The Unofficial Insider Idiot’s Guide for Dummies to the Hope Recovery Festival

read more…: The Unofficial Insider Idiot’s Guide for Dummies to the Hope Recovery Festival

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!

Sept. 26: Airplane glue is no madeleine

read more…: Sept. 26: Airplane glue is no madeleine

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.  

September 25: Catacomb Wisdom

read more…: September 25: Catacomb Wisdom

. 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.

September 24: Keith Howard, reporting all the recovery news that’s fit to print

read more…: September 24: Keith Howard, reporting all the recovery news that’s fit to print

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.

September 23: One of my favoritest days of the year

read more…: September 23: One of my favoritest days of the year

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. 

September 22: Leaving denial aisle

read more…: September 22: Leaving denial aisle

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.

Sept. 21: A few thoughts about a few of the things Hope Recovery does

read more…: Sept. 21: A few thoughts about a few of the things Hope Recovery does

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.

September 20: Eyeball-to-eyeball recovery

read more…: September 20: Eyeball-to-eyeball recovery

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.

Sept. 19: There are many pathways to recovery – and only one proven solution

read more…: Sept. 19: There are many pathways to recovery – and only one proven solution

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.

Support Ink Link