Changing, and Growing, and Knowing…
When I started out this sixty five days of not drinking, I didn’t know where I wanted to go with it. I thought that my mind would be clear and made up: I thought that at the end of that period of time, I would have a definite idea of how I feel about alcohol.
I think that at a certain point in my life, I became defined by being the one with the beer in her hand. I have an entire circle of friends who don’t know the other sides of me that even exist: The quiet, pensive, serious, studious side of me. They see the Saturday Night me, the me without a care in the world.
And that bothered me.
The Saturday Night me is not a me who I dislike. Quite the opposite, I love that now and then I can get up and dance, laugh and look like I’m loving it. Typically, I’m not even inebriated when I hit the dance floor at a club. But if I’ve got the beer in hand, people think that I am. As a result, I’m covered. If I trip and fall over my own two feet? I’m a drunken fool, rather than a really bad dancer.
A bad week, an asshat doctor, an exhausting wedding, no date, a painful hairstyle, confusion about my work and my position at school: I ended up drinking on Saturday night.
Are those lame, pathetic excuses? Or is it a matter of me not caring enough to continue with my beer-fast? Does it really speak volumes about my character that I hate being in public next to the woman who is the centre of attention?
I don’t know what it says about me that I didn’t make it. I had a few drinks on Saturday. It didn’t lead to a bender. I still made it forty days and I plan to go another twenty-five days from there.
I don’t know what it means, but I failed on my mission.
And I’m trying to be ok with that.
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