Karen R. is a longtimer in Alcoholics Anonymous with a sense of history.

Her sobriety date is June 10, 1971. "That was a wonderful time in Alcoholics Anonymous," she said the other day. "We who sobered up in that era in Seattle were very privileged because the Late Greats, as my daughter calls them, were still active in the program. Big Pete, Harold, George, Gene E., Doc L. People who were part of AA in the early days here. We got the basics, before the era of psychobabble that there´s so much of now. "

Karen was born and raised in Seattle, daughter of a Swedish father and a Finnish mother, "so that kinda prequalifies me for alcoholism, I guess." She went to a local high school, where she learned to smoke marijuana before she found out about liquor. But that discovery came pretty early too, when she was 15.

"It was on a dare. Elderberry wine, and needless to say, I got sick all over the streets of Capitol Hill. That´s why I stuck with pot. I could do pot and still go to school. I´d come in stoned and laugh and laugh, and the teacher would ask me what I was laughing at." Angus L., who participated in this interview, remarked that "People didn´t know about marijuana in those days."

After graduation, Karen did some traveling, and at one point lived in New York for several years. It was there that she saw the inside of a jail for the only time in her drinking career-as the guest of one of New York´s Finest. "I got drunk with this cop. He was cute, he thought I was cute, and we got drunk together. Only he got drunker than I did, so I had to drive the patrol car back to the precinct. He took me all through the precinct, showed me the jail. I decided I didn´t ever want to go there, and I never did."

Back in Seattle, she began a stormy marriage. The drinking continued, and the last five years she was drinking alcoholicly. The last six months were desperate times. "I´ve heard it said, and I certainly agree, that if we can survive that last six months, we have a chance. Gin kicked my butt. I had a ton of it, and to this day, I think about gin and shudder."

No matter how bad it got, though, the outside world never knew. "I was active in the PTA, I was the perfect wife, the perfect mother, the perfect housekeeper, the perfect gardener, the perfect daughter." Till it all came crashing down on her one afternoon while she was eating lunch with her husband at a downtown restaurant. "I told my husband, ´I feel funny.´ The cocktail waitress asked if I wanted a drink, and I said ´No thank you.´ Why did I say that? I don´t have a clue. Thoughts kept flashing in front of me. I couldn´t focus on anything. All of a sudden, I said to myself, ´I´m an alcoholic.´ There was no ´ha, ha, I´m an alcoholic´ like I´d said many times in the past. I wasn´t laughing this time.

"A feeling of relief, of contentment, flowed through me from the top of my head all the way to my toes. That acknowledgment explained it all. I looked at my husband and told him, ´I´m never going to have another drink as long as I live.´ He wasn´t impressed, to say the least, but we got through the lunch somehow and went home. Then the floodgates opened. I think I cried for two years.

"I started pouring gin down the sink. You should have seen his face as these bottles appeared from all over the place. When he banged out of the house, I called the Crisis Clinic, and they referred me to the Alcohol Referral Center. This lady there suckered me into Alcoholics Anonymous so beautifully. I kept telling her that everything was fine in my life, no problems, it was just that I drank too much. All I needed was to know what to look for, the signs that might make me drink again. She just smiled and said, ´Why don´t you try Alcoholics Anonymous?´

"My first reaction, was, ´Well, that´s all right for some people, but I don´t need it.´ But being a people pleaser, I decided to give it a try. They might learn something from me, you know? I left there with an armful of AA literature, my collar turned up, my sunglasses on, on that dark and rainy June day. As I was walking by Nordstrom´s, a street band on the sidewalk broke into the song, Days of Wine and Roses. I swear to God. I started smiling and thought, ´It´s going to be all right.´"

She went to her first meeting that night, in Edmonds. "My Higher Power set the scene perfectly. The electricity was out in the building, just all these flickering candles and a guy at the top of the stairs that looked scary as hell. Wasn´t that fabulous? My Higher Power knew I´d love that scene and talk about it forever. And I have."

Then she discovered Old Fremont, the Aurora Fellowship at 3414½ Fremont Ave., and started going there because it was convenient. She reluctantly announced herself as a newcomer, "and the rest is history, as they say. Everybody was kind to me, listened to me. I don´t remember anything anybody said. I just cried."

For the next five years, Fremont was a vital part of her life. "I loved the place. It was different back then. You could just as likely be sitting next to someone in a vicuna coat as a working stiff. There are all kinds of people today who have high level jobs who used to come to Fremont. I became secretary of the Monday noon meeting. Boy, was that an honor!"

She was also in charge of a sort of Loaves and Fishes weekly lunch. The program gave her $5 to put it on, and she and her friends somehow served as many as 60 people. Donations, contributions-"it was a pleasure to be able to do it. That was a wonderful time. The lunches got more and more elaborate with all these gals wanting to outdo each other. It was an absolutely intriguing time and place. I would not be sober today if it weren´t for Fremont."

Early on, Karen became active in 12 Step work. One of her vivid memories is of a call to a little house where the "hostess" was sitting in the living room drinking beer. Karen, in her crusading newness, went into the kitchen and was pouring beer down the sink when "it was suddenly dead quiet. I turned around and here was this guy who could fill the doorway staring at me. ´Hello, how are you?´ says I, a bottle of his beer in each hand. My friend and I ran off into the night, and we were damn lucky to get out of there."

Twelve Stepping taught her humility too. There was the occasion when she went all out for her prospect. "I bought her a Big Book and made sure she´d meet all the right people and hear all the right things. Then I lost contact with her. When I saw her a year later, she was sober, and she didn´t remember me at all. I needed that."

Karen has made several pilgrimages to Dr. Bob´s home in Akron. On one visit, the back porch was being repaired. She salvaged a piece of the old wood, brought it home and framed it. Ever since, at the annual Gratitude Dinner of the Shoreline All-Stars, someone gets to keep it for a year.

Ten years ago, Karen started going to Al Anon as well as AA. "That was probably one of the best things I ever did for myself. AA saved my life and Al Anon saved my mind. I was raised to believe, ´You´re strong. You can take it.´ But I wasn´t. I was just as weak as anybody else. Al Anon really filled some holes for me."

Karen became active in service work, first as GSR, then DCM, and was "looking forward to state positions when family demands forced her to cut back. "I loved it, though, and I encourage everyone to get involved. It makes all the difference in the world to one´s sobriety."

For Karen, first there was desperation, then there was hope, and then there was commitment. "Commitment is one of the secret words. Commitment has worked in my life, even when the hoo-hoo was hitting the fan. I´ve never regretted for one minute joining Alcoholics Anonymous."

Interviewed by Angus L. and Dick S. Written by Dick S.