THE AMERICAN ALCOHOLIC

[Music] w these are members of a Wednesday night Community sing in Atlanta Georgia they have two things in common they like to sing and they like to drink they are all alcoholics including the grandmother at the piano [Music] glor GL hallelu hallu this is Linda she's 27 years old I would get up in the morning I would have enough without his knowing it he wasn't my husband wasn't aware that I was drinking of a morning but I would get up and have two or three enough to get me downtown between 8:15 and 8:30 I drank from a half of a half a pain to a half a pain by noon time I drank the same amount that afternoon I would have two or three more to get me through till after closing time with work and then I drink about a paint at night this is Billy she's 43 years old from about 16 years old till 27 I drank constantly you know off and on and at 27 I was committed to Millville due to the damage I think that alcohol had caused I broke down well my family disowned me and they've never had any use for me since glor Glory hallelu this is Shirley she's 24 years old I don't know what I want to do I don't know what I can do to straighten my feelings out I don't want to hurt anymore I don't want to drink anymore I don't want to go to jail anymore I don't want to feel like an animal anymore this is Joe he's 47 years old I got too much to live for you've seen my family my the photograph I showed you I got too much to stay around for at least I got to see them through this is Chuck he's 52 years old I got the shock of my life one evening the youngest daughter that's at home um wife and I were arguing from opposite rooms for heaven's sakes across the hall both drunk she stepped into the hall and says well you two shut up you're driving me crazy she was balling guess that's about the smallest I ever felt in my life and this is Bob he's 37 years old to begin with I know I'm wrong while I'm drinking I know it we're not happy we are the most miserable people on the face of this Earth Glory Hallelujah GL Glory Hallelujah we are the richest nation in the world our medicine is the most advanced but for all our money and all our our skill the alcoholics Among Us are shamefully and consistently short changed we prefer to ignore them to neglect them to reject them we refuse to understand their torment we question their character we'd rather preach to them than respond to their plight that's what the authorities in the field say and they are right in most communities the only consistent interest in the plight of Alcoholics is shown by Alcoholics Anonymous it is a worldwide organization and it helps many but it isn't by itself the answer to the problem everywhere the gap between what is needed and what exists is readily apparent and everywhere that Gap is wide too much to drink tonight huh this is the alcoholic everyone knows he cost you on the street for money he's dirty unshaven wreaking from cheap wine we think of him as a worthless bum a public nuisance a legal headache but there's also a human side one which we tend to ignore what's it been like Willie what's your life been like the last 25 years how' you describe it terrible do people frighten you yeah do we frighten you now kids frighten me dogs fight me every time I every time I I see a bunch of kids walking down the streets I cross the street get away from well what about when you're drunk drunk I a worried about nothing how do you get your money for your drinks a beger you ever sell blood I sell blood i s more blood every time every eight weeks I sell blood how much do you get for your blood $5 what does that buy you buy me $5 worth of drink what do you do with most of your time I'm a lonely man I just walk the streets why do you drink really that's a hard question you ask why I drink you want the truth I want the truth as much as you know the truth tell it well I found out to to myself I drink because I'm lonely I don't have no friends and I drink because I get lonely and disgusted and sometime I get angry at somebody and I drink them but most of the time loneliness do you know you're crying right now huh do you know that you're crying right now yeah why you I'm lonely right now right now with all of us in this room yeah I know I know the problem I ain't got a friend in there in most cities derelict alcoholics like Willie are banished to Skid Row areas as long as they stay there the police leave them alone but in Atlanta it's different there people like Willie are repeatedly arrested for public drunkenness and shuffled back and forth to the City prison farm despite recent High Court decisions which recognize chronic alcoholism as a valid defense against a charge of public drunkenness this is Rudolph he's been arrested hundreds of times when I came up the I was treated as an ordinary criminal I was processed any if put on a work detail I've been working ever since if a man is a man of money you never see him in the jails but a poor person is a victim of circumstances more or less we've turned out to be alcoholics we've got nobody to have us and we can't help ourselves what kind of help would you like to get I would like to get on some kind of alcoholic probo program a rehabilitation program I would like to have something uh to more or less uh I'm a nervous type anyway I would like to have some uh therapy of some description and uh maybe take job training or something like that but there's more to the arrest than keeping Atlantic clean the prison farm is the only place where Rudolph can be dried out periodic detoxification can be a matter of life or death every morning into this courtroom in Atlanta hundreds of skidrow Alcoholics are brought before municipal judge Robert Jones be seated Rudolph Howen yes for all that we had learned about the revolving door in which people like Rudolph are caught we didn't expect to see him in court that day not that soon but there he was arrested one day after leaving the Prison Farm Rudolph just got out the stock every day before yesterday of course jail is jail is no place for any alcoholic everyone knows that that knows anything about alcoholism but at the same time I'm not going to turn you Lucia every morning no no I won and let you come back again the next morning and then again the next morning again next morning I'm not going to do that I'm going to have to let you if you if you come back several Mornings in a row I'm going to still send you out there to get you detoxified now when they get the detoxification unit in of course it won't do this you'll be detoxified at the time you're arrested and then when you come to court I'll turn you loose immediately but until they do get the detoxification unit I'm going to have to detoxify you the only way can I W back down here I don't think no time soon all right I a seat Rudolph at the end of the session the judge dismissed Rudolph he left the court with a friend less than 100 yards away across the police parking lot was a liquor store Rudolph knowing that we were following couldn't care less and headed straight for the store he bought a pint of Cheap whiskey and walked around the corner Atlanta has a pilot rehabilitation program for skidrow alcoholics but Rudolph isn't ready for it he continues to repeat the only ritual he knows in St Louis Missouri derelict alcoholics are no longer being arrested the police treat them as sick people not law Breakers recently they picked Harry off the sidewalk in downtown St Louis he was in a desperate State mumbling that he didn't want to drink anymore he begged the officers to empty a fifth of wine into the gutter Harry had reached the periodic point where the alcohol had stopped working for him where his body undernourished and neglected was being poisoned and where his mind threatened to disintegrate what's his that McCain McCain MC c a n n you don't have a home address right now do you Harry are you married or single divorced divorced and where was you born Harry what city and state shame to say where was it that's all right don't be ashamed of ITB Hannibal Missouri let your pockets you get them back to you you get them back you get everything back 71 cents you got here I don't you got nothing else in your pockets now right you don't have any money here at any place do you I looked for $5 other day and I couldn't find it [Applause] you can find it I'll give you half of in a way Harry is fortunate he couldn't pick a better place for his drinking than St Louis his chances of staying alive are greater there than anywhere else they don't have a drunk tank there instead they have a First Rate detoxification center where a man like Harry is in a clean bed and receiving expert medical attention minutes after his arrival har you going to open up your eyes and talk to me come on buddy what you been drinking [Applause] today give the for five PS of wine and a fifth of what yeah you put on a pretty good one didn't you have you eaten anything today let's see what we can do here de in here we got [Applause] left 10 hours later Harry was sober you do you remember us from last night do you remember sitting on the sidewalk downtown I just SI and drinking that's sh just got the best of me have you been here before how long did you stay the last time 7 7 Days that's 7 days does this place help you Harry yeah it helps me if I just help myself I ain't got sense enough to help myself I guess when you left here the last time Harry did you want to drink I said I wasn't going to drink anything when I walked out of the door pray to God right over to the church that I wouldn't but he didn't help me do you know do you know why you [Music] drink why is that cuz I ain't seen my kid do back what did you say because why Harry I've seen my kid in about 26 [Applause] years is there someone you want to say something to that's one person I'd like to say something to who that a sister over in the convent what would you like to tell her to write to my niece and see if she take me back where's your niece now Greenburg in the air why don't you ask your nie yourself I couldn't write no [Applause] letter I just wish she'd be able to take me back think she'll take you back I don't know would you like to stop drinking yeah why so I could live a little longer Harry what do you think's going to happen to you if you keep drinking the way you've been God Only Knows alcoholics like Harry are the lonely men who long ago severed all connections with family and friends they disappear from time to time some to die on cold nights in a hole in the ground or in a jail cell during withdrawal others when alcohol has destroyed their brains live out their lives in mental institutions they make up less than 3% of the alcoholics in this country they are the most difficult to rehabilitate and the most neglected Teresa is four years old she knows a song about a sailor and one about a dog named Bingo but this is the song she knows [Music] bestus me Jesus loves me the Bible tells me [Applause] no Teresa's father is an alcoholic for 28 days last January he was a patient at an alcoholism Treatment Center in Avon Park Florida away from Teresa away from his 12-year-old son Rodney away from his 9-year-old daughter Dee and from the woman he married 13 years ago we had given up we just decided while we were just through we just wasn't going to have it anymore well he gets sort of mad at us and he just seem like everything we do it's always something wrong well he always wants money and he goes looking through all the drawers hunting for money she gets real upset and she cries all the time because he goes to fussing and then several times he's pushed us and knocked us around you know he left no one untouched he drank himself into an institution drank his family out of a big house flooded his wife and children with abuse and left them desperate for money and it wasn't the first time but there is more to Bane than his destructive drinking he suffers dark and Restless periods moods too frightening to endure without alcohol he wants to know what propels him on periodic Benders he doesn't want to drink he doesn't want to lose his family that's why he came to Avon Park and that's why he entered this room for the most painful confrontation during his stay at the clinic with the family is Mr Bowers a counselor at Avon Park do you know what kind of a hospital this is R an alcoholic hospital and what is this the reason your Dad's here then is that it yes sir for why what was the well it was because of him U drinking a lot did you kind of Wonder then why dad was in the hospital what was wrong what what did you think he was here for did you have any idea well yeah what was that for drinking really what happens when Dad drinks right well he just gets angry and he just keeps um wanting money and he usually gets us out of our house he gets angry and he wants money and then he kicks you out of the house well he doesn't actually kick us out I mean it just he gets us in such a spot that um uh we just don't have hardly any money getting pretty tough spots when when Dad gets drinking like that yes sir does it scare you yes sir how about you Dave how do you feel when Dad gets drinking oh I feel nervous too you feel nervous too you get scared too sometimes as soon as since Mama soon as we find out is then as soon as you find out what I did soon as we since we find out that he's starting then what what do you do then mostly I just go with Mom that's when you feel real bad as you see what what happens when uh your husband gets drinking what if well uh when he starts in he doesn't he doesn't doesn't quit what I mean by that if he uh if he starts drinking today this has to go on for days maybe weeks maybe a month and then this is when it really gets disgusting because uh uh all this length of time he won't work he doesn't do anything he fusses he gripes he wants money and he demands that from us regardless of whether we eat or what have we so then you're kind of uh uh well kind of walking on eggs I guess that part of the time it's always this feeling when he drives up well is it is this the day then you know it sounds like you're kind of sitting on a time bomb waiting for the thing to go off that's just about what it amounts to Mr Davis what do you think about what your family's saying not saying I'm not denying that I don't need it I need this what is it you feel kind of guilty about what some of the things that they've been talking about certainly not I think anybody that thought anything of his family he would I have uh I don't know I just can't explain it I've never uh really tried to help myself in the past I I'd say I would and gone to AA and and uh things of this nature and doctors and and have all intention but uh which I would straighten up and uh I don't uh I never without trying to find out the reason and I I'm convinced now there's reasons for it have the two of you ever talked really about alcoholism about uh you know what what you're talking about right now not really the only discussion that that we've ever had uh about alcohol is what I have done to cause the trouble and what we were going to do in the future as such as you know I was going to straighten up and uh this and that and the other but uh I don't think we've ever really got down and and uh uh talked to where what may cause it such as uh of course we know I'm 90 95% of it and I feel like maybe 5% may be yours and the children I mean it's hard for y'all to realize it but it could be well I realized that of course I never heard her mention the word love yet you have no what was that for [Laughter] D have you heard it have you heard the word love how do you as a family how do you express love in this family how do you know that you love each other or if anybody does love anybody well now I the my feelings is this um I do a little things for him I don't go around saying I love you this sort of thing all the time because I don't feel like that's necessary what do you think would happen if you did well I don't know you think I was out of my mind probably would you she she doesn't express it that way yeah but that isn't the question I asked would you think she was out of her mind if she said I love you no I wouldn't think she was out of her mind but I would think there was kind of a change would would you like to you'd like to hear that I guess wouldn't you occasionally I think every man would if he if he loves the individual he'd like to hear we discussed this before well you know it isn't going to be easy what you're talking about to uh uh Express how you feel I think probably you have just as difficult a time expressing feelings of irritation and annoyance uh as you do feelings of love and affection and uh so this isn't going to be easy for you and I don't think it's going to be easy for you either but it's something that you're going to have to consciously work at it has now been 3 months since Bane left the clinic at Avon Park he still hasn't had a drink and he's still struggling with his drinking problem Let It Go CB me a river if you feel like it surely oh