Defects of Character

[MajestyJo]

When I had my dart team, it was important to support them and praise them for a job done. We went to Provincial Darts for the Legion and we ended up playing against a team from our own branch made up of the president, the past president, the vice-president, and secretary. We were winning, and they started making fun of me, encouraging my players and we were a mixed lot, one girl had never left the village, and very much out of her league. Another woman was short and weighed about 250 lbs. and another woman could beat us all with a hand tied behind her back, and myself, who could beat each of the other members of the other team on a regular basis. We froze on X1 and ended up losing the game. The young girl said, "We will never live it down if we lose to them." We allowed them to intimidate us. We were down to double out range before they doubled in, and in the long run, we deserved to lose, because we froze and allowed our fear to paralyze us, and we took their criticism and everything they said personally.

Yet these same people, were supposedly our friends. The president wanted me to join the Women's Auxiliary until she found out I wasn't a people pleaser and a follower. I was a helper and willing to work, but not to to her honour and glory if it was detrimental to others and not for the good of the Legion. This was before I got clean and sober. I didn't want her job. I wasn't in competition for job. That is not who I am, it is about trying to do the best job I can do. I am not trying to outdo anyone.

I use to laugh, when I split up with my ex-husband, everyone though I was looking for a man. I wouldn't have taken their husbands in a lucky bag. They didn't know their husbands had propositioned me and I had turned them down. When I left town, I left with no friends, judged and I hadn't done anything but be me. I had even made the decision to quit drinking. I didn't know about AA, but it was the first thought that alcohol was part of the problem.

It seemed like I always had to justify my existence and it wasn't okay to be me. Those old tapes can be killers. I try always try to give credit where credit is due. If I see where something can be improved on, or whether I have found something that has helped me, I like to share it, with the hope that it will help others. That doesn't mean, someone else has to do it. It doesn't mean my word is gospel. What it means that I am old and have been around the block a few times and have learned by trial and error, fell on my face a time or two, and landed on my feet to live and try again.