Wow. Just, wow

Don't get me wrong, my ego is every bit as healthy as the next guys, often times more so and occasionally bigger than it should be. But I REALLY don't like talking about myself. It makes me uncomfortable. I think, as much as anything it makes me feel like I'm arrogant and I really hate arrogant people. Self-confident? Good for you. To be perfectly honest I'm not usually the most self-confident person. And I think, because of that, I just don't like talking about myself.

But I'm pretty proud of something that happened yesterday and I thought "well, why not blog about it?" So. Here goes...

I'm active in an organization, Alliance Against Intoxicated Motorists (AAIM) and have been for quite sometime. Granted, at first my only involvement was helping the Blond Child's Mother with our fundraiser and things of that nature, but after she died in 2006, I became more actively involved to try and carry on what she was trying to do. AAIM was a huge help to us as we went to court in the aftermath of BC's crash and it was important to us (me) that we do whatever we could to help them. So I was asked to speak at Victim Impact Panels (VIP's) and I said "yes". And I was asked to sit on the Board of Directors and I said "yes". And over the last 4 years, whenever I've gotten the frantic, one-of-my-speakers-cancelled-at-the-last-minute phone calls asking if I could fill-in I've almost always said "yes". And I've never regretted it. Any of it.

And I don't mean any of that in a "hey look at how wonderful I am" kind of way, I mean that matter-of-factly. It's just how it is. Like I said, this stuff is important to me. It's important to me to try and do what I can to change behaviors. The people I speak to at VIP's are DUI offenders, sentenced to attend by the courts. And what they did was wrong. And they need to understand the consequences of their actions. And, by telling the story of the BC and her Mom, I try to affect that change. Before the offenders do it again and kill some innocent person.

And by the way, when someone says "if you change one person, it's worth it" I say Bullshit. If I change one person's behavior, I've wasted everyone's time. I want to change the behavior of EVERYBODY in the room.

So, let's move on to yesterday. AAIM's annual benefit luncheon was held yesterday. And it was lovely, as always. This was the 8th benefit I've attended and the folks that organize it really do a nice job with it. Raffles, silent auction, live auction, a nice meal and award presentations. Awards for Assistant State's Attorneys that have gone above and beyond prosecuting drunk drivers, an award for Victim Witness Advocates (named in honor of the Blond Child's Mother) that provide such an amazing service to victims of violent crimes, including DUI crashes and to the victim families, families that are often in such a grief induced haze, that they can't really comprehend the complexity of the court actions and rely on these amazing men and women to guide them through the court system. And an award, named in honor of Sheila Forsner, hit, along with her family, by a drunk driver in 1989. Sheila's infant son Alex was killed instantly and she was left a quadriplegic due to a traumatic brain injury. For the five post-crash years Sheila survived, she worked tirelessly for AAIM as a volunteer speaking to anyone and everyone she could, offenders, judges, high school students among others, trying to affect change. She died as a result of her injuries in February 1994. The award

http://www.aaim1.org/awards_forsner.asp

is presented annually "For Outstanding Volunteer Service".

This year, it was presented to me.

I had no clue. Not. One. Clue. As I sat at the table with my family (a family full of evil people, btw) listening to the presenter describe this years winner and thinking "Huh? Me?" and sealing the deal when I saw one of the administrative assistants looking at me and smiling. So as I stood at the podium, emotions welling up inside of me, I knew I had to be a smart-aleck cause I was on the verge of losing it, my first words were "I'd just like to say to my family at table 21 'you suck'" because they hid the books from me. The books that list, among other things the winners of the awards being presented this year. They hid them, of course, to maintain the surprise, but at the time I didn't know that. At the time I couldn't figure out why ALL the books on our table had disappeared. Couldn't understand why TBGFE! wouldn't answer me when I asked where they went. Couldn't understand why the Oldest Child (who got thrown under the bus by TBGFE!) couldn't produce one when asked. I'm afraid I wasn't as gracious as I should have been. I should send a note to Sheila's family to Thank them. Because it would crush me to find out I was insensitive to them. But I had to resort to my default smart-assedness to maintain some sense of composure.

I've pretty much rambled on longer than I should have. I'm cutting this off here, but let me just say, for the record, I've never been more proud of or more humbled by anything in my entire life. And to those that thought enough of what I've tried to do to decide I was somehow worthy of this award, from the bottom of my heart, Thank You.