Lots of people hide their opinions to avoid controversy. Denise D. isn´t one of them.

Denise, one of the youngest oldtimers in Seattle Alcoholics Anonymous, has strong opinions coming out of every pore and no hesitancy about sharing them. For instance:

Question: Is AA reaching out enough today to the guys hanging out at the Morrison and the Union Gospel Mission? Or the old lady pushing a shopping cart full of her stuff?

Denise: "It´s not the same scene today. A lot of the people on Skid Row today would have been in institutions when I came in. I saw a man the other day down at Fourth and Spokane with his pants down below his fanny. The police don´t pick him up because, apparently, he´s mentally retarded. I´m not offended by his fanny showing. I´m offended by the fact this man is wandering around and there´s no help for him.

Question: How well are we doing with 12 Step work?

Denise: "I´ve seen calls come in and no one willing to go out. Well, if nobody goes hey, there was someone there when you called There has to be somebody there for the next man or woman. That is not stressed enough. It is up to us, to each and every one of us, to carry the message. And it wouldn´t be a bad idea for more of us to go to meetings that attract the Skid Row drunks. They may not be meetings that a high bottom drunk would usually go to, but maybe we need to see low bottom drunks once in awhile to see that they can attain sobriety too. Too many of us are wrapped up in our own little worlds. We don´t go back out there to see what´s going on. Look at the jails and prisons. There are never enough members coming forward to staff those meetings."

Question: What about the way AA meetings have changed over the years?

Denise: "I go to meetings, and I hear people say, ´Oh, I had a bad day. I broke a fingernail.´ Come on! I haven´t had a bad day in 20 y ears. I´ve had days that were better than others, but I´ve never had a bad day. I don´t want to hear drunkalogues. I don´t give a damn how people drank ´cause everybody´s pattern is the same: ´drink drank drunk.´ I want to know how they stay sober and if they´re having a problem with the steps. Maybe I have that problem, too, and I can learn something.

"A lot of old-timers are not going to meetings for two reasons: one, they don´t have transportation. They don´t go out at night, or they don´t drive anymore. They need someone to take them. and they´re too proud to ask. Second, it´s the language. The language is so offensive. Forty years ago, Skid Row bars had signs that said ´No Swearing Allowed. Ladies Present.´ It isn´t just the men in meetings, it´s the women, too.

"This is a problem that´s not stressed enough. A lot of people who don´t swear don´t go to meetings these days. When I was drinking, I had a tongue that would make a longshoreman´s hair curl. Not only a vicious tongue, but a nasty one. But I´m no longer drinking, and I´m not in a bar anymore. There are other words you can use."

Question: Isn´t this because our society has changed? The "F" word is in common use today.

Denise: "Bad language is bad language. You know what that word means? ´Fornication Under Consent of the King.´ It means the king has consented to you to fornicate. The word is absolutely a useless word. And lots of people walk out of meetings when it´s used."

Question: What about the near-universal ban on smoking in meetings?

Denise: "That´s no problem. You can walk out of the room and have a cigarette. That didn´t hurt AA. That change had to be made. People were sloppy with their cigarettes, and they were burning things. That´s something I learned at the beginning: you pick up your ashtrays. your cups, your chair. You don´t leave the work to someone else."

Denise got an early start on sobriety. She says she has two AA birthdays: April 16. 1954, and Feb. 14. 1957. "I drank, came back, drank, came back. I was 21 when I first came to the program. I was lucky, I had a good sponsor. He owned the bar I drank in.

´When I came in, there were two clubs, the 12 Step Club and the Alano Club. I was active in both of them. There were about 10 meetings in the whole city then. One every weeknight and a few meetings on Sunday in the neighborhoods. And Saturday night was dance night.

"The clubs were real meeting places in those days people looking for a place to stay during the day while they were looking for a job, or just someplace to hang out. Some clubs used to have a back room where you could go to sober up. The need for clubs isn´t as great today. If you need to talk to somebody, you can go to a meeting any day, practically any time."

Question: What about the way AA membership has changed with the increase in dual abusers?

Denise: ´Well, I go along with General Service on that question. We don´t want to dilute Alcoholics Anonymous. I have no problem with other groups using the 12 steps, but if drugs is their problem, they should go to NA. They have to address their narcotics problem."

Question: What´s your take on the way AA has changed with the growth of treatment centers?

Denise: "I´m not knocking the treatment centers, but they´re not teaching the full benefits of AA. If they use the AA philosophy, they should teach the whole thing, not just run their patients into a lot of meetings, then run ´em out as soon as it´s over. AA means taking part in your group if it´s going to survive. In treatment, they learn the words, but they need to come here and learn the melody, too. And that means 12 Step work. Not just going on 12 Step calls, but being a part of the meeting. Someone walks in the door, you walk up and introduce yourself, make him welcome. That´s what we used to do."

One of Denise´s big interests is the annual Oldtimers Lunch. She keeps a computerized record of everyone with 20 years or more. "When you get 20 or 25 years, there´s very few as young as me with that many years ´cause they´ve died off. We got kinda tired of going to funerals, so now we get together once in awhile to say ´Hello, how ya doin´? What´s happening in your life?"

Question: Denise, what do you see as the future of AA?

Denise: "The future depends on people who start participating rather than spectating. Now, too many just bring the body, don´t get involved. They don´t participate, they don´t share, they don´t go to coffee afterward. And that is what this program is, a sharing program. We share our experience, strength and hope with each other. This program works if you work it."

Interviewed and written by Dick S.