The parents...

My parents are getting old. The roomies parents are getting old. It makes me ask hard questions about how I want to live out the rest of my life.

Fifteen years ago my mother flew with me for a month to Zimbabwe. Today she won't leave the country.

Steven's mother is pressuring him to buy a house big enough that she can move in.

A coworker just bought a new house with a bedroom on the ground floor, because his parents were having problems using the stairs at his old house.

C2's father just sits there and does nothing with his time.

I don't enjoy watching the inevitable changes of time affect my parents. I exercise regularly and watch what I eat. Perhaps this will extend my healthy and active life. But in the end...

Yesterday was my first court ordered anger management session. It was actually good. I enjoyed it. Maybe even got something out of it. I have to hand it to the instructor. He is trying to be helpful to a room full of people who would rather not be there. I think the program is very 12 steps based. He tried very hard to emphasis that we are responsible for our actions and that we have to be honest with ourselves because anger is often the result of someone revealing our personal fears and shames. If we are not afraid of ourselves... if we are not ashamed of our selves...

Steven hates the stories.

Last September, Steven checked him self into rehab for crystal meth addiction. He lost his job shortly after leaving treatment.

Since then he's come along way. He has a great new job, even better than the old. He has distanced himself from drug and alcohol using friends. He attends AA regularly and has a sponsor.

He still has a lot on his mind. Everyone he met in the rehab treatment center has since relapsed. Regularly, someone he knows through AA falls off the wagon and hits tough times.

He read "Beautiful Boy: A Father's Journey Through His Son's Addiction." The son in this book also had crystal meth addiction. The son relapses often.

All these stories of relapse worry Steven. There are not many role models of people who stayed sober.

I don't know what to say here. His life is going well now so he has the strength to say sober. Sooner or later he will hit a rut. We all do. I hope then that all his friends will help