NCSB Journal Spring 2026

LAWYER ASSISTANCE PROGRAM

I Am 17 Going on 18 (My apologies to Rodgers & Hammerstein) B Y A N O N Y MO U S

First, I am grateful that on October 3rd I celebrated 17 years of sobriety. And, coincidentally, and possibly a God “wink,” also my 38th wedding anniversary. But more on that later. I didn’t begin my life’s journey wishing I’d grow up to be an alcoholic. Far from it. My father joined Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) about two months after my birth. We’ve always laughed that he needed to quit, but when I was born, he was 42. I’m sure he decided it was time when he looked at me and said, “We can’t let anything like a child happen again.” So, there it was, the genetic “addiction gene” passed down from one alcoholic to the next—just like me becoming an attorney—like father, like son. One thing we didn’t have entirely in common was how we got into recovery. In 1956, alcohol rehabilitation facilities were few and far between. I started my sober life after a short stint at Holly Hill in Raleigh, and I attended a rehab facility in Georgia for over 90 days. However, what we did share at that juncture of our wanting to stay sober was AA. His AA attendance began with just a couple guys above a store in our downtown. Mine was at the same AA clubhouse my father had attended for years before his death. My father died sober with 31 years of sobriety under his belt. I have 17 years sober and pray I’ll follow Daddy’s example one more time, one day at a time, to maintain sobriety until my passing. My story began in 1973 when I went off to the University of North Carolina at age 17. It was like dropping a bomb on Chapel Hill. I had very little alcohol or marijuana use in high school and frankly was kind of a loner. But back when I landed in Chapel Hill, nobody cared about IDs. The legal drinking age for beer was 18, but I could get beer and wine anywhere I wanted it. There’s talk in AA circles and literature about alcohol being a social

lubricant. And so, by using alcohol, I went from being this kind of shy loner to getting drunk and realizing that it loosened me up and made me feel like a different person. I was entertaining; I was funny; I was much more likely to ask girls out on dates. My four years at Carolina were the best six and a half of my life. That was chiefly because in my junior year, I came across an article in the Daily Tar Heel featuring the opening of Troll’s Bar. The headline caught my eye: Lawyer Goes from One Bar to Another. The Troll, as he was known, had been a lawyer in Greensboro. After about ten years of practicing law, he missed being in Chapel Hill, especially Carolina sporting events. As a result, he quit practicing law and opened his bar off Rosemary Street. As fortune would have it, I went the first night the bar was open. I hit it off with the owner and therein began several years of working at Troll’s, where I was basically the head bartender while also attempting to navigate through my studies, usually one semester on, one semester off, until I ultimately got enough credits to graduate. I had a great time in Chapel Hill, but a little voice inside me told me that if I didn’t leave there pretty soon, I would probably not make it to age 30 because drinking and drugging were a daily occurrence. However, even though my father was a recovering alcoholic, I didn’t really get the sense that I was doing anything—or my disease told me I wasn’t doing anything—that was irreparable. It was a lifestyle that I continued over the years with brief stretches of not drinking or certainly not drinking to excess. In 1982 I went to Campbell University Law School in Buies Creek. I went through the summer program and made it into law school and did very well. I graduated in 1985 and came back home to practice with my father and brother, both attorneys. I could fill up the Bar Journal with my

drunkalogue, but I won’t. When I was preparing to take the bar exam, I was asked to come in and explain a couple of arrests that I’d had: a DWI and an incident down in Atlanta. I think now we would call it disturbing the peace or resisting arrest. Back then Georgia called it creating a nuisance, which pretty well summed me up when I would get drunk and think I was being funny and enjoying life. I guess the ironic part is, looking back on those days, I wince at some of the things (actually a lot of the things) I did, and as full circle goes, I ended up going to rehab in Georgia in 2008. By then I had been practicing law for 23 years; mainly in a criminal and traffic practice. I’d built a pretty good name for myself and been involved in my community in every way imaginable. During this time, my wife and I were raising two young, beautiful daughters. My drinking, certainly over the last three or four years of my drinking career, was causing problems at home. I would shake off these problems with my drunken episodes and say, “Hey, I’m a Southern lawyer. I’m an Episcopalian. I’m supposed to be ‘kind of’ a drunk, but I do my work, and I work hard. I

SPRING 2026

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