i've discussed my issues with drinking numerous times before on the ol' blog, most recently a few weeks ago. the reason i keep bringing it up is because it's really an issue i'm still working through, and it's an issue i constantly want to be careful of coming down too hard on either side of (read: raging alcoholic or judgmental puritan). like most things, i'm really in favor of moderation: either drinking lightly often or (more likely) a few months of abstinence followed by a 12 hour bender. the second method is really just more time-efficient for me than anything else :)
i don't want to get into the same old issues again. i just ran across a post today on DRA's blog (which i am honest to god trying hard to stop stealing things from) where he trotted out a few points that, while not necessarily paralleling mine perfectly, are an interesting addition to the discussion. so i thought i'd share (i just took a few excerpts, separated by the ellipses):
"Before I fell asleep on the plane (before we even took off..)I was thinking a lot about how I quit drinking almost two years ago. I was thinking about how little it affected me actually but how it affected the things around me.
People who quit drinking (who quit giving up on their minds, their days, their souls or pain) become quite unattractive to those who still drink. It is just so true.
It is almost as though your soul begins to speak a different language. A clear and defined one where every thought is stressed and you leave a trail of ideas and meaning every which way you go. [...] I think some people drink to make sex less intimate. To make life less intimate. I don’t know really. I always thought it was disgusting. I really liked being as untouchable as possible, as far away from attainable as possible and that helped. Most of the time, people would say they saw me here or there, and I ws wasted. I loved that. [...] What glory there was in elbowing up in some ratted shit-hole somewhere when you knew there might be a little fight left in you in a day, but that, somehow in that glorious first pound of a shot of this or that, you could sit and watch the curtains of a day go up in flames, and watch, despite the structure around you. And how that felt slightly naughty and evil. Almost historical. Every drink after that, for me anyway, and for what I saw, was just that idea, that idea of destroying an ability to analyze something, further an further down the pass, until it was a swamp, a swamp of broken ideas and bad people, who took naturally to dreamers, awash on their rum bleached dock, ready for a rummaging through."
Ironic timing on your post. I had a friend confront me (via a blog post...) that she thought I was drinking too much. I agree that everything in moderation is a good motto. It's something I try to stick to.
ReplyDeleteOn a sidenote: I once mentioned that when I was around this certain guy, he just made me want to drink. He suggested a way to fight off that urge...call it hittin' the sauce. Who really wants to say that?
Your post has just totally been intertwined with multiple facets of my life. Whoa.
i say "hittin' the sauce" for the same reason i say "use" instead of "drink" when i'm talking about caffeine; it's essentially drug use, but since it's socially acceptable it's not framed as such. that doesn't mean it's bad to do it necessarily. but people should be aware of what they're doing and not try to sugar-coat it.
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