Byline: Keith Howard

In one major part of my life, I didn’t always take such a moderate view. Since May 21, 2007, thanks to a program of recovery that remains central to my life, I have not found it necessary to drink or use any mind-altering substance. Over these 6,058 days, I’ve worked hard to become the kind of man my mother dreamed I’d someday be. I have, without boasting, made, and continue to make, progress on that goal. That is how I define my recovery.

Three weeks ago, on my 65th birthday, my body was pierced, robots were inserted into my lungs to extract a tumor and some lymph nodes, the booty was sent off for analysis to high priests of science, I was pumped full of painkillers for two days, and I foiled a plot to kill me.

Trigger Warning: There’s some potentially bad news at the end of this. If you want to avoid that, you can safely enjoy (or not) all of this up until the last paragraph.

Yesterday, Hope for New Hampshire Recovery’s board of directors sent out a too-kind press release announcing my departure. This release was gratifying to read, of course, but made me sound much more professional and serious than I am. In the interest of setting the record straight, I’ve composed an alternate release.

While I was having lunch with a friend today, she was, according to reports and rumors, dining with a ghost. Missy watched me slurp soup and eat a sandwich while telling me about a conversation she’d had the other night, a conversation about me.

As I write this, I am a radioactive man. Really. This morning I was warned to stay away from pregnant women and small children. Unlike most Marvel Comics heroes and many DC Comic villains, though, I don’t appear to have any superpowers. Time will tell.

Observant readers will note the use of the past tense in that last sentence. Let me not bury the lead any further. I have resigned as director of Hope effective right away. Before rumors begin, I have not turpituded financially, sexually, behaviorally or any other way. Likewise, I have no policy or personnel disagreements with Hope’s board of directors. They are all fine people, as are the staff members and the membership of Hope. Hope is my vision of what a recovery center should be: a community of folks bonded by a love for each other and a desire to live without chemical assistance.

A while ago, when I was still living in the Great North Woods in the Tiny White Box, I wrote about leadership, describing myself as a mystical clown. Every clown needs a circus, and every circus needs a bunch of gifted and dedicated people to keep the whole thing from crashing down.  These are those people, the ones who make Hope Recovery work, saving lives and strengthening recovery.

The other day, I told you about my new friend, Donald. Now, the truth can be told: Donald is actually Craig, and has given permission to use his name.

Today, at no charge, I’m giving you the Unofficial Insider Idiot’s Guide for Dummies to this Saturday’s Hope Recovery Festival. You might think because this information is free it’s not worth much. You would be wrong. I guarantee you will learn more useful inside dope here than I ever did. If you don’t I’ll give you triple your money back!

That, my friends, is what the first steps of peer recovery look like, a person in recovery getting to know a person who needs recovery and offering a helping hand. That, though, is only a first step. These excerpts from the texts I received from Donald after I left are the true first fruits of peer recovery.

Near the beginning of Proust’s Remembrance of Things Past, he introduces the catalyst for the book: the madeleine, a small sponge cake, the taste of which transforms him: “No sooner had the warm liquid mixed with the crumbs… The sight of the little madeleine had recalled nothing to my mind before I tasted it.” Today, I had a Proustian moment, although not as carefree.  

. No, I don’t hang out with discarded crucifixes, portraits of Protestant bigwigs from long ago or aged Torah scrolls. Instead, like the Christians in the catacombs, I gather with other fallen people who are trying to recover their lives. Luckily, these fellow sufferers are carriers of wisdom, always pithy and sometimes funny. Over the years, I’ve collected some of that wisdom, and would like to offer it now.

I don’t mean it’s unlikely I’ve been working that long, for I suspect some of you see me as a great-grandfatherly figure, a doddering old fool who’s lucky not to have oatmeal on his chin and his address pinned to his windbreaker in case he wanders away. No, it’s the newspaper reporter business you may find unlikely.

One of my favoritest of favorite days, though, comes next Saturday. Hope for New Hampshire Recovery’s annual Recovery Festival is at Arms Park September 30 from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Arms Park is a new and much, much larger space than Veterans Park, the festival’s previous site. Taking up space about two-thirds the size of a football field, the festival has grown from a trade show for businesses in the treatment-recovery industrial complex to become a genuine gathering of the recovery tribe. 

The world is filled with folks who are very smart, but who accomplish little, people who are very strong, yet move little, and humans who are very charismatic, but change little.  I honestly believe, and believe it with every fiber of my being, that attitude accomplishes more than ability.

As I was writing the above, sitting at a table at the front of Hope, the place where members congregate for cards or chess or conversation, a woman I’ll call Carol sat down next to me. I greeted her with some sort of jackassery, and Carol looked into my face, hers slowly melting. On the verge of tears, she told me she hurt. Clearly, this wasn’t a headache or an ingrown toenail. I asked her if she wanted to walk down to my office so we could talk in private. She nodded.

I needed peers, not professionals. I needed to be surrounded by folks who knew and understood me almost instantly—and who still seemed to like me. I did not need a DSM diagnosis of Alcohol Use Disorder. I did not need to explain myself to someone who’d never been within a thousand psychic miles of me. I needed recovery, and recovery was all around me.

Two days ago, I lost a friend to overdose.  That’s a sentence I could have written dozens times over my time at Hope Recovery. I could also write of the thousand or so people I’ve met here who are still in recovery. They go to meetings, work a program of some kind and stay away from drugs and alcohol. Still, the losses mount and my heart gets broken.