Robin Sneed's Open Salon Blog

Getting Sober and Healing

Tue, 24 Nov 2009 22:11:53 -0500

As some of you know, I drank again, after a considerable length of sobriety. I did and said things in that condition that are inexcusable.

The reason I am putting this on my blog is because I know many have been concerned, and for this alcoholic, it is the best thing for me to just get real about it.

Tonight I went to my first AA meeting since I drank. It was lovely. A few women even took me into a smaller meeting room so we can have an all women's first step meeting.

This is not an attempt to offer a lot of 'sorry sorries.' For an alcoholic, it can't be done that way. I will be working with a sponsor to get me to point where true amends can be made.

Right now, I am just very grateful that this relapse didn't last long. I am very very grateful to be sober today.

I am immensely grateful to the friend who gently put a big book in front of me while I was drinking. It brought me back to reality. That's a truest friend a drunk can have. That no matter what's gone down, they know the first thing is to get sober.

I hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving.

I Had a Farm in Africa....

Sat, 21 Nov 2009 20:11:02 -0500

Okay, it only took me 30 years out of 47 to get back here. I love animals. It was Chris Locke who brought me back to this place...because...he's been working on that for a long time.

I have a special relationship with elephants. My grandfather, who founded the San Diego Zoo, had an elephant. And Fred, the elephant, always remembered me. Year after year. That friendship was so important, I can't talk about it now. He used to come running toward me...and I'd feed him. It really disturbs me when I hear of zoo keepers being killed by elephants. I was a very small child, and never in danger. Maybe, that's because my grandpa told me I wasn't. He would say, "Just walk right up and feed the elephant!" Fred died at 90 years old. Rescued from the circus. Elephants can live longer than humans.

But, my primary interest, lifelong, has been in frogs.

This is a

Western Chorus Frog
Pseudacris triseriata triseriata

From 1975

I think there are some varieties that haven't been catalogued here. I'm going to try and do that.

While Apache catalogues the crows.

There's more...my brother and I would stand on the bridge above the lion's cages at dinner time. In the Wild Animal Park...and the earth would move from their roaring.

At dusk.

I'll never forget that.

A True Wildcat, they will make the ground shake when they roar.

(in answer to a question: this was my maternal grandfather.)

His daughter's (maiden)

name was Odette Marguerita-Maximillian Groux.

And so, it's really good that I can go to The Wild Animal Park any day. I prefer the Park to the zoo. You know...you can take a safari on that park. A photo safari. And there are Zebra and Giraffe and Wildebeest....everything.

Actually, Dennis Finchatton, (Out of Africa fame) invented that....photographing rather than hunting.

And I just went pheasant hunting...and well, I have a lot to think about .

Yes, actually, the world is this beautiful. And Chris took me flying over all of it without a plane.

He was not ours. He was not mine.

I had a farm in Africa....

"I had a farm in Africa at the foot of the Ngong Hills. The Equator runs across these highlands, a hundred miles to the north, and the farm lay at an altitude of over six thousand feet. In the day-time you felt that you had got high up; near to the sun, but the early mornings and evenings were limpid and restful, and the nights were cold." -Isak Dinesen

I'm Taking Full Responsibility for My Actions-P.E.O.

Sat, 21 Nov 2009 18:11:36 -0500

Here's the thing of it. (To quote Eloise)

Well.

I take full responsibilty for all decisions I have made. That doesn't mean there hasn't been pain.

I am in pain because of choices I made.

That's done.

And now to that end, I'm going to contact a very old sorority that I have been a 25 year member of, and seek their counsel and wisdom.

It's PEO.

Just a few women who started a college. Began in Wesleyan College. PEO now has Cottey College. A two year prep school for women.

These are some of the most magnificent women I have known.

Just a bunch of old girls getting smart, and keeping it together.

And yes, the PEO star is my true gold star.

Just got to look around here for my pin.

(and no, PEO doesn't stand for Phone Each Other Often! Those initials are part of a secret society.)

One Lucy Kuster invited me. She was 70 years old at the time. And once a sister, always a sister.

Wild Mountain Honey

Sat, 21 Nov 2009 00:11:52 -0500

The Aria From La Wally

Fri, 20 Nov 2009 21:11:32 -0500

Unrequited love.

Wilhemina Wiggins Fernandez is the most amazing coloratura in the world.

She has only been filmed once...this is it.

She is a purist.xox