Romantic?.......No way, not me........

The man who leads the Thursday night, "We are not Saints" meeting reminds me of Frank Sinatra. I was commenting on this to my sponsor when she looked at me and smiled, "Well aren't we the romantic!" I was about to protest when I realized she's right. I am a romantic. There I said it. Not the mushy, lovey, can't live without you romantic, but the heady, smooth jazzy (Miles Davis) kind of romantic. In my 20's I went through a big "blue eyes" phase. I have lots of Sinatra. In fact I listened to it so often that our oldest son knew the words to "Fly me to the Moon" by the age of three! I do like Frankie, Chris Botti, Dean Martin, and Tony Bennett. I love smooth jazz, candles, lavendar, nice things etc.....so yep, that's me, a romantic. I would have denied this before I got sober. I didn't want to be known as someone who was sappy. I was strong, I was confident, I was full of shit. No really more "full of myself" than anything. So what was it about romance that bothered me? As I started to think this over it came to me.....vulnerability. That's it! I didn't want anyone to know I was vulnerable. I mean you open yourself up for any type of criticism, any weak spot, and every type of pain when you are vulnerable. However we are all born with the "vulnerable gene". We all have somthing we wish to not expose. For me its letting go of the fact that I'm not self reliant. I need to lean on people. I need to ask for help and it's Ok to have help. My sponsor likes to say "It's Ok to ..." because she knows this is a tough area for me. What's really funny is that I thought I had escaped being vulnerable when that's all I was thanks to alcohol. I opened that door wide open, I just couldn't feel it because I was so numb. So yes, today I can say I am a romantic, I am vulnerable, because today I am willing to change, and to change you need to be open and vulnerable to the unknown that lies ahead......