Light of a Clear Blue Morning ft. Shane

Steve welcomes Shane to share his experience, strength, and hope with you, along with advice on getting and staying sober.

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Transcript

Steve: 0:03

Hi everyone and welcome to Gay

Shane: 0:05

a, a podcast about sobriety for the

Steve: 0:07

LGBT plus community and our allies. I'm your host, Steve Bennett. Martin. I am an alcoholic and addict, and I'm grateful for winning the Team Spirit Award at this year's Gay and Sober Conference. As of this recording, I am 766 days sober, which means that we're caught up on my date count to pretty much the weeks that we're releasing episodes. And today we, we are welcoming a guest to share their experience, wisdom, and hope with you. I had the pleasure of getting to do service with and get to know him this past week, and I can't wait for you all to get to hear his share. Welcome, Shane. Hi, how

Shane: 0:40

are you? Good.

Steve: 0:42

Good to see you

Shane: 0:43

again. Good to see you again. Been missing all my GSM fellows over this. It seems like it hasn't been a week already, but it has been. Yeah.

Steve: 0:54

Well, for the listeners who weren't at gsm, why don't you introduce

Shane: 0:58

yourself? Well, my name is Shane s and I am from the great state of Alabama. And I will be 50 years old this year. My sobriety date is December the 28th 2021. And I am just a grateful sober, recovering alcoholic and addict. Excellent.

Steve: 1:21

And what would you say is your favorite part of being

Shane: 1:25

sober? Oh, my favorite part. There's so many things that I'm happy about, but I think the most important thing is having my family back with me. And not feeling anger like I felt before when I was in full addiction and a big drunk. There was a lot of anger in my life, and today I don't nearly feel the anger. Well, I really don't feel the anger. I let it all go, and I just love that living life to the fullest today. It's such a better life today for me. I, I always thought I was happy. But this is true happiness. This is

Steve: 2:03

true happiness. Yeah. And speaking of true happiness, I know that I was afraid for a while of getting sober cuz I thought I would never have fun again. But I've learned we're not a glum lot. So what are some of your favorite hobbies or things to do in sobriety that you found or rediscovered?

Shane: 2:18

Well I originally played the piano since I was nine years old and when I got into full addiction and And in my drunk days, I lost that talent in the way of loving it. Today I find I love. Playing the piano even more today. I love to go hiking. Hiking is one of my favorite pastimes to be outside and I picked up reading again, reading. I have the patience, I guess you could say now to sit and focus and read. And it's such a fulfilling thing to read. And I'm, I sing in a choir at my church again and back involved with that. And and I'm getting ready to open my cafe tomorrow coffee shop. So that's, that's a new thing that I found in, in my new sobriety is that I love to create and, and I'm opening a cafe to share this with others.

Steve: 3:08

Excellent. Well, it certainly didn't happen overnight though, so why don't you tell us a little bit about the good old, what it was like, what happened and what it's like now?

Shane: 3:17

Yeah, definitely. I was always this person who loved to have a good time and what I thought was a good time, and not all those days were necessarily bad, but they ended up in a lot of pain and chaos in my life. I I guess you could say I started drinking when I was in college a little bit, hitting the bottle here and there. And then I moved to New York City in 1994 to pursue my acting career. And when I got to New York, I had not fully come out of the closet until I got to New York City, and I knew that when I got there, boy, that door was gonna fly right open. And I got there and of course I immersed myself into the bar scene and the nightclub scene and Kind of let my acting slip aside in the fact that I stayed out drinking quite a bit and partying because I felt like I was in the center of the world. I could be gay. I was free from what I thought was Religion holding me back from being who I was. I grew up in a Southern Baptist family where back in the nineties you were going to marry a girl and you were gonna have kids and raise them and go to church every Sunday. And it really sucked me into a pain of feeling like I was not worthy of love and that I was doing wrong all my life. And that I always had the sexual attraction towards men. And so when I got to New York, you know, I felt like I was living this double life because I would come home for the holidays and kind of pretend and but then I'd run back to New York, get drunk, go party, go to the nightclubs, stay out late got involved doing ecstasy and other types of recreational drugs such as that. And never. And then I got on tour with shows after that for a while after I got outta school there. And when I would tour, I would stay at the bar all the time, just drinking constantly. It was just a constant drinking. Never thought that I was an alcoholic. I just thought I was young and partying. But I would always have this sense of pain. That I was lying to my family. I finally came out of the closet maybe two years after I moved to New York, and my mom and dad were very upset. I remember hearing my dad crying and blaming himself for it. So then I felt this guilt of hurting him and you know, and then I felt the guilt that I was gonna burn and hell, because that's what I've been taught all my life. And I struggled a lot with that. And my acting career never really took off because I kept. Drinking and drinking and drinking. I ended up kind of living in going on tour, but then I wanted to be in New York City and I ended up working for a CD store, music store, which was a great and fun career. But when you work in a CD store, you can drink all night. It stayed open till midnight so I could come in at four o'clock in the evening, sleep all day, didn't go out and party all night, and no one cared What I looked like at a record store, they wanted you to look grungy and dirty. So I thought, so, you know, my alcoholism just, I never was saving any money. I was spending all this money on alcohol. I would call my mom and beg for money and she would send it to me. And you know, I was lying saying I just needed money to pay this and pay that. When it was really going for my party lifestyle, the, I stayed with The record store, Virgin Entertainment Group for many years. And I got to work with artists such as Lady Gaga, Kanye West faith Hill, just different people that came in and signed autographs and it was a great job. But I never was focused. I never could stay focused cause I always wanted to drink. There'd be days I'd come into work and I would run home cuz I'd be so sick cuz I would stay out all night. I turned from ecstasy to cocaine and to meth and it just, Kept piling on and poling on. Well, the store ended up closing down in 2009 and I was in full addiction mode with cocaine, spending 600,$700 on cocaine and alcohol. And this is sometimes spending that a night. And my life was wasting away. And so when I lost my job at Virgin, I decided I needed to move home. I couldn't pay bills. I was either gonna end up on the streets, so I did move back to Alabama and I thought that was gonna be okay. But one of the conditions on moving home was my parents had said to me for who I was, and they had kind of learned in a way that that's who I was anyway. And I moved back to Alabama 2009, got back here, still struggled with alcohol. I got my first D u I within six months of moving back home to Alabama. And that didn't teach me a lesson. Embarrassed my mom. I had alcohol in the car. I got it in Atlanta, Georgia, driving back on the interstate. And I blamed my alcoholism on the fact that I lived in New York City and I didn't have to drive a car. So that's why I got a D U I. So I was blaming it on everybody else, but still living that pain of not fully being myself, hiding myself. I partied so much, drank so much, and it just kept going on for years and years and years. And then finally I had a job where I worked in local government and I kept screwing up the job and I ended up doing some fraudulent credit card charges, and I got caught and embarrassed myself, embarrassed my whole family. It's a small town and After that, though, I still blamed everybody. I wasn't the alcoholic. Everybody said I had a problem. You have a problem, Shane. But I did, I, I, I had gained weight. I weighed astro an astronomical way to, and I was, my cholesterol was bad. I had turned a wine because wine was gonna be okay for me cuz it wasn't real alcohol. Just like the big book says. I would sneak off and do meth. As a party drug for when I was partying, playing, that's what it was all about. You know, when I would go out and have sex, the drugs would turn too. And I got so angry and I just built up this anger against my whole family. And I said things about people on Facebook and I blamed everybody for what I did with the job. And dealt with some issues. I really wanted to die during that time and my brother died. In 2018 and when my brother died, he had died from Parkinson's and dementia. I kind of made it all about myself, oh, poor me, my mom and dad. How am I gonna live without my mom and dad if this takes my mom and dad out? Not even realizing my brother was so sick and watching him die. And then my dad got cancer right after my brother died, and I still wanted to be the center of attention and just drank constantly. And then I found all the people I could take care of. So I started taking in people that were high on drugs and acted like I was gonna take care of them and rescuing them. Even though I was sitting there doing drugs with them, they were way worse than I was. I wanted to blame everybody else. I was a server during that time and when people, when I would serve people drinks, I used to get a high off of watching people get drunk cuz I could go back and I'd be like, oh my gosh, have you seen table six? They're so drunk. And because I didn't want the attention on me, even though I'm going out to my car and drinking wine during my breaks and maybe snorting a line of something. And then when my dad died in December, I was not having any relationship with family and I decided I was gonna move to North Carolina to an island called Okra Island. And I was gonna say F you to my mom, F you to all my family and leave. Forget you. I'm going out on my own, and I did, and I left in March of 20 21. And when I got to Ocracoke, I thought I was running from my, I thought that I was gonna leave all my problems, everything was gonna be fine. I would get there and I wouldn't be, I'd be okay. I wouldn't, you know, have the issues that I have. When I got there, it was just a drink fest. I'd drunk. I would drink and drink and drink, and I stopped doing meth after that point. And I found cocaine a little bit back again. And I was having sexual relations with people I didn't know I was doing risk, risky behavior sexually. And December of 2021, December, like November, December. I just hit bottom real bad. And on December 28th, I had lost my job on the island. I had nowhere to go. I couldn't come back home to Alabama. I didn't know what I was gonna do. And I got behind the wheel of my car and I decided to go on a high speed chase on an island with no bridge. The only way to get off the island was a ferry, and I really was trying to kill myself. I thought, well, if I die in a wreck, it won't look like suicide and. I just remember the car driving so fast. I went past people on bicycles and golf carts. I didn't hit anything that day and the car stopped. I remember getting out of the car and getting arrested, and I remember calling my mom and telling her what happened and crying and thinking she was gonna get me out of it. And then I went to jail about three hours north of the island and I was laying in the cell and I remember there was a little cross on the side of the, the cell. And then I just realized I'm gonna be okay. And I walked into, I, my mom went and get me outta jail, which I'm grateful for today. And I went into the general population and I found this wonderful book. And the big blue book of aa. And I started reading it and I realized I had a problem and I realized I was the one at fault for all these things that I had caused. And I realized that this book that was written so many years ago was about me. That I was every page of that book. And I remember calling my mom and I go, you know what, mom? I'm gonna be okay. I need to be here. Because I realized I was safe from alcohol, I was safe from drugs, and I needed to be away from it. And I finally was escaping that clutch, that alcohol had on me and that that pain and, and I, I spent about a week in jail. And, and when I got out I went to my first a, a meeting on January 7th back on the island. I went back to the island. And when I got back to the island, I was working the steps and I realized, man, what a mess I've caused. But how lucky am I today that I got to get outta jail, that I didn't kill anybody, that I didn't kill myself, and I'm getting a second chance at life and. January and February of 2022, I had to stay on the island. I didn't know how I was gonna get back home to Alabama, but I knew I wanted to get back home. I wanted to get back to my family because I wanted to make those amends. I needed to. And I didn't know how that was gonna happen. I didn't know if they were going to want me back. I remember sitting in the AA room there on the island. There was only two guys there that had lots more sobriety. They had years of sobriety. They did not have to even go to AA if they didn't want to, but they showed up. They showed up for me. I had never met these guys on the island until I had been there a whole year and hadn't met these two guys. I didn't even know AA was on the island, and they took me under their wing and they really taught me that I was, I wasn't fault for everything. I was the one that had caused this whole mess before this new life was happening, but I was gonna be okay next. I could fix. I could fix today. I couldn't fix what happened yesterday, but I could fix today and make today better. I didn't have to worry about tomorrow, but I could make today good. And I remember asking them, what do I do if I go home and no one wants to talk to me or these people hate me? And they go, you just suck it up and deal with it because you cost it and. I kept trying to get home and trying to get home. And finally these people that had really some just angels that took me under their wing and like helped me find a place to stay for a little while they said, Hey, we'll take you home. And they drove me to Alabama, that Alabama in February. And I remember when I first got sober, I thought, man, what is my gay life Gotta be like, cause I knew I was gay. I mean, But I also knew that I had a higher power that loved me no matter what. That loved me as a gay man that loved me when I was drunk, that loved me when I'm the sober guy I am today. And I got back to Alabama in February and I moved back in with my mom and I slowly had to make those amends and then I started looking. I. Googling things and I found gay and sober cuz I was like, man, I got, there's got to be people like me out there that have gone through this, that have had the same situations in their life happen to them where they've been drunk outta their head and done crazy things and made mistakes. There's got to be people like me. It just has to be possible. And I did, I found Gay and sober and I met there was a friend of mine that I had met on Ocracoke, who was a part of Gay and Sober, and he kind of told me about it too. And I got, you know, started talking in the Facebook group and but I also took time to nurture my family during that first year of recovery from in 2022. I knew I could not go back into the bar scene. I had to get away from Grindr and I abstained from sex because sex was a, something I used and I used it in a manner that was not helpful for me because of how my addiction was. 2022 was an amazing year because I got to come back to my family and they, they saw that I was serious. About my recovery and I started going to meetings left and right and got into AA and I found friends and I, I, I learned that the mistakes in the past were just mistakes and that I can't go back and I can't change it. I can't tell people I'm sorry, but I can say that I'm wrong for what I did. And boy, there were a lot of wrongs that I had to say I was wrong for, and I'm grateful that I got the chance to say I was wrong. Over the past year, I've made amends with people that I worked with before who I did that in the city government that I didn't think I would ever get to talk to again. My mom and I have had conversations about. My gay life that we would've never had in full addiction because it would've been my opinion and I would never have listened to hers. I found my faith again, and was really worried about that in my life because I, I do love my faith and I found. That I could be gay and could have my faith. I didn't have to listen to what some people say about me and my faith, but I could, I couldn't have my faith and I was okay with that. I found this wonderful book called God in the Gay Christian by Matthew Vines. And boy, it helped me so much and I read that book cover to cover and I got to meet Matthew in may and tell him how grateful I was for what his book did for me. I went on the GSM Gatlinburg trip, hiked to the top of the mountain La Mount Lacount with the group I found a brotherhood of gay men that loved me. For me, I can have gay friends without having to have an orgy and us running away from each other. I became part of a service group in gsm. I talk about being gay in my AA meetings. I talk about being gay within my church to my minister. I just recently got back on Grindr when I went to New York, and it was very relieving to be able to do that and feel comfortable and feel at peace again. And and I realize it's okay for me to have sexual relations if I choose to do so in my sober life, and that I'm okay with that now because I don't have to feel dirty because of the stuff that I'm doing within sex. I can enjoy it. I don't miss drinking. I don't miss drug. I thought when I went to New York last week that I was gonna feel like I was left out of something because I was, so, when I lived in New York City, I was so involved in going to the bars. I was so involved in being in nightlife and I thought that I was going to feel like I was missing out. Mm-hmm. But I have gained so much more today and the friends I met there, Are gonna be friends that I'm gonna have a lifetime. And I'm making relation new relationships with people in my life. I don't have to throw my garbage on someone's side of the street. I don't have to. And if somebody throws their garbage on my side of the street, I can take that garbage and put it in my garbage can. Because my garbage can is nowhere as full or overflowing as it used to be. And I have enough room for everybody else's garbage that wants to throw it my way because as soon as I throw it back at somebody, somebody's gonna just toss it right back at me. So why do that? I'm opening my cafe tomorrow. I decided I wanted to do a cafe. I I actually started teaching piano. That's kind of how my cafe came to life. And I'm opening my cafe, rhythm cafe tomorrow on July 4th, and I'm sitting here now in it and looking around at what sobriety has done for me. My job today is to give back what was so freely given to me. To be of service to help the next alcoholic, to help the next addict to help. I remember walking down fifth Avenue on Sunday and looking in the crowd, and I talked to one of the attendees and I said, there's a shame out there in that crowd that's trying to figure out how do I get into where he's at today? How do I find that happiness? And there's gonna be a shame in that crowd that's gonna run to the bar and get drunk and high because, He can't, or he or she can't find that today. And I hope that someone saw the happiness and the light that I have, because I wanna give my light away. I got a lot of tools in my toolbox now that I didn't have before. And if you wanna steal a tool outta my toolbox, steal it because I'm probably gonna steal a tool from somebody else or borrow it from somebody else. Because it's such a better way to live today. It's such a, a freer life. I'm happier today. I'm not angry today. My family loves me. I love my family. I have some friends I can't hang out with today, and that's okay. I hope one day we'll be able to hang out again, but in a different manner than what we did before. Going to New York was a big step for me and my recovery for me to prove, not prove to myself, but for me just to know that, that feeling. And I remember walking down 43rd street by myself on the Friday night of the conference, and I remember this feeling of, wow, this is what it feels like. This is what it would've felt like all the time when I lived in New York. But I also know I'm home now in Alabama and this is home for me. I'm back with my family and I get to be a part of my family again. I know I can have my gay life too and be happy and fun and throw my hands in the air and dance and I can pat someone on the rear end and hug somebody and, and, and just have a great time and I can do it without drugs and alcohol today. And it's a great feeling, a wonderful feeling. Thank you so

Steve: 24:35

much. And also, fuck you for making me tear up a little bit. So,

Shane: 24:39

There's that,

Steve: 24:40

but you talked a little bit about, about, let's get more into like, how do you feel your sexuality kind of played a role with not only your addiction, but then your recovery, like having to take the break from the sex and the apps and all of that.

Shane: 24:55

You know, at first, I remember when I got back to Alabama, I got back on the app. And when I got back on the app in Alabama, I saw people that I had partied with. And then I also didn't want some of my friends that were on the apps to see me and go, oh, he's back at it again. He's back, he's going to fail. I remember talking to one of the attendees in Gatlinburg about it, and they told me if you If it was part of your addiction and part of the problem, you might want to take a break from it. And I did. I never felt, after a while, I realized how much time it took outta my life of just scrolling through pictures and scrolling, wanting that, that self gratification of people liking or wanting to have sex with me. And today, I don't need that. I don't have to have that self validation that that's what life is. And before, that's what I thought life was. If I was at home by myself, I thought that I had to find somebody to hook up with, that I had to have a hook up every day or I had to have a hookup, you know? Or if I wasn't hooking up with somebody, I was not of value as a person, and I didn't miss. It was funny when I got back on it in New York, I just did it cuz I heard a lot of people talking about it and I thought, you know, I'm gonna give it a try here and see how it's, and I didn't really stay on it that much there, but it was kind of fun seeing who all was on there from the conference and, and meeting people. And I did meet somebody there and, and and we had a great time and I was grateful for that experience. I'm not back on it back home. Because I don't feel like I need it. I don't feel like I'll get back in trouble and go back down that rabbit hole again of going and finding somebody to have sex with and party with. I just have too much going on. That's, that is more important to me right now than just sitting on that app trying to look for something. It's just important for me to be productive in life in a way of sharing this message of recovery with others and, and being of service in my my home group and being of service in my church and being of service in my family. And I think one of the most important things is being a part of my family again. I thought I had lost them and I had, and I hurt them so bad. Today I get to see my nieces and nephews and I get to hear them say how proud they are of their uncle, that he doesn't lay in bed all day and he doesn't party all the time. And my little 10 year old nephew told me that he was so proud of me for doing my garden and, and, you know, I get to take them places. I got to spend the night with them three nights and where I wasn't trusted before. Today I'm trusted to be in their life and I'm trusted to take them to school in the morning. And we talk about my recovery. We sit and we talk about my drunk days. I remember when I first went to church again, my little nephew, we were doing communion. And my little nephew looked at me and he goes, it's just grape juice circle, Shane. It's not wine. Because he didn't want me to drink the wine, you know? And you know, I hope that I can be an influence on them, that if they do choose to drink, That they can come to me and talk about responsibility because I don't hate anyone that drinks. I don't hate anybody that may choose to go out and do a drug. That's their, that's their life. I can't judge you. I can't be your judge. I can't tell you how to work your program in your life. I can just tell you what it did to my life and how it disrupted my life and almost cost me my life. And today. I get a new life. I get a new life every single day that I wake up. I wake up every day to a brand new life, a brand new miracle every day, and I go to bed every night and I can sleep and fully sleep and put my head down and know that today was a good day and every day to me is a good day. No matter what little obstacle might be thrown in my path, it's just an obstacle and how I handle it. Is is much better today than just calling it, I don't like to call it a problem because a problem is something we all create if we make it a problem. And then that problem creates a bigger problem to a bigger problem. But this thing is just to handle it and deal with it and be like, okay, there it is. Handle it. And I do. And, and, and before though, I was gonna let the whole world know about it on Facebook. I was gonna put down that the traffic was hell, and I was sitting in it and blaming grandma and grandpa who are driving too slow. You know, today if I'm sitting in traffic, I can put gay AA on and listen to a podcast, and this is truth. You know, I can find opportunities to better life in every. Thing that's happened today, you know? But, you know, going back to the sexuality thing, you know, today I'm okay with sex. I'm okay with if I do want to go back on the app it's a choice. I don't feel I have to, and I'm okay with that. So, yeah.

Steve: 30:23

And what would you say are some of your favorite, like suggestions or tips that you like to give people, whether they're new or even if they're just

Shane: 30:31

facing a rut? If they're just facing a rut, sorry, somebody was at the door. Sorry. You know, if somebody's facing a rut today and, and they're having issues, I tell them to pause. Don't let life worry you so much. Don't allow life to be such a, I don't wanna cut. Life isn't horrible. We're gonna have issues in life. Our higher power doesn't, isn't gonna pay our power bill for us. I've gotta get off my butt and I've gotta go to work. Mm-hmm. The same thing with things happening in life. Yeah, we're gonna have issues. We may have car accidents, we may have where the bank needs to, to, we may not have a bill that we didn't pay and we've gotta get that bill paid. But, you know, taking a deep breath, relaxing, think before you do the action. There's so many more ways to do things than getting drunk or getting high or getting angry, just. To me, it's just pausing. I remember I lost my temper one day, about 120 days into sobriety because I was at work. And this girl, she complained about me and I got so mad because she complained about me. Why did she do that? And when I thought about my reaction to her and why she said what she said, I realized I was at fault. I could have easily. Said things in a different manner than I said to her. And I could have easily thought before I talked. I was in a rush of doing things and I remember I had to go outside and take a break and I did. I went outside and I had to apologize to all the people I worked with. Cause I said some really nasty words in the, at the job I was doing and, but I realized it though, why I caused it. And that's the thing. If you start to really soul search and think about, Think about things before you do it. And I think that's the best way of, of, you know, I, I've talked to people in my groups that have relapsed and I go, do you know why you relapsed? And, you know, usually they do, usually they've gotten out of the rooms. And being of service to me is of the best thing, you know being of service to others and helping others, no matter. If it's in your sober recovery, it's at your job. It's in your family, it's with your friends. You don't have to do it for the gratitude or the or somebody to pat you on the back. It's just what we should do as humans. I mean, I live in Alabama where gay people are supposedly not welcome, but you know, if I go out looking for it, I'm gonna find it. And that's the way I felt at the Pride Parade. I don't recall seeing any protestors at Pride this year, but I wasn't looking for it. I'm for sure if I would've looked for it, I would've found it. The same thing when I was walking down that fifth Avenue. I don't recall seeing people drunk out of their head on the parade route. I'm for sure there were people there, but I wasn't looking for it. You know, if we look for the problems in life, we're gonna find the problems. But if we just live and live life and try to be kind to everybody and try to just to do the right thing, and sometimes, sometimes you're not gonna make anybody happy, and that's okay. But you don't have to get upset about that. You just gotta just, you know, and That's how I try to live life every day is that, and then I just, I just know I'm grateful. I'm grateful and I'm lucky. I'm, we all are miracles that we're not in the grave. We're miracles that we're not in jail and we're miracles that we get to breathe this fresh air every day that we've been given. I always tell new people coming into meetings. You don't have to believe in my higher power. I don't ask you to believe in my higher power. You don't have to come and follow what I'm doing, but put faith in something because you put a lot of faith in the drugs and you put a lot of faith in the alcohol, and you put a lot of faith in those midnight drives to hookups where you didn't know the person and you're walking into strange houses. Put faith in something. Because it's so easy, even if it's just a tree or if it's, if it's, if it's, you know, something in your room that's precious to you, but give thanks to it that you get to live today. I mean, you know, I, that's just the way I like to live life because I did put so much faith in the drugs. I put so much faith in the alcohol that I wasn't gonna die from alcohol poisoning. I put so much faith in myself driving behind the wheel of a car. Drunk down the highway. So today I could put faith in what my higher power is, that my higher power loves me no matter what. My higher power's there for me every day. My higher power never left my side even when I thought I had thrown my higher power away. And I'm just grateful that I get to live again. You know, we are so lucky. We get, we get a second chance at life. Sometimes some of us get three or four chances at life, but I know I don't ever want to go back down that hole again because the days I have today are so much better than any of those days before. And not all those days in the past were back. Mm-hmm. There were some wonderful days and I can recall when we have them, but there were a whole lot of days where I cause so much pain and so much. Anger and I hurt so many people and I don't have to do that ever again through this life that I get to live today. Yeah. Beautifully

Steve: 36:38

said. And out of all the books, mantras and Dolly Parton songs out there, do you have any favorite quotes or mantras to live

Shane: 36:48

by? Yes. There's a song by Dolly called Light of a Clear Blue Morning. Mm-hmm. And I u, it's one of my favorite songs by her, and it always has been. But to now, it has such a different meaning to me and it's, I can see the light of a clear blue morning. I can see the light of a brand new day. I can see the light of a clear blue morning. Everything's gonna be all right. It's gonna be okay. And it is because the new day starts every day. And I love sunrise now. I used to remember when the sun come up. I was usually high trying to go to bed or go to sleep, and today I wake up to a new day when I see the sun come up, and it's such a beautiful thing to know that I made it again to another day. I get to do this again. It's gonna be all right. It's gonna be okay no matter what I face each day. And. Today I can see the blue skies and I can see the day is even though they rain. I love rainy days. I love every day. Every day is just beautiful. And I am grateful for Dolly Parton because she has been a angel to me in my life. She's truly a wonderful human being and I've got to meet her before. And her songs. Have took me out of some dark places into better days, and I'm very grateful for her and the love that she gives to everyone in this world. She loves everybody and we all should be so lucky to have lived in the era of Dolly Parks. Well, you,

Steve: 38:34

you would make Dolly proud because one thing that I admire about you is how you love everybody too. So thank you so much for sharing that. Thank you. And how can our listeners find you if they want to connect?

Shane: 38:49

Well, I have a Instagram page called Uncle Shane Rocks. Mm-hmm. I also have my cafe Instagram page called Rhythm Cafe Heflin. So would love for everybody to follow me on there. My cafe's gonna be full of music life. There's a Dolly Parton wall already in here, and but Uncle Shane rocks is my Instagram page. I'm proud of my nieces and nephews. I'm proud to be an uncle, and I'm not only an uncle to just my blood nieces and nephews. There's other kids that call me uncle here in my hometown, and I hope that. Now Uncle Shane can be somebody that rocks because before I wasn't that person that rocks. And today I know that I can be that rock. Mm-hmm. I can rock and I can be the rock. Excellent. So it's, it's a great way to live and I'm grateful for everything and it's a good life.

Steve: 39:45

Wonderful. Well, listeners definitely head on over there. I'll put the hashtags or ads in the show notes for you so you can click on over. And if you wanna hear us chat more, we're gonna head on over to the Patreon show, where we can talk more about our unfiltered experiences at the Shears gsm. Meanwhile, if you're interested in sharing your story, getting involved with the show, or just saying hi, please email me at gay a podcast gmail.com. And follow us wherever you're listening so you can get new episodes when they come out every Thursday. Until next time, stay sober. Friends,

40:20

I.