Happy New Year!

Update: What a busy holiday season! My two weeks off miraculously felt like more, despite nearly constant travel, so it was a great break. After finishing finals, I took the weekend off to party and relax, then went home for a few days before Christmas to see my family. I spent Christmas weekend in Pennsylvania with Eric's family -- and got to see the new baby! -- then went back home for a few more days before flying home on the 28th. That left me a few days to clean our entire apartment before our New Year's Party, which ended up being a big success, except for the drunk girl passed out in our bathroom at the very end of the night.

January 2 had me back at school, and they dove right in, no easing into the semester. We only have 4 weeks this block before our test, which also serves as our Path final, so it's going to be a busy January.

AA: In other news, I went to visit the local drug/alcohol rehab facility in town, The Healing Place, this morning, and that was surprisingly interesting. We attended a community meeting for the clients currently being served, which consisted of 76 of us sitting in a large circle (2 staff members, 6 med students, and the rest clients) and taking care of business. Business point #1 was to assign duties for the next two weeks: housekeeping supervisor, kitchen supervisor, maintenance supervisor, and runner. The process followed Robert's Rules of Order fairly well, a person being nominated and seconded, more people being nominated and seconded, and then a motion to close the nominating and a second. The people who made nominations had to explain themselves, and then we all had to vote, by standing up and counting off, to ensure that all 76 people voted each time. At first I was worried about voting, since I didn't know any of these people, but this problem was easily solved, due to two things: first, the nomination explanation was actually quite useful; second, you didn't vote based on who was most qualified for the job, but based on who would benefit the most from having the job. For example, we voted a guy into the position of maintenance supervisor because his nominator said,

"We came into detox at the same time so I've been with you a lot, and I notice that you're very clean and meticulous. Your clothes closet is as neat as a department store's! I was on maintenance duty these past few weeks and we were doing really dirty things like moving toilets and cleaning moldy basements, so I'm nominating you because I think doing something dirty will pull you out of your comfort zone and give you a chance to grow."

Obviously, that guy was therefore the best choice, so I voted for him. It's an interesting concept, voting people into positions based on what will be the best for them, rather than what will be the best for the position. It focuses on personal growth, rather than on jobs being done.

Then two clients who had submitted petitions to leave for the weekend explained their requests to the group, and the group got to ask them questions before we voted to allow them to go. One man, Joseph, was going to go down to Elizabethtown to his dad's house for the weekend so he could make amends with his father, which was what he needed to do to move to Step 9. The group questioned him on whether making amends at his father's house was wise or if a neutral location would be better; on what he would do if the amends didn't go well; and other similar things.

Finally, everyone went around and told their "issues" and "grievances" -- issues are things you've done wrong that you're reporting (like being late to a meeting) and grievances are issues you are calling out on others. The theory is that other people can identify your shortcomings better than you can (definitely true) and so they're brought out in a community atmosphere with a goal of improving each other. James was called out for shirking his duties as kitchen supervisor, and the group came up with an appropriate punishment (although I don't think they call it "punishment"): 2 weeks of more menial kitchen duties, writing 1000 words on "my disease doesn't forget," 2 weeks of a Feelings Journal, two weeks of doing "meet and greet" at the shelter, writing out Chapter 5 of the "Big Book" twice, writing a two-page synopsis of each of the first three steps of AA, and various other things I can't remember anymore. Talk about homework!

The Healing Place uses a "social" or "peer" model of drug/alcohol recovery, as opposed to a "medical" model of recovery. Thus, most of the recovery is done in peer groups, with only minimal leadership by professionals. There was a Social Worker leading the community meeting this morning, but he only served to keep everyone mostly on task, and didn't facilitate or lead the discussion in any way. Grievances are brought by peers, decisions are made by peers, and lots of graduates of the program work at the center so there is a sense of success and credibility everywhere. It was really quite interesting.

I sat next to a man named Shakur (sp?) who came to Louisville from Richmond for a reason I didn't quite catch, but he said he had been living on the streets for 31 years and trying to become sober since 1979, and he had done AA in Richmond, but with all of his family and old friends there, it was too easy to relapse, so he left. He was a really nice guy, and watched out for me the whole meeting, explaining when I had to participate and what I had to do. I wish him luck in his recovery.

Another interesting fact I learned today is that a surprising percentage of alcoholics/addicts are actually very smart, since so many have their high school diplomas or college degrees, and they were able to obtain them while, for the most part, drunk/high. There were college courses I didn't do well in sober, and I can't imagine having to go through them high, but these people are so smart that they were able to lose that much cognitive ability and still be successful in school. It really is a shame when you think about it.

Medical Spanish: I started Medical Spanish today, and we'll see how it goes. I took French in high school and Chinese in college, and the only Spanish I know is from Sesame Street. I figure, though, if I can just learn the basics, like pronunciation and basic sentence structure, that I can always look everything else up later on an as-needed basis. So far, the hardest thing is trying to figure out what words are supposed to sound like, since I want to say them with French pronunciation and accents. I learned today that "le" in Spanish is pronounced like "les" in French, and while "le/les" in French is a direct object, it is an indirect object in Spanish, and "el" is the equivalent direct object. I foresee more confusion along these lines for me, much as there was between French and Chinese when I first started... On the plus side, a lot of the vocabulary is similar between French and Spanish, so it makes sense to me what "biblioteca" means, whereas learning "bibliotheque" in the sixth grade was somewhat more difficult. In any case, the professor is nice and said he'll give everyone Honors, so it's just for fun!

And finally, I have to give a big CONGRATULATIONS to Jamie and Tim -- they're engaged! Luckily, the wedding's not until 2008, so I'll have a chance to recover from this year's string of weddings (1 in March, 2 in May, 1 in June, and 1 in September, with a bridal shower in March also; the added stress is that 3 are during my board studying time, so that is going to be a marathon to get through).