Leave the Light On

by Jennifer Storm

  With that in mind, I decided it was time to end my pseudo-lesbian relationship, which went over like a lead balloon with my suitor. I sat her down one day and just told her I wasn’t ready for a relationship, that I was too new to recovery and going to college—I essentially made every excuse I could without saying, “I am just not into you in that way.” I just knew I wasn’t ready, and I wanted to walk into this college thing on my own without any ties or distractions. My whole life was in front of me, and I was eager to tackle it by myself. I tried to tell her I still wanted to be her friend, which really was what we were anyway— there was no physical intimacy, no long kissing sessions or any gestures that remotely resembled a relationship other than being inseparable all the time. But she felt for me in a way that I wasn’t capable of feeling for her. She was angry and upset and wouldn’t speak to me. She told me she couldn’t be my friend and began to get very mean with me when we spoke.

  I thought Lynn and I could transition into being friends smoothly, but boy, was I wrong. She wouldn’t return my calls or even look at me in meetings other than sending a random snarl in my direction. Thus, my introduction to lesbian drama began. This, as I would come to understand, is highly common in tight-knit lesbian communities. Those who are best friends and partners one minute will break up and hate each other the next, and many times will break up and switch partners in a heartbeat, causing even more public emotional outbursts and childish antics. Yet the little circle still must find a way to function, so dramatic entertainment just becomes standard until it all blows over and the exes become best friends again and start to vacation in Provincetown, Massachusetts, during the summer with their new partners and dogs. It’s complicated, as only women who love women can be. It’s emotional, it’s deep, it’s sometimes political, and it is always personal. In lesbian relationships, rarely is anything left unsaid or undone.

  Lynn ran around to every one of our mutual friends like a wounded cat, crying the blues to anyone who would listen and putting all of our friends and community into an uncomfortable situation. Suddenly a group of tight-knit gals was being fractured as she demanded that I not be present at events or dinners. Ironically, just as Penn State was recognizing me as accepted, I was losing acceptance among my lesbian friends.

  22

  STARTING SCHOOL

  I DECIDED TO TAKE A STEP BACK FROM MY RECOVERY group of lesbian friends and the drama and put all my focus on my new endeavor—being a freshman at Pennsylvania State University. I felt as giddy and nerdy as I did the first day of kindergarten, when I got all dolled up in a red-and-black plaid dress with my black patent leather mary janes, hair placed tightly in pigtails on either side of my eager-to-be-educated head.

  My brother Brian, who is a year and a half older than me, got to experience kindergarten a year before me, and for my overachieving self, that was unacceptable. So in my little four-year-old brain, I plotted a way to join him.

  I loved spending my endless days playing with Brian. He and I were glued at the hip, and many people thought we were twins because we shared such a similar face—both blue-eyed with brown hair and a sprinkle of freckles across the bridge of the nose. We used to make up characters and tape ourselves on our little tape recorder. Two of our many characters were an old couple named George and Marcy. We would talk for hours into the tape recorder, making our voices sound like an old couple and falling into fits of giggles as we got a kick out of each other’s imitations. Still to this day when I call Brian at work, I tell his coworkers that Marcy is on the phone, and he knows immediately that it is me and picks up in his “old” voice. We were inseparable, and the thought of him leaving me on a daily basis and me being alone with my mother was unbearable.

  So I decided I was going to go with him to kindergarten, although I never shared this idea with my mother. I told Brian I would just sneak on the bus with him, and he agreed. No one noticed as I slid in next to him on the bus. My mother must not have noticed either. I arrived with Brian and walked into his assigned classroom with him. The teacher asked us all to sit in a circle on the floor, and she began to call out names, asking us to raise our hands when we heard our name called. Obviously my name wasn’t on the list, and when she was done, the teacher looked at me with a furrowed brow. After looking from me to my brother and comparing the freckles splashed on my cheeks and nose to the identical ones on my brother’s face, it took her all of a minute to realize that I was Brian’s sister. She asked me my name and how old I was. When I told her, she gasped and said, “Oh my, does your mother know where you are?” The look on my face was a dead giveaway. She let me sit down at a small, wooden table and gave me milk and graham crackers and told me that my mother was on her way to get me.

  An hour or so later, my mother came rushing into the class, all melodramatic, and grabbed me, panting that she didn’t know whether to hit me or hug me. She chose the hug option. I wasn’t grounded or anything, and it ended up being a funny little story she would tell to everyone. I was just a fearless girl wanting to go to school.

  Here I was, years later, about to embark upon a whole new schooling experience, and I was ecstatic, but this time full of fear—fear of failure, of not fitting in, of being stupid. I tried to push the fears out of the way and just focus on one task at a time. That made it much more bearable, because when I thought of it as a whole—like a whole class or a whole semester—I would get all in my head and scared again. I started slow, one step at a time. I was getting oriented to the campus and how to register for classes. I had to figure out a way to pay for it all, and I ended up filling out a million applications for every grant and loan I could find. I didn’t want to have to work while in college because I knew this was going to take every ounce of brain power I had in me.

  My parents agreed to help me with rent and bills while I was in college. My father was a working-class success, and in many ways didn’t see the point of college. After all, he made an incredible living as a salesman for years without any additional schooling after high school, and he was damn proud of that. But my stepmother had gone to college and she fully understood the value of a college education. They both decided to support me in any way they could. I briefly looked into college dorms, and there was a “sober” dormitory, but I just didn’t think it would be a good environment for me to be right on campus all the time. I needed the quiet solace my apartment offered me in order to maintain my recovery, and my parents agreed. It would be safer for me.

  I realized quickly that college wasn’t going to be easy. I had a lot of preparation work to do before I could even schedule classes. Because my GPA was so poor and I hadn’t taken my SATs, I had to have testing done to determine my math and English skill level. I had never taken algebra or anything beyond that, so when I sat for this test, I felt like a moron. I had no idea what x equaled or how to determine a and b. I was lost, and my self-confidence plummeted to the industrial carpet below my desk. “Maybe I can’t do this,” I thought in the most self-defeating manner I had encountered since before I got into recovery. Was I crazy to think college was a viable option? I quickly shook the self-doubt out of my head and gave it my best try. I filled in the bubbles on the test knowing that I was simply guessing at the answers. I had heard once that C was always the safest choice on any multiple-choice test—I have no idea where I got this bit of brilliance, but I decided I would just start darkening all the Cs and randomly intersperse an A or B or D answer to make it look good.

  I left the room feeling uneasy, but knowing somehow that it would all be okay.

  23

  HIGHER POWER

  THIS WAS A NEW AND AMAZING FEELING THAT HAD begun to take over in my life—that somehow, some way, I would be okay. Feet planted, I saw a new pattern developing in my life. At that point, my world was surrounded and embedded in my twelve-step fellowship. This is common in early recovery. Life moves slower as we begin to feel our way through each and every day with the newness of recovery. It’s always best to take things slow and not rush into
anything. I had spent two years in therapy dealing with all the reasons I used to drink and drug. I was beginning to understand my own triggers and demons and how to manage them to avoid old negative behaviors, or worse, a relapse. I no longer had a desire to use or drink; the obsession was lifted from me when I woke up in the hospital alive after my suicide attempt. Now, thanks to a twelve-step program and going to therapy, I was learning to deal with life on life’s terms without picking up a drink or drug. Instead I learned to deal, to feel, and to heal. It was important for me to keep my feet firmly planted in recovery.

  The new positive pattern challenged my spiritual view in a good way. Good things were happening to me; things in my life were just working out somehow. I know a lot of it was due to my hard work and simply doing the footwork to get myself to the next step in my life, but there was more to it. Not only was I doing the footwork, but I was then letting it go and simply believing and trusting in the process.

  I had begun praying a lot, which was also pretty new for me. I had always said foxhole prayers when I was using, like “God, just get me through this night and I will never do x, y, z again,” or “God, please make the room stop spinning and I will never drink again.” Often I was clinging to a toilet bowl when I had these false connections to God. My prayers now were different. They were less selfish, less about a pathetic plea negotiation and more about a working relationship.

  I wasn’t sure what my higher power was; I believed in God, but had no idea what exactly God was. However, I was willing to begin to trust and believe in this higher power, and the results in my life were proof that I was on the right track. Things just worked out for me. If I didn’t have enough money to pay a bill, somehow, in some way, the money to pay the bill would find its way to me. Whether it would be a card from my parents with a check in it or a refund check from my insurance company, somehow things always managed to arrive just when I needed them. The universe began to provide for me.

  I was in awe of this process because it had never existed in my life before. I began to really understand that in recovery, if I kept doing the next right thing, I would always get what I needed. I might not get what I wanted, but somehow, I would always get what I needed on any given day. It built a faith in me that became strong and foundational in my life. I had always heard in the rooms that one of the few requirements was to believe in a higher power of some kind, and I was fully embracing this concept.

  The program doesn’t attempt to define what your higher power must be; it just suggests that it is really important to have one. It makes sense to me. As addicts, we tend to be very self-centered people; after all, we thought we were in control of everything for so long. Many addicts walk with a godlike complex. Recovery is about getting out of yourself, out of your head, and realizing you’re not in control and that you must rely upon others to succeed. It is a hard concept for many, but one that, if you don’t complicate it too much, actually makes a lot of sense.

  I’ve met people whose higher power was the rooms of their twelve-step fellowship. Or, as one old-timer in the rooms would say, his higher power’s name was Ernie, and that was all he referred to him as—Ernie. It is that simple; he just believed in something greater than himself and it worked for him. Many people come into recovery with old baggage of God and church, so the thought of any form of religiosity in a program of recovery is enough to scare them right out of the process altogether. In my opinion, this is where the program is quite brilliant. It allows you to develop that relationship on your own and in a gentle manner.

  I had often heard in meetings that there would come a time when the only thing that stood between me and my disease would be my higher power, so I had better harness that relationship and nurture it so I would be ready. It was beginning to make total sense to me, and the relationship I was starting to form with my not-yet-defined higher power felt nice and safe for me. It became something I could rely upon. The act of relying on something, of having faith in something, was brand-new to me. It felt stable, and for someone who had been as unstable as you can get, it was a blissful feeling.

  My strength in recovery was solid. I was ready to take on more challenges and to grow into myself. With my foundation in recovery strong and my belief in a higher power in place, I knew I could get through any situation as long as I continued to live my life along the spiritual lines of the twelve-step program. I still spoke to my sponsor every day. I still went to meetings. However, my life became more than just twelve-step recovery. Especially with my entrance into college, it was also time for me to begin exploring more. So my life began to evolve and develop. I realized I could tackle more and more. More things came into my life and I found myself busier and busier. My life began to blossom, fill in the edges that once were rough, and make me whole. I knew how to handle situations that in the past would have left me broken. The twelve-step program was a bridge to a new life for me, and I didn’t waste time standing on that bridge; I ran across it and embraced the life that awaited me on the other side.

  24

  FEELING SMART

  A COUPLE OF WEEKS AFTER I’D TAKEN THE MATH TEST, I received a letter in the mail that said I had failed it and needed to take remedial math prior to taking a college-level course. I didn’t get upset, because I knew I hadn’t done well on the test, and seriously, I was just excited to be taking any classes. I had a thirst for knowledge that was insatiable. I just wanted to start learning. I had neglected my brain for so many years; it hadn’t been really turned on since the sixth grade. I hadn’t taken any education seriously since that time, so I was ready and eager to absorb everything that was coming my way. I scheduled four classes, including English, Adolescent Development, the Remedial Math course, and Sociology, at night since I was enrolled as a returning adult student, which meant my courses were geared towards older students and catered to the adult learning theory. This was perfect for me. I was in class with other people my own age, and it gave me all day to study and go to meetings.

  Going to the bookstore and picking out my books was the most exciting venture I’d had in a long time. Just walking through the bookstore made me feel smart immediately, as if each book I passed and touched was imprinting its knowledge upon me. When I stepped onto campus, I had a sense of belonging that was solid. I felt like I was right where I was supposed to be, and that feeling helped me glide around in a state of wonderment like a small child entering Disney World for the first time. I had to go get student identification, and as I left the photo area with my new still-warm plastic badge in hand, I stared at it in awe and felt like I was someone. The ID not only made me feel like I had arrived at a new identity, but it made me feel like I was coming home in some way. That little girl I abandoned so long ago, the straight A-, perfect attendance-achieving girl that I left behind in sixth grade was remerging inside of me, and the smile on my face was just as magnificent as the feeling it produced inside me.

  I remember coming home with my books and wanting to get a jump start on my homework before my first class. I figured I better get a nice lead since it had been so long since I had been in any form of school setting, so I began to prepare my surroundings. Everything had to be perfect; I had to create an environment conducive to learning. I put sufficient lighting on, turned on a CD of sounds of nature to gently float in the room, but not so loud as to distract my thinking process. I lit several candles to create warmth and relaxation. I even lit some incense to add positive energy and aroma. I wasn’t messing around; this was serious business! I pulled out my shiny new book, a legal pad, a calculator I had just purchased—some big fancy thing that was listed as a requirement—and my newly-sharpened pencil. I was ready to tackle my first homework assignment. I surveyed my surroundings and determined that I had in fact created the perfect learning environment, and I felt good about diving into what was sure to be a huge challenge. I was ready for anything and as organized as I could have been. I knew how hard the math test had been, so I had predetermined in my mind that this was going to b
e a struggle for me. But I was up for the challenge, so I opened the book with great anticipation, but after seeing the first page I just burst out laughing. It was literally 2 + 2 and 4 + 4 and 6 + 6 and so on. All my expectations were shattered, and I was laughing so hard that tears were streaming off my face onto my perfect legal pad. I immediately picked up the phone and called my father, laughing so hard I almost peed my pants as I explained to him what my college homework actually entailed. We both found the humor and joy in this situation. Just like with everything else I was learning in this new life, I had to start at the bottom and work my way back up. Relearning all that I thought I had already learned was a big part of this process. It was fun, and needless to say, I got an A in that class. In fact, I got almost all A’s that semester.

  I adjusted rather well to college. I began going to noon meetings in town, which allowed me to mingle and mix with a different set of people in recovery. This was a good break from the lesbian crew, since Lynn was still giving me the silent treatment. I would still go to my Saturday morning meeting, and she would sit there with her arms crossed staring straight ahead the whole time. It hurt me that she was so angry with me, but I also knew there was nothing I could do about it, so I let her be and went about my new life. I loved going to school. I felt a part of something so much larger than myself when I stepped onto campus each day with my backpack strapped on. I loved the feel of walking to class with the rush of hundreds of students scurrying across campus from one class to another. I was a part of this energy and it made me feel confident in a new way. I began making friends in my classes, and I soaked in the environment.