The Lifelong Quest For Sobriety…The Ultimate Hero’s Journey—Part 55

Avalon mythical island

Guest Blogger and long-time Council friend, Bob W. presents Part 55 of a series dealing with Alcoholism and Addiction from a Mystical, Mythological Perspective, reflecting Bob’s scholarly work as a Ph.D. in mythological studies.

Santa Catalina is an island offshore southern California, “26 miles across the sea…” from Long Beach.  The “26 miles…” line is from a 1958 song by the Four Preps, a male quartet of Hollywood teenagers whose name conveyed their image…preppy, well groomed suburban kids in white shirts, identical suits and skinny ties. They had a number of hits in the late 50’s and 60’s as the popular music world was moving from traditional rock ‘n roll to folk ballads.

But the island of Santa Catalina eschewed their image.  It was a quiet, very rocky, almost magical island whose main harbor and city then and now is Avalon, a quaint village of shops, restaurants and B&B’s.  Avalon also was a very reverent name in ancient Celtic legends. 

Avalon was an island in the marshlands of Wales where spiritual beings with great healing powers were said to reside. It was also the place where the magical sword, Excalibur, was reportedly to have been forged, the instrument that empowered King Arthur with a mantle of invincibility.

When Arthur was wounded in his battles with Modred, he was transported to Avalon where he was attended to and healed by the Enchantress Morgana le Fay. While Avalon on Santa Catalina today is just a nice quaint city on a distant isle, those of us blessed with the miracles of the Process of Recovery can easily see it in its mythological constructions. Travelling there across the water, entering the beautiful harbor, walking among the rocky hills of the island, we can imagine ourselves as Arthurian Knights, reveling in the bliss of a magical existence, immortalized in so much literature…for our lives in the “sunlight of the spirit,” afforded by our diligent working of the program, is precisely that…is it not?