Relections on One Hundred Days

Reflections---Great Bear Rainforest
Great Bear Rainforest

Today is my one hundredth day booze-free. The quit has been a lot easier than I thought it would be. And a lot better. My big takeaway: I like not drinking alcohol. I like being clear-headed all the time. I like sleeping better. I like dreaming; both while I’m sleeping, and awake.

I hear sober bloggers talk about the feeling of missing out in not drinking. But I don’t feel like I’m missing out. In fact, just the opposite. I feel like I’ve discovered a salve for my broken bits. My broken heart. The ennui, the depression, is beginning to dissipate.

Depression is an odd beast. It’s only now that I’m on my way out that I fully realize how deeply I’d slipped back in.

I also didn’t realize the role alcohol plays in depression. All these months I’ve been trying to get a grip and move past the death trifecta. Struggling. Stopping and starting. And ultimately, giving up, crawling into bed, surrounding myself with cats. (Not that there’s anything wrong with being surrounded by cats.)

What I hadn’t realized is that in drinking several drinks most days, I may as well have been trying to crawl out of the pit with one foot nailed to the floor. No matter what I did, how hard I tried, it wasn’t happening. But now, at one hundred days, I’m beginning to ascend.

Yesterday I planted fourteen plants in my garden. And then I sat on my patio admiring my work and watching the birds. The Buddhists, whose temple adjoins the back of my property, were doing their morning chanting. White winged doves joined in, cooing from the branches on which they roosted. I felt a profound sense of peace. Something I haven’t felt in quite some time.

This morning, in celebration of my one hundred days, I made myself French toast. I can’t remember the last time I made French toast for breakfast. As I write this, Sunday dinner, chicken tikka masala, is simmering in the crock pot. The pièce de résistance, my one-hundred-day treat will arrive in the mail tomorrow: an adult coloring book and 48 assorted colored pencils.

Coloring books and French toast. And this is just Day One Hundred.

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