You know, once in a while I get this flash of desire to drink. It happened the other day when I was on a walk. It was a beautiful day about 70 degrees out. And this desire came over me. Not exceptionally strong, but it came. So, I let myself go into it and picture what I was missing. I could picture myself sitting on my balcony overlooking the Canyon that we live on. I could see the glass of ice cold Sauvignon Blanc or Sancerre on the arm of my chair. I recalled how the part I liked was when I first started to feel the wine and my mind would roam-drift. God! I spent who knows how many hours of my life doing that. And, to be honest, I could take myself great places. Come up with some really good ideas. Visualize past experiences and future goals. Drifting. But, as I went into it, I realized that that feeling of floating mindlessness was fake. Because while part of me was drifting, another part of me was constantly aware of how much wine was left in my glass. Aware of how much wine was left in the bottle. How much time it was taking me to drink it. Calculating the amount of time it was taking me to drink it and how much time was left in relation to the amount of wine in the bottle and the time I wanted to stretch it out. For instance, I would normally only buy one bottle at a time-guess why? Yep, that way I could control it! Yeah, right. But, if I had more than one bottle on hand, the chance was that I would open a second one. The other component was that I usually timed my drinking with prepping dinner and eating said meal. So, I would want to maybe have a glass left for my dinner-but would have gone through most of the bottle by the time the food was ready. Of course then things became more complicated as I had to be conscious of the the amount of time needed to prep the food and then the amount of time it actually needed to cook. Of course I was a pro at saying dinner was taking much longer than it actually was. Eeking it out so I could drink and keep to that schedule. Getting the right amount of “buzz”!
Jeez Louise! How complicated is all of that!?? What a lot of work that was! And, I wasn’t totally drifing and relaxed because another part of my brain was always aware of and calculating the amount of wine versus time. Oh how we deceive ourselves!!! Yes, I’ll admit, I did come up with some great ideas during that “drifting” time. And then, I’d be pleasantly sloshed. Then I’d be drunk. I’d try to remind myself that even after a glass-or a bottle- of wine was finished, the effects continued to grow. Of course that never stopped me from pouring more or opening that second bottle if I had it.
As I’m writing, I’m thinking about how at times, I would buy a big bottle. To save money..(she snickers)! But then I would think-“well, one bottle!” So that wasn’t good. Then I started thinking that maybe I should try some of these wines in a box. Some of them get really high ratings and they’re cheaper and last longer. As if that was ever an issue! The problem with that was that I never had any idea of how much I drank. And boy! Was that easy, just turing that spigot! So, I went back to a normal bottle of wine every night. Continuing to fool myself that I was in control. Fooling myself that it was helping me not only to relax but to create. So what if I didn’t remember the last episode from a series that we’d watched the night before? So what if I got grumpy in a restaurant because my SO was having half a glass of wine which would deprive me of my bottle? Not taking into consideration that I’d probably had a glass or two before we’d even left the house!
WELL! After mulling all of that over, I decided that I really didn’t miss that wine time. It took too much work under the guise of relaxing!
Learning to “relax” without the wine can be a challenge. To be honest, I’m not sure I really knew what relaxing was without wine! What I do know now is what it’s not-it’s not getting numbed out. It’s not getting blotto. It’s simply enjoying a moment or a period of time. It’s letting myself breathe. Letting myself “be”. And guess what? I can still be creative in that time! So, go ahead! Put your feet up for awhile. Let yourself “Be”!
Free Falling Into a Sober Life 