the AA thesis: Lucky, not Grateful
he always says he’s Lucky to be sober today, instead of that he’s Grateful today, because he admits that the former is always true, every day, even though a lot of the time he still doesn’t feel Grateful
Context
Single-entendre honesty as daily discipline, at the level of one word. On Commitments everyone says how "Grateful" they are whether they feel it or not — the prescribed piety — but Gately swaps in "Lucky," the word that's "always true, every day," because he's trying "to be just about as verbally honest as possible" without calculating how it'll land. It's a tiny, exact instance of the practice: not faking the pious cliché, choosing instead the plain word he can actually stand behind. Sincerity as a discipline of not saying the expected true-sounding thing when a truer plain thing is available.