today is day 29

today is day 29 and i’m happy for that. i hadn’t strung together more than 9 days before this attempt at Dry July. I started having regular beer/cider every day after work in 1987. I was 21.  Just one a day, it gave me a good buzz. I never drank in high school, was always afraid of alcohol, in fact, still am. That one beer a day, or every second day didn’t really expand at first.  I could buy a 6-pack of cider, and drink my one per day, taking a day off, then go and buy a new 6-pack. After about a year, i started working in a restaurant, and at the end of our shift we were allowed to have one staff drink, at $1 each. Again, i’d stay for one drink late at night, then head home. One or two beer or cider, that’s it. Go to a party and I’d have beer. I’d host an open house wine and cheese party at my office once a year, and I’d have 2 Coronas in the fridge for me.  I used to go to the store and just buy 2 beer at a time. That’s all I  wanted so that’s all I bought. I used to joke and say “i don’t buy more because beer speaks to me.” Beer hanging around my house says drink me now so i only bought two at a time. my friends though that was funny, kind of comedic, isn’t she hilarious.

in 1995 i remember being on vacation, and i bought a 6-pack every two nights, having 3 beer each night in my hotel room, putting the ice in the sink with the plug in. hotel too cheap for an ice bucket (and you can’t fit 3 beer in an ice bucket anyway).

i think there was a post-bad-boyfriend time, the business I was running wasn’t going so well. maybe it was 1999. i was drinking 3-4 beer at a time.  not every night, but often enough.  probably two or three times a week. i really hated drinking beer, though, because i hated the repeated trips to the bathroom. i know. first world problems.

things stayed right there, 3 beer at a time, and not every night, for years. Later, much later, I met my husband (2005) and we started dating. Now i had my partner in crime, my buddy, my traveling partner, my drinking companion. wine or beer at all events. it’s really not his fault. i thought i was playing house, putting dinner on the table, the bottle of red wine. i knew someone would help me drink it. I’d buy different kinds of pinot noir and open them all at once, and we’d do taste tests. he drank to keep me company, never initiated it himself, but would always go out to get more if i asked. (left on his own, like he is now, he has 1 or 2 beer a week… oh god.)

so for seven years, the husband years, the good years, the happy years, the years where we could argue that problems with loneliness have been solved, that boredom had been erased, the years with unconditional love finally provided … yes, for these seven years i’ve been drinking 5 out of 7 nights, then 6, and then 7 out of 7.  right up until 29 days ago.  you might say i was drinking to fill loneliness back when it was 3 beer alone in a hotel room. but now? got no good excuse. except laziness. i took my eye off the ball.  I’d always been afraid of alcohol, knew what it could do to ruin your life, and i’d always been very very cautious. but in the safety of married life i got lazy and complacent and forgot to watch out. cuz i knew it was calling me. back when i joked that beer spoke to me, i knew it was waiting to suck me in … as soon as i took my eyes off the ball …