Stevie B. at The Twelve Step House 9/15/2025

Stevie B. at The Twelve Step House, Ft. Lauderdale, FL. 9/15/2025.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
And so before you say, because I know you say
that you've already heard my story.

Speaker 2 (00:07):
I'm.

Speaker 1 (00:10):
The Holy Spirit should change the story around. It shouldn't
always be the same story. So I really feel tonight
I'd like to start when I came back, and right
before then, because if there anybody's coming back, I want
to tell you that there's a lot of us in here.
First of all, I want to say thank you to
Mike and thank you to the Motorcycle Club for having me.
And I wore the toughest clothes I had, I thought,

(00:34):
and then I saw I probably didn't do that.

Speaker 2 (00:37):
Great of a job, but I was trying. I put
on all black. I was trying.

Speaker 1 (00:45):
I've been in Alcoholics Anonymous since I'm twenty one. I've
been in this clubhouse since I'm twenty four. I grew
up in this clubhouse. I grew up in a meeting
in the back where I know Randy from and I
hadn't seen him in years and years and years, in
a meeting called the Eleventh steph Group, and it just
recently stopped running after fifty years. But it was in

(01:06):
the back on a Thursday night. My sponsor was Myron
May God Rest the soldiers, the locksmith of Broward County.
And I grew up in this very room watching speakers just.

Speaker 2 (01:16):
Like you're doing right now.

Speaker 1 (01:18):
And I said to myself when I first got here,
I can't believe that I got you know, I can't
believe that I'm here, Like what is a young, smart
kid like me doing with these old farts here at
the twelve Step House. Because in my group we had
some of the oldest farts there were. We had Moury
May God Rest, the Solies on Moy, and we had

(01:38):
Ruth Rogers and a lot of the old times. But
I came and I stayed, and I went to different meetings,
and my sponsor made God rest his soul. Myron took
me to all different meetings around Broward County and even
some indeed, and I fell in.

Speaker 2 (01:56):
Love with Alcoholics Anonymous.

Speaker 1 (01:58):
And what I want to tell you is that, but
the program of Alcoholics Anonymous is different than the Fellowship.

Speaker 2 (02:03):
Of Alcoholics Anonymous.

Speaker 1 (02:05):
I really fell in love with the Fellowship, and I
was definitely going to get to the program. I was
really going to get to the program, and I kind
of got stuck in the fellowship part and I was
taking guys around the meetings, and we were going to
dances and we were having a ball and I had
all the intentions in the world of getting to the program.

(02:26):
Part I was like, it was like, it was like
right around the corner, I was getting to the program park.
And I did an amazing first step. You know, I
totally admitted that I was a drug addict. I wasn't
sure if I was an alcoholic, but I knew it
wasn't good for me to do drugs and.

Speaker 2 (02:41):
I and I and I believe that.

Speaker 1 (02:42):
A power greater than myself could restore me to sanity.
And I made a decision to turn my will in
my life over to the care of God in some ways.

Speaker 2 (02:49):
In some ways, I did.

Speaker 1 (02:50):
That, and I got around five years of sobriety in
this clubhouse, and I started to get stark, raving crazy.
I started working on the OUTSID, I started taking a
bunch of steroids, and I had a triple black Mustang
Cobra that I would park in the handicapped parking right
outside there. Sonny never said anything yet on that. And

(03:12):
I started to get full of myself. I became my
own higher power, and I spent a lot of time
with God about twenty seconds in the morning and twenty
seconds at night, and then a lot of time with me,
and I had this god size hole that kept getting
bigger and bigger and bigger. And one night, driving out
of a meeting while coolic synonymous in Fort Loaderdlle the
Fort Laude Delle Men's group, I picked up a prostitute

(03:34):
coming out of a meeting of AA and.

Speaker 2 (03:38):
I was arrested on Federal Highway.

Speaker 1 (03:42):
Sober physically sober, but not mentally sober. I had this
god size hole, and I would try to fill it
with everything that I could sober. You see, a lot
of people have a lot of issues drinking. I have
many more issues sober. Matter of fact, the problem with
my variety is that I'm in it, and I had

(04:05):
mental illness ever before I took my first drink. As
a matter of fact, the first time I took my
first drink, which is a Jewish table wine called Manischevitz.
Doesn't look like a big Jewish type of crowd here tonight,
so I'm going to just fast forward through that. But
I had a drink called Manischevitz, and at that moment,
that glass of wine at the table with my family,

(04:25):
my alcoholism was actually cured for that nanosecond. I had
been suffering from alcoholism for twelve years. I was twelve
years old and I hadn't had a drink. My alcoholism
was so bad that I gave another kid a gun
and I told him he could shoot at me as
long as he didn't leave the playground, he could shoot
at me. And I thought it was a great name
of a great game, shoot at me until I lost

(04:48):
the game and I lost my right eye. And that
was full blown alcoholism. And I hadn't had a drink yet.
I had full blown alcoholism at twelve years old, and
I had not had a drink yet.

Speaker 2 (05:01):
Alcohol is a cure for what I have.

Speaker 1 (05:03):
Alcohol is the problem is I also have something called
I want another drink, and that you don't know where
that's gonna go. But the moment I took that first drink,
there was a peace and a comfort and they eat.

Speaker 2 (05:15):
I don't know. I don't want to use the word comfort.
There's a big word for a fifteen year old, our
twelve year old.

Speaker 1 (05:20):
But there was a There was the first time that
the angst in my stomach stopped.

Speaker 2 (05:26):
I've had angst my entire I've had.

Speaker 1 (05:28):
I've had something called anxiety my whole life, and I
didn't know the word was anxiety. I couldn't say to
my parents, Hey, Mom and Dad, I got anxiety. First
of all, my dad was a cream War hero fought
on Porkshop Hill, and he would not have been big
on me bringing up anxiety type of issue.

Speaker 2 (05:44):
If I came and said, yo, Dad, I got some anxiety.
I don't think that would have went over very well.

Speaker 1 (05:50):
But my dad, being a poor Jewish man from Manhattan,
he didn't have the opportunity when he was a kid
to go to doctors. So his family that they had
like they had like an amateur doctor set in the house.
And my dad carried that tradition on even though we
were the Long Island, New York and we weren't poor.
My dad wasn't big on and I think when Sunny

(06:12):
and I came up, we didn't just go to You
didn't have urgent care, like for a toenail, you know,
you put it, you did a lot of wrapping of
gauze and a lot of tape and a lot of
you know, you.

Speaker 2 (06:24):
Didn't really go for a lot of stuff.

Speaker 1 (06:25):
So my dad had like a thing where anything that
was wrong. He had a liquor cabinet and he would
administer that specific liquor depending on the ailment we had.
So if you had if you had a stomach ache
or the runs in my house, that was BlackBerry brandy,
and that cured the BlackBerry, that cured the runs, cured

(06:47):
all before before pepto bismo, we had BlackBerry brandy in
my house. If you had a sore throat or any
type of cough situation, that was peppermint snaps.

Speaker 2 (06:57):
If you had a cough.

Speaker 1 (06:59):
Or anything that was keep you up at night, my
dad had something called a hot toddy. I'm not sure
what a hot toddy is, but I developed a lot
of coughs and a lot of symptoms. And so as
he was ministering to me a lot of these type
of things, I would develop a lot of symptoms.

Speaker 2 (07:14):
You know, I had a lot of those symptoms and
I liked them. And every time I had one of
those drinks.

Speaker 1 (07:18):
Oh and if you couldn't fall asleep, he had a
whole super concoction for falling asleep. And I don't mean
we would get wasted. I'm just talking my little shot
of something. And I think that was Jack Daniels. That
seemed to be the sleep of cure. But when you're
twelve or thirteen, I started to develop a lot of issues.
And then I got my eye shot out. And then

(07:39):
I spent a year outside of school trying to get
my eye repaired, and that has its own issues, and
I already felt less than or different. And then I
returned back to the school as the kid that everyone
would point at. Hey, remember we told you don't play
with guns because you could.

Speaker 2 (07:54):
Get a eyes shot out. That's the kid, you know.
So that didn't go that great.

Speaker 1 (07:58):
And then I found pot and hot helped. I was
a great helper for a while, and and then and
then uh and then other stuff. I'm a product of
the seventies and eighties and in New York all that
was a lot of cocaine. And I want to thank
some of the bikers for getting us good prices on that.

Speaker 2 (08:15):
Appreciate that.

Speaker 1 (08:17):
And uh So, but when you're when you're a waiter
at a hotel, uh and you can't buy a lot
of that stuff.

Speaker 2 (08:29):
It's not like if you're.

Speaker 1 (08:30):
On waiter money in the eighties, you're not buying a
lot of that stuff. And so I didn't have money
to get like really deep in trouble. And then my
uncle died. He was an internis down here in South Florida.
He was a very famous doctor. And he died on
the bottom of a swimming pool on the inter coastal
and left me a bunch of money.

Speaker 2 (08:50):
And then I got, you know, deep into it. It was
a time of New Jack City.

Speaker 1 (08:53):
It was the time of you know. One time, my
grandfather said to me were Italians? And I came home
and he says to me, I go, yes, Grandpa, and
he says, don't. He was reading the papers every day.

Speaker 2 (09:03):
Was in the papers. He says, you see this stuff.

Speaker 1 (09:05):
If you smoke this stuff, if you try this stuff,
you'll be instantly addicted. And I hadn't tried it yet,
and I said, that seems like terrible stuff, Grandpa. I said,
could I see that news article? I would want to
make sure I won't never get hooked up in any
of this kind of stuff.

Speaker 2 (09:22):
I went to Washington Heights in New York City. I'm like,
anybody's seen this stuff.

Speaker 1 (09:32):
And when you're like a like a half Jewish, half
Italian kid with one eye, you shouldn't be hanging around
in Washington.

Speaker 2 (09:38):
Heights with a newspaper. So I got in some trouble
over there, and then I ran out of money. You know,
I don't know if this is your experience. When you
have money, it doesn't seem like a parliament. It's a party.

Speaker 1 (09:54):
But then when you run out of money, then the
party is now a problem. And I came home and
I told my parents house twenty one, I said I
have a problem with drugs. And they were shocked. They
were really shocked. I gos un shoot because I was
a way of college and they hadn't seen what was
going on. They hadn't seen that, you know, all the
nights and and and making a ford underneath my steps,

(10:15):
and and and all everybody graduated and I was still
underneath the steps, and when I finally surfaced, everybody was gone,
and and I and I came home and my parents
didn't know what to do with me. I was it
was in the you know, I should have been graduated
in the middle of school year, and I was just
coming off a run. We didn't even know what a
run was. We had never met anyone on a run.

(10:38):
We had never met anyone to the meetings, We had
never met anyone that went to treatment.

Speaker 2 (10:42):
I was like cutting edge. I was like up ahead
of my time for my family.

Speaker 1 (10:46):
And and they called up someone and they said, there's
a there's a program in the middle of the United
States for young people, and they sent me there. And
that's where I met Alcoholics Anonymous. And that was for
twenty one year olds or twenty one in under. And
I was kind of a big twenty one year old.
So I got thrown out of there pretty quickly because

(11:06):
it was like younger twenty It was like Midwest twenty
one year olds, like kids. And I was coming in
from New York with all my like my five gold
chains and my hair gel and my Cavareci jeans and
my muscle pants that were basically pajamas from muscle Builders,
and you know, I was.

Speaker 2 (11:26):
Like, yo, the kid is here, you know.

Speaker 1 (11:29):
And they liked that act for a while in the Midwest,
but then it gets old.

Speaker 2 (11:32):
You know, real fast. They threw me out of there, and.

Speaker 1 (11:36):
Then I came down here to the twelve Stephouse. How
to get to twelve Step House.

Speaker 2 (11:40):
I had a.

Speaker 1 (11:40):
Sponsor in Minneapolis and told me, when you get down
to the twelve Step House, when you get down to Minnesota,
my my family invited me to come back and be
a part of their lives. And my grandfather JC, who
I named JC Recovery Center after J C. House, he
lived down here and he said, come down here and
give it a shot down here. But you better get
into that AA. You better get into that A and A.

(12:00):
And I said, I'm gonna do that A and A
when I get there. And when I landed, there was
a there was a hotline called Intergroup Hotline, and there
was a woman behind behind the counter. Sonny remembers her, Uh,
Michael was her Her name was Diane. She was a
big woman. She had a great attitude. Well she had
a great attitude that night, and I'm not sure if
she had a great attitude. And she answered the phone

(12:20):
a hotline and she was answering it right from the
right from the front desk. I said, I need a meeting.

Speaker 2 (12:26):
She said, were you guys? I'm at the airport. She said,
come right over.

Speaker 1 (12:28):
We're right next to the airport. Come up, we have
meeting going on right now. My grandfather drove me here
from the airport. They didn't believe I was coming into
a name and they waited right outside the parking lot
because I had to run a bunch of game on
the family and they didn't even believe I was sober.

Speaker 2 (12:43):
And they came in checked with the with the with
the coffee bar. While I was in the a meeting.

Speaker 1 (12:49):
You see that mice grandson is in there as I
get is in the back, and I met My sponsor's
name was Meyron.

Speaker 2 (12:54):
I told you and I met the eleven step group
and it was a great five years, great, great three years, greade,
three years. You know what happens. We stop being teachable.
Some of us stop being teachable.

Speaker 1 (13:07):
I'm not saying everybody me. I stopped being teachable everything
you told me to do. It seems like when I
told you to get in the car to ninety one,
to say why that's the way I was on my
third year. My third year, I'm like, everything's why. My
spond's like, you need a clean ass trass. I'm like,
I don't smoke. I was like, what is that part
of the question. Why did you even bring that up?

(13:28):
I just told you to clean the ash trays. Why
I started doing the wise. When you start doing the wise,
that means your self will is creeped back into your life.

Speaker 2 (13:37):
I suppose I said go over there to for Lord,
now pick that guy up. I'm like, why he doesn't
have a ride? Doesn't that have a car? That was
the beginning of the end.

Speaker 1 (13:45):
And then alcoholism started to resurface again, and I didn't
do six and seven properly. Six and seven is the
is the step that separates the men from the boys,
that women from the girls.

Speaker 2 (13:56):
You know what six and seven is being ready to
have God remove your defects of character. That's you.

Speaker 1 (14:01):
I'm working all my defense. Good luck with that, working
on your defex character. You cracking alcohol, heroin or ventana,
doesn't worry. How do you think you're gonna do with
your defex character? And I and I and I refuse
to work on my defenx character. First of all, I
was like, look at me, what kind of defects what
I have? Right? And I was getting sicker and sicker

(14:25):
and sicker and bigger. That was juicing and that's a
bad combination ego and steroids. That's a bad combination. And
that's when Frankie saw me. Had the fist fight here
in the clubhouse, hit the guy with the chair and
pop on a beach book headbutted the guy. I had
a great reputation, just great pick it up prostitutes. It's
just an amazing guy with alcoholics now everything you would

(14:46):
want to be.

Speaker 2 (14:47):
Grow up just like me.

Speaker 1 (14:50):
And I was working at the fort Load of Delle
Stop Swapster, remember Mike. I was working at the fourth
Lord of swap Shop. And and they had a circus
there every day. And my wife was a featured U
artist in the circus. Before I married her, I saw her.
She was from Columbia and she worked rid into Elephants.
And I said, and Ricky and I used to work
the other Ricky from the motorcycle club. He used to

(15:10):
work there with me. And I said, man, if I
can get that girl, I probably feel a lot better
about myself. And I got that girl and didn't work.
Didn't work. You know why it didn't work because everywhere
I went I brought me with me. I had this
god sized hole and I brought it into the relationship
with her. I had this god size hole. I brought

(15:30):
it to work. I had this god size hole. I
brought it to the twelve Step House. And finally we
won our honeymoon in New Orleans. And I saw someone
drinking fine wine in the table next to me, and
I had never seen fine wine. I had never seen
a fine wine presentation. A fine wine presentation, if you've
never seen it, is very impressive. They pour wine in
a decanter in the middle of the table and no

(15:52):
one drinks it. And even though I was five years sober,
I knew that was very peculiar. And I said to
the food service I said, what do they do? And
she said, they're drinking fine wine that needs to breathe first.
And when she said that, I was like, BINGO, that's
what I need. I need to drink some fine wine
that needs to breathe first, because that's definitely not going

(16:15):
to bring me back the crack.

Speaker 2 (16:16):
That's not even its own, that's its own animal. I
had never tried. That went from right from Mad Dog
twenty twenty to crack. I miss fine wine. It.

Speaker 1 (16:27):
It may sound funny, but I want to pause for
a second. If you're in here tonight and you do
not think you're powerless over alcohol, you will drink again.
It'll take time, but you will drink again. They'll become
a time at two o'clock in the night in the
morning when the enemy will call you and you will
answer the coal and the drink will be there.

Speaker 2 (16:45):
I know my harder hearts. I don't like to admit it.

Speaker 1 (16:48):
I was a drug addict that came in alcoholics anonymous
through the back door, and I'm powerless over alcohol, but
I refuse to admit it. I never thought I'd go
back to drugs, Never in a billion years. If you
would have said to me, Steve, you're ever gonna go
back to drugging. Never in a billion years. But I
took picked up my seven year medallion in the back
room back there, and I went out to try some

(17:08):
control drinking, to get some fine wine.

Speaker 2 (17:11):
Randy knows what I'm talking about.

Speaker 1 (17:12):
THEO alcoholism is cutting, baffley and powerful and patient and
has all the time in the world to trap you.
You think you're so smart, You're not so smart. Sin
has been happening since the beginning of time. There's nobody
that beats alcohol. I don't care how tough you are
an alcohol and it told me that I could. I
could drink fine wine that was forty five dollars a glass.

(17:34):
I remember when out during my relapse, I would walk
in the bars and I'd say to what's the most
expensive vodka. You had this imagine this ego, what's the
most expensive Because I had seven years sobriety. You gained
some money in seven years of sobriety. So what's the
most expensive vodka you have here? They said, Oh, we
got some stuff from Sweden, and send a back chef
all the way in the back.

Speaker 2 (17:52):
I can get the ladder. I'll get it open.

Speaker 1 (17:53):
It's twenty seven dollars a shot. I go, that sounds
like good vodka. I'd like to try that vodka. Two
shots into that, I've said, what's the cheapest foky you
got here? What's the stuff that was a potato yesterday?
I always saw myself as some high end drunk, and
I'm just a garden variety alcohol. I was walking in

(18:19):
their high end and I walk out just the same
way as everybody else.

Speaker 2 (18:22):
You got to know who you are. You know, there's
power in knowing who you are. I know who I
am today, and I know what I'm not. I'm not
something that could play with alcohol. I don't take anything.
I don't play around. I don't take stuff on the side.
I'm not an and or.

Speaker 1 (18:35):
I don't have stuff that affects me from the neck up.
In any way, shape or form. I know I will
become addicted to anything. My grand sponsor, Dion, who's got
fifty six years of sobriety, at forty eight years of sobriety,
he went in to get his teeth fixed and he
had and his wife, Sue had.

Speaker 2 (18:51):
He gave his pills to Sue, you know, run around Sue.
He gave the pills to her, and he came back
in Sonny and said, I need another pill.

Speaker 1 (18:59):
She said to me, you gonna pull that shit again,
Dian at forty eight years of sobriety.

Speaker 2 (19:04):
This thing is cunning, but this thing will wait for
you to have a chink in the armor. And I
lost it all, triple black Mustang Cobra.

Speaker 1 (19:15):
I lost it off to three piece matching Gucci luggage
when I came back to when I came back, when
I came back, I had a wind Dixie bag and
I walked over and I got dropped off from the
Fort Lauderdelle Hospital insane not the insane, what do you

(19:36):
call it?

Speaker 2 (19:36):
Psychiatric floor?

Speaker 1 (19:38):
And they dropped me off at the Liberty House on
Federal Highway, right before Anthony's was put there, right before
Anthony's cold fire before they was there, right before.

Speaker 2 (19:47):
They was there.

Speaker 1 (19:47):
I got I got there twenty five years ago, and
Richie saw me, the manager, and he goes, Stevie, b
are you here to speak?

Speaker 2 (19:54):
And then he saw.

Speaker 1 (19:56):
He saw how I was, and I hope I I
never forget these words. He said to me, would you
like a sandwich? Like I had been there before bringing
the message, and then he said, hey, man, you need
a sandwich. And I hope I never forget Tall Tom
from the eleven Step group coming into the fore Lord

(20:18):
of the hospital and me saying them, Hey Tom, do
you have eighty cents so I can get a soda
from the soda.

Speaker 2 (20:22):
Machine here at the fore Lord of the hospital.

Speaker 1 (20:25):
I hope I never forget being walked on Los Sola's
bulevard and my slippers with my gown on Los Sola's
boulevard because the day to the text took us out
for a.

Speaker 2 (20:34):
Walk like like one floor of the Coco's nest. I
remember a shuffle of the loft.

Speaker 1 (20:42):
People are brought driving their maserades and they let me
get and then was shuffling along looking in the windows.

Speaker 2 (20:46):
So I wish I could have that. I wish I
could have an ice cream.

Speaker 1 (20:54):
You know, I pray that we never forget where we
came from. And you know why I always say yes
to speaking at this group, no matter how many years.

Speaker 2 (21:01):
I'll tell you why. That man right there.

Speaker 1 (21:05):
And I didn't realize my I didn't for you know,
I'm older now, I'm almost sixty.

Speaker 2 (21:09):
And I came here when I was twenty four.

Speaker 1 (21:11):
And that man right there when I came back when
I was thirty four, he was really kind to me.

Speaker 2 (21:16):
His name is Sonny, and and Rickie pointed me out.
He said, he's he's the big cheese over here, but
he didn't act like that in the meeting. He came
over and welcomed me back. I like thirty days.

Speaker 1 (21:31):
And for some reason, I know Sonny all the years,
and we've seen each other in different places, and I
know what he does for.

Speaker 2 (21:35):
Work or what he did before work.

Speaker 1 (21:36):
And Mike called me and asked me if I wanted
to speak here tonight, and I said, I said, true,
of course, because we know each other, for we know
each other from church.

Speaker 2 (21:43):
We know each other for years. You know what I forgotten?
I called Mike back. I said, Mike, do you think
that I forgot something?

Speaker 1 (21:50):
I said, do you think the guy that was the
big cheese there back years ago and he works for
the fbon all that I think of either, And he goes,
I think, so he's my dad.

Speaker 2 (22:00):
I said, well, I'd love to speak there for you.
I want you to know something.

Speaker 1 (22:04):
You never have to start again. If you don't forget
who you are, you never have to start again. If
you work the steps, you never have to start again.
If you keep God where he's supposed to be on
the throne, don't you can have a higher power. Listen,
I have a higher power.

Speaker 2 (22:18):
Okay. Her name is Sandra. She's home.

Speaker 1 (22:20):
She tells me exactly what to do. She's got me
on the thirteen pillow system at my house. I'm a
one pillow type of god. My wife has me doing
thirteen pillows, six and six and one in the middle.
That's my higher power.

Speaker 2 (22:32):
That's my wife.

Speaker 1 (22:35):
She tells me when I'm gonna wake up, when I'm
gonna do things, where I'm gonna walk the dog, where
I'm gonna take my son, what I have to do
for baseball. I need to go over my wife's head.
If I'm gonna stay clean and sober and have an
amazing line.

Speaker 2 (22:46):
I need to go to the highest power. That's God.

Speaker 1 (22:49):
You want to stick with higher powers, you stick, go, listen, go,
that's fine. I'm going all the way to the creator
of the universe. When Bill w said, this is the
god of our fourth fathers, this is the god of
the preachers.

Speaker 2 (23:03):
Who is a monitor needs to be reset? Oh, Will, Will,
that's his health stuff. Will's got a lot of health
stuff going on.

Speaker 1 (23:12):
His don't have to has his heart working, and he's
dating a girl up. He's engaged to a girl thirty
years younger than himself.

Speaker 2 (23:20):
That's not a good diagnosis. It's not good. I don't
think that was a good choice. But we're hoping for him. Hey,

(23:41):
you know, this is what I want to leave you with.

Speaker 1 (23:43):
I had a lot of nose in the last twenty
four years. I've had a lot of disappointments in the
last twenty four years. I just want to just say
some and I'm not putting sun in a pestel. Be
nice to the new car. They never forget it. Carry
the twelfth step. Yeah, do all the stuff works, but
be nice to the newcomer. We were newcomers once. I'll

(24:05):
never forget the kindness that that man showed me there
was another man by the name of Dale. May God
rest his soul from Narcotics Anonymous, Big Dale. He died
with fourteen years clean and he and he welcomed me
into AA and Sonny and a guy named Lenny welcoming
into your AA back.

Speaker 2 (24:20):
They both were kind to.

Speaker 1 (24:21):
Me, Lenny on at the NA meeting on Friday night
here and Sonny at the Monday night meeting. You'll never
forget people's kindness when you're a newcomer, because we were
all there. If you get too big, if you get
too big shot for yourself, then then you could be
shot out. And I always remember that. I hope if

(24:42):
you're a newcomer and you've come up to me, that
I've tried to be kind to you. And because it
wasn't for people like Sonny and Dale, May God rest
his soul and Lenny p from the Narcotics anonymous and
Paul E from Narcotics Anonymous and alcoholic. If it wasn't
for those people welcoming Big Back, I had no us
to you, I had no esteem. I just relapsed. My

(25:03):
wife left me, serve me with a restraining order. I've
lived with men I don't know in a halfway house.
I had just owned a full house recently. Now I'm
in a halfway house. I had a triple busting my
sname COVID. Now I got a bicycle in Winn Dixie bags.
And these men don't care. These men and women don't

(25:23):
care what you do. They want nothing from you. The
sunny came over to me. I was with Nick Ricky
Di and Senning goes, welcome, welcome back kid. And I
will never forget that. And I hope that that comes
across with the way that I am. Because you're gonna
You're gonna do that for the next guy. You're doing
that for the next guy. This whole thing is about

(25:45):
the next guy.

Speaker 2 (25:45):
You know, the person we lost this week.

Speaker 1 (25:47):
Whether you I don't care if you like his politics
or not not, It doesn't matter about politics.

Speaker 2 (25:51):
We lost a person. This is my personal story.

Speaker 1 (25:53):
It's not alcoholics and iics, but not early whether any sect, denomination, politics,
organization and religious. We lost a warrior out there that
was telling people about God. Who cares what the politics is.
If we're not concerned with carrying the twelve step, this
thing never goes on. We have visitors up here from
Key West, night. They knew if they landed here, people were.

Speaker 2 (26:16):
Gonna say welcome, welcome, welcome, welcome.

Speaker 1 (26:20):
Anywhere I go around the world, and I have had
the blessing of speaking around the world. I was in
Iceland last week. Chris travels all around the world. He
spoke in Egypt and different places. Everywhere we go the
hand of Alcoholic Synonymous and for my friend Chris Narcotics Night, it's.

Speaker 2 (26:34):
There for us.

Speaker 1 (26:35):
You never have to go through anything alone. I've never
went through any death alone. And we lost our baby,
our only baby, and Alcoholics Anonymous was there for us.
I didn't see it coming. We had waited five years
to get pregnant. We had been through in vitro fertilizations
and doctors and medications and eggs donated from her family

(26:56):
in Colombia, and we even hired a surrogate. Was a
five year process. We finally got pregnant and we lost
the baby, and I was wrecked. And a guy from
the West Side Men's group said, pray for the pray
for the acceptance of God's will. God didn't cause your

(27:16):
baby to die, but everything that happens down here is
God's will.

Speaker 2 (27:20):
And if you try to fight that then you're trying
to fight.

Speaker 1 (27:22):
Page four seventeen, which says that anytime I find some person, place,
or thing unacceptable to me, it's not so much as
what needs to change in that person, place, or thing,
but what needs to change in me. And that night,
which was a Monday night, which is the same night
as the Melrose Park allen On meeting, my wife was
in the Melrose Park.

Speaker 2 (27:40):
She just lost the baby.

Speaker 1 (27:43):
She was scheduled to go in for surgery the next day.
She was at a meeting of allan On that night
at the Melrose Park meeting. And I was at the
Christian Recovery Solutions right around the corner from here, bringing
a meeting into their treatment center. And I was crying
in the parking lot and I had a bunch of
guys around me. I had dug In around me and
Danny around me, and we were all in the parking
lot and everyone was holding me, and they were like

(28:04):
stevie'sch we'll get through this. But I had a commitment
that night, even though I was I was in sadness.
I learned from you people. I learned from Angry Don,
from uh. I call Marry do I apologize.

Speaker 2 (28:14):
That's not his name. I'm sorry. Let me just strike
that from the record.

Speaker 1 (28:19):
His name is Don and he married a beautiful woman
that worked at the Floridian and they had a beautiful
marriage and she got cancer. He's a member of Victory,
and she got cancer and died. You guys, remember she
was a beautiful blonde lady. I forgot her first name.
But Don used to come here. And I saw Don
come to meeting that night, and I learned.

Speaker 2 (28:36):
That you can. You can stay sober and bring your
stuff to AA.

Speaker 1 (28:40):
We know another guy by the name of Mike Mechanic
that his wife was murdered and chopped up and put
in a bag in a luggage, and I saw him
at a meeting. So I knew that I wasn't going
to stay home and not go him to meet. And
I went to that meeting that night, and guess what happened.
There was a woman by the name of Jana. She's
seventeen years sober. She sponsored some of the women right
over there. Jana is seventeen years sober now. She saw

(29:02):
us sponsors you. She saw us praying in the park line.

Speaker 2 (29:05):
She was a treatment. She looked out the window and
saw a bunch of.

Speaker 1 (29:07):
Guys praying in the park line, and she saw a
guy that was crying that was me and made an
impression on her. She said she had never seen a
bunch of guys that got vulnerable. And that guy brought
a meeting into that meeting, and I cried in that meeting,
and I stayed sober. And my wife cried in her meeting,
and she stayed sober. She stayed in now on Off.
And the reason I tell you this story is not
to be emotional. I want you to know you can

(29:28):
get through anything. We get through all things together. That's
why I want you to travel two by two. You
don't go in the car by yourself. If you're traveling
to AA by yourself, you're missing the point. She'd be
driving AA by yourself, unless it's the extreme circumstance.

Speaker 2 (29:41):
If you have a car, there's people that need to ride.

Speaker 1 (29:44):
If you're showing up at AA by yourself, you're missing
the point unless you're on a serious schedule like Jess,
just come all the way across town from the middle
of a plantation. But if you're local and you know
there's people in halfway houses in different then your sponsors
don't have a ride give him a ride.

Speaker 2 (30:03):
People gave me rides.

Speaker 1 (30:06):
And we lost that baby, but we kept staying and
we had a baby room built in the house. And
this is a part of the story that you guys know,
that's the same part. So because it's my story. Now
I've been traveling with the Lord. Now I know Mike
from church. Now I'm really upset with God. God, I'm
one of your guys. God, I'm one of your guys.

(30:27):
The word says that you want us to be fruitful
and multiply. Your word says that you want us that
we can have the desires of our heart. Of our
desires of our heart lines up with yours. God, How
is this happening to me? Sponsoring guys, I'm taking meetings
in up to going to church. I know really good
guys in AA. How's this happening to me? And then

(30:48):
we get kicked out of the adoption agency. I'm not
the for Lord el Schwatschad, but I'm working. And if
Joe from the adoption agency calls and says a man
like your husband can never adopt in the state of Florida.

Speaker 2 (30:59):
If you have to go, probably go through that door.

Speaker 1 (31:02):
Yeah, that's it. No exit door. That's the nows you
can't leave door. They saw the bronxtown and they're trying
to get theirs back. I'm gonna tell you right now,
I didn't like that scene nothing, Mike, that they leave

(31:30):
And we called up a woman because a man in
alcoholics and there's experts in AA. There's people that have
been through with what you've been through. You never have
to go through anything alone. A man by the name
of Happy Bob, May God rest his soul. He was
a person that played music and all the different events
that happen, all the different events that Happy Bob amazing.
I forgot the name of the band, but it's the
very famous band that we have here in AA.

Speaker 2 (31:51):
Played many years. He died. Made God rest his soul.

Speaker 1 (31:53):
He was a famous attorney down here before he got
caught with two kilos and uh and I called Happy
boble is that Happy Bob? Do you have any connections
in the adoption world? And he said, why don't you
call this woman by the name of Mindy from Boca,
a Jewish woman by the name of Mindy from Boca,
and maybe she can come down and give you a
home study. Even though you're not allowed to adopt in
the state of Florida, and that woman gave us a

(32:15):
home study and she approved us, and we had a
beautiful baby. And we went to go see that baby,
and we traveled all the way to the top of
the United States, by California, by Canada, and we saw
this little white baby. Because that's why they make those
white babies up there.

Speaker 2 (32:37):
I'll tell you what. I'll tell you why I said that.
Don't get us. I'm telling you why I talked about
the white baby. Because my wife's from Colombia. We're not white.

Speaker 1 (32:45):
She's not white white. This is like a white, white baby.
And our son's birth mom was holding up the baby
and she says, what do you want to name your son?
And we said Joshua. And she says, why Joshua. We say,
because Joshua twenty four fifteen says, as for me in
my house, we choose to serve the Lord.

Speaker 2 (33:06):
As for me in my house, we choose to serve
the Lord.

Speaker 1 (33:14):
Listen, never sure from the truth of what God has
done for you. Because she said, and she could have
said to us, you know what, you're too religious or
something like that. You know we're not going through this.
She did say to us, I'm not religious. She said,
I'm not.

Speaker 2 (33:26):
Religious, And we said, all that means is your son
is going to grow.

Speaker 1 (33:28):
Up in a godly home, and he has. We've honored
that promise because of the sixth and seven step. I'm
entirely ready to have God remow all these defects of characters.
Were you there the last time I had to fist
fight and swapshot?

Speaker 2 (33:41):
Were you there but Joe that was part of urtic group?

Speaker 1 (33:45):
Here there was a Joe that you guys had, And
Joe happened to be staying there with Ricky and I
was six months sober and a guy walked up to
the counter and he said something about my wife and
punched me in my face. And I didn't raise my hands.
I said, God's honest truth. Joe and Ricky could tell
to tell the truth that he I punched me, run
in my face and I'd raise my hand.

Speaker 2 (34:05):
It's not like I'd want to, not like I couldn't have.

Speaker 1 (34:08):
God said, don't raise your hands, let me handle this.
Vengeance will be mine, Just take it easy. How many
people I punch in the face? W I a big
federal face in theories and then like I lost my
face and God did for me the last twenty four years,
and every single time I had a defect, the character
that popped up, the Holy spirit inside me told me, listen,
you need to ask him.

Speaker 2 (34:29):
To remove that lust. Forget about it.

Speaker 1 (34:33):
That's a daily that's a that's an hour to our situation,
anger hour to hour situation.

Speaker 2 (34:42):
I have lust and I only have one eye. I
don't even know how you guys do it. You got
double double problems.

Speaker 1 (34:57):
And we took that little baby home, and there was
people on the lawn, Alcoholics Anonymous with science saying welcome
home Joshua, and people from Alcoholics Anonymous took care of
our dog. People from Alcoholics Anonymous, Rachel Shavels specifically, and
Rob Shavel.

Speaker 2 (35:10):
Rachel Shavel taught us how to take care of the baby.
We brought the baby here. We brought our son here.

Speaker 1 (35:15):
Within two weeks, he was in one of those little
satchel's coming to mes with me speaking at events. My
son had spoken many events by the time he was two,
and a little satchel like a bonnet. And this is
the last thing I want to tell you. Never take
no for an answer. The state of Florida says I

(35:37):
can't adopt in the state of Florida. God says, yes
you can. There's people that are driving in the treatment
centers right now.

Speaker 2 (35:43):
They have five DUIs. They should never drive again. They're
the drivers of the treatment center.

Speaker 1 (35:53):
Sally one of the people on the board here, she's
a nurse. She had her nursing toy taken from her
because she used to take one pill and give one
the patient and went.

Speaker 2 (36:00):
Back to her. The State of Texas told you can
never be a nurse. God said, yes you can. We
have seen miracles, right, Michael, We have seen miracles as
a result of this program. We have seen people that
could not make it. They're making it.

Speaker 1 (36:17):
People that could never sponsor sponsoring people that could never
be parents their parents, people that were the worst parents.
Another great grandparent. They're doing great job as grand grandparents.
They've been giving another time. You know a lot of
people in AA that were terrible parents, they're amazing grandparents.
You know a lot of people that were terrible parents
in AA. They're raising other people's kids in AA. There's
nothing that you cannot do with the help of God.

(36:39):
You can limit yourself, but then you don't know the
first one hundred and sixty four pages is a big book.
The first one hundred and sixty four pages are very clear.
This is all about your relationship with God. The reason
that we named our group the Golden Text Group because
it says Henrietta bill w is talking to Henriette. Henriette,
the Lord has been so wonderful me curing me of
this terrible disease that I just want to tell her

(37:00):
one about it. And that's exactly our platform. Kindness, one
hand helping another, carrying the twelfth step. If you're in
your way of carrying the twelve step, you still need
to go back to six and seven, which we always
do humbly ask God to remove these shortcomings you're all
about you go back to.

Speaker 2 (37:18):
The seventh step. You don't need to drink over it.

Speaker 1 (37:21):
If you're not able to receive correction, you need to
go back to the sixth and seven. If someone tells
you about yourself, might if news comes up to me
and says, listen, Steve, I gotta tast something, you'll full
ego that night, Thank you, brother.

Speaker 2 (37:33):
I really I will definitely take a look at that
the moment I get to yeah, but well, you don't understand,
you know how much. I do like people like you.

Speaker 1 (37:40):
Guys know, I'm constantly for meetings, right because I do
like twenty seven meetings a week, right, doesn't matter if
you take twenty seven means if.

Speaker 2 (37:45):
You're going to be at a meeting, show up on time.

Speaker 1 (37:47):
People come up to me and say, you know what,
you need to show up on time, and I want
to tell them, I'll do twenty seven meanings a week.

Speaker 2 (37:52):
You know what I tell them? Thank you.

Speaker 1 (37:55):
You know why I wore a college shirt here today,
even though I could have been killed for it, because
recently I was speaking at a place in wisconcert or something,
and it was an outdoor event and it was young
people in the a and it was a rafting thing.

Speaker 2 (38:09):
It wasn't even an indoor meeting. And the person said
to me, why don't you have a college shirt on?
This is alcoholic synonymos.

Speaker 1 (38:15):
I'm like you people all in bikinis, he said, But
you're the speaker, And you know what I said, thank you,
if you're.

Speaker 2 (38:22):
Going to be this I'm not saying this is the
rule everywhere. I'm just saying this guy, you know.

Speaker 1 (38:26):
Correct to me, and I just said thank you. I'm
not saying it's the rule everywhere. So I said, from
now on, when you speak where college you're not And
I said, thank you. You know, because whether that's the
rule or not, I'm a guy that doesn't want to
fool any rules. I'm a guy that's always looking to cut,
you know, cut the corners. I'm a guy that says,
do you know who?

Speaker 2 (38:45):
The moment I say do you know who I am?
The enemy is ready to say. Yeah. Man, you're a
guy that can take a drink. You know these rules
don't apply to you. You're a guy that can take
one drink. You're a guy that can drink fine wine.

Speaker 1 (38:58):
You're a guy that can drink those one hundred dollars
shots of Scotch or whatever those things are.

Speaker 2 (39:04):
Keavasi. I've never had any of them. I've never had.

Speaker 1 (39:08):
One other than that twenty seven dollars shot of vodka.
I've never had anything fine because the moment I have
one thing, I go right to whatever is still sitting
on the bar. But when I start saying stuff, I
got this, there's a little emony right next to me goes, you.

Speaker 2 (39:25):
Know you do got this? Man, You're amazing. You know
what you can Still when you get to the twelve
step house.

Speaker 1 (39:31):
Why don't you park in the handicaps, mom, because you're
such a great speaker, and you know why, your eyes
definitely go in the same direction.

Speaker 2 (39:44):
Don't listen to anybody with their titling because you got
it all going on. Steve B.

Speaker 1 (39:49):
And the moment that happens, I got to get on
my knees and say to God, God, please keep me
right size. It's only by the grace of God if
I have treated anything wrongly tonight I get on my knees.
I'm gonna do a tenth and eleventh step. Whereas I selfish, dishonest,
self seeking, Who do I own amends? What could I
have done better? And that's most days. Most days I

(40:11):
fall short. Most days I owe people. And guess why,
let me tell you something why. This is why I
never let the sun go down on my anger. In
terms of amends, that doesn't mean I handle it all
on the same day because I've fallen short. But anybody
I've ever wronged in Alcoholic Synonymous in the last twenty
four years, they have gotten in amends within.

Speaker 2 (40:29):
Twenty four hours. You know, I don't want any of
that stuff building up in me.

Speaker 1 (40:35):
I got nothing mental illness without bringing on new garbage.
And that's why I've really hadn't had to do. And
I'm not saying because Peter Marinelli goes through the work
every year and there's other people. Maybe sudd He does,
maybe Michael does. I have never had to do another
fourth step. I'm not saying I don't need to. If
someone says I should, then I will. But I carry
the tenth step.

Speaker 2 (40:56):
Really close to my heart. I bet you there's nobody
in here that I haven't made amend to that I
needed to. And if it is, you'll let me know,
you know, because I could wrong people without knowing.

Speaker 1 (41:06):
Then that's the last thing I want to leave you.
There's people in AA that are gonna sell for the Creutons.
You know what Crewton people settle Forth. Did you see
how much fun these are, like old timers like metic
gets about you. You heard them and the how it works.

Speaker 2 (41:20):
They made the Howard works fun right. They're having a ball.
They absolutely insist on enjoying life.

Speaker 1 (41:27):
They own bikes, they travel in packs, they go and
do things, they camp together.

Speaker 2 (41:32):
They have fun together. That's what this meeting is all about.

Speaker 1 (41:34):
Having fun in sobriety together is it's still called sobriety
on two of the motor.

Speaker 2 (41:39):
This is what they this is what they played to
have fun together.

Speaker 1 (41:41):
You understand why I brought that up is because there's
people that sell for crewtons and alcoholics anonyms.

Speaker 2 (41:46):
You know what they settle for being sober. You see
them in meetings. They're like, how either hanging in there?
They got those squinchy faces, and how he's doing hanging
in there?

Speaker 1 (42:02):
They say stuff like ssdd shit different day, and they're
in the staying sober category.

Speaker 2 (42:11):
And then there's the people that have their life beyond
their wild streams.

Speaker 1 (42:15):
They've decided to do everything, not perfectly, but follow the
Big Book of Alcoholics anonymous work the twelve steps, carry
the message, take care of the newcomer, bring the message,
not the mess.

Speaker 2 (42:27):
And they're having a life

Speaker 1 (42:28):
And they're its attractive and you want what they have
and I want what they have, and we keep coming back,
so God bless you guys,