Gangs to Grace: Rico’s Tale of Hope

Gerald Rodriguez, also known as Rico, sharing his compelling journey from a life of gang involvement and incarceration to sobriety and self-redemption. Rico recounts his tumultuous past, including his early exposure to sexual abuse, substance addiction, and the tragic loss of his twin brother. He discusses the challenges of re-entering society, the importance of emotional honesty, and the transformative power of asking for help. Rico highlights the supportive role of his community, Shell, and the unwavering support of his wife and family.

 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, everybody, it's Cena McFarland. Welcome to the SINO Show.

(00:02):
I'm your host, Cina McFarlane. My guest today is my
good buddy, Gerald Rodriguez aka Rego, now Rico. He's got
a great story and I'm excited to share it with you.
Rico is an ex con, ex gang member who found
sobriety here at shell in a place that used to

(00:24):
rob this place. We're gonna get into that story, Okay,
We're gonna talk about how do you not go back
to the gang life. I'm gonna talk about that, the
devastating loss of his twin brother, for giving sexual abuse
and trauma, Okay, in the power of family and healing,
and why sobriety is so impactful in his life right now.
It's gonna be an incredible episode. I'm very excited to

(00:45):
share this with you. Thanks for joining us. How did
a guy who has been in gangs since he was twelve,
who spent his life in prison, how on the fuck
did you change what happened?

Speaker 2 (00:56):
He was shot in the throat, in the head, I
was shot in the base and in the he died instantly.

Speaker 1 (01:01):
Then you read the letter to me?

Speaker 2 (01:03):
Yeah, I kind of sobbed the letter to you, I just.

Speaker 1 (01:05):
Saw you as a fellow brother sufferer.

Speaker 2 (01:07):
Nothing's going to break me.

Speaker 1 (01:13):
Brother. You have a very interesting history in this building. Yes,
so A lot of people don't know. Before it was
shell for many many years, it was the More Brothers.
It was a very famous Mexican you know Delhi.

Speaker 2 (01:26):
This was the Samara Brothers meat market. Yeah, you know,
and it was one of my uh pit stops to
make some easy money. You know. They used to have
their display out here with all their meat and stuff.
I used to come around through the back break into
the place and load up my you know, one of
those rubber meat trash cans, you know, and load it
up and take it to the neighborhood and start peddling

(01:49):
it whether you go.

Speaker 1 (01:49):
You're like a modern day Robin Hood. And when if
you remember when I when I got to know you
a little bit, I said, how's the fil to come
through the front door?

Speaker 2 (01:57):
Yeah, that was a whole different experience, a whole different
through the front door. It was always you know, late
at night through the back, you know, in and out.
I think we should.

Speaker 1 (02:05):
Probably start at the beginning of our relationship and our
beloved Bobby Luna brought you into the room, brought you
here right, Let's talk about what was happening before then,
Jess had.

Speaker 2 (02:16):
Gotten released from prison, like for the one hundredth time,
Bobby had called me, and I was actually contemplating getting
going to the person that that stays in the back
house that we rent to. I was actually going to
looking to see who was there because I was gonna
cop some dope from him. And Bobby called. So when
he called me and he asked me, Hey, what are

(02:38):
you doing? I responded like I was doing nothing. So,
you know, I didn't want to tell him what exactly
what was on my mind. But I told him when
I was doing doing nothing, And he says, hey, would
you like to go to a meeting? And I said sure,
why not? You know, And so in my mind I'm thinking, like, well,
it'd be great to go to a meeting. I could
get the parole officer off my back. He sees that
I'm going to a meeting if I like it, you know.

Speaker 1 (03:01):
You're just running game and hustle. Still, yeah, I didn't
want to get sober you No, no, I.

Speaker 2 (03:05):
No, I had no intentions. That was not That was
the furthest thing from my mind.

Speaker 1 (03:08):
You gave me the best gift in the world. And
I want to talk about if you're comfortable talking about
what happened to you as a young kid.

Speaker 2 (03:15):
See that that that right there. I just wanted to
make it clear that that's something I never talked to
about till last year, fifty seven years carrying shame around, shame,
and I felt guilty. I was embarrassed. And it wasn't
til last year's, you know, until you were able to
shed light on something that you said to me that

(03:35):
you need to bring everything out. And if I was
going to change, and if I was going to do
anything this time around, I might as want to get
real and be real with myself. So I did so.
I told you something I never told anybody, you know.
I told you that as far as I can remember,
at the age of five, I was being sexually abused
by my mother and father. I didn't really like understand

(03:57):
too much of what, you know, what was going on.
I just know that as it went on that I
wanted out of the house. Like my parents would come
in the house. If they were coming into the house,
I'd find a room to go, another room to go, in.
I took to the streets at an early age, wanting
to be out of the house. I mean, that's I

(04:17):
can remember hitting the streets like around Ladies nine ten,
you know, and joining a gang. You know, if we
were going to survive on the streets, we had to
have some kind of like a community out there, so
to speak. And I never said nothing because I didn't
being a gang member and saying you've gotten sexually abused
and all that, you know, I don't think that would

(04:37):
upset too well with it. And nah, you know, and
you want to make this kind of image of yourself
of being hardcore and you know, tough as nails, you know.
So I never spoke of it. I never said anything.
And I don't even even know if my twin brother
that was happening with him. I just I never said nothing,
you know. And it was a dark secret. It's a secret.

(04:59):
And I understand down when they say you can harbor secrets,
they'll take you out every time, right, And I think
that's why, you know, I'm really like, you know, graining
momentum in my sobriety is because I don't hold secrets.
I call it garbage, you know, I don't carry that
around with me anymore. You know, I don't feel the
shame no more. You know, like you have that sign

(05:21):
on the door, we leave it out there. I'm not
ashamed of what happened to me anymore. Is just it was,
like I was saying that, it's just was the cards
that I was dealt in life.

Speaker 1 (05:33):
And that was probably one of the best days of
my life talking about that with you.

Speaker 2 (05:38):
It was for me. I didn't just didn't know it yet.
I mean I felt still. I felt so like I'm exposed. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (05:45):
And the thing that's very important that we do here
is we talk about it. And it's very important to
find one person in your life to tell the truth to.
You don't need twenty one person that you feel safe
with in the world. And we have a belief here.
It's shame on them for treating us that way. Shame
on us for staying that way. And you still love

(06:06):
your parents.

Speaker 2 (06:07):
Yeah, you know, and I gave them. Yes, I had
a hard time with that, and I I would get
mad at myself because still seeking their approval and still
wanting the out of boys out of them. After that,
it was hard now that I'm grown up, And then
and It's like I didn't need their approval. I didn't.
I didn't create this. They did. But you know it

(06:29):
was something I had to sort out, you know, within myself,
you know. But I'm at peace with myself. I'm at
peace with my parents now, even though they're not around.
And yeah, you know, but you know, and I wake
up and I know tomorrow is going to be a
better day than yesterday.

Speaker 1 (06:44):
And you being so honest and romal right now is
going to help a lot of people tell the truth, brother,
And I thank you for that. What really made you
join a gag?

Speaker 2 (06:53):
Being out there at a young age, exposed and you
know what, it's a sense of being like part of
I wasn't getting that at home. You know how you
think of home as like safe heaven. It was the
opposite for me. I had to be out of there,
you know, I mean what was taking place. I didn't
want to be at home and then joining a gang
and you know, being a bunch of guys, you know,

(07:17):
your age and stuff and running the streets as it
made me feel like at home. I fout that, you know,
like this is it? And I worked hard. I worked
hard being a gang member, you know, doin everything you
know that was asked to me or you know, going
beyond the call.

Speaker 1 (07:35):
It was important for you to get the respect of
the older gang members. Yes, they became essentially your fathers
and uncles, and right.

Speaker 2 (07:42):
When you do out there on the streets and stuff,
you're like, Okay, he's not one to be messed with,
you know, right because like anybody else, they'll you'll be
taking advantage. You'll seen as that. But they called me
like a knucklehead because I wouldn't listen to nobody. But
they didn't. I don't know if they I had things
going on inside me that was like beyond you know,

(08:04):
I mean like just the gang. It went way deeper
than that, with the sexual abuse on my brother dying
and stuff. You know, I had things going on in
my thinking was not not logical.

Speaker 1 (08:19):
I want to talk about the work you did around
your brother. Let's can you give us a little backstory
about your history with your brother. What happened please?

Speaker 2 (08:28):
The summer of eighty one, my twin brother, Harold Rodriguez,
we were coming from a party from Lenox. It must
have been around close to midnight or maybe just a
little bit after. We went to the neighborhood park just
wait for the rest of our friends to meet there.
And as we were waiting, we were the first one

(08:49):
to arrive at the park, a car came by and
opened fire on us, killing my twin brother instantly. He
was shot in the throat, in the head. I was
shot in the face and in the back. He died instantly,
you know, of course I didn't know that at them
at that moment, but later I was. I found out
when I was in the hospital because the bullets that
had me had punctured my lungs cracked a couple of ribs,

(09:13):
so I was in the bullets that hit me in
the face. I was messed up pretty bad. So people
were led me to believe that he was still alive
and that he was okay. I think they did it
more or less so that I probably wouldn't worry or
recuperate a little bit and in a good way. But
he died instantly at the scene.

Speaker 1 (09:34):
Now what went through you, buddy, when you realized he
was no longer.

Speaker 2 (09:37):
Here being a twin is I don't know if you
can probably relate to this, but it's like part of
me died too. When I buried my brother I buried
half of me and still hard for me to talk
about it because it still hurts and it probably always
will hurt. But it was something that I couldn't cope with.

(09:58):
But I have fifteen with it. I know, fourteen, fifteen
years old, I didn't know there was resources, but I
refused it. You know, it wouldn't look good being a
gang member, you know, I mean getting psychological help and
stuff like that, no way, you know, So I refused
all that when I was in the hospital, and you know,
in my mind, I just I resorted to what I knew,

(10:19):
running the streets hard, you know, and getting high.

Speaker 1 (10:23):
And that that created a fire inside you didn't a resentment.

Speaker 2 (10:28):
Towards everything I had. You know, again, I would say,
at fifteen, you know, you don't think things out. And
I did a lot of things that I'm ashamed of,
and you know that I'm not proud of. But I
was the way I was dealing with it. I had
to let off my steam. I was a fifteen year
old with you know, on fire. I was a time
bomb ticking.

Speaker 1 (10:47):
Let's talk about the work that we did here to
release you from that and to have a different kind
of relationship with your brother.

Speaker 2 (10:53):
It sounded simple when you had told me, Okay, you're
gonna have to write a letter to your twin brother
and letting them know about everything how you feel and
what's going on with you, and that I don't know.
I cried, and I cried some more. I'd get a
line down and cry some more. It was like bringing

(11:14):
up old feelings that I've worked so hard all my
life to push down and then bringing them up again.
It was really hard. I kind of caught me off guard.
I didn't expect that, you know, I didn't think that
was part of sobriety before me.

Speaker 1 (11:26):
But you know, you were not willing to do it.

Speaker 2 (11:29):
I had no Yeah, well yeah, it was like it
didn't make sense to me. Why would I want to
bring up something that I pushed so hard all my
life down? But honestly, I was saying the best thing
in my life that's ever happened, you know.

Speaker 1 (11:41):
And then you read the letter to me.

Speaker 2 (11:43):
Yeah, I kind of sobbed the letter to you.

Speaker 1 (11:45):
It was beautiful. And then what was the next thing
that we did?

Speaker 2 (11:49):
And when you thought it, I thought it was all over.
And then I thought that I went. I thought that
too was I had to get in my brother's shoes
and write a letter to myself, you know what I mean.
And that was probably even more disappointing because I had
to write the things that I was doing and the

(12:09):
way from his view, and I know he would never
have wanted me to be that way or to be
hurting that much, and you know, to have my life
fipped over and be a different person that who I
really wasn't, you know, because I always thought that I
had some decencym me. But you know, with those things
that that happened to me, I forgot about the decent

(12:32):
cym me. You know, I thought about the person that
who I was. I was becoming a bitter, angry person.
Than writing that letter from him, he would have never
want me to go through all that.

Speaker 1 (12:43):
Tell everybody what he wrote back to you. You take
your time, make your time, buddy.

Speaker 2 (12:52):
Yeah he will. Yeah, the things that I was doing,
he would never wanted me to do inflict the pain
that I was doing to other people and being that
person that you know was a cold heartless person. He didn't.
I know, he wouldn't want me to do that. And

(13:14):
so writing that and realizing it, and it just realized
that what I was doing to other people, and then
how the how cold herded I was becoming, you know,
And today I really really carry that with me. I
don't have to be that person. You know.

Speaker 1 (13:31):
He told you that he loved you.

Speaker 2 (13:32):
Yeah, and that he loved me. And I know he
loves men because I never stopped loving him, even though
he's not you know, physically here, but he's in my
heart and in my mind, you know. And I love
talking about him with people that remember him and stuff.
And I just love talking to him because I don't
want to ever think that he's forgotten, because he's not.

Speaker 1 (13:52):
How old were you when your first experimented with drugs
and alcohol?

Speaker 2 (13:55):
I would have to say at the age of maybe eight. See,
my dad was a a real heavy alcoholic. He used
to leave his beer bottles in his bottles laying around
and so it was me and my my my twin Harold.
You know, our job was to pick up all his
bottles and take them out to the trash, you know,
And there was some of those bottles weren't empty, but

(14:17):
we made sure they were empty. At that's what we
did do. And that's where where my drinking started, you know,
and it just progressed and then it started like you know,
from drinking and went to the drugs, you know, and
that's what you know, you're out there and hanging out.

Speaker 1 (14:32):
How sure would you say the progression last year whening
before it was fun, it was, it was great, hang
out the beach, get high, fuck off, til became a
habit and you had to have it and was running
your life.

Speaker 2 (14:45):
Do you remember, Yeah, I do kind of remember, like
maybe in my early twenties when I started noticing, okay,
this is not this is an addiction. But yet then
I'm still trying to deal with what's going on inside me.
But you know, like and that was the solution, covering up,
you know, doing the drugs. I still I used to

(15:09):
think that like it would go away. It did go away,
but it was only temporary.

Speaker 1 (15:14):
So you graduated some very serious like hallucinogenic dugs and
we're doing like PCP.

Speaker 2 (15:20):
Oh absolutely, that's the night that I got shot and
my twin brother got killed. I was on PCP.

Speaker 1 (15:28):
Yeah, and I think it's you've been shot? How many times.

Speaker 2 (15:31):
I've been shot? Three different occasions, and each time I've
been here twice or six times. On each three times
I've been hitting the head. You know what it is,
the magnet.

Speaker 1 (15:42):
Yeah, so obviously you're meant to be here, but three
pretty severe gun shots to your to your head, brother, huh.
You know, nobody does PCP because they love just to
be on PCP. Addicts, if they get really real about it, Okay,
especially addicts who've come kind of trauma.

Speaker 2 (15:58):
You do.

Speaker 1 (15:59):
They're drink for one reason, one reason only to shut
their fucking head up.

Speaker 2 (16:03):
Yeah. The voice, the what you hear in your minds, Yes.

Speaker 1 (16:06):
And it's just shut the fuck. It's not because I
just love PCP or whatever it is. It's just to
shut it down. And when we get sober, we have
to learn how to make peace with that. Because there's
physical sobriety and there's emotional sobriety. Because the brain doesn't
shut off all of a sudden. You get sober, and
that's what we're doing, the work on it, and that's
what you've been doing.

Speaker 2 (16:25):
Yeah, you know that emotional roller coaster riety. I didn't
have to deal with that because I was always high.
But when you, like you said, when you sober up,
now you have to there's different stages of sobriety that
you have to deal with, you know, besides just not
using the drugs and stuff, and you have all these
emotions built up and stuff, and I mean far as

(16:45):
like all of a sudden, you're watching a movie and
something sad and you start crying, you know what I mean.
But you're not crying because of the movie. You're just
crying because it was a trigger to let those emotions
out that you've been having bottled up so much. You know,
I used to be like a stone wall. I kind
of like pride to myself that nothing got to me.

(17:07):
You know, nothing could bother me. Nothing rather of my
cage women or the things that are being shot or something. Nothing.
I'd like to say, nothing's gonna break me. As long
as you didn't put your hands on me, you couldn't
get me to come out of my character. Right. But
that's not that's not so today, you know what I mean.
It's not that that was like make believe you know,

(17:30):
there's you know, that's like somebody walking around dead. Though
probably a.

Speaker 1 (17:33):
Lot of people want to know, did you struggle with
alcohol drugs in prison?

Speaker 2 (17:37):
You know, a heavy alcohol drinker. They used to make
pruno in prison.

Speaker 1 (17:41):
So explain that to everybody, not everybody knows.

Speaker 2 (17:44):
Okay, pruno is a manufactured alcohol, but they do it
with fruits. They four men on me. It becomes you know,
when four men and it starts to become a turns
what you're saying, It becomes an alcohol substance, you know,
And yeah, I did. You was drinking a lot in there.
It was convenient, inexpensive. But you know, honestly, because I

(18:08):
thought that drugs was my hard drugs were my primary
I never, really, until I came to the room, recognized
that alcohol was part of my disease. You know. I
didn't want to admit to it because I was always
putting the harder substance first, you know, and if I
get around to our drink, but I always got around

(18:29):
to it. I always got around to drinking. But so
they all played hand in hand. But because of.

Speaker 1 (18:34):
Who you were, right, and you could get access to
whatever you want. But you made a constianus decision to
stay off certain things in prison.

Speaker 2 (18:41):
Yeah I didn't. I stayed off the hard drugs. I
never wanted to be that guy owing money getting beat
up because he couldn't make make the payment on whatever
drugs that he got. Says I kind of pair did
pretty good in that area.

Speaker 1 (18:57):
So let's walk everybody through coming here for the first
time in our meeting.

Speaker 2 (19:02):
What happened actually, you know, to be honest, I was
scared to death, you know, being going to an AA meeting,
like for some reason, it just like ittimidated me. You know,
it's because it's something I've never done. So I actually
stepped through the doors and there you were, you know,
and when I went to greet you with the handshake,
you said it was all right if I give you

(19:24):
a hug, and me, particularly I'm a hugging person, I
kind of felt the love there, you know, and I
really felt, okay, well maybe there might be something here.
You know. The hug with the embrace that you had
given me was real. I noticed that right away from
the beginning.

Speaker 1 (19:39):
You felt the truth in that.

Speaker 2 (19:40):
Yes, absolutely, because.

Speaker 1 (19:42):
What SHELL is about, and what I've learned from great
teachers over my life, is that is we meet people
where they're at, and as you know, we have a
sign on the door, we don't do shame here, right,
And I just saw you as a fellow brother sufferer,
and you felt a love and care for you. I
also saw something very special in you. You've spent the
majority of your life prison?

Speaker 2 (20:01):
Yeah, unfortunately, Yeah that.

Speaker 1 (20:03):
Was because how old are you, know, Rico, I'm.

Speaker 2 (20:06):
Fifty eight years old.

Speaker 1 (20:07):
Fifty eight years old, and you've been sober? How long? Now?

Speaker 2 (20:11):
Fifteen months?

Speaker 1 (20:12):
Okay? People are gonna want to know. Okay, how did
a guy who has been in gangs since he was twelve,
I think, who spent his life in prison? How on
the fuck did you change?

Speaker 2 (20:24):
What happened?

Speaker 1 (20:26):
Why are you not? I always say I've joined a
different gang, but let's walk through that.

Speaker 2 (20:30):
I can't pinpoint exactly what it was that really was
the changing point in my life, but I know that
I had to get real with myself. I know that
I had to change something, and I think that started
when you started working with me, and I learned that
I needed to clean, you know, clean out the closet

(20:50):
so so to speak. Right.

Speaker 1 (20:52):
One of the things that you did so beautifully that
all people in recovery and life need to do is
you said the magic were I need help.

Speaker 2 (21:00):
Nop absolutely, And I don't know.

Speaker 1 (21:03):
Yeah, And tough guys like you don't ask for help.
You do it on your own. So what made you
vulnerable enough to say I'm fucking scared. I need help.

Speaker 2 (21:11):
I was tired, probably being tired of just this vicious
cycle that I was living. You know, all my kids
grew up without me. You know, I'm grateful that they
still want me in their lives, but the majority I
was not in their lives, just watching life pass me up.
You know, my wife had said something to me, I

(21:34):
kind of like apologize for my you know, my history
of being in prison. I'm being away for her so
much and stuff. And she told me, you know what,
don't be sorry for me. I'm sorry for you because
you missed out on everything. And I think those words
there made a real big impact on me, and I
had to really realize that I'm missing out on life.
I'm missing out on the things that I say that

(21:56):
I'm important, that are important to me. But my actions
showed that it was different though.

Speaker 1 (22:00):
You've told me, and this is the definition of insanity.
You knew that when you got out, most likely you'd
be going back. You would be drinking, start a life,
and you knew you'd go back, but yet you kept going.

Speaker 2 (22:11):
That's the insanity of And you know, I would like
to say that, oh, it might have been drugs, but
when I came out. I wasn't strung out, but I
consciously made that choice, knowing that either I was going
to end up back in prison, I was going to
be strung out on the streets, or I was going
to die. And still I made that choice to go

(22:32):
ahead and do that, you know. And I didn't really
realize that I was making that choice and throwing everything
away or anything that possibly could become of anything. I
never gave myself a chance because that's all I knew.
I was so set to doing those things that it
just became like second nature to me.

Speaker 1 (22:52):
I think it's important for everybody to understand, you know,
your great analogy of switching gang, sticking with winners. Yeah,
talk about the community you found here, talk about the outreach,
talk about the necessity of having a tribe.

Speaker 2 (23:05):
When it came to like surrendering, and it was a
big change because I knew that I couldn't have two masters.
I couldn't go to the gang and be real for
real here and Shell. You know them too, that they
just don't mix. There's just they're totally opposite. So giving up,
like you know, running the streets was a big thing.

(23:27):
And I found in my mind that I would be
alone and stuff, which was furthest from the truth, because
coming to Shell and meeting a set of guys with
the common goal was really like inspirational for me. I said, Okay,
I won't be alone, and then I like these people
that I call my community now is that they just

(23:48):
wanted to be my friendship for me, not because I
had the sack or I was that person running the
streets with a lot of cloud. You know. They were
really interested in who I was, you know what I mean,
not the person who I made up, you know, because
all that is just made up, you know, it's not
it's not real, you know, So that, you know, converting

(24:10):
over and doing this was really that was a game
changer for me. Really I had I wasn't all alone,
you know. I wasn't that scared guy that had to
do crazy things to ward people up. I was able
to be myself beautiful. That was important.

Speaker 1 (24:25):
This is going to be good for listener. Let's talk
about your wife, Darling.

Speaker 2 (24:29):
Yes, love that woman.

Speaker 1 (24:31):
Yeah, yeah, she never gave up on you.

Speaker 2 (24:33):
No been married thirty three years.

Speaker 1 (24:35):
And how many kids do you have? We have four
kids and how many grandchildren?

Speaker 2 (24:41):
About six seven grandchildren?

Speaker 1 (24:44):
And why don't you think she gave up on you?

Speaker 2 (24:46):
This is what she would always say. You know, I
see something in you, even though if you don't see it.
I know that there's a decent, good person inside there.
And I guess because she's had her moments seeing that
person and stuff. But you know, and with her that,
you know, she's just a strong will person, you know,
a loving person. She's kind hearted, you know, and she

(25:10):
put up with all my crap, all the things that
I put her through, and you know, she's still here today.
And I'm you know, and I'm kind of fortunate because
now that things that are like, you know, I've cleaned
up and my life is you know, totally different. And
you know, I'm a good grandparent. I know that cause
my kids, my grandchildren following me around and the way
my kids are coming around me too that you know,

(25:32):
those are just signs to tell you that they want
to be around you is because you're doing the right
things and stuff like that. And they still see something
in me. So you know, she's always seeing those things
in there. And now I'm grateful that she's able to
see me at my best right now. She trusts you, now,
Oh absolutely yeah, and.

Speaker 1 (25:50):
That wasn't that didn't happen in the beginning. When we
first started.

Speaker 2 (25:53):
I would tell you this that she would even say, like,
you know, or she would grab my phone and go
through it. You know. She would doubt, like why you
need to go to meetings and stuff. She didn't understand though,
and at the time I didn't really understand either. So
I'm just taking I'm going through a step by step,
you know, and I'm learning as I was going along too.

(26:15):
And but yeah, that wasn't the cases, you know, but
now it's totally different.

Speaker 1 (26:21):
Yeah, so this is one of the most beautiful things.
I was just good for people in recovery because addicts
are so selfish and they want instant forgiveness, instant like
you know, I'm sorry, I've been gone for thirty nine
years in prison. But you know we're cool, right, let's
everything's cool. And I remember one time, maybe there about
three months of sobriety, and she was on something about

(26:42):
you and you were all pissed off, and I said, brother,
what do you expect? I mean, like, because what we
do and what's important the guys that wake up and
make things right, I say, put on the bulletproof jackets.
Take the fucking hits. Be a man, and you're living
amends is just to do the right thing and let
trust happen, okay, living immense Well, take the hits, okay,

(27:06):
and you guys have something really special. And she's my hero.
The moms are my heroes. She took care of your kids,
she still visited you in prison, she still sent the
Christmas cards, okay, and she provided for your family. And
that's a hero of my mind.

Speaker 2 (27:23):
Yeah, you know what it took me to humble myself into, like,
because when I did come out, I was like, I'm thinking, like, well,
I've been absent. Now it's like me meantime, like you know,
but I didn't realize that, you know that I had
all these years that I've had her life on hold,
and you know, all the packages and the money she

(27:43):
was sent and all her you know, extending herself as
much as she could to me and helping me, and
like you said, you know, the addict. They have a
different way of thinking. Honestly, because I think of myself
as pretty selfish and greedy and considerate. I'm still having
struggles with it, but I'm coming around though.

Speaker 1 (28:03):
Yeah, yes, you are talk to everybody about the first
time your son came to you and asked you for
help and guidance as his father.

Speaker 2 (28:11):
Really, oh, you know, being that I was absent so
much that he I think he's had other men as
role models in his life, you know, and that was
kind of hard. But it was a good thing though,
that he had on a role model. So when he
did come to me and did ask me, it was

(28:31):
like him being like born all over, so proud, you know,
I mean to have me back into his life and
him to think of me as enough to where he
really wants my seeking my advice or what I think.
So that was something special too. You know, it's like
him being a kid, you know, I see him as
kid asking me for advice and something, and that was

(28:52):
really it was grateful. I was so grateful for that
to happen, you know. It just made my heart warm. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (28:59):
So this is something that you and I have obviously
talked about and something that I believe if you want
to be free, if you want to be sober, if
you wake up, you have to put the light on everything, everything,
because the disease grows beautifully in silence.

Speaker 2 (29:16):
Yeah, and that's the only reason why because you had
said something to me like you imagine how many people
that we could help, And that right there is just
stood out because I've thought of just speaking about it.
It doesn't like even my story, it doesn't go beyond
something I dealt with. I don't I didn't think about
like a lot of people say, you're going to help
people out, you know, with your story. What you have

(29:37):
to share with people is you're going to reach people.
And that I'm just barely waking up to that and
it's just barely coming in and manifesting in my mind.
Maybe Okay, So when you told me that, I was
on board with that.

Speaker 1 (29:50):
So I want to talk about something. How we concluded
that session that day, our time together. And this is
a tradition that started in nineteen eighty seven when I
was twenty two years old and I had six months
of sobriety and there was a contract on my life
and the you know, the guys came out to kill me,
and they waited and they got nervous and they shot

(30:11):
my roommate. Thankfully you survived. But I literally sprinted to
the Scottsdale Valley Alano Club. My sponsor, Jay God bless him.
He used to run the Heroin Trade lower easide, Manhattan.
He's listening to me and call me down. He says,
are you ready to do the third step? And I
said yes. And the third step is what you and
I did together when we held hands. We got on

(30:34):
our knees right here, and we said that beautiful prayer together,
and the prayer goes God. I offered myself to THEE
to build with THEE and do it with me as
thou wilt relieve me of the bond yourself, that I
may better do. Thy will take away my difficulties, that
victory over them may bear witness those I'd help thy
love thy way of life, and I do. I will

(30:56):
always amen. And then a big smile came on your
face and I said, I love Hurico, and you said
I love you too.

Speaker 2 (31:04):
You know, yes, thank you for that, man, you know,
thank you. I've always been a God fearing person, even
though my actions or something really didn't show it. But
when you started praying with me, I said, that's right
up my alley. I said, okay. Then I felt really comfortable.
I've always felt that God's been present with me even
though but it's really really hard when you're trying to

(31:26):
serve two masters. You're trying to be a gang member
doing dope and doing crimes and stuff like that, and
then trying to believe in God at the same time.
Is just like it's contradicting, you know, and it's really confusing.
So when you were saying that, I said, Okay, you
know this is this is good. I always felt that
he's there, it's just that I tend to not call up.

Speaker 1 (31:47):
Yes, let's talk about that addiction as we see it
as a spiritual malady. As everybody knows here, I'm big
on a morning routine. We don't just kind of clumsily
go through the day, right, talk about your morning routine,
what you got going on, how you're getting centered, how
what you're doing.

Speaker 2 (32:04):
My morning routine, you know, if you think about it,
it's really simple. You know, even before I step out
of bed, you know, I do my well we could
call it original, but I say my prayers, you know
what I mean. I clean house in the morning, and
I do the same thing in the evening too when
I go to sleep, and I feel that it's very
important that you know, before I even get my day started,

(32:26):
that I get in touch with my higher power, you know,
because my thinking and my living life is so bad
that I have to have him, the Lord, you know,
guide me through my day. And that's what I do.
And it's a constant check in. You know. It's like
an addict when he feels like he has to drink
or something and he reaches out to a fellow member.

(32:49):
And that's what I have to constantly do, you know.
And my higher power, you know, is really like guiding
me sino. He's guiding me. And in the back of
my mind, if I have those and I keep those
in checking, I'm always using them. I can't lose, you know.
And that's been working for me. And that's what's the
most important, that that works. You know. I'm not trying

(33:11):
to fix it.

Speaker 1 (33:12):
And you never go off that routine, do you know?
And you love texting all the guys early in the morning.

Speaker 2 (33:16):
Absolutely, it's part of my morning. Yes, it's a tough
guy like you, Yeah, exactly. You know, it's honest.

Speaker 1 (33:23):
You know.

Speaker 2 (33:23):
It's just like you know, if I see you and
you and you walk past me and didn't say good
morning to me, I would think something was wrong, you know,
something was wrong with you that you didn't you greet me,
and so it's my way of greeting everybody in morning
and through another day.

Speaker 1 (33:38):
So this is interesting and I want the listeners to
hear this shell believe that you're going to stay sober
and do great things. Okay, But the LA Police Department
did not, the Paro Department did not, the district attorneys.
I was like, this guy's full of shit. And I
think how many times, four or five times did you
get pulled over? Including here? Talk what happened there?

Speaker 2 (34:01):
Yeah, it's even gone as bad as like well after
a morty meeting on it was. This was on a
Saturday here at Shalla. I stayed back to clean some
windows and while I was in the process of cleaning
these windows, they had undercovered detectives happened to, I guess
recognize me. I didn't see them because I had my
back turned. I was to the street cleaning the windows,

(34:23):
and they rode up on me full force, you know
what I mean, pulled me off my ladder, handcuffed me,
searched me seeing what car that I came in, and
they went through the car and stuff, and you know,
I guess in their mind like, yeah, this guy, we
got them now the reason for stopping me. They said
that they ran my name and that I had warrants.

(34:43):
But at the end they said, oh, it must have
been the computer. It was messing up that. You know,
I didn't have any warrants and stuff. But this happens
regularly when they see me.

Speaker 1 (34:54):
You know, it's you got pulled out and they pulled
everybody at your house.

Speaker 2 (34:57):
Yes, they have. They do probation search, which is they
pulled everybody out of the house and they go and
you know they're in there. I'm not in the house,
so I don't really actually if they're just standing there
or if they're actually searching, but they pull us all out,
and you know this it becomes like a probation check.
So they do it whatever it is. I guess it's random.

(35:19):
I would say, even like if I'm sitting out in
front of my house in the car, they have pulled
me and my wife out of the car and stuff.

Speaker 1 (35:25):
You know, well, what did I teach you about that?

Speaker 2 (35:27):
What you taught me is that if you don't have nothing,
you have nothing to worry about. And so it's like,
let them do their thing what they have to do,
and let them go about their business and eventually they'll
see that you know that I am doing what I'm
supposed to do.

Speaker 1 (35:41):
And if you don't have a bag of dope on you,
you don't have a gun on you. Did nothing. They
can't right, right, And one day they're gonna say, we
don't need to go. He's good. A matter of fact,
he's helping a lot of people. People just don't believe
that a guy like you can turn it around, right.

Speaker 2 (35:58):
And you know when I when they have me handcuffed
and stuff, and the way I speak to him is
like there's no hostility, no animosity, toys and they got
a job to do. Okay, that's fine. It may be
a little bit uncomfortable, you know what I mean. It's
embarrassing because they do it out in front of the
house and stuff, and my neighbors, you know, they see
all this. But other than that, you know, I don't

(36:21):
as they got a job to then eventually they will.

Speaker 1 (36:24):
And the thing that we talk about here is we
take responsible for actions for many years you did this.
This comes with the territory, right, it does, you know.

Speaker 2 (36:30):
And that's why I say I can't be mad at them,
because you know, they only know me as one way,
you know that person that was causing havoc on the streets.

Speaker 1 (36:39):
So a lot of people believe in you, and one
of our persons that do is the fame criminal defense
attorney Sean Hawley.

Speaker 2 (36:47):
Beautiful. She has such a beautiful to day, I mean.

Speaker 1 (36:51):
And she took your case on because she believed in
you for free. She didn't want anything. And let's talk
about that day that what happened there, because things got
very funky there for a second.

Speaker 2 (37:00):
Right It was almost a turning point in my sobriety.
They had switched paroleicers on me and stuff, and when
I was calling my profser, she wasn't answering no more.
So this went on for about maybe three weeks. So
when I finally decided to call the main office, they
had the attitude like, well, you need to go into

(37:21):
the nearest police department and report, turn yourself in because
we have us upscounty. And I said them, well, if
you just talked to my parole officer, well she's no
longer here, so we can't talk to her. I said,
well you can look at the recordings. I left a
lot of recordings for her. They're not going to do
that I understand that they're like they're underpowered, they don't

(37:43):
have the manpower and stuff like that, and you know,
they're really swamped, so they just see me as a
person that's not reporting. So what happened is they put
a warrant out for my arrest and that's when Holly
came into the situations. She advised me not to that.
Under her advice, I said, okay, I won't. She said,
we'll go into the court together, and that's what we did.

(38:05):
We walked into the court together and she prevented from
me being arrested right there on the spot, which is
really unheard of if you're in a parole.

Speaker 1 (38:14):
Violet, they were going to rush you that day. That
was it, and you were to go back for a
long time.

Speaker 2 (38:18):
Yeah, going back, Yeah, and it's like starting all over again.
It just so happens that the probation that they assigned
from us to do the report that morning, well, she
happened to be as somebody who I would say that
was a god fearing woman. You know, she's definitely had

(38:39):
God in her life because the way she came up
to me and she approached me, first of all, she
hugged me and that's unusual for a probation officer.

Speaker 1 (38:49):
She didn't hug you right away. First off, she was
really careful. She was checking you out. I was like, oh,
we got a prom here, and Sean and I looked
at each other. She was lining you up and seeing
if you're real or not right. But you just stayed coold.
You answered her questions. And do you remember what she
said to you?

Speaker 2 (39:06):
Yes, she said you don't have to worry. He's up
he pointed. She pointed to this guy and says, he's
watching over you. You're protected. You're protecting the light around you. See. Yeah,
she did say, and I could see the light I
can And oh, man, yeah, that made my head spin.
It because the probation they're they're there, they're the opposite
where me as being somebody that's coming off of probation,

(39:30):
I'm on the other side. So for her to open
up like that and to talk to me in that way,
you know, she treated me like a human being, that's right.

Speaker 1 (39:38):
And then we were all kind of just like emotional.
And then you said, can I give you a hug?

Speaker 2 (39:43):
Yes, she gave me. She gave you a hug of hugs,
did she Yeah, she did. She gave me a warm,
embracing hug. And you know, and this is before we
went into court, and I knew I was going to
be all right.

Speaker 1 (39:53):
Yeah, and what did the judge say?

Speaker 2 (39:55):
Rico the judge, we're still a little nervous because still
we don't know what what's going on. And he came
into the court and wanted to read all the recommendations.
But not only that, when when he opened up, he goes,
I've never seen somebody come into this room with so
much support from who.

Speaker 1 (40:13):
Had the extensive background that you have. Yeah, he couldn't
believe it, he could. And then he broke his own
in amity. He says, he's a member of alan.

Speaker 2 (40:20):
On, Yes, and that was that was mind blowing too.
He said, like as a member too, you know what
I mean, I know what it is. He commended me
on doing the good work that I had been doing.
He knew that it was the probation's mess up and
he really felt that, you know, I mean, his hands
were tired with nothing to do. So he just told me,
keep doing what you're doing. I'll see you back here

(40:43):
and this time and you will. He told me that
you'll be all right. You're gonna do all right, yeaheah.
For a judge to say that, you know, I mean,
it's really like, you know, mind blowing it was.

Speaker 1 (40:54):
And Sean Holly, who's worked on you know, work with
the biggest celebrities in the world on all kinds of
cases and truly one of the best lawyers out there, sweetheart. Yeah,
and she said, thank you for reminding me why I
became a lawyer. Yes, oh man, that's how we left.

Speaker 2 (41:08):
Yes, And she said that, you know, it was like
the highlight of her year. Yeah, you know, the highlight
of her year were doing my case. And that felt
so great, you know, coming from you know, a lawyer
like that, you know, I mean, so down to earth.

Speaker 1 (41:24):
It's not like you came here and got sober and
everything overnight magically. Because Venice is Venice still, yes, and
Venice didn't need a change. Rico needed a change. And
that's something that's very important. I try to teach people, Okay,
the rule doesn't need to change.

Speaker 2 (41:40):
I do.

Speaker 1 (41:41):
The only person I suffer from is Cena McFarlane. The
only person you suffered and you got you understood that.

Speaker 2 (41:47):
Right away from the beginning.

Speaker 1 (41:49):
Because it's still going on all the stuff's going on.
You just made a decision to walk.

Speaker 2 (41:53):
Straight home and make better choices.

Speaker 1 (41:54):
And make better choices and ask for help.

Speaker 2 (41:57):
And I shared this a lot too. Is like what
I learned was right from the beginning, was that I
didn't have to do this alone. When you have too
much pride and you don't ask for help, your subject
to go back to whatever you were doing. Early on
in my sobriety, that I've learned that I didn't have
to do this alone and ask you for help. Was

(42:17):
it just the greatest thing ever. It's been working and
still working to this day. I don't have all the
answers and never will, but I can tell you that
that when I don't know something, I could just pick
up the phone and there's somebody out there in my
all of my community that may have.

Speaker 1 (42:36):
The answer, right, and you always ask for help always
never hang on to it.

Speaker 2 (42:40):
No, never hang on to it.

Speaker 1 (42:41):
And just to be clear, it's just like you know,
there's a lot of characters that roam around here in Venice, okay,
and you know sometimes those guys will roll up on
you and you've made the decision just to move on. Yeah,
not easy, brother Rico, No.

Speaker 2 (42:56):
Because when you're used to it. I got fifty something
years of bad habits, right like you said, they're not
going to change overnight, you know. And not everything my
sobriety that has this up and the downs and stuff,
but there's more ups. And I've always I refer to
back to being in prison or being out here. And
it's a no brainer.

Speaker 1 (43:16):
But explain to the good folks out there what Shell
is to you and what Shell means to you.

Speaker 2 (43:21):
Shell it's my life rap. I'letn say it is my
life raft, you know. And and like I said, the
people will reach out to you, but you have to
go to grab it. It's just like a life wrap.
You know. They could throw it out to you, but
if you don't grab it, that life rap think going
to do you no good. So Shell is is where
I keep myself in tuned. Every Wednesday, sometimes on Thursdays

(43:47):
and Saturdays, I get tuned up to deal with my
weekly you know, whatever arises. Knowing that and then even
in my mind that I've always no matter how bad
my day is, good, I got shot to go back
to it off my steam and get it all back
tuned up again and ready for the next day. And
it's been working, and it works. It's not that it's

(44:08):
been working, it works.

Speaker 1 (44:11):
I love you come in with your big smile and
you squeeze me and you hug me so damn hard
that I think I've broken a few ribs. That's just
a love, that's just pure love. Would you say that
it's a safe place to be unsafe?

Speaker 2 (44:22):
Oh, yes, I'm I'm proof of that, right. Some things
that I've exposed that I would never have done in
my life. If you're in your back of telling me
I would say the things that I say now and
that I'd be doing this, I would tell you were crazy,
not me, right. You know, that's how much shell is.
Shell is where you could come and let out, blow

(44:44):
off your steam and let the lead the shame at
the door, and you know, and and and you're safe.
And it don't go beyond that door. It stays within,
you know. And that's it speaks for itself, you know,
just knowing that in your mind that you can go
there that and be protected. You know, there's love here,
lots of love.

Speaker 1 (45:03):
You know, there's a lot of love here. And we
also know when to kick a brother in the ass too.

Speaker 2 (45:07):
Right, it comes It's like you have to have that
tough love too, though, because some guys are not gonna
get it as quick as others. Sometimes that everybody has
to have their own path.

Speaker 1 (45:19):
Yeah, everybody has to have their own path. So I'd
like to celebrate some of the big highlights I've enjoyed
with you, and then I'll let you throw in a few. Okay,
I got maybe three or four. One. You said, you know,
when you're in prison, Christmas came, you always wanted one
of those goofy sweaters.

Speaker 2 (45:37):
Yeah, that's true, and you know what it was year
after year. I don't know. Maybe my timing always seemed
to be locked up around Christmas. And maybe that's because
you're locked up, you think that. But you know, so
I used to go through the magazines and you always
see these like Little Christmas a guy and his wife,
and the guy would have that, you know, that ugly sweater,

(45:58):
you know. I mean, I didn't think they were ugly
at the time. I just learned that they call them
ugly sweaters this year, but I wanted one for the
long It's so bad I and now I have like
two or three of them. I said that shared that
in there in a meeting and you would be surprised.
Guys were telling me what size are you? And they
have foughten me. You got the sweater?

Speaker 1 (46:20):
Who was who was it?

Speaker 2 (46:21):
Who was on the grin?

Speaker 1 (46:22):
The grinch was on it? Yeah, yeah, yeah, will fareholl right, yeah,
And you did not want to take that thing?

Speaker 2 (46:28):
No, I wore. I were all the way to like
New Year's you know. Yeah, it was pretty cool.

Speaker 1 (46:33):
And you told the story recently of being at your
home here where you're opening the doors and and Darlene's like,
what the hell are you doing? Right?

Speaker 2 (46:43):
Yeah, that and it just happened. I was opening and
closing the door, opening and closing the door. And you know,
first you got to understand that when you're in prison,
you have no control over the doors. They're they're done
by their switches that the control booth has. So when
you want your door open, you have to flag down
to them and to get the door open and stuff

(47:04):
or and they closed. So when I was opening and
closing the door, and to me, it was a sense
of freedom. Look at I could open and close the door,
open the door. Like the other day, I was watching
from I was looking out my window and I seen
the wind blowing, and I went out there to fill it.
Because in prison you can only look at you don't
get that luxury. And on the yard prison here, you

(47:27):
don't have no grass. So I took my shoes off
one day and let the grass go between my feet,
you know, and take a lot those things like little
things like that for granted, you know, which we often do.
But I'm glad that that I'm thinking about those things
and they're coming to mind, and and I want to
experience being able to, you know, enjoy those things. You know.

(47:52):
Incarceration took so much all my life, you know, I
gave them so much of my life. Now I'm slowly
taking things back, you know, and I'm starting tom starting
to live, I really knowing how to live, you know.

Speaker 1 (48:09):
And then you know, my favorite, probably anybody that knows
me knows my love of the ocean.

Speaker 2 (48:15):
Ocean at the beach, and I swim every day.

Speaker 1 (48:17):
And I said, you ready to get in, and you yeah,
I watched you get in for the first time. I
forget it. How many years did you say?

Speaker 2 (48:24):
It was? Twenty odd years. I don't even probably even longer,
but it was.

Speaker 1 (48:28):
And I grew up here that you grew up in
the beach here man, Yeah.

Speaker 2 (48:31):
Hanging out, you know, being a gang member, we didn't
really mess with the beach. We stood in the oak
Wood area. So that's why I was like, my friends
weren't there. The gang wasn't on the beach, they were
inside something. Yeah, it's been so long. I remember just
jumping in the ocean and stuff. And it's funny because
I seen videos of me jumping in It was it
was like if I was a little kid, but it

(48:51):
didn't feel It felt like I was just like I
was back in the days when the last time I
was in the in the ocean.

Speaker 1 (48:58):
And you gave me the gift that I get to
have with people sometimes when they do the work. Yeah,
and they enjoy something, whether it's the grass on their
feet or the doors opening. I see them return back
to their child when they were safe in the world. Yeah,
And I saw your little boy and you just were
you were free, man, and that was beautiful, because that's

(49:21):
why we're here to do the work. We're here to
get back to our original settings before the world was
scary and we had bad fingerprints on us. And that's
the work we do here, man.

Speaker 2 (49:31):
But it's important. It's important to know that through all
good struggles there's going to be a payoff, but you
have to put the work in in order to reap
the benefits of enjoying life. You know. Unfortunately we have
the sickness in us and it will never go away.
But you know what, we can manage it if we
do the work. We could jerky every day. You know,

(49:53):
if you don't, we will be one of those persons
that got clean and then forgot where they came from
and forgot all the how to you know, stay sober,
and then they're back on the streets. And that's hard.
It's it's hard to see somebody who you tend to
grow very fond of, you know, and and you kind
of let you love them as a brother, and then

(50:14):
you hear that they went ahead and children.

Speaker 1 (50:17):
I think that's that's a good thing to talk about.
That's probably been your greatest struggle actually, and the guy
that you've been super close to that the darkness overtook them,
and how do you know, how do you say that
to people like that? Are you know, the people that
are struggling and they don't want to get what's your
advice to them?

Speaker 2 (50:32):
That's a whole different challenge. At first, you know, I
really wanted to, like maybe to get mad and rip
their head off. You know, why did you do that?
You know, you know what you're jeopardizing. And like I said,
through AA, you learn not to shoot your wounded, you know,
was one and stuff. And then you've got to remember,

(50:52):
it's not them, it's the addiction. It's the the drugs
that's really that's got a hold of them. And I
can relate to that because I was that was me,
you know, and I'm not better than anybody. So but
you have to put the work in if you're going
to do anything and really in progress and being sober,
you have to put the work in it and don't

(51:14):
stray away from it, not one moment, because it's that's
all it takes, that one thought in your mind, in
your back.

Speaker 1 (51:20):
We'd like to say the disease doesn't take a day off.
We can't.

Speaker 2 (51:23):
We yeah, we can't.

Speaker 1 (51:26):
Yeah, but it's hard to see some of our brothers
that we've been close to that get taken out and
and like you said, beautifully it's their path. We can't
save anybody here.

Speaker 2 (51:36):
We just got to showing the message.

Speaker 1 (51:37):
Yet we can't save anybody here.

Speaker 2 (51:39):
No, And it's really hard because it's like having a
family member, because that's what we are as a community.
We're a family and stuff. And it's like seeing your
own brother, like you know, self destruct and stuff. You know,
if your heart is big and you got decency in
your ard, you don't want to see that, you know, right,
not even for a stranger. I really believe that, you know,

(51:59):
don't really wants to see.

Speaker 1 (52:01):
How did you make amends for the gang activity that
you're ashamed of?

Speaker 2 (52:05):
That was a tough one. It's tricky because being making
amends of stuff, you have to feel it within yourself
and then it has to be real. So I came
to my higher power as I understand him, and asked
him for his forgiveness. So it really doesn't matter if
anybody else chooses to forgive me or of all my things,
but mentally and physically I know him by my higher

(52:26):
power has forgiven me. I think that's all that matters,
and then allows me to carry on, you know, not
sitting there dwelling on that thing like oh shit, you know,
is is it going to be all right? Am I forgiven?
Or like that? Know? The important thing is that God's
forgiven me.

Speaker 1 (52:43):
I would also say, you're always on the front lines
to help anybody.

Speaker 2 (52:47):
Absolutely.

Speaker 1 (52:48):
So your men's too is your community, I'm here for you.
The men's to your family is you continue to show
up every day?

Speaker 2 (52:55):
Yes, and you know that when you're doing the right thing,
that comes to become second nature, you know. But yeah,
I'm always willing to help out. And that was another
thing that would surprised me about myself too, because I
didn't even know that I had that ability or even
that desire to want to help people when you're doing
something such The opposite is you know, it's magical, isn't it. Yeah,

(53:18):
And it wasn't always like that though, even though I
was I knew God in my heart and mind, I
wouldn't speak on it and that stuff I'm working on
today now I'm openly tell you that, you know what
I mean, there is a God, you know, and you
know what He's done for me is as a turnaround tremendous,
you know what I mean. How could there not be

(53:39):
you know what Sino was done for me? How could
there not be? You know, God's assisted, you know you're working,
you're doing you know God's work.

Speaker 1 (53:48):
Yeah, No, no, no, no, And I want to keep
reminding people that this was not some I mean you
put right.

Speaker 2 (53:57):
Yes, I did a lot of things, a lot of wrong,
and you know, I could end my life doing right
and well still not make up for all the wrong.
But that's not what I'm trying to do. I'm just
trying to keep myself you know, grounded, stay above water,
and help others.

Speaker 1 (54:12):
Yeah, let's talk about that. What are you doing to
help others? Inspires mentor others.

Speaker 2 (54:16):
Now, I speak at a lot of at AA meetings.
I'm here wherever it is needed. There's always somebody telling me, hey,
could you come speak at this place or this place?
You know, And I'm more than happy to you know so.
And not only that, you know, I'm having myself available

(54:36):
to other family community that are here and shell always
being there whatever it is they may sometimes it's just
to lend it here, you know. Sometimes they you know,
they want to meet up for coffee and they really
want to get something. But you know, me being so
new to sobriety and stuff like that and that kind

(54:58):
of sometimes I always me because maybe I'm asked something
that I may not know the question to you, And
that's when I when I come to you and I'll hitch,
I'll come in and ask you. You know, you know
this was you know this came at me. This and
knowing that I have that in the as my arsenal,
it always makes me, really makes me comfortble. I'm real

(55:18):
sure about being able to for the task.

Speaker 1 (55:22):
Thank you, brother, Thank you for your trust and faith.
Thank you for being on The Sino Show. I love you.

Speaker 2 (55:26):
I thank you very much. Okay, I feel great, feel
good and do it. I feel great.

Speaker 1 (55:31):
Yeah, I feel great.

Speaker 2 (55:32):
I think this did more for me than you.

Speaker 1 (55:34):
It probably does. Yeah, there we go. Thank you man.
The Sino Show is a production of iHeart Podcasts, hosted
by me Cina McFarlane, produced by pod People and twenty
eighth av Our. Lead producer is Keith carlak Our, Executive
producer is Lindsey Hoffman. Marketing lead is Ashley Weaver. Thank
you so much for listening. We'll see you next week.