I had lunch yesterday with a munchkin—seriously, one of the original munchkins from the Wizard of Oz. He has a (small) star on the Hollywood walk of fame. He is in his 90s.
Other potential opportunities for me to meet him before didn’t happen because he is almost always travelling—to film festivals, etc, where he is a star. He is one of the last living little people from Oz. He didn’t mention the film (presumably, he knew I knew), but he did share some very funny stories, particularly about needing to be protected by state police when he was travelling around with circuses and fairs—especially in the south. He carried a gun. Being “different” (he was German in addition to being small) made him a target.
But I was most struck by the fact that as remarkable as he is, hardly anyone knows who he is. Or cares. And it is true of most of us. We are all pretty much “out-of-sight, out-of-mind” kind of people. I think most of us in the States learn it when we graduate from high school, when those people we thought we would be friends with forever drift away, while others drift in and take their places.
And it isn’t a busy-modern-world phenomenon. Jane Austen wrote over 200 years ago of one of her characters that “she believed she must now submit to feel that another lesson, in the art of knowing our own nothingness beyond our own circle, was become necessary.”
Everything is not about us, and we are not the center of the world. In fact, we are barely anything beyond those immediately around us. That’s why it is important for me to choose the people around me carefully. My home group, my sponsor, my friends in and out of recovery—it is my responsibility to make certain that–while I am as small and insignificant as everyone else–I build my own circle.
The last contact any of my using “friends” (some of whom I only really knew by their screen names) made with me was about six months after I stopped using meth. And they weren’t thinking about me, they weren’t caring about me—they cared about my supply. They texted at 3 or 4 in the morning, wanting to “hang out.” The calls diminished over time until they stopped.
And I know if I stop showing up in recovery, the same thing will happen. The meetings would go on without me. The calls that I get when I miss a meeting would be made to someone else, over time.
So, I show up. I want to keep what I have. I know that I am small, and that I only matter where I am. So I put myself in the places and with the people I want to matter to. For this, I am responsible.
That whole Hungry, Angry, Lonely, Tired thing really does apply to me. I’m just not that smart at the best of times, so it doesn’t make sense for me to make any decisions, at all, ever, when I am even a little HALTy.