change

I'm two weeks into Dry January now, and as I thought about things last night, I realized that my relationship with alcohol is changing.  Not that I had much more than a social relationship with it  before, but I do realize that I used my glass of wine as a crutch at times.  After the socializing, we were calling each other up to drown some sorrows--a conversation that felt productive but was really just numbing me.  Never in my life have I felt such a need to feel numb at the end of the day.  Mostly, it's Trump and Trumpists and Trumpism.  I've seen a version of people and the world that has reawakened me to the horrors that exist out there.  I was one of those people ready to call racism a dying attitude when Obama was elected. I was a privileged idiot. Now I realize it was stoked and smoking and waiting for a mouthpiece to explode into our world in a bigger way than ever. This has made me sick at heart. That's my excuse for drinking one or two glasses of wine at night, and maybe a third glass on the weekends, and I think it's a valid one.  Throw in climate deniers and the Kavanaugh hearing and conspiracy theories and it's nearly a world that a sane person can't deal with without some kind of crutch.   But.  Last night I realized that I am better without the alcohol most of the time.  I have more energy to do something rather than simply sitting at home in sweatpants, screaming at a news article on my phone. I can see myself only having a glass of wine or two on the weekends or maybe at a special dinner out and being perfectly fine with that.  I'm feeling more like my old self.

(Photo: My totally adorable grandchildren playing in the Bryan Park--the biggest draw for coming to Mama Julie's house, next to the cookie jar that always contains treats.   Honestly, a grandma without a cookie jar is sad.  I speak from experience on both sides of this equation.  My grandma's cookie jar was a cherub-faced girl with sort of holographic winking eyes, and it always had cookies in it. I wish I had that cookie jar. I miss my grandma.)