Dead Drunk

By Gil VanWagner

Buddy's story. He is going through recovery....working the 12 Steps that have saved so many......only he is doing it over twenty years after he died. A message of hope that crosses time and space for addicts in all shapes and sizes....and those that love them.

It began as another story. Tom Van Wagner's story of 40 years of sobriety and the cost of the disease that is alcoholism. A story to be written by his nephew, Gil Van Wagner. The tale began there and stalled when Tom decided that it might be too much sharing....might be too hard to show all the work and the pain. Gil honored his Uncle's wishes when Tom changed his mind.

Somehow the story continued. Gil felt his own Dad, Tom's brother Buddy, walking beside him as had been the case when the story first began. Buddy guided him and helped him understand Tom. Then Tom decided to stop the process......yet Buddy remained. Gil liked his ghostly company on the morning walks but wondered why. Why? Why did Buddy remain? Why did he still show himself? Why did Recovery still link the dead father and the writer son?

Then Gil noticed Buddy was smoking. Why would you smoke in the afterlife? Because you could? Because it couldn't harm your body anymore? Why would someone hang on to a vice? Why would they hang on to a lesser choice? Gil wondered what other things Buddy carried over from this world.

It was then he knew. This was not supposed to be Tom's story of recovery. It was to be Buddy's. So Gil let Buddy begin what he did not do in life.......he let Buddy go to AA.

This is that story. Tom and Gil thought it was about Tom. Buddy just needed to get his own son's attention....so he could finally begin the path to recovery...one day at time....years after he died.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Gil VanWagner
• Release date: Dec 31, 2011
• ISBN: 9781465939982

Gil VanWagner

I have been lots of things and am lots of things. My core is slave to writing, healing, sharing, believing, doing, including, and dancing in joy. Know me through my words...as I learn me through my deeds. Welcome. Born and raised in New Jersey, twenty-eight years traveling the world in the USAF, ten years in corporate America, several years running my own business, and ended up in Utah. Now I write, share, life coach, and do whatever feels right to be a self-sufficient global citizen.

Book preview

PART ONE

Hi. My name is Buddy and I am an Alcoholic. I didn’t start out that way. I finished that way but I am going to undo that. It is time to recover. Time to heal. Twelve steps. Forty-five steps. I don’t care how many. I choose to heal. That is the first step. Today. Actually yesterday but it took me a while to get pen to paper.

This is my story. It may seem a bit sporadic, spontaneous, or just plain fucked-up at times but it will be the truth, the whole truth, and everything Perry Mason held holy and true. I have no reason to hold anything back and I am going to stop blaming others, excusing myself, and shifting my shit to everyone and anyone else. I can do that now. I am dead.

Been dead since 1979. Died of a bunch of things, some big, some small, but the result was the same. I was dead at 59 years old and died an old man. Took a lot of stuff with me when I died and it has been with me ever since. I am about to let most of it go. You get to watch. You need to watch actually because we are all in this together. Learn from me. I might be slow but I’m gonna get there. I am about to heal and soar or wherever it is I am supposed to do. After all, I deserve joy just like any Pope, President, Movie Star, and anyone else you think matters. I matter. Just as much as you do. We all do. Now I am going to fix some things that I should have fixed a long time ago. It begins with fixing me. Took me twenty-nine of your years to realize I could not, should not, and would not do it alone. Did not work for the fifty-nine years I lived and didn’t work for the twenty-nine I’ve been dead. Time to change something. My reality needs a shift. I choose to heal. Listening, Big Kahuna? I am going to do the hard stuff and peel back my soul for me to see.

So let’s get started. I’ve got a lot to do and places to go.

I did not start out as an Alcoholic. A long time ago, over 80 years, I was just a kid in Brooklyn. Along the way, I crawled into and out of the bottle. That comes later though and there is a lot to tell about that so let’s just talk about me being a kid in Brooklyn. It was 1920 and, as they say, I was born at a very young age. My sister, Eleanor was already 3 years old and my brother John was on the second of what would be his thirteen years when I came along. Paul followed me two years later and Tom completed the set when I was 4. It was an active house, kid wise, for the whole time I lived at home with Mom.

Mom ruled the roost. Mom ruled the roost for as long as I can remember. Dad was away and she said just to let folks know he was dead. So we did. All of us. Dad was dead. Somewhere in some home or something but he was dead if anyone asked. Pretty soon, no one asked any more. For me, the lie became the truth because we told it so much. For the family, Dad became the deep dark secret. Mom thought she and Eleanor kept the secret from me. Dad had Schizophrenia. In the 1920s, you might as well be a Leper. There was no treatment for that and mental illness was something you didn’t even talk about. Lock them away and deny they even existed was pretty much par for the course.

As a kid, I did not know any of that. I just knew Dad went bonkers one day, hit my mother, then tried to hit me and my Mother took the beating for us both. That was the day I began to hate him. Still do but that will pass as I share more of this. Hated him. I have some memories of him being Dad in a way but the memories that were mine for the rest of my days was his attack and then his absence. Mom had him locked away and I was glad. He should have been killed if you asked me and I was quite content to say he was dead. After all, I spent my life, and beyond, wishing he was. For me, he was dead. I did get to beat him up a lot but that was later when I was drunk and looked for him in every big guy around. I was barely 5 foot 6 and 130 pounds but I was a scrapper. That comes later though. It just started back there in Brooklyn.

This retrospective thing is harder than it seems. The time lines and exact sequence get a bit fuzzy but I’ll do the best I can. As a kid, I had a bit of an attitude. Eleanor was Mom’s favorite. She was pretty much every one’s favorite. Mine, too. Paul was the smart kid. He was polite and obedient in school, home, church, and just about everywhere. Sure, he got into some trouble but his trouble was bush league compared to mine. Tom was the youngest and the biggest. I was his big brother but he was bigger than me by the time he started school. I did not like that much but basically shut up about it.

John and I were really close. It kinda pains me to talk about him. John and I shared things the others did not know and that made him and me as close as brothers can be. He was two years older but we were like twins, we were so much alike. I loved being around him. Even when we fought. I learned a lot about being tough from him. He did not let me win unless I actually won. That was an important lesson.

I showed off for him a bit. Used to put a chip right on my shoulder and dare the kids in the neighborhood to knock it off. I was scared but no one but me knew it. Kinda hoped no one would take me up on the dare but a few did and I let them have it. Usually, I won. Sometimes, I lost. I never said Uncle though. They could try and try and I would rather die than say Uncle. They might beat me up but they would not beat me. My brothers, Tom and Paul, both got a bit mad when I was in fights. As if it embarrassed them to be my brother. Not John though. He was ready to save me if I needed it, but I rarely did. He usually patted me on the back after I had a good fight. One time, he helped clean me up so Mom and Eleanor did not see the cuts. I loved John.

One day, John was perfectly fine. Went to Coney Island and we had a blast. We argued a bit about some candy. I swiped it and he knew it and said so. I told him to get off his high horse and have some. He ultimately did but I was pissed that he got all high and mighty about it. Heck, I swiped a lot of stuff and he did not get all high and mighty before. Why this time?

I never did get to find out. We came home from Coney Island and John got sick and died two days later. Just like that. Poof! Gone. I thought they were just kidding at first. No way that could happen. Not John. He would be alright. Then they had him in a box and I cried a bit but stopped when I saw other kids watching. Then we went to church and they took him to a graveyard and put him in a hole in the ground.

It was really weird being there. Felt like it was a dream and I would wake up any moment. The alarm never sounded though and John was really dead. He did his school work. He tried to be good like they taught us in school and church. He was a good kid. None of that mattered. He was dead. Thirteen years old and he was dead. I was already eleven and wondered how long I would be around.

What hurt the most was that folks moved on. Kids in school said they were sorry and all. The Priests came by…first for those Last Rights, then for the Funeral, and then for some comfort or something. Neighbors brought food and gave sorrowful looks. All that lasted a few weeks and then it was like John wasn’t ever born. Even in the house, I would bring him up and pretty soon Aunt Edith and Eleanor asked me not to bring him up since it was so tough on Mom. They were right. It was tough on Mom. I stopped bringing him up. Pretty soon he was as dead as Dad was only I did not want John dead. Still don’t. It hurt not talking about him. I should have spoken up. I killed him by letting others forget about him. I let him die. Shame on me. Looked for John in the graveyard for a while. Just me. His grave wasn’t marked but I knew where it was. Pretty soon, I realized he wasn’t there and wouldn’t be back. Pretty soon, John was gone for real. I stopped going the graveyard. I stopped looking for my brother. He was gone.

After that, I hardly ever lost a fight. Fought to show John how tough I was. Even without him around. Fought to beat up anyone that reminded me of my father. The same father that wasn’t there when John died. I hated him even more because of that. Wished he had died instead of John. Wished he was gone for real. Now, that would be something to talk about. I would have shouted it to the heavens. Ding, Dong, the Fucker’s dead!

I do not want to sound negative but hate is hard to paint in other words. My hate for my father had many causes and I watered it well in its own darkness for the rest of my days. Beyond as well but that is why we are having this talk. My youth may have been fatherless but it had good stuff too. Mom was one of the best things. I was always awed by her. She hid her sadness so well. She taught school and I bet she was one of the best teachers there. She talked of her students sometimes and I saw how much she cared for their education. She pushed them hard, especially when they had their heads up their asses. She made a difference in many of their lives. I just never heard any one of them thank her or anything like that. She did it because it was her place to do it as a teacher.

She taught all day and then took care of us each night. Aunt Edith helped out too. She was Mom’s sister. I liked her. I think she liked me, too. We lived in her house on Avenue N. I know it was her house because her kids took every chance to remind us of that. Sometimes subtly. That meant Mom or Eleanor were in earshot. Sometimes not so subtly. That meant it was just us boys. Just us Van Wagner boys. That’s the way it was. Seemed having us all crammed into the house was something some of the kids did not like. Can’t say I blamed them. Probably woulda been pissed if folks crowded me in my own home and all. It was pretty crowded. Aunt Edith liked having Mom there but there were a lot of us crammed into her house on Avenue N. We had our five, until John freed up some living space by dying, and her four. Elbert was the oldest and Elbert was the holiest thing a person could be. Elbert was a Jesuit.

There were Priests and then there were Jesuit Priests. I didn’t know what made Jesuits so special but heard quite routinely that Elbert was a JESUIT. Someone would say Priest and Aunt Edith, my Mother, Eleanor, or Ruth, Elbert’s sister, quickly corrected them by saying, Elbert is a Jesuit. Seemed to be very important so I played along. Elbert was alright and seemed like a nice guy. Elbert was a kid though before he was a Priest and Elbert swiped a few apples right along with me before he got all high and mighty after he became a Priest. Not just a Priest…a Jesuit! Priests were pretty much assholes though so that meant Elbert the Jesuit was a super-asshole in my way of thinking.

Priests did one thing very well. They judged. Evidently they were born better than the rest of us sinners. Selected by Jesus while still in the womb or something so they had what it takes to be a Priest. People really respected them. Just because they were Priests. That made them better or something. They farted like us and their shit stunk just like ours but that didn’t matter. They were blessed and then sat in Judgment over us.

Mom liked Priests. Guess it was kinda like having a man in her life so she went to see them each time she could. That meant on Sundays, Holy Days, and a few days a week when and if she could. She spent as much time as she could down the block at Our Lady Help of Christians Church. I did not mind but she always tried to drag us along.

Paul and Eleanor usually went by choice. Tom went just because he was told to go. John and I went when she caught us. We knew the routine and the times and just made sure we were somewhere else when she went. Ended up being a very special time. Stolen time. Time we likely would have been kneeling and praying and hearing what miserable sinners we were. Instead, we played tag, shot marbles, explored the neighborhood, and just enjoyed being together. I liked it extra special since we sorta earned it by making sure Mom did not catch us and make us go to church. After John went away, I did not like the time when I avoided church. It was kinda sad and lonely but it was better than being forced to hear the Priests and walking away feeling like shit. I could feel like shit without their help. Who were they to add to my shitpile?

Mom worked hard and I wished she did something that made her feel good. Instead, she went to Our Lady Help of Christians or visited my wife-beating daddy that was supposedly dead. She worked hard and should have done something that had her smile or laugh. Heck, she would have been better off shooting marbles with me than going to church or the loony bin. I would have let her win some of the time. They didn’t.

It was the Great Depression. They only called it Great after it ended. It was anything but great at the time. I might have only been nine when it hit but I knew how the bread was buttered. For a lot of folks, it was not buttered. Heck, it was not even bread. Mom always made ends meet though and I was impressed. There were no soup lines on Avenue N and my brothers and sister and I ate every day. While some days, it was heavy on the potatoes and light on the meat, we ate. Mom made that happen. Her and Aunt Edith…two Women took care of themselves and a whole bunch of us kids.

Tom was too little to notice and that was the way it should be for a kid. He was five so he was too busy learning about life and books and things to notice that the School of Hard Knocks officially opened for just about every adult alive at the time. Times were tough and somehow we all made it. Even those folks without a Dad. Mom made sure of that. She handled the Great Depression without a man, buried a son two years into the Depression, and kept right on doing what she did best. She worked, went to church, took care of her family, and pretended she was alright. I loved my Mom.

Having a school teacher for a Mother presented some challenges though. Mom wanted us all to be good at school and routinely reminded us of the value of an education. Whenever we went to Manhattan on the bus, she pointed out the business men. All in suits with brief cases…all looking very important and very rich. She said each one of them went to college. Eleanor was earmarked for college. We all knew that by the time she was in fourth grade. Paul and Tom were college bound. Paul was younger than me but better known in school since he was one of the smart kids. Tom was just likable in every setting.

Me? Unless Reform School qualified as higher learning, the idea of me going much passed High School was rarely mentioned. I had a bit of trouble reading and bluffed my way through most classes and cheated on the really important tests so I at least passed. It did not start that way. I was reading pretty good just before I started school and for a little while after even. One day, I was reading aloud and stumbled over a big word. While I concentrated on it and broke it down to syllables in my head, the teacher moved to the next kid. Next thing I heard was the word that was forming in my head coming out of someone else’s mouth. She spoke it with an attitude that cut my confidence like a knife through Jell-O. Then I heard a snicker or two and knew I was not such a good reader after all. The words got harder after that and the first of the C’s appeared on the report card.

That was alright though. While other kids were home reading, I learned the lessons of the street. There were certain areas of Brooklyn, most within walking distance, that were a hell of a lot different than Avenue N. On Avenue N, we had kinda of a mix of folks but most were pretty tame compared to other neighborhoods. Heck, compared to some of the rougher neighborhoods, Avenue N was Park Avenue. Even the men coming home from work in the evening seemed softer. Nicer.

It was mostly a white neighborhood. Lots of Micks and a few Guineas thrown in for color. A few blocks away, it was a cornucopia of Jews and Jesus knew what else. Some of the areas were damn near dangerous. That was where I went while the other kids read. Mom did not know. She thought I was wandering around the neighborhood and playing with the others kids. After John died, I did not really hang out with anyone else. Being alone was safer.

Even my time with Paul and Tom dropped off after that. Quite frankly, they were too soft for me. They brought into too much of the school and church crap for my liking. I loved them and all but just did not have much in common with them. They read while I explored. They studied and made A's and B's while I did not and barely passed most classes. They did the Altar Boy, help the Nuns, and be good for Jesus stuff. Me? I lived in the real world.

One day I watched Tom from across the street. I came home from one of my outings and saw him before he noticed me so I slipped behind one of the big maple trees to watch him. He seemed to be playing but I knew he was bluffing. He was hanging around outside just to see something so I laid low to see what he was up to. I figured it out pretty quick. Tom was there as the men came home from work and he watched like a puppy waiting for his master to come home. It was when the night eased the day away, the smell of supper filled the neighborhood, and the flow of the evening washed over the entire block. The men came home from wherever they were for the day. Some had briefcases. Most had lunchboxes. We were more the lunch box bunch than the suit group. I could tell the men were tired from work but happy to be home. Tom pretended to be playing with some trucks on the lawn but he spied them. There was a look to them. Ruggedness. Most looked dirty from the sweat of a good days work. I bet they smelled all musky and manly. Tom watched them come down the street and turn into this house and that house, just not our house.

That night, I heard Tom crying in his room and went to see what was wrong with him. I sorta already knew but did not let him know that. After all, I was four years older and a helluva lot wiser. It took a while but he finally told me that he wished he had a Dad like the other kids. I held him and let him just sob a bit. Then I comforted him. I let him know there were things he did not know and that he was a lot better off without a Dad. He asked me why but I didn’t answer. He was too little to understand evil. He was too young to know about the bastard that was not dead but was said to be dead and should have been dead. He was too little to know about hate and how sucky it was to have a father like the one he had but did not have. I held him and felt him. The inside of him. He was so young and better off not knowing the truth. The truth was cold and tough. He was just a kid so I held him while he drifted off to sleep. Sweet dreams, kid.

Grammar School and High School pretty much blurred for me. While we had Nuns in Grammar School and regular teachers in High School, my time there filled a square. I guess there should be more memories and laughter and stuff but I was not that kind of kid. Most folks thought I had an attitude. They were right. Mom went to Parent-Teacher nights and came home with the standard stuff. We don’t know what to make of Buddy. He’s moody. It was always variations on that theme. The talk when Mom came home from those things was pretty much the same each time.

She waited until we were alone. Usually at the kitchen table. I knew it was coming. She knew I knew. Then she asked what was the matter. The way she asked it always got to me. It was so filled with love and caring. At that moment, I wanted so hard to tell her I was sorry and that I wished I was better in school and that I would make her proud of me and that I would be the very best I could and she could brag about me the way she bragged about Eleanor and Paul and Tom. I wanted her to be happy. All she did was sit and ask me that question with those eyes that made mine want to cry I loved them so much. So would just ask Buddy, what’s wrong?

I wanted to say all those things but my answer was pretty much like the question. My answer was the same each time. Nothing, Ma. Then she asked the follow on questions and I gave the follow on answers. We had it down like a dance team. It was one of the most private times I had with my Mom and it broke my heart that it was about her embarrassment about my performance in school. She was so caring at those times. I ached to see her so hurt and was very sincere when I promised her I would do better. I meant it each time. She believed it each time. Then I would go back to school.

Teachers are rats. They knew my Mom was a widow. They knew she raised four kids, mourned for one, and worked her ass off. They could have been a little gentler in their report about me. I was not a thug or nothin. Books were just not my thing. Conjugate your own damn verbs. Who cared about the Magna Carta, the Armanda, or the price of tea in China? I was a kid in Brooklyn for Christ’s sake and would be a working man in Brooklyn, and then a dead guy buried in Brooklyn. What the fuck did I need to study for? Teach me to swing a hammer or a fist or drive a nail or a taxi. Teach me something that was gonna make me a buck. I could add and subtract. I could read alright. Nothing they covered in class prepared me for other than pleasing the teachers and getting good grades. A report card never fed nobody but the damn school board. Keep me the hell out of it and leave my Mother alone, you pious bastards.

Yeah, I guess school was not my thing. But there was one thing about school I kinda liked. More and more as the years went by. There were girls in school and that made it almost worthwhile to go there each day. Alright, most days but even when I played hooky, I liked the ladies.

This retrospection thing is a process that made me color outside the lines. Way, way outside the lines. The very thought of how I felt about females helped me see how much crap I brought into over the years. Sex was the first and greatest separator and I believed so much of what was wrong about it that it was a wonder I did not crack up. I felt so guilty about my feelings and thoughts that I wondered if they had the wrong Van Wagner in the nut house.

Sex was something littered and land-mined with Don’ts. This gender with that gender only…if not, you were unnatural and went to hell with all the other freaks. Sex after marriage only and not before because…well, because Jesus said so. Or God did. Someone did and you just do what you are told. You don’t know shit so get married and then two of you cannot know shit together. That would help. This body part went in there and only there…..not there, not over there, not under there, definitely not through there, and don’t even think about anything below here or above there. Women that dressed this way were whores. Men that acted that way were leeches. Looking at these kind of things was sinful. Sex was for pro-creation, not recreation. Thinking those thoughts was perverted. Sex was basically wrong and the surest way to burn in hell. Make babies with it but don’t get in the habit of enjoying it or…well, or else.

Well, based on what I liked in life, I was pretty much doomed. I was a child prodigy of evil when it came to things carnal. Took that with me all the way to the box and beyond. It wasn’t always a bad thing. I first thought sex and all things related to sex were beautiful. As pretty as any rose in any garden and as stunning as the peacock in full feather. Felt hints of that every day in my life. Felt it guilt free when I first discovered girls were different than me.

There was something very special about females. I noticed it very young. Noticed it even before I noticed the budding breasts and shaping curves. Maybe it started with Mom. Most likely. She was the one that showed me that strong and nurturing were not contradictions. Eleanor had that ability too. I loved her so much. She and