Gates Unbarred

Remember that scene at the end of Pretty Woman when the Richard Gere character climbs the fire escape to the call-girl Julia Roberts character and asks her “What happens after the handsome prince rescues the princess?”“She rescues him write back!” says our Julia and the audience totally gets that because of course her smooth and deceitful Prince has been pretty lost himself.Listen to this:When I first met my friend  Bryan he was a chubby-cheeked member of the Advanced Placement English class I taught in my years at Somerville High School. Well a lot has happened in Bryan’s life since those schoolboy days: He went from Boston to Florida by way of California as the saying goes, meaning he made mistakes that even led to his being incarcerated, all because of addiction that proved as hard to cut through as the super-tough ligaments that tie the arm to the torso.Lucky for us both the 12 Steps came along. One day well into his journey toward recovery he and I did a prison ministry show called Gates Unbarred together and as I was taking him back to the Pre-Release, he told me I should go to meetings myself. He said this because he saw in me what I never saw in myself: that as a result of alcoholism in my family of origin I had terrible boundaries and exhibited the kind of ‘rescuing’ behavior that almost never helps anybody and dearly costs not only the person practicing it but those with the closet claims on that person.Today Bryan owns his own very successful business, goes to the VA a couple of times a month to talk with the guys there who are 'in program' and flat-out loves singer-songwriter Lori McKenna,  one of whose tunes caused him to have to pull over the first time he heard it on his car radio and weep tears for pain so old he did not until then know its name.Without saying more let me show you the letter he wrote me ten days ago which I have excerpted as this week’s column and which he says he is happy to have me copy here in unedited form. I titled the column “What Recovery Looks Like” but privately I think of it as “Bryan: May He Speak at My Funeral”:

Dear Terry: So how was your long weekend? Were you up north? I went to Maine on the bike all by myself to visit my Aunt Polly,  my father's sister. Stopped in York Beach to see the twins do you remember them? It was me, Ricky & Robby. Joe, Peter and Yuri all through junior high and high school. Their family has a house in York Maine and we all spent summers up there.Here's a story: In 1984 when I first started going to meetings, my first sponsor was a guy Paul. This was before I even started going to AA. We were going to Cocaine Anonymous back then. I only stayed sober a year and half that first time. Me and Paul stayed friends though. He was a good guy, a contractor, and he always helped me out.In 1988 I was really declining and I needed a car. I had totaled mine. I conned Paul into buying me a car. He bought me a brand new 1988 Ford Escort, he registered it and insured it and I was supposed to give him the payments. Since I was using at the time, I was always a month behind paying him. His car was the car I did those armed robberies in and since the car was registered to him, the police initially went to his house with guns out in front of his kids, the whole nine yards. He told them I had the car and that's when they came and got me.He took the car back, I went to jail and never saw or heard from him again.He's been on my amends list for a long time. I heard 10 yrs ago, he had moved to North Carolina.Fast forward to Saturday. I'm leaving my Aunt's house in Biddeford and I stop for gas with the bike. This couple also on a bike at the next gas pump start talking to me, asking where I'm from, was I enjoying the riding? they asked me if I'd been to this biker bar/restaurant down the road called Bentley's. I told them I hadn't. They were like “Oh, you have to go. It's wild, all the biker's go there, the food is good. Then this other guy at the next pump in a car starts telling me “Ya, you have to go there” Blah, blah, blah, blah.Now I feel like I’m in a Twilight Zone episode where I've gotten off the main road and everyone is a little "too" friendly.The other couple finally talked me into going and following them there. We pull in, I'm completely overwhelmed. There must have been 300 bikes there. Bikers, biker chicks, regular people everywhere. It's a huge place with like 4 bars. They had a mechanical bull, a big bar-b-q pit. Hundreds of people all over the place. I'm all alone, overwhelmed, in a place I had no intention of going to, brought here by two strangers I didn't know.I go get some food and I'm walking around with my plate, just taking it all in. I get in line at one of the four bars to get a coke. I'm standing in line waiting and there’s this guy in front of me with his back to me. He calls over to the bartender and I recognized his voice instantly.It was Paul. My first impulse was to walk away, but I knew I had been led to this very spot for a reason. I tapped him on the shoulder and he turned around.I said 'Hi Paul.'He's looking at me not remembering me and he says 'Do I know you Friend?'I said 'Ya, you do Paul, it's Bryan.'He looked at me for a few seconds then he remembered me. He goes 'Bryan! Is that you? how are you. What happened to you? How ARE you?' I was expecting 'You piece of shit, you fucked me over and you owe me for that car.'I caught him up on my life. He caught me up on his. I noticed he was kind of buzzed and he was drinking. I got his number and told him I needed to call him when he wasn't drinking and make amends to him, including financial amends for the car.Before we parted, I told him 'Paul, you were a good guy and I took advantage of that. I just want you to know you were a good guy to me.'In the midst of all these bikers and all that was going on around us, I saw his face just crack and he started to cry. I don't think anyone had told him he was a good guy in a while. I knew exactly how that felt and how he felt.There were three gas stations at that intersection. Why did I choose that one? Why did I talk to those strangers? I never do that. Why did they talk to me, plus the guy in the car. No one ever just talks to me. I wasn't going to follow them, but I looked over and they were waiting for me.I could have just drove off. There were four bars at this place, why did I end up at that bar in that line, behind that guy?Today I drove back up to York in my car and sat down with Ricky (Robby had to leave) and I made amends to him too for not having been a better friend, for leaving the group and blaming them all these years like they had abandoned me. In reality, I abandoned them for drugs, my crazy lifestyle and being a criminal going to jail. Out of that whole crew, I'm the only one not still in the loop.My whole adult life I've felt the loss of those guys. They knew me, they really knew me. In a way that no one, since, has ever known me. Until I became someone they didn't know anymore.I blamed them for not caring enough to save me. But, how can anyone save you from yourself?I was looking at this Labor Day weekend as a sad end to a summer alone. I guess God didn't have self pity in the game plan for this weekend.  But, I started finding myself again after a very long time.There's a line in the first Lori McKenna song I ever heard called "Boston By Friday:  'I lost a lover, but found my best friend.' I've always known that the  best friend that was being referred to in that song was  me-myself.Love, Bryan

Bryan in 1984