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October 23, 2006
III
It's been three years as of last Friday.
Unlike last year, or the year before, I don't have anything uplifting to say. I'm just not feeling it.
I'm not struggling, I don't think. I don't really have any compulsions, no monkeys on my back, other than maybe ice cream. But neither am I on some damn pink cloud any more either.
For a while I'd been kicking around the notion that maybe someday I could go back out. Just be more careful. Drink like a normie. That whole idea changed a few months ago when I was out with Maitri at some pub in the Quarter. I bought a round of drinks, and her Guinness spilled onto my can of Rockstar and down my hand, and without thinking I licked all the Guinness foam off of where it spilled.
It shot straight up into my brain and down my spine into all my nerve endings. It was electric. Almost orgasmic.
Alcohol. Wow. I'd pretty much forgotten. I'd reduced it to a distant memory, a sort of academic curiosity about myself, like my shrimp allergy. It was just something I'm not supposed to have. And it all came rushing back.
I liked that one little lick waaaaay too much.
I've been wrestling with my place in society lately. It's changed so much in the last three years, and even more since I moved. I used to be the guy that organized the pub runs, the Bigfoot beer schnocks, the Sunday afternoon darts and pints. And when I quit, I stopped calling people, and they stopped calling me. I know how it goes, I used to be the same way. You don't know whether to call up the recovering drunk and invite him out when you're gonna be drinking, in case it might somehow be rude. And so vast stretches of my social life just kind of slowly faded away.
And now we're in a new city. A city where everything revolves around booze, and where a guy who is visibly not a drinker just kind of doesn't quite fit a lot of the time. And I am the stay-at-home dad, and I have a high-pressure job, and so vast stretches of my social life just seem barely out of reach. I can see them, but I can't get to them.
Sometimes the only things that remind me what city I'm in are my lunches, and my gutting days. Which is why I'm so passionate about the gutting, and why I'm gaining weight. Another kind of gutting.
I had a majorly frustrating weekend, and I tried to finally clear my head of the crud last night by taking the Triumph out. Which led to more frustration, since the motorcycle is both 1. infrequently ridden, and 2. British, so it was a bitch to start.
I headed out to a meeting, to a place I'd never been, thinking to maybe pick up my three year chip. Turns out it was a speaker meeting, at a halfway house, and they don't do chips on speaker nights but I wasn't really feeling the love anyway. Halfway-house and rehab meetings are like that. Sometimes they can give you perspective, but sometimes they give you too goddamn much...perspective.
Afterwards I took the bike and decided to wander vaguely in the direction of Angelo Brocato's.
I was on the freeway, going way faster than I've gone on a motorcycle in at least a year, feeling the wind going up my sleeves and ballooning out my jacket, feeling my hands pulling away from the handlebars. I felt like letting go. I felt like something in the universe wanted me to let go, just to see what would happen. Do you ever get that feeling when you're looking over the edge of a great height, and you have to resist the urge to just step off the edge? I get that feeling all the time. I always have. It just fascinates me that it only takes one second of courage, or stupidity, to step off, and then you're committed and you can never take that step back.
The bike was like that. I could just let go, and maybe I would float backwards while the bike raced on ahead. Or maybe something else would happen.
Part of me wanted to find out. But more of me really really wanted a cannoli.
Maybe the Guinness was like that too. Maybe that one step is just a pint, and maybe nothing happens. Or maybe I die.
Maybe shrimp is the same way.
Angelo Brocato's was closed.
I headed back Uptown to the Creole Creamery. Thinking that it's dark, half the streetlights on St. Charles still don't work, I could hit a pothole and that would be the end of me. And I tried to remember what my last blog post was, and would it be a fitting last post. And I wondered what happens to somebody's blog when they die a premature death. Does somebody pull the plug? Or does it stay up for weeks or months while total strangers pick through the archives finding every mundane post suddenly fraught with meaning and foreshadowing? I remember thinking about this last summer when Hiromi was having her dark days. What happens to her blog? Would Karl and I, her blog maintenance man and her blog gardener, respectively, know what right thing to do if she were to leave us?
Creole Creamery was open. Chocolate malt chip is very good. I called somebody. They teach you rule number one before they even teach you the steps. Call somebody. Somebody who gets it. I know people who get it. I know people with only months under their belt who sometimes get it better than I do.
I'm OK today.
Posted by ray at October 23, 2006 10:06 PM | Permalink
Categories: [sobriety ]
Tags: worthy
Comments
I'm so glad you feel better. As I was reading, I tried to think of something to say that would help you feel better, but instead I felt like John Belushi in Animal House when he tried to cheer up that pledge whose brother's car got wrecked. Do you know the scene I'm talking about? He hovered at the pledge's shoulder and made clowning faces and broke a beer bottle on his head to no avail. You'd think a survivor of Enormous Crap would have something of substance to say.
Anyway, congratulations on your third year. And congratulations on having the balls to upend your life so that you could do something that has meaning for you.
Posted by: Hiromi at October 23, 2006 11:11 PM
Coffee?
Posted by: candice at October 24, 2006 12:05 AM
Yeah, Candice, that sounds fun. When?
Posted by: Ray at October 24, 2006 12:15 AM
Wed/Thurs or so. Tomorrow I will be drinking coffee at Rue, but accompanied by my discrete book and a bunch of proofs by mathematical induction.
Posted by: candice at October 24, 2006 12:17 AM
I can't figure out how to express how much I enjoyed this post without the words taking something away from what I mean. (Know what I mean?)
Posted by: Lisa at October 24, 2006 3:09 AM
Congratulations Ray.
I've thought about what would happen to my blog if I were to meet an untimely end.
It's rather depressing to think about. What's worse if it had happened to someone else and checking back day after day for months hoping to see some sign of life.
Posted by: Whirly at October 24, 2006 6:39 AM
Hiromi, you always know exactly the right thing to say. That's one of my favorite Belushi scenes, I actually do that to people to try to cheer them up sometimes.
Lisa, I know exactly what you mean. I feel that way reading your blog sometimes.
Thanks, Whirly.
Posted by: Ray at October 24, 2006 9:02 AM
Excellent post, Ray. Beautifully written, mon ami.
Posted by: Adrastos at October 24, 2006 9:37 AM
Kudo's on 3 years and your strength.
Posted by: judyb54 at October 24, 2006 11:16 AM
You're my hero, man.
I know that feeling - i get it every time i'm diving and see that dark dark deep dropoff that goes hundreds or thousands of feet down. And i hear it call me and I have to think to not answer, to not go head down and start kicking.
It's a small victory every time you say no.
Three years isn't very long, and it's been a weird, hard three years. Just hang on to the bars (what the fuck you think my tattoos mean?), and carry on. It'll be worth it.
Posted by: Elvis at October 24, 2006 12:19 PM
three years! Kudos darlin'.
Posted by: Gentilly Girl at October 24, 2006 1:44 PM
Great post, Ray. It was kind of weird though, because I read it immediately after reading Chris Rose's Sunday column on depression. You said something very similar but more elgantly (meaning no offense to CR, 'cause they were apples and oranges).
Hearty congratulations.
Posted by: Sophmom at October 24, 2006 1:57 PM
Keep on keeping on, Ray. Adastros is right. Beautifully written post.
Posted by: Julie G at October 24, 2006 2:06 PM
Soulful post, courage and lots of humor.
Posted by: Marco at October 24, 2006 2:19 PM
Congrats Ray on 3 years. Hope ya got a chip. Thank you for this post.
Posted by: scout prime at October 24, 2006 3:07 PM
That was amazing. You are amazing. I for one am glad that the urge for cannoli beat out the urge for oblivion.
I've had that same feeling when standing at the edge of a waterfall. Wouldn't it feel amazing to put just one foot out, just a bit too far, too far to pull back, and get sucked down in the water?
But no.
Posted by: aag at October 24, 2006 3:37 PM
Congrats on the three years, hon. That is terrific. And thank G-d cannoli has such a pull on you. Bless that cannoli.
I get that feeling sometimes. Not as often as I used to, but there have been times when driving on a freeway overpass, or on a mountain road, when my fear of falling is almost overcome by the desire to see what it would be like to just drive over the edge.
Good thing I rarely drive these days. Though there have been times I've heard the call when walking across an overpass.
There's a wonderful John Irving quote I keep in mind, from Hotel New Hampshire: Keep passing the open windows.
Ray, sweetie, keep passing the open windows. I'll do the same.
Posted by: Carol Elaine at October 24, 2006 4:05 PM
Seems like we all have our crosses to bear Ray -- it's just that some people, like you, bear those crosses in public, with courage and honesty. That's an inspiration for the rest.
I wish I had a motorcycle. The wind on the face and the scenery passing by is a great way to leave those skeletons behind.
Instead of a motorcycle, I pedal. Nothing devastating long or time-consuming. A half-hour or an hour a couple of times a week can make a big difference in my outlook and sense of well-being. Plus, the feeling when the endorphins kick in is both calming and euphoric.
Gotta bicycle? It's a great way to tour the city to see what's going on.
Posted by: Schroeder at October 24, 2006 5:00 PM
Yeah, actually, after the first round of trying and failing to get the motorcycle started, I took my bike out and roamed around through Broadmoor and Gert Town and the projects. Now that both bike and motorcycle are in working order, I plan to spend more time on both of them.
Posted by: Ray at October 24, 2006 6:09 PM
Thank you, Ray in New Orleans. Just -- thanks.
Posted by: Mu Ling at October 24, 2006 6:30 PM
So beautifully written, Ray.
You know, you're appropriately named. You leave us, the world's a little less bright.
So baby, for year three, a theme for you.
(shit-eating grin)
And a great, great, big congratulatory kiss.
Posted by: Miss Syl at October 24, 2006 9:24 PM
38 Special? Hmph. What, I don't rate a Bowie song? Dorkwad.
I'll keep the kiss, though.
Posted by: Ray at October 24, 2006 9:56 PM
Oh, honey, my mistake.
You sooo rate a Bowie song.
Posted by: Miss Syl at October 24, 2006 10:23 PM
Don't make me revoke your whitelist priviledges.
Posted by: Ray at October 24, 2006 10:25 PM
ahahahahaha. i crack myself up.
come on, admit it, made ya laugh.
Posted by: Miss Syl at October 24, 2006 10:27 PM
Plus, you *gotta* give me points for even knowing that song existed.
Posted by: Miss Syl at October 24, 2006 10:30 PM
It's true Ray. You gotta give her points.
Posted by: Elvis at October 24, 2006 10:34 PM
I've already given her points. Just not in the music selection category.
Posted by: Ray at October 24, 2006 10:56 PM
Thanks for the post and the honesty. Next time you're in Austin, give me a call, please.
Posted by: Banzai Bill at October 25, 2006 7:10 AM
lots of courage to write this.
excellent. many thanks.
Posted by: Termite at October 25, 2006 11:19 AM
Dude,
Your post went right through me. Very real.
I don't want my comment to sully what you've already put here.
Just accept my gratitude.
Posted by: Mr. Clio at October 25, 2006 8:10 PM
I see what you mean.
Congrats on 3 years.
Posted by: G Bitch at October 27, 2006 8:29 AM
This is good Ray.
It helps me to see through the eyes of someone fighting, for when I look at the person I love who is also fighting. He had his 3rd year in September.
Posted by: melanie at October 29, 2006 12:49 AM
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