Two GA Meetings Fail to Attract One Single Compulsive Gambler

by Tommy George

Trinity United
Methodist Church

Have you ever thrown a party and nobody showed up? I hosted several gathering in my earlier years characterized as "dismal" and "the worst party I've ever been to," but at least one or two people came. However, the Gamblers Anonymous group I am trying to establish in Waverly, Iowa takes the cake. High and low rollers alike stayed away en toto from two G.A. meetings--one held at 6:30 PM on October 18 and the other November 1 of this present year 2018. Both were held at the Trinity United Methodist Church on Bremer Ave W adjacent to the public library. Nobody came to either. Zip. Nadie. Zero.

Some of you may not know this about me but I am a degenerate gambler who has lost everything with a capital "E"--every penny plus far more (I will spare you my melodramatic litany of non-monetary losses). I was earler in life addicted to several vices that I got over without breaking a sweat. Alcohol. Opiates. Sexual perversions and egregiously bad literary efforts. But these were all cake walks compared to gambling addiction. 


I attended several GA sessions down in Jackson, Mississippi in 2007 and found them a wondrous relief from the rats gnawing away in my belly. I had to return to Iowa for legal reasons, and I never got back to Jackson. I am still consumed by the impulse to wager. Lately I have reasoned: why not establish a GA chapter here? In Waverly, Iowa, the only town I ever lived in where people have not all turned sour.

Reverend Bowers

I corresponded and filed papers with the GA International in Los Angeles. They sent me a start-up kit. I familiarized myself with the session protocols. I found a location for the meetings right at the church nextdoor. I and Carolyn Bowers--the reverend of unbounded good will who has helped and encouraged me with this project-- decided on a regular day and time: Thursdays at 6:30 PM. 

I phoned local behavioral services providers to notify them of a new GA chapter forming--send me your problem gamblers. I taped up posters all over town. When the appointed hour approached, I made the coffee and tea, set out the literature, and prepared for an onslaught of people like myself--men and women desperate for therapy with like-minded losers in the 12-step format of Alcoholics Anonymous--addicts who needed to walk away from gaming forever. But nobody showed. 

I recovered from my numb disbelief and approached the goal of a hometown GA chapter again--this time, a bit more aggressively. I put up more posters and visited the offices of the Waverly Democrat, published by pro journalists. Eavesdropping on the editor's high-speed decisions about the paper's next issue (already an hour overdue at the printers), I realized surely such power could deliver me a few problem gamblers. The meeting was listed in the October 30 issue of the paper among upcoming community events. 

Also, KWAY Radio's "Community Calendar" announced the planned meeting. Meanwhile, I continued plastering the town with posters. 

This time, I told myself, the word is out. Problem gamblers are sure to come. The Thursday meeting space at Trinity United Methodist Church was set up as before. I brought along plenty of cream and sugar for the coffee-swilling slot junkies sure to show up. To my dismay, again nobody came.

This chronology of failure is my way of annoucing that I'm going to give the Gamblers Anonymous meeting another go. My next attempt to get together with other compulsive gamblers like myself for the purposes of mutual support and an organized climb back to redemption (let's call it a GA Meeting) is scheduled Thursday, November 29. You should have digested all that turkey by then. Maybe--just maybe--you'll be in the mood to talk turkey about gambling with the Christmas season setting in. Thanks.  --Tommy G.