May God grant you and your family the peace and healing so greatly needed.

I've never shared this story but I feel compelled after reading so many posts.

We watched our Son for 15 years struggle with alcohol. It always appeared he just liked to party and have a good good time.
First a divorce after two boys, then wild girl friend who drank and snorted. They bought a condo in LV while blitzed.
Finally met another drinker who's biological clock was expiring and married and had two little girls -
After she had her children - she began the process to make his life hell and they finally divorced.
We had him live with us, both 65ish and him about 46 for about a year. We both joined al anon which helped dealing with the helplessness we felt. He was in treatment so many times and psych treatments to no avail. We had him sober for 7 mo. and we left for a week and upon returning he was a mess. It went downhill till my wife found him dead in his trailer 3 years ago.

We live with horrible guilt and try to live our life but the bottom line, he was broken. 365 days 24/7 he was thinking about that drink.

I drink and did during my life but I never hit that point of no return. I only drink now if I'm in a safe situation as my mind will take me to some very dark places so I choose to just move forward and take life one day at a time.

Alcoholism is a family disease.

"God is father to the fatherless."-Psalm 68.5 I have Prayed for Peace to be with you during this difficult time.

Sorry to hear this. I haven’t even looked in on the forum for a while, so just now reading this. I still appreciate the help you gave me with my Jazzmaster.

It feels like some sort of update is appropriate. I don't think I'll be updating further, it's time to put this little period of my life in a box, and put it on the shelf. I can take it down and rummage around in it when I feel like it, but for now, it's time to put it away.

Friday the 10th, I took my father's ashes to an AA meeting. Our first and last together. My wife thought it would weird out the other drunks, but quite the opposite, they thought it was great. One of the guys I was sitting there had brought his adopted daughter of maybe seven or eight. She listened to what I had to say, and at the end, she brought me a napkin she had drawn on. It was a drawing of two stick figures, one large and one small, and in fairly neat block print was "My daddy died, too. Be strong for your son." I asked the adoptive father, and he said the bottle got him. The note hit me pretty hard.

On Saturday, December 11th, I decided the time had come. I'd been driving both my parents around in the rental for days on end and the presence in the back of the car, although silent, was heavy at times, and always known to me. I noticed a little lightweight two-person rocker in the porch furniture set, and took it down in the middle of the field out in front of the house. I found a spot that was it's own space, away from trees and bushes, and on a little rise. No view of the St. Lawrence river valley like there is from the front porch - I didn't give him that, but neither did I dump him in a ditch like I was saying I would. I went to the rental, opened the lift gate and gathered the little black box that weighed more than it seemed it should have. I went in the house, found my mother sorting through some of the mess he left and said "it's time." I walked my mother out front with one hand in her arm and the other cradling my father's ashes. Out we went, to the little rocker, sat the box in front of us and we sat for a while, quietly. She'd had a few rough moments earlier in the week, starting to cry in public, and being a tough old cop, she'd clamped down on it hard and fast. I told her "now's a good time to cry if you want to." She did. I lost it for a little while, longer than I guessed I might have, but nowhere near as long as a child of a loving parent and a healthy relationship with them would have. I don't remember what I said, but it felt appropriate to speak over the remains before we freed them from plastic and gave them back to the Earth, and so I did. It wasn't bitter. It wasn't resentful. It wasn't dripping in emotion. It was a simple good-bye.

Now, a quick aside: My father hated pickles. It was something to do with an old flame who loved them and eating them reminded him of her, and then suddenly from nowhere, the last few years of his life, he decided he loved pickles. Very bizarre. Anyhow, he had a complicated relationship with pickles. My sister was very specific about wanting a third of his ashes (there being three of us surviving him), and repeated this a number of times. When the time came to actually deal with the ashes, I asked my mother if she wanted to weigh them out on a kitchen scale and divide them, using a funnel to put the set aside third in some sort of vessel for my sister. Her reply did not surprise me, I was simply told "fuck no." I opened the refrigerator that had been filled with rotten food, found a full jar of fancy pickles, and fed the contents to the Waste Kang. I began rinsing the jar out, and thought "what the fuck am I doing?"

My story resumes. Given ASG's advice about bone shards, we wore nitrile gloves and handled the ashes carefully. I gave my mother the pickle jar, she put it in the bag of ashes, and scooped it mostly full. She was going to fill it to the brim and I stopped her. For all my talk of having a Big Lebowski memorial for him, I never actually considered wind as something we would have to contend with. Of course, God has a sense of humor, and so there were strong, random gusts the whole time. First it came from one direction for a minute, and then the opposite for several more, and then ninety degrees from there for a few seconds, all in no way I could predict. So rather than scattering the ashes around... I dumped them out on the ground. My mother tossed a few handfuls, but mostly, his ashes lay there in one spot. Oh well, at least it was a good spot.

I helped my mother back to the house, and then returned to the little bench with his badge case, complete with badge and ID, and sat for a while. After a few minutes, it seemed to me like he was sitting next to me on the bench, and not old and fucked up, but the way he used to be when he was my age. He wouldn't look at me, and he didn't speak, he just stared out at the field. We sat that way together for a long while. And then I was alone. I picked up the little bench, and walked back to the house without looking back.

As it turns out, the State Troopers saw a shotgun out in the open and then "secured" all the weapons in the house that they could find. NYS law required them to take them all to a local gun shop, and my mother will have to have them all transferred back to her, filling out 4473's for guns she legally already owns. I think it's fucking stupid, but New York State's gonna New York State. On the list of guns the investigator read to me, it's all there, the stuff I expected him to still have... except one. An early 70's Winchester Super X Model 1. It was the first gun he bought when he moved to El Paso. Bought it from Montgomery Ward on their credit card to start establishing credit. I just don't see him having gotten rid of that, so it's either hidden somewhere in the house in one of the spots my mother didn't know about, or... who knows? Speculation is pointless, honestly. The State Troopers also didn't find everything, and in the dad soup that marinated the whole back of the house were two shotguns under a bed that I wouldn't have touched for love or money - the people doing the biohazard cleanup found them. One of them was my mother's 870, which was in a padded case, and will probably need a complete refinish. It's bad, and I didn't even get a look at the inside and the tale the rust tells around the push pins makes me believe the inside is probably on it's way to being seized up. I did what I could with what I could find there, but it's going to have to wait until I either get back there or get it here to deal with it in depth. Next to it, thankfully in a plastic waterproof case, was a 1954 production Winchester 1897 in damn near mint condition. It was one of the ones promised to me.

Earlier this year, my mother had the foresight to sneak my guns out of the house and take them to a family friend who kept them for me until I collected them on this trip. Among them were: My grandfather's 870 Wingmaster, my 1894-22, and a Winchester Model 52D. Those are the guns I learned to shoot and hunt small game with. Also were a Winchester Model 12 20ga with Varichoke and a 1909 production Winchester 1897. The Model 12 was mint condition when we got it. One of the guys my mother knew who retired from the El Paso PD many years ago bought it new at the Okinawa PX in the 50's, and sold it to my parents to give to me when I was old enough. We had the receipt and some sort of paperwork from the base there when the guy rotated back to the US. My father lost the papers, and the Model 12 has many bad patches of rust, and a bad gouge where he tried to pry it apart to take it down. The 1897 is a parts gun my father got from a gunsmith who refused to work on them anymore. It's been a mostly complete pile of parts since the 70's. It was refinished at least once (blued over polished pitting), the stock has a number of cracks that've been repaired, the barrel has been cut down to 18", and it's missing visible parts, but! It's a legit Winchester 1897 in riot config that's begging to be built up! It won't be cheap or easy to do, and I may end up trying to find a gunsmith who will do it so it's done right, but this is a project my father always said would never get done because "they're an absolute nightmare to work on and even gunsmiths won't touch them." Wrong.

My mother is flying back on the 8th to oversee the remodel and try to deal with what she can. Depending on vaccine mandates with flying, I'll need to figure out my way, but I'll be heading out there in March or so. The house looked ransacked, but apparently that's just the way he was living. It's not livable right now for me. I had to wear an N95 to be able to breathe in there after the first day. That first day in there, I didn't, and the next morning, I was spitting up black blood. Whole back of my throat was covered in it. Anyways, between not being able to breathe in there, and the weather, it'll be March at least. Then I've got to see what is going to be the best way to transport two six foot tool cabinets full of Snap-On, a welder, probably a half ton of ammo, two guitars, and some firearms. A Uhaul in hotel parking lots is like asking to get robbed. No idea about getting stuff freighted. I just have no idea. Open to suggestions.

I've also got a 1973 Porsche Targa, a 2005 Holden GTO, a 2016 Camaro SS, and a 2003(?) Honda Valkyrie to clean up and dispose of, plus clean out a three car garage packed with not those things that looks like something from a hoarder show. I'll have my hands full this spring. May end up driving the RAM out there and back. That'll be a pretty penny with gas prices.

Thanks for the replies and emails. This truly is a great place with some of the very finest people humanity has to offer. Truly, thank you.

Thanks for the epilogue Smudge.

I think you’d be OK hauling the stuff back in Uhaul. Sell the modern cars to fund the Targa’s restoration. Or just sell it……to me.

May your 2022 be better.

I'm glad to hear that you didn't get itchy, and the guns were more or less safe, and not in some tweaker's collection or whatever.

God Bless for a far brighter 2022. The pickle story made me crack up. I hope little memories like that help you to heal.

Smudge, my thoughts are with you and your family.

Whenever I used a rental truck for a cross country move there were two of us. We would take turns at night of one sleeping in the cab armed. Most of the thefts do not occur in a motel parking lot, the thieves steal the truck and shop it’s contents elsewhere as you probably know already.

I am sorry for your loss and wish I had something to say that would help. God Bless and stay strong. Somehow, I missed all of this until today. We moved last month and everything has been upside down.

And I also liked the pickles story.

Smudge, thank you for sharing all of this. I hope the New Year brings a measure of peace and stability.

Thank you for sharing your story. Many of us have had to deal with somewhat similar circumstances and reading your thoughts helped me realize we are not alone.

I could have written this thread myself… God bless anyone struggling with Alcoholism…

I have been soooo blessed..one day at a time..