I know what upset your mother, I had resigned my position.  In a small town, being superintendent is a very political job.  People with kids in school often join the board because they want to make sure their kids don’t get screwed over and then quit when their kids are out of school.  It is a very political job and you are always doing a juggling act and the buck stops with you. It didn’t suit my personality very well. 

I used to come home and complain to your mother.  In hindsight, I know this was hard on her, but really she was the only one in town I could talk to about this stuff.

I was Assistant Principal by 27, Principal by 31 and Superintendent by 35.  It was as high as you can go, and I asked myself if this was what I wanted to do for the next 20-25 years.  I had no problem with performing my job.  I never drank on the job.  I’d get home at night and have some drinks then, but I was not a guy with a bottle in the desk.

In fact, the board was surprised when I talked to them about resigning and asked me to stay on while the new guy got acclimated.  One of the board members said, “We’d have been willing to give a leave of absence if you needed time off.”  But it was just not the right job for my personality.  After I resigned, the librarian said, “You know what your problem was, you are too honest to be superintendent.”

I planned to work on the house and maybe go into business with a friend.  As far as your mother goes, I felt like when I took time off, she had no further use for me.  Before I resigned, we had an argument and I said, “Fine. I’ll resign and take some time off and you can work and support the family for a while.”After I quit the job, I was home all day.  I was no longer any use to your mother and that was the downward cycle for me.  Things got dysfunctional after I quit my job.  It was almost two years from the time I resigned to the divorce.After I went into rehab, your mom wanted a divorce.  I begged her to take me back.  She let me come back, but I think it was only half-hearted and not sincere, as I think the marriage was finished for her.  Then we had an argument and I started drinking again.  There was still alcohol in the house because she still wanted to drink sometimes.  Really there shouldn’t have been any alcohol in the house.

After rehab, I realized I had to be responsible for me–no one was there to do it for me.  It was important for me to go through that and I had a chance to think about what I wanted to do in life.

Eventually, after selling books for a while both in the Detroit area and back closer to home, I got my resume in order and took a job as a business manager, which was a much less political job and a better fit.  But I still would drink in between sober periods. I went back to rehab one last time.  My boss said, “The board will not understand a 2 week stint in rehab, especially considering your history.”  I didn’t complete rehab because I had a choice to make.  After three or four days in rehab, I left the hospital and made up my mind not to drink any more, and that was the last time I had a drink.

I did go to AA for a year.  But, finally, there was this one woman who said “You don’t belong here with us.”  She didn’t mean it in a mean way.  She meant that I didn’t need to be there.  I just never went again and I’ve never had an urge to drink since. I have always felt I would be welcome at AA if I ever had the urge, but fortunately I have never felt like taking a drink and may be lucky to be a “1%’er,” or those who stay sober without AA.