Knock Knock Who’s There? | Noah Bergland

Knock Knock,
Who’s There?
God!
Ya, okay Dennis,
I think you forgot to take your medicine again.

So, I started my 12 steps a little over three weeks ago and something strange has been happening ever since. I don’t talk to God, it’s just to weird to me, but more and more lately these, “coincidences” have been happening and it all started at a 12-step meeting a few weeks ago.

If you are reading this, you probably know me pretty well: I like to share. Any chance to talk about me and I’m going to take it.

Well, you are about to find out as you read Dennis’s stories and experiences that we are simply two peas in a pod. So, a couple of days before the meetings at one of our 9 pm get-togethers up in the stairwell, Dennis was telling me about a time when he was in the Residential Drug Program here at the prison camp.

He was arguing with staff and he yelled out during a meeting, “I don’t hear any recovery here!” The staff member responded, “Because you don’t ever shut up long enough to listen.”

After that, his feelings were hurt and he began to pout and he didn’t speak the rest of the meeting. I don’t know what happened after that but in the present time, I was laughing at Dennis because I could relate. The only one that gets in my way most times is Me and Dennis is the same way.

So we made a pact that the next two meetings, Monday and Tuesday, we won’t share and we will simply listen.

Dennis said, “Agreed.” I responded, “Maybe we go for two weeks.” Dennis quickly snapped back, “Absolutely not, one will be hard enough.” We laughed and joked after that about what we will look like twisting in our seats because we knew we will certainly have something people need to hear.

The first meeting came Monday night.

Dennis shared!

I was staying quiet, and at some point during the meeting, based on the look on his face, he must have remembered. After the meeting, I gave him a hard time and he said, “Alright, I got you tomorrow.”

Next meeting, the following night, Tuesday.

Somewhere halfway through Dennis started to freak out and mouthed me the words, “I have proof.”

I didn’t know what he was talking about but he pulled an index card out of his pocket and showed people to both sides. I didn’t have the slightest clue what anything in his pocket had to do with the meeting, but I continue to listen.

Two members in a row had shared about a picture of God at a door with no handle, at least the first one did, the second shared that he was just thinking about the same thing. The first said, God is at this door and he says, “Knock Knock, it’s God, let me in.”

Later that night Dennis and I meet at 9 pm.  He arrived early and he has a shit-eating grin on his face like he knows something I don’t know.

I asked, “What the hell are you all excited about.” He said, “I have proof of God,” and he slaps down an index card on the table next to us that reads: At the top said Traveling Companion, which was the subject of the just for today reading. Below it said:

Knock Knock
Whose there
It’s God
Let me in

I got goosebumps the second I read it, then reasoning kicked in and I started thinking about how he could have predicted them saying it.

After our meeting, I went to the book, Just For Today, and read the daily reading. I didn’t find anything about Knock Knock jokes. I didn’t bother going and confronting the guy who shared it because he lives in a different unit and Dennis doesn’t ever talk to him, Dennis was actually so excited about it, he ran down the wrong guy after the meeting and told him about it.

I went to the guys he showed the index card to during the meeting and I asked each of them what the card said and they both responded with the same, they repeated the phrase and then both looked at me with confusion and then asked me, “why?” I told them “No reason, just wondering.”

It was at that point I said, “alright come in!”

Thanks for listening,

Noah!

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