppy boozy hilarious mess. Most of us made it home. A few didn't. Such a good time though. New peeps. No peephole. Just pure uninhibited drinking debauchery.
So much so, we went back again the next night. More fun. More crazy. Most made it home. A couple not. Crazy crazy. Later that Sunday afternoon, sitting around sharing our weekend drunkalogues, making memories, building bonds, yet the lines between coach and friend were becoming blurred.
Then someone got the idea of going down to Mexico a third night in a row. And it shouldn't have been a hard decision, to say no and get back to disciplined hard work. But there I was, riding shotgun in the crazy mobile. Shitfaced and burned out from a long weekend, I could barely stand. Night winding down, we came back across the border. Reaching our car, we had a designated driver. He was sober, but lagging behind.
It was cold. I was trashed. I got in the driver's seat, starting the car to get the
heater going. In a flash, police rode up on me, pulling me from my seat, ramming me up against their car. They cuffed me while throwing me in the back of their patrol car without the
slightest hint of a field sobriety test. I was being arrested for a DUI. And to the slammer I went.
My first night in jail. Messy. Drunk tank. No place to sit. Barely a place to
stand. And no letting me out until morning.
Following day. Monday, a new week had begun, but I started it in jail. I was a total wreck, left in San Diego to fend for myself. Hitchhiking the 90 miles back to Irvine, I barely made it home, arriving late to practice. My guys were all laughing, but Coach was not. He was pissed. Trust had been broken. He had the best team he'd ever had, he wanted to win a championship. But not this way. Not with his assistant coach taking his team out all weekend partying.
I was on notice to get my act together. Yet I didn't take notice. Coach wanted me away from the guys, hooking me up with a nice home to stay. Yet I blew it up within a week. The drinking. The speed. I started getting delirious from not sleeping for days at a time. One morning, I ended up in the ER. I thought spiders were crawling on me. The attending Doctors saw that I was staff. I tried to explain to them what was going on. They listened patiently, and then not. They asked me if I was alright. I said no, my skin was crawling.
Oh we bet your skin is crawling, they said, asking me again if I was alright...
And there was that question again. All I had to say was no, that I'm not alright, that I'm strung out on hard drugs and everyone who knows me thinks I have a drinking problem.
And maybe they could have gotten me help. But again, I didn't own up. All I had to do was say no, I wasn't alright, but my false pride got in the way again. All I had to say was the few simple words.. I'm not alright...
Yet the shortest distance between two points is often unbearable...
But what if I had told them the truth, then what? Would I have lost my job? Would they have sent me away? In a panic, I ran from the ER, calling in sick for a couple days... to get the spiders off me.
A week later, I was back at it again. Closing the bars, I staggered to the local Jack in the Box, putting on a fast food eating clinic. In no shape to drive, I crawled over to a team mates house, slipping in the front door, passing out on their couch. Yet I awoke in the middle of the night violently sick. Was it the booze? Was it the two Ultimate Cheeseburgers? I tried to ride it out, but the delirium was intense. Something was wrong. I needed to go to the ER, but I was afraid to go back. For then they would know.
Two days later, still wildly
delirious and I hadn't moved yet. Not cool. Trying to hang in there when a couple of my players from the same house got similarly sick. Same intense symptoms, yet they went to the doctor. They had nothing to hide. Acute carbon
monoxide poisoning from a leak in the heating system. Dangerous. I could have died. I should have gone to the doctor. How fucked up was I?
I was out an entire week. Coach Patton didn't know what to think anymore. He was sympathetic, but even he had his limits, for I was becoming a distraction and he couldn't have that. With the season winding down, we ended up having a great year, getting ranked as high as 3rd in the nation, by far Irvine's best team ever. But by season's end, team unity began to fray with myself a big part of that. I once again felt the need to get away. But even further this time.
An amazing season of experiences and opportunities, yet again, I had little to show for it. On the party front, I'd traded crack in for speed. A different kind of madness, though only muted slightly. My relationship with my girlfriend was sputtering, the rocks in her head no longer fitting perfectly to the holes in mine. She liked her speed. Which meant I liked her speed. And so did all her friends. Speed. Cheaper. Stronger. Lasted forever. Do a bump at noon, still grinding your teeth at midnight. And through all the madness I had my first exposure to heroin. What started fun, everyone getting crazy high, soon became tense with everyone fighting over who got more. A good crowd to get away from and fast.
Still unsure what to do with my summer, I answered an ad in a tennis magazine. It was for a teaching position in the Hamptons. It was a seasonal job. A summer vocation, teaching the vacationers. The Fabulous Hamptons, where all the rich and famous played. And I got hired, landing myself a cool gig all the way across the country, to the most eastern tip of Long Island. I couldn't get much further away that that.
The roaring 80's winding down. 1989 to be exact. Still young and playing well, I quickly became a hit in The Hamptons. My days were soon full, going from palatial estate to sprawling compound teaching many of the world's wealthiest tennisites.
Summer rolled on with me making lots of money. Never a good combo, me and money. Working hard, partying harder. I get arrested for drunk driving. Just couldn't help myself. Spent the entire day in jail. By now my boss had had enough of me, kicking me out of his house to fend for myself. Having a hard time getting settled, I finally shacked up with a wealthy Hamptons divorcee. Living the full cliche tennis pro life, I'd become the exact person I despised, a laughable caricature of my former playing self,
The week before the US Open, a major tennis charity event came to town. The Huggy Bear. The most exclusive Pro-Am tennis tourney in the world, with a full calcutta format to assure mass wagering took place. The world's wealthiest pared with the worlds best. Once an intimate private event hosted by Ted Forstmann of IMG (M and A) fame, the event recently expanded from a manageable 32 teams to an unruly 64 teams. And as luck would have it, a home I was coaching at was also hosting some early round matches. A back scratch here, a call from my client there, and low and behold, myself and another local teaching pro were entered as a team in to The Huggy Bear against the world's premier players.
Back in with the big boys again. But it was doubles now. Those who can, play singles, those who can't, play dubs. But at least I was playing.
The event had two sections, with touring professionals paired with ex-professionals in one half and and with local uber-wealthy amateurs in the other. Being an unknown, I was originally denoted as an amateur until one of the tournament organizers recognized my name from my UCLA days, likely saving his job and several others.
I was paired with a peer of mine, Joe Defoor. On paper, we were undoubtedly the weakest team in the draw, but we were both young and evenly matched, making us a tricky out. Playing well, we managed to win a couple rounds, putting us up against one of the better doubles players in the world, #3 ranked Thomas Smid of Czechoslovakia. Playing on the Center Court at Teddy Forstman's Water Mill compound, I played about as well as I could, losing another tight third set tie-breaker after squandering a couple match points.
Elite tennis by day, Gala parties at night. I excelled at the latter. I never lost a party. Seated at a formal dinner, surrounded by tennis royalty again, I still felt an imposter. A wannabe surrounded by professionals. I felt my place in tennis' food chain. They were touring professionals. I was a local teaching pro. There was a camaraderie among them, a unique union. They spoke a special language. A pro tennis code I was on the outside of. They were respectful, yet not respecting, for that had to be earned. I felt the scab who crossed the picket line, poaching their cash and prizes. For I hadn't paid my dues. And again, it wasn't the fame and glory that united them. It was deeper than that. Their bond was in the sacrifice, the life commitment to the the training, the travel, the unforgiving heartbreak that pro tennis regularly doled out.
Summer season winding down. My docket was full of movers and shakers. I talked Watergate with Ben Bradlee. I lunched with Norby Walters and Frankie Vali. I tried to sell Norby's wife a racket. Norby, thinking I was overcharging them, got irate, wanting to break my knuckles. Maybe he was putting on a show for Frankie, but I lowered my price, for the customer was always right, especially if they were connected.
Last lesson of the summer and I was sent again to George Soros' house, who'd built a court in his neighbors yard so he didn't have to uproot a tree. He'd been a great customer all summer. Yet on that day, he'd forgot his wallet. He still owes me 60 dollars to this day.
My boss at The Hamptons Tennis Company was a gentleman named Doug Degroot. Industrious, hard working, reliable. The antithesis of myself. I'd made him a lot of money that summer, but it didn't matter. He was done with me. Come summer's end, we met to settle up. Doug sat me down in his office to chat.
But there would be no chat, just straight talk. Doug looked me right in the eye and told me I was an alcoholic and I needed to get help for my drinking. I got defensive, resentful, leaving in a huff. There was that term again though, but this time it wasn't said in passing. My boss said I needed help. But what did that mean? What did getting help for my drinking entail?
Summer over in The Hamptons, I headed home to California. I performed decently as a college coach, but I was no longer traveling light. With baggage accumulating, I'd become more trouble than I was worth. Coach Patton felt my pain. Being such a kind man, he didn't want to add to it. So he didn't fire me, but he wasn't about to rehire me either. So he hit the phones trying to find me a gig. And when the head coaching job opened up at UC Riverside, I read the room, accepting the job on the spot.
UC Riverside. About an hour and a couple tax brackets inland from Newport Beach. UCR was the runt of the UC system. It needed a do-over, with a fresh blueprint and a dozen bulldozers. But they were now my new employer. Head tennis coach of a top 5 in the country Division 2 team at the ripe old age of 25. And to get our season off on the wrong foot, our first match was on the road in Westwood, Ca against my former UCLA Bruins.
Back at UCLA, back on court one, now in the new sterile 10,000 seat Olympic stadium. Both teams assembled, I lined up my guys on one side. The UCLA Bruins lined up on the other. I walked to the center, shaking hands with Coach Glenn Bassett, now as an equal. Right before we sent the matches out, Coach Bassett approached me, asking me if I'd play a practice match with their number 7 guy. Not sure if he was serious, I told him sure thing Coach, right after we whoop ya. Coach and I shared a laugh. The Bruins rubbed us out pretty good, yet Coach was all grace, and that felt good.
May 1990. St Louis, Mo. The team's had a great year, but not myself. My drinking progressing, I'm becoming less functional by the day. At Nationals, play is delayed for days by biblical rain. Not one to sit around, I caroused the town, meeting a cute little bartender along the way. She became my St. Louis tour guide, showing me the surrounding town and more. I was on a tear, buying rounds for everyone everywhere we went. It was the bender of all benders. Unbeknownst to my team, I blew through all the team money in three days. Tapped out, at our team meeting the next morning and still drunk from the night before, I broke the bad news to the squad. They wanted their meal money. I told them I drank it all and that they need to call their parents and I'd make everything right when we get home.
We lost in the semi-finals, finishing 3rd in the country. A solid season for sure. We got better, we got close. What more could I ask for from a team? But my players had concerns. I was drinking constantly all year. One early morning match, I came over to my #1 doubles team sitting on the bench. As I leaned in to say something, they both recoiled in horror, telling me I smelled like a brewery, alcohol seeping from my every pore.
End of the season party. We were wrapping it up. The guys were joking around about my drinking. But they were also not. And that word got used again. I got called an alcoholic. The word hung heavily in the room. What did the term really mean?
Drinking daily had become my normal and they were worried, for there was nothing normal about what I was doing. And someone important to them, their
college tennis coach, appeared to have a problem and they could no longer remain silent. Just like all the others before, they needed to get it out.
Like Lawson, like Coach Louderback, like Lansdorp, like Coach Patton, like my boss in the Hamptons, like an increasing number of my friends. My behavior was now an undeniable problem, yet how to confront it still a mystery.
Through all the rain delays in St Louis, I finally got to spend time with the other Division 2 coaches. Good guys, hard workers, they shared their backgrounds with me as I shared mine. Several already knew much of my past, (hopefully not too much). I shared with them my year of playing for UCLA as well as my attempted comeback at Irvine and the broken leg. Mid conversation, one coach informed me that if those were the only two seasons I played, I still had two years of eligibility left to play Division 2 tennis if I wanted to get back to playing college tennis again.
Inches from a clean getaway. Play college tennis again? The drinking, the smoking, the partying, the eating. I didn't look like the cover of a men's fitness magazine. But I was going back to the Hamptons for another sweltering summer of teaching. I was only 25. What was stopping me from getting back in shape and competing again. I literally had nothing to lose.
Or so I thought...
I reached out to my Athletic Director at Riverside, Dick Perry. He was curious, interested even. I asked a lot of questions. I'd been teaching, I'd taken prize money. UCR had been paying me the past year. Wouldn't all that be a problem? But AD Perry seemed to think he could work it out. He told me to stick with my plans, go to the Hamptons, get in the best shape I could and he'd handle all the details.
So back to the Hamptons I went, woefully out of shape, but now with a plan.
First week of summer, I hurt myself badly. Torn cartilage in my rib cage. I was grounded for a couple months. Literally the worst start possible.
Scrambling for money, I picked up a busboy job (it all comes full circle) at one of the Hampton's hottest eateries, an Italian joint named Sapporo Di Mare. Tennis training suspended, I was back to drinking heavily. More Groundhog Day. With my work shift starting at four, I'd get up at the crack of noon, eat something, take a nap, then start getting ready for work.
First hour at the restaurant was set-up. A supremely fun charismatic group to work with, I immediately befriended a waiter named Guy. Always upbeat, serene, calm, reflective, intuitively I was drawn to him. Like the Deadheads years ago, there was just something about him. He had something I lacked. He had something I wanted.
Like any good drinker, I would give Guy the entirely unsolicited play by play of the my prior nights drunkalogue. I would tell him how trashed I got and all the hi-jinx that ensued, yet most importantly, how wrecked I felt the morning after. Guy listened patiently til I finished my spiel, never interrupting or interjecting, then in the calmest of voices, he would ask me if I was bragging or complaining?
Bragging or complaining? Another question I could not answer.
Temporarily stumped, I was unable to give him an honest answer to his curious question. And Guy and I would do this dance all summer. Each time he would listen patiently, then each time, without the slightest tint of judgment or disapproval, he would ask me that same question.
Are you bragging or are you complaining?
Then one particularly hungover day, my story didn't have the same elan as nights before. And as I finished up, Guy asked me one more time... You bragging or complaining?
To which I paused, not really sure how to answer. And we began to talk. I said I didn't know. I asked him what he thought? He said it sounded like I was complaining. I said maybe I am. I then asked him how come he's so calm all the time and never complained?
And he told me he was sober. That he used to be just like me, trashed every night. But he'd found an easier softer way to live. He'd been sober two years now and that he attended meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous every day and to let him know if I ever wanted to join him.
What was Guy trying to tell me? That there was another way to live, that I didn't have to feel like shit everyday? I'd been in full self-destruct party mode for 12 years straight now, costing me everything dear to me. Twenty six. Fat, drunk, and smoking, working us a busboy in a restaurant, going nowhere in a hurry. So I asked Guy when and where to meet him for one of these mysterious AA meetings.
The following afternoon, I arrived to the venue, a small church in the hamlet of Wainscott. One o'clock on a Tuesday afternoon (don't any of these people have jobs) on a gorgeous summer's day (don't they have anything better to do). The church overflowed with people, many of them chipper and friendly, conversing and engaging animatedly with each other. With few exceptions (myself), everybody seemed to know everybody. Cheers, with an abundance of cheers. Everybody knew their names. First names that is. I would learn more about that in time.
I searched for my friend Guy, but I couldn't find him. Walking up the front stairs, there were greeters flanking the front entrance. As I reached the front door, a hand reached out toward mine. Welcome. Welcome. So glad you could make it today...
I then asked where the check in desk was. They didn't understand my question. But they did.
Shit newcomers ask..
They directed me to a table, with pamphlets and books. Inside people were mulling around, the voices a buzz of white noise, conversations indecipherable. But there was a palpable energy in the room. These people shared something with each other. I started thumbing through the literature, picking up a pamphlet, skimming it quickly. It was unintelligible, written in some secret code. I flipped a few more pages, to which I read a line
All I needed was willingness... Man, I felt I needed a lot more than that.
The meeting was soon called to order. I walked in timidly with no clue what to do. I took a seat in the middle of a long row of chairs. It was standing room only in this quaint little church. There was a leader. A trusted servant. He read off the minutes of the meeting. He then asked to go around the room and for people to introduce themselves, giving their first name and the nature of their disease. Disease? Who said anything about a disease.
Around the room it went. My name is X and I'm an alcoholic. My name is Y and I'm an alcoholic. I'm Z and I'm an alcoholic. The procession worked its way around the room toward my chair. As I saw it coming toward me, I tensed up. I had no idea what to say. I wanted to run. Then it finally reached me.
My name is Barry...and this is my first ever meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous.
The room erupted in cheers and applause. Embarrassed, I looked up. All the meetings' eyes were upon me. It was overwhelming, to be enveloped by so much care and compassion. All so new. All so scary. All I wanted was to not feel like shit in the morning. Was all this really necessary?
The meeting convened. There was an opening prayer. Didn't see that coming. Then there was something about serenity. They spoke in code. There were jokes. They all knew when to repeat, collectively delivering the punchlines. Groupthink. Culty. I wanted to get up and run out. But I wanted to stop feeling like shit more so I stayed.
They went around in a circle. People shared about their days. Their conditions. Their challenges trying not to drink that day and every day for that matter. They talked about steps. And taking action. And solutions to their condition. It was a bit much to digest, like opening a book to a random page and jumping right in. I had no idea what any of it meant.
There were small wicker baskets at the ends of the table. People began putting money in them, then passing the basket. Small money. Singles. The occasional five. The baskets worked their way toward me. They both arrived at me simultaneously. I didn't know what to do. I asked if the money was all for me for being new? The room busted out in laughter.
The baskets were the contributions. All AA meetings were self supporting through them. The 7th tradition. Which meant there were at least 6 others. Lot to learn here. Traditions, steps, books. The meeting ends. We stood as a group. We held hands. We recited the Lord's Prayer. I didn't know any of the words. It was awkward, yet powerful. A room of people, convening on a beautiful summer's weekday afternoon. To heal. And to help each other heal. And to help me heal. And it worked. I could see it in their eyes. They had a glow. Like I saw in my friend Guy. This was what sobriety looked like.
As I walked out, people approached. They handed me their cards. Say call if you need to talk. Others said welcome, please come back. One after another. Please come back. Keep coming back. Finally, a place that wanted me around. Was there a catch? There had to be a catch. There's always a catch. But I drove away feeling different, that I'd participated in something profound. Not all unlike my first Grateful Dead show where they asked if I was coming back. I had no idea what it was that they had, but I sensed they had something I did not. A serenity about them, that they had something to teach me.
That night at work, I saw my friend Guy. We talk. I had questions. Lots of them. He did his best to answer. He said give it a try, they'll gladly refund your misery if you like. We made a deal. Thirty meetings in thirty days and I agreed.
A week in, I stopped going. It was a bit more of a commitment than I was capable. But I was feeling better. Fog clearing. I could see past the next 5 minutes. I woke up feeling good. I went to bed feeling good. It felt good to feel good. If I could sustain this, I sensed I could do whatever I wanted.
Healing up, I got back to training. At home, there was a full scholarship offer with my name on it to play college tennis again. College tennis, once the ordering principle of my life. I would be in school, I would be able to train. I was 26 now, still young enough to ball. So I agreed to give it a whirl. Getting on the phone, I called my AD. He told me all systems were go. I told him I was coming. He said don't worry, we'll work it all out.
I made it through the end of the summer sober. It all seemed overwhelming. People with 5 years sobriety. Ten years. Thirty years. Seemed like forever. Because it was. Forever was a long time. Yet I was only 26. Was this my future? Was this really the only way? What about fun? I'd set the bar pretty high for what constituted a good time. Was this it? Sitting around tables listening to strangers carry on about their days? I still had questions. Will this 30 day break help me regain control, or did I never really have control in the first place.
More questions I could not answer...
Back to California and Riverside, I got to scrambling. Now it was my mission. I had to retroactively withdraw from my last quarter at UCI three years ago where I failed all my classes. Yet some of my professors were no longer at Irvine. Tracking them all down, I filed all the required paperwork, knowing none of this was getting done if I was still drinking. I was already reaping sobriety's benefits. Days later, there was a call on my voicemail from my AD. I'd made it in. I was eligible, by a hair.
I was now the player/coach of a top 5 college tennis program. Playing tennis again. This wasn't JDC or UCLA or rolling with Al. This was D2 college tennis. I was a long shot at best. Overweight, out of shape, still smoking, and barely sober. I hadn't played any sustained meaningful tennis in years, but I hit the practice courts my first day back, hoping against hope to make something out of the opportunity.
Back on the courts. Running practice while practicing. Same as it ever was. He who has himself for a coach.... Anyway, it was working. I was training. Shedding pounds. Hitting the ball. It was killing me though. The uphill in to the wind part of the run with an achy leg. Except the leg ache was real. Too much, too soon. Minor stress reaction on the shin. Doctors throw me back in a cast for 6 weeks. Ugh
January comes around. Out of the cast. Back in school, taking a full load of classes, waiting tables at a restaurant, living with the girlfriend. And staying sober. And for the most part it was working. It was a lot though and I was starting to stress. My mind started racing again. Couldn't sleep. Then I couldn't get up. Around and around. Why did this happen every time I stopped drinking?
Just trying to hold it together. My anxiety mounting. Feeling on the edge. Like on a ledge. Like I was about to fall or snap. My stress growing, it all felt unsustainable. Walking around campus talking to myself. Getting in my car, yelling at people. Getting in arguments. Winning fights. Yet there was nobody there to yell at..
I wasn't drinking, but I felt crazy. Like I was losing it. Why was this happening again, and why now? Walking on campus, I couldn't take it anymore. In an act of desperation, I felt the driving need to talk to someone. And just like at UCLA years ago, I walked straight in to the campus counseling center and asked if there was someone I could speak to.
I was directed to an office. There sat a counselor, head down, working away at her desk. She asked me to sit. A brief back and forth ensued. She was as serious as a heart attack. All business. I explained my situation. I chronicled my past. I told her everything. Oddly, she seemed to know everything that happened before I even told her.
I continued to detail my busted life when she jumped in, cutting right to the vein, telling me I was untreated alcoholism in the flesh. No fucking around. No 20 questions, no leading queries, no waiting around for me to self-diagnose. She knew of what she spoke. She had 10 years clean herself with the chips and key-chains to prove it. An AA Blackbelt. I tried to continue, explaining the stressors of all I was trying to do. School, work, college tennis, a relationship and not drinking for the first time in my life.
Her face grew concerned. Listening uncomfortably, she leaned in, telling me I needed to go to meetings. Like right now. I told her I tried that last summer and that I really felt I needed to talk to somebody. Yes you do, she said. You need to talk to another alcoholic about recovery, for right now you are the embodiment of white knuckling alcoholism. The quintessential dry drunk. Sober without a program. Restless, irritable, raft with discontent. And if you don't get to a meeting soon you're going to drink again and all the stuff you're stressing about won't matter anymore.
And she wasn't wrong. She continued that there was nothing she could say or do in that moment to change anything in my life, but if I wanted to have a life, I needed to get to a meeting and get a sponsor and start working a program because I was an alcoholic not in recovery which meant I was a ticking time bomb.
I countered again with the insanity of my schedule and just how was I supposed to squeeze a full program of recovery in. She wouldn't hear any of it, telling me again all that stuff was gone if I didn't stay sober. And back and forth we went. Her telling me what I needed to hear. Me nowhere near ready to hear it.
We set up another appointment. As I walked out, she gave me a plan, detailing what I needed to do to stabilize and see my opportunities through in school, tennis, and sobriety. But the moment proved too much. I was overwhelmed and in need of immediate help. And I sought it, at the bottom of a pitcher of beer across the street from campus at the local Bull and Mouth bar.
Drinking at your college bar when you're not supposed to be drinking. Coaches, faculty, administrators. Yet for once, I didn't care how much they knew. I needed a drink and I needed one badly. Half way through my second pitcher, I felt a long lost ease return. I'd reached my cruising altitude, having blown the requisite steam. But I knew these feelings were temporary, a non-solution to my much deeper problems.
The following week I returned to the counselor, but this time I brought the girlfriend. I was drinking again and she was pissed. I told the counselor I went drinking right after our last week's session and now she was pissed too. Everyone was mad at me now. Two on one, with all my travails being laid out before me.
I had a problem. A medical problem. Alcoholism. Many called it a disease. Either way, It was not going away on its own. It was progressive. It got worse, never better. Bedside manner be damned, my counselor laid it strong. My situation was dire. No more talking. Only action would save me. My situation was urgent. I had to start going to meetings or else. Humbled, I agreed.
Random Riverside recovery. Nobody tells you where to go or where the better meetings are. Lets just say it wasn't the Hamptons. Poor neighborhoods, downtrodden crazed street people coming indoors for some coffee and a doughnut, rambling incoherently about the minutiae of their days and not a moment of it felt healing. In reality, recovery felt like something to be avoided. I tried a couple meetings, started lying about going to more. Fortunately my fever broke that day at the Bull and Mouth. Feeling more grounded, I had plenty going on to keep me away from the bars, for if I thought my schedule was hectic already, UCR men's tennis dual matches were about to begin.
I was twenty-six, playing number #1 for my college tennis team. I was at my core a Pac-10 snob. But Division 2 had some athletes, with every school having somebody who could play. And playing number one singles, I would face them. Playing my way in to shape, I got run off in a couple early matches, but soon, I started hitting my stride, winning a bunch of matches in a row. Our team then headed down to San Diego for a local ITA tourney, the same one I played as a member of UCLA eight years prior.
It was all so weird, being back playing college tennis so many years later.
I lost early in San Diego, but then started playing well, winning the back draw while making the finals of the doubles, beating the top seeds along the way. One part exhilarating, one part humbling, for I was having to explain myself again. Where I'd been, what happened, what I was doing, and why I was playing college tennis again at 26.
But for once I wasn't embarrassed by it all, for I was finally taking ownership of my life. Particularly my alcoholism. I was being honest, admitting for the first time publicly I had a problem and that I was trying really hard to turn my life around.
And for the first time, I didn't care much they knew...
And here I was at 26, still trying to better myself, using tennis again as a tool to stabilize my life. To give it purpose, hope, some direly needed structure, being reminded that there was so much I could accomplish on and off a tennis court if I could avoid drinking myself blind.
I started playing really well, running through a bunch of strong opponents. Then the rankings came out. Our team was top 5 with myself already third in the country. I started to get some nice local press, but this time around, it all felt right.
The team started traveling. Winning more matches, having fun. I was loving my new life, jiving with my team as we grew close. Returning home from a successful road trip, I got called in to my AD's office. There was a problem. The coaches in our conference had filed a grievance against me with the NCAA for being a professional. Until it was resolved, I was provisionally suspended, but to sit tight and not panic, for he was going to work things out.
And in an instant, my heart sank. For what AD had promised wouldn't happen was about to start happening.
I was now the target of a full blown NCAA investigation. Me. Twenty six year old has been burn out alcoholic enigma, trying one more time through college sports to get his life together. And they wanted to take it all away. They said I was a professional tennis player and that I'd violated my amateur status. JFC. There was nothing I'd ever wanted more in my life than to be a professional tennis player.
The irony of my predicament buckled me.
What a sham. College athletics and amateurism. Of course I'd accepted money playing tennis. So had every single person playing on the last dozen NCAA Championship teams. Yet I was the problem? I was the player who needed to be made an example of, that I was somehow threatening the integrity of the NCAA system. It was baffling on every level.
I got a call to meet at my AD's office. A conference call to NCAA headquarters in Overland Park had been arranged and I was about to get introduced to Janet. She had my case. She wanted details. I sensed she had details. I was told to be honest, to tell them everything. Everything? Did I include the Hamptons? The Huggy Bear? The Saudi Prince. There was no way she knew everything? But she knew something or I wouldn't be under investigation. Janet and I got to talking. She knew about all the stupid little money tournaments I supported myself on from the South Bay years ago. She had exacting details. Tournaments won. Match results. Amount of winning check. Somebody from home had outed me. I'd burned the wrong bridge. I was going down.
But coaching UCR the year before was the final nail. I was paid by check from the school, the same school that declared me eligible to compete as an amateur, the same school that promised me this wasn't going to happen. Janet smelled blood. She had me in her cross hairs. There was little I could do.
I tried to appeal to her compassionate side. I brought up the Steve Alford situation, that the NCAA had an image problem and they'd promised to do better, to look at situations independently and with compassion. What larger purpose was kicking me to the curb serving? I was a 26 year old alcoholic trying to turn his life around through NCAA athletics with some scratchy Division 2 tennis. I should have been part of their new marketing campaign, not being banished from playing. But Janet was on a mission. She wanted scalps. She started probing me, asking me about other players taking money. Maybe if I named names she could help me.
JFC. Bring the whole NCAA college tennis system down so I could play a few more shitty matches for the UCR Highlanders. No thank you Janet.
A couple weeks go by. I checked back with school. It wasn't going well. Now my AD refused to see me. Totally ghosted me before ghosting was a thing. The team had to forfeit my matches. I was thrown under the bus. I was losing everything. My job, my team, my chance to play again, my scholarship. Everything. In a flash.
Too much to handle, I went on a bender. More behavior. I wasn't taking it well. I eventually went to the press. I had receipts. A more calculating person might have wiser and played it smarter but I wasn't that guy. The paper eviscerated the school, the athletic dept, my Athletic Director. All of them. And in a flash, I was no longer welcomed in Riverside.
It was time to get away again, this time for good...
Facing an uncertain future, the girlfriend and I packed up the car for another cross country drive back to the Hamptons. But we made a plan. To work hard, stay sober, work on ourselves and our relationship and see if we could build a life together. No more of the hamster wheel. We touched down in NY and for the first couple weeks the plan held. We were doing well, allowing ourselves a little hope.
Walking Main Street in Southampton one evening to get an ice cream. Beautiful summer night. I was good. We were good. Life was good. I had a good feeling the sober life was doable. We walked past a stylish cafe. A good friend from the old restaurant was the new maitre' de. Big greeting. Big hugs. Kiss kiss. Lots of great to see yous.
He insisted we come in and let him buy us a drink. We politely declined, saying we couldn't, that we were being good. He wouldn't hear of it. It was summertime in the Hamptons. We must catch up. Just one. We repeated no we couldn't. Then he came in for the close. He insisted we have one right then. The girlfriend and I shared a glance. She wanted out of there. I wanted in there. We agreed to have just one, but then we had to go.
But I never had just one. And its the first drink that gets you drunk. And so began my final bender, one that wasn't going to end well.
The beast awakened. All summer. Every day. Drinking, dysfunction. Sloppier by the day. Even worse at night. Still with the girlfriend. Then not. Winter comes. We stay in New York. Try to work on things, but to no avail. I'm barely working. Drinking, drugs, dysfunction. Summer of 1992 comes. Everything intensified.
Back to working a ton. Making bank. But the party was on and my burn rate was high. I'm holding it together, but barely. June July, I'm starting to fray. Just make it to Labor day. Looking at thousands in tips. Just make it to the finish line. But it was getting harder. I started missing work. I made up grander and grander stories to cover my absences, telling them I got arrested, telling them my Mom passed away. Anything to elicit sympathy and stay employed.
But I was losing touch. Too much money, too easy access. One ill fated weekend. I was missing again. A whole weekend of lessons blown off. All out of lies, I couldn't call in. Up for days. Drugged out. It was Monday morning. The party finally winding down. Time to move on. I got to the train station. What was I going to tell them at work? What was I going to tell my girlfriend? I couldn't keep doing this but I couldn't stop, a reality that jarred my mind. Trains began to appear. The eastward line. East was back home. To the Hamptons. To my girlfriend. To my job. To my life. West was toward NYC. And God knows what. I wasn't in my best state of mind. The East train comes. I don't get on. I get on the West train toward NYC. Away from my job. My girlfriend. My clients. My life.
Hours and hours on trains and buses. Passing in and out of consciousness, I come to in Atlantic City. I check my pockets. I see a train ticket for Philadelphia. I have not a single recollection of setting foot in Philadelphia. Atlantic City was grim. I was grim. My life was grim. I was officially missing by this point. Nobody will find me here. Hotel. Money. Drugs. Casino. I do my thing. Twenty fours hours. Forty eight hours. I'm pretty out there. Blacked out, but functional. I finally come to. Its been a few days. Now I'm scared. I call home. Enormous relief. But I can't leave my room. I'm petrified. Girlfriend and my doubles partner Joe agree to come get me. Tell me to stay put. And I do.
Hours later they arrive. They scoop me up. Take me home. I can't really explain myself. I don't even try. Somehow I still have a job. I take a couple days off to clean up, then I pick right up like nothing ever happened. But my people are worried now. Hang in there though, just two more weeks to the finish line.
I tried going to a meeting. The same church where I attended my first meeting. But I would receive no applause that day. Not feeling it, I walked out. I sought out my friend Guy from a couple years ago, yet he was nowhere to be found. I called my counselor at Riverside yet she no longer worked there. The week was going poorly. Trying not to drink, but I felt powerless. The obsession constant. I was a risk to myself and everyone around me, yet nobody had any idea what to do with me. My chain of command was broken. What was it going to take to get me to stop?
I survived the week. Friday payday. Why was anybody giving me thousands of dollars? I cashed my check. I found a bar where nobody knew my name. And I settled in. I made up a name, I made up a story. Before long, I had new best friends and we're off to get drugs. Up all night, I was supposed to be at work in the morning. Yet I was out of control again. Reckless. Dangerous. I needed to get going. I get back to the train station, once again faced with the choice. The LIE, eastbound to Southhampton, to my home, my life. Westbound to Jamaica and to a great unknown. I sat there pondering as trains passed by. They'll be no coming back if I take the train west. The east bound train arrived, my train to go home. I let it pass. I got on the train going west again. I was completely out of control. Without a call, without a trace. I'd disappeared again. Destination unknown.
Trains and transfers and buses later, I end up right back in Atlantic City. A crazed drugged out liquor infused fool on a deathwish. Days go by. Time was closing in. Resources dwindling, I can't go on like this anymore. In my room. I buy some pills. Lots of them. Ones that will put me out. Ones that will take me out. I keep drinking. To muster the courage. Its messy. Blacked out. Sloppy. Apparently I started calling people. Friends. Girlfriend. Slurring. Apologizing. Crying. Just carrying on and on then hanging up, not telling anyone my whereabouts.
Courage mounted, I go to the counter. I take all the pills. I'm slipping away. I'm checking out. What a way to go. Not even 28 years old. A life so full of hope and promise and dreams. All fading away. Groggy. Blurry. Drifting. So much not done, so much not said. But I can't go on anymore, not like this. Slipping away for good. I make one last call. I don't remember it. I don't recall anything about it. It was to my buddy Howie. His wife Roseanne got on the phone. Somehow, someway, she got me to tell her where I was.
Moments later. I'm out cold. The door breaks in. Paramedics rush me to a gurney. I'm on my way to the ICU. They get me in. I'm in and out of consciousness. They pump my stomach. Some charcoal substance to induce vomiting. I'm in trouble. But stabilizing. In and out. In and out. Violently sick. Able to answer some questions. I'm hurting. Hysterical. Mad. Who can we call. I tell them my Dad. They call my Dad. They explain to him whats happening. I'm crying. I'm crazy. I'm sobbing uncontrollably. My Dad gets on the line. I start crying. Apologizing. My Dad's in a panic.
He says we had no idea. But hang tough. We'll get you the help you need. We'll get you the help you need. We had no idea. We'll get you the help you need...
Passing in and out. Later in the evening I awaken. I'm in the NPI of a downtown Atlantic City hospital. On lock down. I look around me. Men on gurneys. In restraints. The noises. The groans. A nurse approaches the gentleman next to me. He'd been bleeding from his eyes. Hemorrhaging. They ask him is there anybody they can call. His answer was no. Its heartbreaking. Lying on a gurney bleeding through his eyes and not a person in the world to take his call.
Will this be me if I don't stop...
The nurse approaches me. Is there anybody we can call for you? I gave her my girlfriend's number, but she won't come. She's afraid of me. My girlfriend was afraid of me. Wow. They contact my parents, arranging for me to get home. They'll get back to me when they find someone. In the mean time, just try to get some rest.
I had a couple dollars left stuffed in to my socks. I hadn't eaten in days. Famished. I get up to look for a vending machine. I'm in a locked down wing of the hospital. I keep trying doors but to no avail. Finally, a double door pushes open. I walk down a hall to vending machines and an exit sign. I walk to the exit door. I push it. It opens.
Barefoot, in a hospital smock. Covered in the front, not so much in the back. I emerged upon a busy city street. It was evening. Scalding hot. Disoriented. I realize I'm not supposed to be here. Yet still starving, parched, disheveled, destroyed. I look up on the street to see an open bar with its lights on. A signal goes off in my head. I had a few crumpled up dollars. I had a few hours before my ride arrived. Nobody from the hospital knew I was there.
Then a voice. In my head. Not sure of who or from where.. But in a calming way it said... No. Go back. You've had enough... No more... You've had enough.
And I did. I listened to that voice. Walking back in, I see the nurses charging down the hall toward me. The door I went through was not supposed to be unlocked and I certainly was not to be walking the streets a free man. Escorted back to my gurney, I laid down, drifting off to sleep to a future uncertain.
They were going to get me the help I needed...
Drifting off to sleep.
We had no idea.. We had no idea.. We had no idea running through my head...
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