Re: It is with great sadness that I must announce the passing of Bob S.
|
Thank you for the announcement Thom of Bob's passing. [Moderator comment: You are welcome but I must thank, again, Bruce C. for his email to me this morning. -Thom]
?
Bob S was my Big Book sponsor in Los Angeles in 1987 and opened up the whole world of being Big Book recoverED, paragraph by paragraph, sentence by sentence, occasionally line by line.
39 years later I'm still working with the Big Book.
My first Big Book with Bob is coming?apart, and there's so?much writing in it that I can barely read the text.
But there's no way I'm letting go of this book!
?
At 14 months sober, I asked my Higher Power to put someone in my life to help me with?what I was going through.
I?had so-dry-ity as Bob called it and no Steps yet.
Bob was my Higher Power's answer to my prayer, coming across at a meeting at the Westside Alano Club in L.A.
It was the Monday night Ask-It Basket?meeting.
The question was "How do you handle anger in sobriety?"
One member shared you talk to your sponsor, which is a reasonable answer to reason things out with someone else.
Another member shared you hit a sofa cushion with an encounter or "batik" bat which is also a reasonable answer, a physical way to get out anger, a big thing in the 1980's.
?
Then there was Bob, sitting at a table all by himself, with an eerie white light of the soda machine behind him.
The lights had been turned down low in the meeting to encourage members to share.
Bob said in response to the question about how to handle anger in sobriety that "There are?5 parts to the Tenth Step" and then he proceeded to count them off on his fingers and recited the parts from memory from page 84 in the Big Book.
I don't remember a single thing said in that meeting before the question and after Bob's share.
?
After the meeting, I made a beeline to Bob and "demanded" that he show me these 5 parts of the Tenth Step.
He pointed to the passage in the book without saying a single word to me, and there the 5 parts were in black and white -- complete with tiny numbers in circles, and a little?"P" in a circle?above the words of the last sentence in that paragraph -- "Love and tolerance of others is our code."?
When I finished reading, Bob said he was holding a Big Book study at his home on Wednesday nights, handed me a business card with his phone number on it, and told me if I was interested to call and he'd give me directions to his house.
?
After going through the Steps with Bob over the course of 3 weeks, we ended at Chapter 6, "Into Action."
Bob "dropped" me off at Chapter 7, telling me to work with others as he had worked with me.
Sadly I was not very successful with most of the people I worked with as most didn't want to do the work but regardless I stayed sober, and a few members here and there got the message, with a few of them still sober today, some nearly 40 years later.
?
When Bob moved from L.A. to Indiana, I lost track of him.
But through the years from time to time,?I crossed paths with Bob again via email, all of which was my Higher Power's doing.
Most recently I found Bob again here, through the AA History Lovers.
?
In late June of last year (2023) Bob?emailed me that his belly button birthday was coming up the first week in July and that he would be 91 years old and on August 15 he'd be 48 years sober.
Bob said he had given up painting -- which is sad, he was amazing -- but that he was still editing the Indiana District newsletter and was the Archives Chair.
He then sent me every single document he had put together on AA History complete with text and tons of pictures.
I'm sure I don't have to tell you guys that all of this material contains absolutely phenomenal gems.
?
Shortly after I recovered, Bob gifted me with a comb-bound copy of the original pre-publication multi-lith of the AA Big Book.
I still use that copy as the basis of my program today.
The multi-lith makes many things in the published edition of the Big Book much more clear.
?
When Bob broke his arm in October last year, he left me a voice mail about missing meetings which I have still saved on my phone.
While his voice was frail and weak in the message, his spirit came across still strong.
Sadly I didn't get the chance to call him back while I was inundated with health problems.
?
In L.A. I saw that Bob helped a ton of people get on the road to becoming recovered.
I'm sure he did the same in Indiana.
He left us with a wonderful wealth of AA historical material.
I will be forever grateful for all of his 12th Step work.
Bob's name surely has been written in the Book of Life.
?
Rachael M
?
?
|
RachaelM55