Determined To Succeed

Day thirty.

Do any of you gamble? It doesn’t matter really if you do or not. I guess what I am asking is if you guys are familiar with the ways people gamble in places like Atlantic City or Las Vegas. They use chips at all the table games instead of actual money in part so you feel like you are playing with “fake” cash. You may remember you are dealing with your own hard-earned cash but at least the various chips are pretty and shiny and fun to look at.

My favorite table game is Craps, a game where the shooter stands in position and rolls two dice down a long oval table while she/he and others place chips on the table betting on what number will come up when the roll is completed. I love Craps because, when a great shooter is up, you can win a great deal of money. The energy is high and everyone is excited and feeling good – as long as I remember to take it easy and place conservative and somewhat conservative bets on the table. It’s when I go and think “I’ll be O.K.” that I over bet and lose. That’s, invariably, when even the best shooters “seven out,” rolling a seven which means that round is over and EVERYONE loses EVERYTHING on the table.

There are other games of chance of course that also employ chips – various versions of poker, Roulette, Blackjack and more all use chips and you sure as hell want to have a lot of chips in the game. The more you have the longer you can stay, have fun and play. Also, the more you have the more you’re not going broke from losing your fun, pretty “play” money because it’s never fun (or very smart) to gamble using just one or a few chips.

They even mention playing chips in the movies. There’s a quote from “Clear and Present Danger,” the Harrison Ford flick based on the Tom Clancy novel. In the movie (I don’t know if this scene is in the book as I’ve never read Clancy) Ford as hero Jack Ryan is confronting the President with information he has about an operation that was illegal. Ford’s character knows that this is huge and could, in effect, bring down many people in government including the President, who turns to Ford/Ryan and says “you won’t do that. You have a chip in the big game now and when you need something I’m going to be the one to cash it in for you.” Ford then tells the President off, walks out of the room and testifies in front of Congress anyway, and you can imagine him mentally holding onto that “one chip” in his head, and you know he ain’t going to bet with just one chip.

I guess you all are wondering why I am talking about chips today. Well, I’ll tell you. Today is my thirtieth day of sobriety. I had always seen in the movies that people in Al-Anon get a chip to mark their month-iversary of sobriety. One single chip. In doing a bit of looking before writing I see that many different A.A. groups and many different companies distribute and make, respectively, different chips – chips marking everything from 24-hours of sobriety to years of sobriety. But no matter how many hours, days, weeks, months or years you are sober the idea is you carry this chip/these chips with you to remind you to stay sober.

In the movies the person who receives or has the chip will always be faced with the dillema of whether or not to take a drink, thereby negating the sobriety already achieved. They will be tempted to act out on their bottom line behaviors when faced with X, Y or Z. Most recently I saw it in an episode of last season’s “Flash Forward,” a show in which two of its main characters are recovering alcoholics – both of whom take a drink and give in to their demons.

But if I have learned anything from the movies and table games in Vegas it’s that you never, ever gamble when the stakes are that high and you have only one chip to your name. In many cases it may be all the currency you have in the world and you have to hold onto it with both hands because it’s all you’ve got to get you home.

And being just thirty days sober means I have but one, precious chip.

Is it fun to gamble from time to time? Sure it is but I ain’t ever gonna gamble with this most precious chip. It’s what I’ve got. It’s all I’ve got. And as I stand on day thirty of this sobriety I am feeling better now, more honest and free, than I ever have and I’ll be damned if I am going to gamble that away the way I’ve gambled before. Yesterday, I met a friend of mine for coffee and she has lost a lot of weight and I bet she wouldn’t bet that chip for the world since that weight loss and happiness was hard-fought-for and a long time in coming.

I may not get an actual chip today but I don’t need one. I won’t need one and I will never need one because I do not need a wooden coin to remind myself how lucky I truly am in this world. I’m going to take today and just breathe and think about what my life was like thirty-one days and more ago. Those thoughts of that old me will be all the reminder I ever need, and all the strength I need, to not gamble with my one, precious chip no matter what happens for the rest of my life.