About 12 years ago, I found a computer in my office at the school I was teaching at in Japan. I had not requested it as I didn't feel very technologically confident and never cared for sitting down and typing. I figured out how to use a search engine and found a link to an email group at the AA website in Iowa City, not far from my home town, Rock Island, Illinois.
At first, this seemed like a second rate way of keeping in contact with other English speaking members, but I was not often able to get to the nearest English meeting a couple hours away even using a bullet train most of the way, and I wasn't all that keen on Japanese meetings, even though I was going to one each week to keep the habit of doing so, until I could get to a couple English meetings a day by doing someplace during school vacations. I was only at the college Tuesday-Friday, so an email group suited me pretty well. I could start reading on Tuesday, write on the week's topic later in the week and exchange a few personal messages in between. It was a men's group in which members seemed to be on a high spiritual plane at times, writing only stuff that Bill W. would have approved of, but often got into flaming each other as well. One guy would send me personal message knocking what I had written on topics, calling me an overeducated egotist. I mentioned that in a message to the group and said that I may be one of those, but I might as well stay here and write like one as there were no Overeducated Egotist Anonymous meeting where I lived, and they would have been in Japanese anyway. I later found out that this guy had been doing the same to others. After a while I found that writing on a topic can be better than speaking at meetings. While speaking my head has to keep up with my tongue and I tend to say things I have said before, choosing only among well worn paths. But while writing, there is plenty of time and I can explore the ground between those path, often coming up with new thoughts that surprise me a little. I can also write whatever comes to mind knowing that I can go over it later and change anything I decide I should say differently or not at all, although usually I just go over it as a retired English teacher and correct the mistakes I see. Anyway, it seems to be a sort of productive meditation for me. After moving to Tasmania from Japan six years ago, I was soon able to get back into the same email group I had been in there, giving me a bit of continuity after moving to an island I'd never been on before, and joined another one as well a bit later. It is much easier for me to get to English face to face meetings here, at least since I was able to get a driver's license and car, and doing this now seems a bit less vital for remaining sane and sober, but still an important one. I suppose I spend an average of a bit over an hour a day sitting here, on weekdays after watching Today on the tube and reading the morning paper, reading, writing, and corresponding with another member of one of the groups. We seem to be on a similar, perhaps weird wavelength, and bounce a continual message back and forth several time a week, acting rather like sponsors for each other and catalysts for each others thoughts. As I am retired now, I have plenty of time to do that. For me it does not take the place of face-to-face meetings, and I really enjoy going to four or five of them a week, two here, AA and NA, and two or three in other towns. This is a somewhat isolated part of the world and a lot of AA thought tends to be re-cycled a bit too often, in my opinion, and one of the main roles the email groups play for me is to keep me thinking about things, often thoughts that I share in meetings here. For me, email groups seem to be good for carrying the message but not the fellowship and I find that more in the meetings I go to here. Even with plenty of face to face meetings around, there still seem to be reasons for using email, such as being able to share my thoughts with others, or read their thoughts, twenty-four hours a day without disturbing anyone, having them feel like they should stop to talk when they are doing other things. It isn't uncommon for cell phones to ring in meetings these days or for members to get to them late because someone rang just as they were getting out of the house. |