This is "a letter home" sort of posting.

When I was in America sought out people associated with these MIP groups and spent time with three. In Maori we say kanohi ki te kanohi, or face to face. There is no substitute for face to face contact.

I have a meeting tonight, godwilling. Two members or maybe three. For one it will be their second meeting.

I don't have a sponsor these days. Mostly don't really need one. I have cut down on meetings. I no longer have to seek out new meetings. I am working two programmes side by side.

I have done mentoring over the last 16 years. But not a sponsor. But, after a while we do learn to seek and find advice, when we need it. To be confident. To work a good Step 10 just requires a good routine.

This morning was a frosty morning. Our first humdinger- going into winter.

My doctor has given me a pruning job again. I have done it to raise money to go to Fiji. But, at the moment it looks like Fiji is going into lock-down. One day at a time- ah kin do the pruning anyway.

One time when I was a kid someone told me that Maoris left their kids out in the car when they were at the pub drinking. So I grew up thinking that we must of been Maoris.

A Maori pa is a settlement, and I was in one in 1973. Someone tried to make it a place to deal with drug issues. Drug use was fairly new then- and causing a lot of concern.

My big concern that in the south, where I lived were plans to flood the valley to make hydro-electric power.

There were things I needed to learn about this.

I had been kicked out of home at age 17. Mum and dad came home from the pub about 7 p.m. They got stuck into our sister because she did not have tea on the table. I stuck up for her and told them that there was nothing for her to cook. Things went from bad to worse after that- and I was told to F...k off. I was still at school... I did my exams, got some work on a shearing gang, and then f...ed off.

When I reached the pa in 1973 I was really lost and broken. I had learned not to use drugs. Either street drugs or meds. But all of my friends did. And they drank too when they could not score.

When I was 16 I read about Tahupotiki Wiremu Ratana. He had been an alcoholic drinker, but had changed and did healing and stuff. This movement was based on Methodism.

The pa I was at was inclined towards Catholicism- which was just as good really.

Virtually all the youth and young families had gone to the city. Others had gone to jail, and elsewhere.

So this influx of young people was used to keep things going.

We had a base in the deep south, based on the tribe down there.

We are asked to join the local hapu, or clan. I was present when this ceremony took place.

The chieftainess and chief were lovely people. Just shearing gang people, really... but in terms of leadership they were tops.

The term we use in AoNZ, aroha, is just slightly different from the aloha you might hear in Hawaii.

The crowd I knocked around with in our southern city used to buy codeine cough mix and skull it. That was before heroin became available. Up and down the main street you would find those empty bottles laying around the footpath with the paper wrapper still on them.

I needed up on a railway gang. They sent my mates out to work with me. This did not work out, really. Drinkers still feel pain when they injure themselves. But not my lot. I was a ganger, or foreman and I just got them to sit up on the bank and keep out of the way.

One day I would like to talk more about the baby boom years.

I went back home to my upland valleys in 1976. Mum and dad had split up- and we were in danger of losing the property.

At the same time the construction gangs were coming into the valley to build a huge dam.

I say this never and over again- and I do so with gratitude.

The gangs bought along with them AA members. And the AA members bought along Alanon members.

The rest is history!