Uncategorized

The Sober Pagan

The One Thing That Keeps Me Sober

 

(Photo by Yoal Desurmont on Unsplash)

 

It’s been a terrible winter for me. The weather has been working against me. We had a very snowy and windy winter here in Buffalo – which honestly, isn’t that unusual here – but we also had to contend with a lot of freezing rain and icy conditions on the roads and sidewalks. As a pedestrian who owns a really good pair of boots, I can deal with the snow but ice will keep me indoors since I don’t want to fall and break a bone. So there were many days I would have gotten out but I stayed indoors.

There were AA meetings I would have gone to but between the weather and the local bus service running “Sunday service” on Monday holidays, I have yet to get to a meeting this year! Yes, I know I could go to other meetings but you know how it is when you find a meeting you really like. This one isn’t that far from my house but I do need to take the bus to get there.

The other thing is that at the end of January, I got that terrible flu that’s been going around. If you haven’t gotten sick from this flu, count yourself lucky. Or blessed. I know people who got flu shots and they got wicked sick. I haven’t gotten a flu shot in over ten years and I rarely get sick – a cold every winter and a sinus infection or two – a reminder of my cocaine days – but I haven’t gotten “The Flu” in a long time. But this year, I was so sick, not only did I think I was going to die, I really wanted to. My lungs have never hurt so badly in my life. I thought of my friends who smoke cigarettes and have COPD and I wonder how they deal with this! My son called me everyday and bitched at me for not going to the ER. But I didn’t have the energy to go anywhere. I lost nine pounds in four days. I drank bottle after bottle of spring water. I sipped chicken soup. Eventually I got better. I started eating again. The cough hung on for three weeks. But that’s subsided now, too.

A persistent depression has dogged me these past few days. My aunt, who is 88 years old, had a stroke this summer and is now going into assisted living, since she is always falling and getting tangled up in her walker. She can’t cook for herself anymore. My aunt is the picture of sober living – she never smoked cigarettes, drank, ate very sparingly, and of course never did drugs. But here she is – at age 88 – totally incapacitated and dependent – not to mention depressed and angry. I was thinking about this. What’s the point to live such a sober life, just to end up all messed up anyway?

Of course, this is classic “stinkin’ thinkin’” and how you start on the road to relapse. I know that I had better get to a meeting right quick or at least call one of my sober friends or open the Big Book or one of my other recovery books. And the main thing I have to remember is:

It isn’t about when I am 88 years old. It isn’t about some time in the future that may or may not happen. Or something – like having a stroke – that may or may not happen. It’s about now. It’s about having a good life now. That’s the real meaning of “One day at a time” – it doesn’t mean don’t plan for the future – because we all have to make plans or else we won’t have a future – but it means to live fully in the now.

To me, if there’s one thing that keeps me sober on a daily basis, it’s the fact that I passionately hate hangovers. I used to take them with a grain of salt – they were the payment for having a really good time, right? But now – I don’t want to wake up feeling like that at all. When I was sick with the flu, I thought that I would rather have a hangover but honestly – I don’t want to be sick with the flu or a hangover. And the thing with hangovers – they’re preventable. All you have to do is don’t take that first drink.

Hopefully, I’ll have something a happier report next month. Until then – hang in there and stay sober. Brightest Blessings!

***

About the Author:

Polly MacDavid lives in Buffalo, New York at the moment but that could easily change, since she is a gypsy at heart. Like a gypsy, she is attracted to the divinatory arts, as well as camp fires and dancing barefoot. She has three cats who all help her with her magic.

Her philosophy about religion and magic is that it must be thoroughly based in science and logic. She is Dianic Wiccan and she is solitary.

She blogs at silverapplequeen.wordpress.com. She writes about general life, politics and poetry. She is writing a novel about sex, drugs and recovery.