Sober October
Too much to catch up on from the 10th month of the year for a single post, but that’s my fault for not updating this throughout the last 31 days (I know everyone has been riddled with suspense, wink).
Sober October – The Challenge
As the name suggests October was about cutting out the alcohol, but actions speak louder than words, and my actions suggest I went off the deep end and got too drunk to write at all. Thankfully, this is not what happened. I did abstain for 29 straight days, only breaking the 31 day cycle for a few beers during a friends wedding as planned. The other challenge of the month was giving up meat, which I prematurely deemed to be the easier task.
Red meat has been out for a long time, but things like turkey, chicken, fish, and pork…. Oh boy. I’ve missed them more than I ever missed Jack, Jim, Jameson, and all other things corked.
I am fortunate enough to be offered free food fairly frequently. Normally I will eat whatever is thrown my way, but adding in dietary restrictions is always a curve ball worth swinging at. It shakes things up, gets things moving. My primary problem with the lack of animal protein in my diet was convenience. Almost all those free meals contained meat, and I had to deny most of them this month. It was entertaining explaining to friends who have seen me devour a bar-b-que chicken pizza why I was no longer partaking in carnivorous acts. Becoming vegetarian is something that I would love to pursue later in life, when I live in a home, with a fridge and a kitchen to cook in. Van life does have its restrictions, as freeing as it is.
For years now I have relied on alcohol as my go to pacifier and sleeping aid of choice. As soon as the sun went down, and often before, I would be drowning my sorrows in shots of southern sin.
What I knew long before this month had come
was that every sip from the lip of a bottle was one less day in the sun
one less hour of fun
one more forgotten memory of a life that had already begun.
I took those bottle pulls begrudgingly
each one starting off smooth, nice and neat
no ice, but a finish that was bittersweet.
I knew what I was actively engaging my life in was wrong
it wasn’t the smart choice, and it couldn’t last long.
Following that path leads to places I would rather not land
face down is not my preferred position in sand.
Now that the month is done, I have managed to get some fresh perspective on my situation. It was a lot of money to spend on a mental treadmill. But it didn’t make a dent financially compared to what it was doing for my mental health. Drinking alone can be sad, but doing it every night without fail is guaranteed depression. Drinking socially can still be fun, but drinking to forget, or drinking to run, is done. It was never my intention with these challenges to completely stop an activity or habit, merely to experiment what it would be like to live without something to feel the experience. If that experience is better than what you were doing before, you have learned something about yourself, and that experiment was a complete success. If you learn that what you were doing was fine and you don’t see a need for change at all, that’s great too! Still a success as long as you learned something about yourself, that’s the whole point of these challenges after all.
What I loved about October was that I got a bit of both with the two distinct challenges. And it was not how I expected things to work out at all. I thought a month without meat may convince me that it is a good enough idea to stick to long term. What I am realizing, is that in my vagabond influenced lifestyle, a free meal is a free meal, and dietary restrictions be damned. Dirty hippies need to eat too.
I have also learned that alcohol, like everything, IS best enjoyed in moderation and preferably with friends. Ew, that sentence was so adult it grossed my inner kid out a little. Farts!… Moving on, I will still happily enjoy a beer or two with friends a couple nights a week. But this whole buying a bottle for yourself business needs to go. Waste of money, but more importantly, waste of time. As I have written before, time is a terrible thing to waste as you can never get it back.
Time for November! Challenge details hitting the front page tomorrow!