3/6/12 Drugs and Behavior A.A. Meeting Reaction
Recently, I attended an A.A. meeting, which stands for, alcoholic anonymous. The meeting I went to was located in Penfield, NY at 1601 Jackson Road, area code 14526. It was called the
Yellow House. When I walked in, everyone was very welcoming and nice. Many people stared at me intensely as I entered the Yellow House. I think they thought I was a recovering alcoholic, until I explained to them later that I was there to listen and observe for a school project for my drugs and behavior class. The place was very cozy inside, had a number of chairs lined up for everyone to sit down and coffee ready to drink. I sat down in one of the chairs. A lady came up to me and handed me a coin that said “24 hours recovery”; this was before I had the chance to tell her that
I was there to observe for a school project. I guess when you go to an alcoholic anonymous meeting for the first time you get awarded a 24 hour recovery coin to make you feel good and know you’re doing something good to help you recover from your alcoholic addiction.
The meeting started promptly at 5:30 P.M. like it said it would. The leaders read out announcements and let everybody know if someone new has showed up. If you’re new joining alcoholics anonymous, you introduce yourself by saying your name and stating you are an alcoholic, and then everyone else in the room say “hi…” whatever your name is to make you feel welcome. Then the person can either talk more about why they came or stop talking and then another person will randomly say their name and why they are attending and so on. There was a vast majority of adults and older people in their 50s or
60s. There were a couple grandfathers, grandmothers and one or two kids my age. I sat next to a kid who was around the same age as me and I felt shocked that he would be attending this type of meeting at such a young