It's funny what you learn and how you learn it.
Well, it's not always funny -- and by funny I mean strange, not ha-ha.
In retrospect I guess there's nothing funny-strange about this at all -- it's just my ego, yet again.
I've tried to write this three or four times since I wrote Part 1, but it always came out much snarkier than I intended. But then I got it: That's what I needed to see in all this. The bits of snark hiding in the corners, like crappy emotional dustbunnies.
You see, it turns out that this rehab which may (or may not) go in on my street -- so laughably close to my front door that it's hard not to see a cosmic punchline somewhere in the offing -- is what would generally be referred to as "high end."
Very high end.
"Luxury concierge accommodations for people willing to pay $28,000 a month (doctors are billed separately) ..."
A concierge.
There's more:
According to the owner/founder of the rehab it would "cater to Fortune 500 CEO's, Major League Baseball and Soccer Players and entertainers. Ten percent (two) of our beds would be committed to 'community use' for low/no cost patients, but we'll screen them carefully to fit in with our clientele."
Yeah, I know. Me too.
I had thought I would be describing the process of finding out about the rehab, and maybe whatever then passed between myself and my neighbor who seems so opposed to its placement here on our street. I'd wondered if the situation was going to turn out to be a little amusing, and I might have fun sharing it here -- not at her expense -- just the irony of the larger dynamic -- what with me being a big AA booster and her apparent attitudes (not unwarranted, I hasten to add) about addicts in general.
But instead of humor, I found my own snark. I found my AA arrogance. And of course, my familiar friend, ego.
You know, for the longest time in early sobriety I never thought I played God -- I thought "playing God" meant you were some kind of know-it-all bully-type. (And I'm too wiley for that -- I'm the passive/aggressive low-self-esteem charming bully-type, who grinds you down with courtesy and kindness. Death by butter knife.) But it is playing God to think that I know how things should be for people. It is playing God to assume -- albeit not always with a side order of snark, sometimes with the best of intentions -- that my way of getting sober is in any way morally superior or more effective than a method which costs $28,000 per month.
Because the fact is, I don't know. (Some people only value information they have to pay dearly for, after all.)
Turns out that in trying to write Part 2 of this I saw that my initial reaction to what I learned about the proposed rehab was dripping with reverse-snobbery, and a good sized dollop of God-playing snark underneath it.
If my own financial roller coaster and checkered job history has taught me anything, it's that poverty is not ennobling, and money is not degrading. Sure, poverty can put you in survival mode, and it's hard not to succumb to fear when you're there. And money can prey on ego, and engender its own kind of fear (in my experience the fear of not getting what you think you need is a dull throbbing ache, but the fear of losing what you've got is a sharp, acute, stabby kind of thing.) It's cheap sentiment, populism and reverse snobbery to make the leap that just because someone can and does spend a lot of money to go to rehab that they are ... foolish? Misguided? Spoiled? Grandiose? Wasting their money?
None of those things are true.
Some of those things may be true. But I am not an authority on what works for other people -- I must remember that the only thing I can be sure of is what works for me.
It is embarrassing to write here, but my initial reaction to a $28,000 per month rehab had all the sophistication of an episode of "The Beverly Hillbillies": "Garsh, Jethro, those city folks shure are high steppin when they go to dry out!"
Sure, I'm being a little hard on myself. You could make the case that something which appeals to elitism may not be very helpful in dealing with the commonly agreed-upon profile of an addict, which includes a propensity for grandiosity and a generally high level of self-involvement. (And playing the victim! Let's not forget the victim stuff! Oh, and the entitlement!) Having the concierge swing by the dry cleaners before you go into Group is not a treatment strategy I'm familiar with, I grant you, and the questions it immediately raises for me are worthy of consideration.
But it's not for me to say. No, really. That is not a posture I'm striking. If I'm going to be open and available to newcomers, if I'm going to be open to new ideas, and not be rigid or close-minded, I must guard against playing God, and watch for arrogance in all things recovery-related.
AA is one way of getting sober. The 12 Step world has been an amazing, healing experience for me, and for a lot of people I know.
And certainly lots of people try lots of things -- potentially including the Fortune 500 rock-star style rehab -- before they are willing to try AA -- if they're ever willing to.
What I learned from this (so far -- more will be revealed, as the expression goes) is how subtle -- but hopefully not pervasive -- my arrogance can be on certain topics. How easily my affection for and loyalty to AA alchemizes into something which serves no one -- not the newcomer and not me.
AA is a program of attraction, not promotion. Thinking that we're the only and the bestest way to get sober is probably not very attractive.
It is the best way for me, yes. But again, that's the only part of this I can be certain of.
Ah, nothing like an uncomfortable recognition of my character defects and the humbling phasers set to stun as I start the week.
Happy Monday!