Leonard Lee Buschel: Person of the Week:

Mr. Buschel is Philadelphia native and now a happy Angeleno. He is a California Certified Substance Abuse Counselor with years of experience working with addicts struggling with life on the natch. He founded the REEL Recovery Film Festival which played in 7 cities around the country for 13 years. He is publisher/editor of the Addiction/Recovery eBulletin.

Q. If you are in recovery, what was your drug(s) of choice and when is your sobriety date?

A. Marijuana, MDMA, Percodans, Absolute Vodka…Clean & Sober since August 4, 1994

Q. Is there anything special in your sobriety toolkit that helps keep you sober?

A. There’s always a tomorrow.

Q. Do you think addiction is an illness, disease, a choice, or a wicked twist of fate?

A. I think ADDICTION is the state of being compulsively committed to a habit or practice or to something that is psychologically or physically habit-forming, as narcotics, to such an extent that its cessation causes severe trauma. NOT a disease.

Q. Where are you from and where do you reside now?

A. Philadelphia, home of the Declaration of Independence, and Rocky Balboa.
Los Angeles California, aka City of Angels

Q. What is one word you would use to describe yourself?

A. Adorable

Q. Describe how you came to your “rock bottom” point.

A. I was too sick from drinking and staying up all night to be able to lay through a massage without having to get up and go outside to throw up every 5 minutes. I seriously thought of calling Poison Control.

Q. If you ever retire, would you prefer to live by the ocean, lake, river, mountaintop, desert, or penthouse?

A. I already live on the LA River.

Q. How do you measure success?

A. Not being in jail or on the street. Seeing everything as holy. Treating everyone like you would treat Jesus or your mama.

Q. What is your biggest pet peeve?

A. Negativity, mostly my own.

Q. If you had an extra million dollars, which charity would you donate it to?

A. American Theater Wing

Q. Who has been the biggest influence throughout your life?

A. Michio Kushi, Stephen Sondheim, Alan Watts, Allen Ginsberg, Joseph Chilton Pearce and of course Dr. Bob and Bill W.

Q. If you could give advice to your younger self what would it be?

A. Learn a trade or how to play an instrument. Musicians are like Gods.

Q. Who made you feel seen growing up?

A. The cops. Because I was always hiding from them.

Q. Which living person do you most admire?

A. New York City Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani and Rev. Michael Beckwith.

Q. What major event or realization shaped who you are?

A. Meeting Alan Watts when I was a teenager, Woodstock and attending Naropa Institute. That I could not do acid every day, but I could smoke pot

Q. What do you love most about living sober?

A. It’s very sustainable. AA Meetings, crossing borders with no fear.

Q. Which part of your treatment and recovery do you feel was the most interesting or unexpected?

A. That it’s possible to live without doing any street drugs.

Q. What is your Astrological sign?

A. Sagittarius

Q. Who is your favorite celebrity in recovery?

A. John Taylor.

Q. What book(s) have you read more than once?

A. Be Here Now by Ram Dass. Money by Martin Amis. All of Patricia Highsmith, Billy Phelan’s Greatest Game by William Kennedy, The Order of the Universe by Michio Kushi, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon, Raise High the Roof Beam Carpenters and Seymour an Introduction and Nine Stories by J.D. Salinger and many more…

Q. What books are you reading now?

A. The Great American Novel by Philip Roth, Music for Chameleons by Truman Capote and Strange Loops and Gestures of Creation by Joseph Chilton Pearce

Q. If you were giving a dinner party for your 3 favorite authors, living or dead, who would they be?
(You can choose a 4th if you think one might be too drunk or stoned to attend.)

A. Haruki Murakami, Henry Miller, J.D. Salinger, Martin Amis …

Q. Which film have you watched the most?

A. Chinatown, 12 Angry Men, Mean Streets, Annie Hall

Q. Who is your favorite film director?

A. Paul Thomas Anderson, Robert Downey Sr., François Truffaut, Spike Lee, John Cassavetes, Alfred Hitchcock

Q. Are you binge watching any TV series?

A. The Lincoln Lawyer and Mom.

Q. What is your favorite App?

A. YELP

Q. Who is your favorite performer, living or dead?

A. Judy Garland

Q. Who are your heroes in real life?

A. My brother Bruce, my son Benjamin, my dog, Lolita.

Q. What are some of the most memorable songs in your life?

A. SUNDAY by Stephen Sondheim. Turn On Your Love Light by The Dead. My Favorite Things, the John Coltrane version. 

Q. What is your favorite city?

A. London

Q. What is your favorite cuisine?

A. Macrobiotic

Q. What is the best concert/performance/play you’ve ever attended?

A. Sweeny Todd in London.

Q. What are five things you always carry with you (not including cell phone, keys, wallet, or lipstick)?

A. Cash, Evian Water, pocketknife, my last AA coin (31 years) a book.

Q. What is the best and or worse piece of advice someone has given you?

A. BEST, Do whatever you want, just don’t get caught. WORST, Do another line.

Q. What is the best piece of advice you’ve given someone else?

A. Never lie or bullshit anyone.

Q. What do you value most in a friendship?

A. Humor

Q. What do you consider your greatest achievement?

A. Writing my memoir HIGH: From Cannabis to Clarity. Stopped doing drugs.

Q. What is your biggest fear?

A. Dying alone, and not being found for a week with my dog whimpering and almost dead from not being fed.

Q. Where do you go when you’re seeking solitude?

A. PEETS

Q. If you could wake up tomorrow having gained any one quality or ability, what would it be?

A. To play piano like Keith Jarrett.

Q. What would constitute a “perfect” day for you?

A. Attending a meeting at my home group at the White Fire Theater, breakfast with my son, a walk around Central Park, reading some Rumi, dinner at the Souen on E. 6th St. seeing a revival of West Side Story on Broadway and … none of your business…

Q. What is your biggest regret?

A. Never got a degree at Temple University.

Q. What is the greatest risk you’ve ever taken?

A. Smuggling a pound and half of hashish in my girdle through Kennedy Airport.

Q. Which living person do you most despise?

A. Take a guess.

Q. What is something you’ve learned about yourself in the last six months?

A. I’m not as young as I used to be.

Q. What is  your concept of a Higher Power?

A. God is a VERB not a noun.

Q. What is something you are currently curious about?

A. Is Pluto a planet or not?

Q. What do you love most about yourself?

A. I say funny things all the time. My view of the world. I never dropped a dime on nobody.

Q. When did you realize you were a grown-up?

A. Say what?

Q. How important are your pets to you?

A. As important as Romeo was to Juliet. 

Q. Which words or phrases do you most overuse?

A. That can’t be true.