The Ultimate Rebellion

This is an excerpt from my book 'The Wine O'Clock Myth', published in 2020. My favourite chapter actually!

========

One of the things I loved most about alcohol when I started drinking it in my teens, aside from the physical warmth and emotional numbness it gave me, was that it made me feel really cool. Drinking beer on the riverbank with my friends made me feel really cool. Buying cheap, sickly-sweet bubbly wine from the back entrance of the liquor store made me feel really cool. Getting plastered on my parents’ gin made me feel really cool. Even vomiting my guts out every time I overdid it didn’t stop me from feeling cool. Everything about alcohol made me feel cool. Cool and naughty and rebellious, and there was no better feeling as far as teenage me was concerned.

Teenage me loved nothing more than to be a little rebel. Railing against any sort of authority at home or school and desperately trying to assert myself as an independent person was my raison d’être. At a time in life when I still needed guidance and boundaries, I did not want to be told what to do or when to do it. Just ask my poor parents! I put them through the ringer in my teenage years by pushing back against almost every boundary that was imposed on me. I bunked off school, failed exams, lied about where I was going, snuck out of my bedroom window in the middle of the night, did a whole bunch of other naughty things that I’m not going to list here because they’re too shameful, and drank. I drank and I drank and I drank.

Alcohol was the perfect accompaniment to my naughty, rebellious lifestyle. It was forbidden and alluring. It even tasted naughty, or so I thought. (Really it just tasted gross, but I translated gross to naughty in good rebellious fashion.) Overall I saw drinking alcohol as the perfect way for me to be everything that I wanted to be—strong, independent, feisty and cool. I’m still trying to be all of that now that I’m in my forties, but I’ve found a much better way to achieve it: ironically, it’s by doing the very opposite of what I used to do—saying an enthusiastic ‘no thanks’ to alcohol, where I used to scream ‘hell yes’.

Choosing not to pour alcohol down your throat on a regular basis in this alcohol-centric culture of ours is an utterly radical act. When alcohol is normalised and glorified at every turn and your entire environment almost demands that you drink, taking a stand and deciding not to imbibe is a hugely subversive and deeply rebellious thing to do. By choosing not to touch any alcohol, ever, I’m finally achieving what I’ve always wanted, except this time it’s for real. That’s because not drinking is the epitome of strong, independent, feisty and cool.

Drinking alcohol didn’t make me strong; it diminished my strength. Every night that I was under the influence I wasn’t fully standing in my power with a clear head and feet planted firmly on the ground. Far from it. I was numbed to my emotions, vulnerable, distracted and disconnected from myself and the people around me.

Drinking alcohol didn’t make me independent; it made me depend on something outside of myself. It made me rely on a liquid drug to feel confident and interesting, rather than being self-reliant and grounded in my natural state of being.

Drinking alcohol didn’t make me feisty. With alcohol being so normalised, glorified, cheap and readily available, choosing to chuck it down my throat regularly just made me a sheep, blindly following the flock. I never stopped to properly question or examine what I was doing and whether it was truly serving me.

And drinking alcohol certainly didn’t make me cool; it just made me blurry, sloppy, loud, slurry, clumsy, smelly, flippant, dismissive and (I’m pretty convinced of this now) boring. None of this equals cool.

Not drinking is the ultimate rebellion. Not drinking is so countercultural that the naughty teenager inside me is having a field day. I cannot believe how strong, independent and feisty I now feel (not to mention well rested and healthy). Every time I front up to an event and ask for a ‘fizzy water, please’, every time I say to the waiter ‘the house-made soda, please’, every time I’m at my local pub ordering a ‘chamomile tea, please’ (yes, I do that) and every time I’m searching around at a wedding for something non-alcoholic that isn’t orange juice (gah), my inner rebel is punching the air, screaming, ‘You go, girl!’ It’s delightful.

It’s taken a bit of grit and determination to get to this delightful place, of course. Transitioning away from being a boozer takes time and effort and it sure isn’t a walk in the park. It’s emotionally and physically draining and there are numerous stumbling blocks along the way. All the more reason why those of us who make it through the transition process to settle in and become contented non-drinkers truly are the epitome of feisty, strong and brave.

We’re even feistier, stronger and braver when you consider that alcohol is the only drug that you might get judged harshly for not taking. Ever thought about that? Not only is our environment stacked massively in favour of drinking, but also it’s stacked massively against not drinking. Say no to a drink and you’re met with bemusement, disappointment or defensiveness. At best eyebrows get raised; at worst pressure gets applied. Questions like ‘Why aren’t you drinking?’ get thrown around, as do statements like ‘Just have one.’

We find ourselves having to trot out excuses like ‘I’m training for a marathon’ or ‘I’m on medication.’ If we’re really brave we’ll tell the truth and say something like ‘I’ve drunk my lifetime limit already’ or ‘I can’t stop at one, so I’d rather not drink.’ I prefer the honest approach, as it tends to shut the conversation down pretty quickly. And, as one of my Sober Stories interviewees at livingsober.org.nz, Luke, once said, ‘It’s way more interesting at dinner parties to say, “I’m a recovering crazy drunk and addict” than “No thanks, I’m driving.”’

But why do we even need to explain or justify our actions? Why is it anyone’s business what we choose to put in our glass? Would the same happen if we were saying no to a line of cocaine or a syringe full of heroin? Or any other drug you can name? It’s crazy.

Non-drinkers can be judged, and not in a good way. We can be judged as being boring. We can be judged as being lame. We can be judged as having nasty skeletons in our closets. We can even be judged as being judgemental. And, when we’re not being judged or accused, we’re being pitied. Pitied for ‘missing out’, for not being able to have as much ‘fun’ as the drinkers. Well, I’ve got a few things to say about all of that.

First, non-drinkers aren’t boring. As I said earlier, I think I was extremely boring back when I was necking wine daily. Boring is being half-present, repeating yourself, rattling on about stuff that isn’t funny and having your attention span hijacked so you can’t hold down a decent conversation.

Second, non-drinkers aren’t lame. As I said earlier, I was lame when I was doing what everyone else was, despite it doing me no favours. Lame was allowing myself to be manipulated into constantly chucking a grade-one carcinogen down my throat.

Third, the skeletons in non-drinkers’ closets aren’t nasty; they’re rich and intriguing. My skeletons give me depth, meaning, empathy and understanding. I love my skeletons because they got me to where I am today, which is a mighty fine place to be. And, anyway, who doesn’t have skeletons in their closet?

Fourth, non-drinkers aren’t judging drinkers. How could we possibly? We know what it’s like to love booze. We also know that you can’t judge the true nature of another person’s drinking habit unless you’re living with them 24/7. No, we’re not judging. Most of the time we’re just thinking to ourselves how gobsmackingly grateful we are that we don’t drink anymore.

Which brings me to my final retort. Don’t pity us. We don’t need your compassion. We’re good. But thanks anyway.

I honestly look at alcohol now as a cancer-causing poison, diluted with sugar and other flavourings to make it palatable, wrapped in fancy packaging with a price tag slapped on it. I don’t hanker for it. I don’t wish I could drink it. I don’t envy people who do. The way I experience life now is so far removed from how I used to that I might as well be on another planet.

When I was boozing, it was like I was stuck at the back of a rock concert being pushed around by a squishy, smelly crowd, not able to see or hear the music properly. Now that I’m not drinking it’s like I’m standing in the front row, right in front of the speakers with every drum beat and guitar lick pounding in my chest. Joyously stimulated, vibrantly alert, fantastically grounded and very much alive. ‘Sobriety is full throttle,’ writes Sarah Hepola in Blackout: Remembering the things I drank to forget.1 ‘No earplugs. No safe distance. Everything at its highest volume. All the complications of the world, vibrating your sternum.’

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again (and again, and again, until the cows come home), being a non-drinker is a mighty fine thing to be.