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Monday
Sep062010
Potatoes and Coffee and Time
Monday, September 6, 2010
I don't know how you full-time sober people do it. I mean, I am a full-time sober person now myself – I am two weeks and three days in – but I am kind of new to this twenty-four-hours-a-day-seven-days-a-week sobriety, and it is at once very slow-moving and highly dramatic.
photo taken using the iPhone's PictureShow app
Time takes two to two hundred times longer to go by than it did when I was drunk and/or hungover, and, not only that, but I can also feel and remember everything while it is dragging by. Intoxicant free, sober reality feels very suspenseful and incredibly boring and memorable in its every minute detail. It's like I am sitting on the edge of my seat waiting for time to leak by in the slow hiss of a way it has now while my emotions are set to an amplitude of ten.
When you're not drunk, it turns out, your emotions feel sharpened to a fine point.
Three days ago, I was certain that I had been sober for at least three weeks. The Palinode corrected me and said that it had only been two weeks since I'd had my last drink. The truth felt kind of defeating, because it really felt like two months, but, still, two weeks! That's good no matter how you look at it.
The last three day since then, though, have been three of the ess-ell-oh-double-u-ee-ess-tee dee-ay-why-ess of my entire life. I have lived six months in these three days, which means that the last seventeen days have felt like EIGHT MONTHS. It's ridiculous.
And it's also very suspenseful and incredibly boring and memorable in its every minute detail.
You see, when I was drinking, I got drunk, time whizzed by, I passed out, and then I had forgotten half the night by the time I had woken up. Time just disappeared on me constantly. Days, weeks, and months ran through my brain like water through a sieve. I lamented the speed with which my life was careening along, but it is hard to regret what you don't remember, so I just kept careening along. Now it is all there, remembered, plodding along at this steady and predictable pace, and there seems to be so damn much of it all the time.
For instance, there are fourteen hours and fifty-three minutes left in today. That's a lot of hours and minutes to pace through. Before, I would be getting my drink on by six o'clock and slamming into tomorrow morning before I knew it. Now I have a functioning brain for all of those hours that is aware of every passing moment and that will probably remember all of those passing moments tomorrow.
I am not yet used to these long strings of remembered moments. Right now, it feels like I am one of those extremely boring individuals who, when you ask them about their day, tells you about every single damn mundanity, such as what condiments they had on their sandwich at lunch and whether they had had exact change for the bus on their way to the library. The problem is that I am the extremely boring individual going through all the mundanity, and I can't excuse myself from myself anymore.
Don't get me wrong. I don't actually prefer my previous method of existence. It is such a terrible waste to pour so much of this one life I've been given, almost literally, down the drain. I don't want to go back to that. It's just that this new sobriety thing almost feels like an unfamiliar drug I have to get used to with its new sense of time and heightened emotional state. I used to have a cigarette or get loaded or smoke a joint to balance myself out one way or the other. Now that I've quit all of that, I just have potatoes and coffee.
Seriously. Potatoes. And coffee. I've used potatoes to help calm my anxiety since the 1990s, and the coffee's been perking me up since 1987. And then I get to experience more of this voluble time that all you sober people have been dealing with all along. And me, too, now, I guess. Because I'm sober now, too.
So, I've got potatoes and coffee and time.
Potatoes. Coffee. Time.
It's an adjustment, I'll tell you that.
photo taken using the iPhone's PictureShow app
Time takes two to two hundred times longer to go by than it did when I was drunk and/or hungover, and, not only that, but I can also feel and remember everything while it is dragging by. Intoxicant free, sober reality feels very suspenseful and incredibly boring and memorable in its every minute detail. It's like I am sitting on the edge of my seat waiting for time to leak by in the slow hiss of a way it has now while my emotions are set to an amplitude of ten.
When you're not drunk, it turns out, your emotions feel sharpened to a fine point.
Three days ago, I was certain that I had been sober for at least three weeks. The Palinode corrected me and said that it had only been two weeks since I'd had my last drink. The truth felt kind of defeating, because it really felt like two months, but, still, two weeks! That's good no matter how you look at it.
The last three day since then, though, have been three of the ess-ell-oh-double-u-ee-ess-tee dee-ay-why-ess of my entire life. I have lived six months in these three days, which means that the last seventeen days have felt like EIGHT MONTHS. It's ridiculous.
And it's also very suspenseful and incredibly boring and memorable in its every minute detail.
You see, when I was drinking, I got drunk, time whizzed by, I passed out, and then I had forgotten half the night by the time I had woken up. Time just disappeared on me constantly. Days, weeks, and months ran through my brain like water through a sieve. I lamented the speed with which my life was careening along, but it is hard to regret what you don't remember, so I just kept careening along. Now it is all there, remembered, plodding along at this steady and predictable pace, and there seems to be so damn much of it all the time.
For instance, there are fourteen hours and fifty-three minutes left in today. That's a lot of hours and minutes to pace through. Before, I would be getting my drink on by six o'clock and slamming into tomorrow morning before I knew it. Now I have a functioning brain for all of those hours that is aware of every passing moment and that will probably remember all of those passing moments tomorrow.
I am not yet used to these long strings of remembered moments. Right now, it feels like I am one of those extremely boring individuals who, when you ask them about their day, tells you about every single damn mundanity, such as what condiments they had on their sandwich at lunch and whether they had had exact change for the bus on their way to the library. The problem is that I am the extremely boring individual going through all the mundanity, and I can't excuse myself from myself anymore.
Don't get me wrong. I don't actually prefer my previous method of existence. It is such a terrible waste to pour so much of this one life I've been given, almost literally, down the drain. I don't want to go back to that. It's just that this new sobriety thing almost feels like an unfamiliar drug I have to get used to with its new sense of time and heightened emotional state. I used to have a cigarette or get loaded or smoke a joint to balance myself out one way or the other. Now that I've quit all of that, I just have potatoes and coffee.
Seriously. Potatoes. And coffee. I've used potatoes to help calm my anxiety since the 1990s, and the coffee's been perking me up since 1987. And then I get to experience more of this voluble time that all you sober people have been dealing with all along. And me, too, now, I guess. Because I'm sober now, too.
So, I've got potatoes and coffee and time.
Potatoes. Coffee. Time.
It's an adjustment, I'll tell you that.
Reader Comments (26)
Actually, I just made a really lumpy vest out of our potatoes and some fishing line. So you're down to coffee and time and a very stylish husband.
I haven't been keeping up on reading your blog and wanted to tell that you're awesome and I miss you and am so happy for you on the two weeks sober!
xxTam
You used some of that time to write this awesome post, which is so dead on about how the sober life feels, at first.
The hardest thing of all, when I first stopped getting high, was how boring life felt. The long days, not filled up with finding the stuff, doing the stuff, drinking...yeah, it feels boring at first. Takes a while to feel normal not being wasted.
Yay for not drinking for two weeks! That's huge. It's incredibly hard and you've done it.
Being sober has it's moments of boredom and time does move like molasses on a cold winter's day, but remember that for every bored-out-of-your-mind-minute you will have hours of laughter and joy! And to top it all off... you'll be able to remember them with clarity and not in a post-hangover fog.
Keep it up you are doing awesome! Think of it this way... You are two weeks ahead of the person who decided they would be sober today.
Congrats on your two weeks!!!!
I am so proud of you!! I will take a boring day over a day filled with drama and chaos any day, especially after living in a very awful marriage. Calm, peaceful days (IE: boring) are such a good thing. If you are still bored, you can email my video contest entry link to everyone you know bc I am trying to win a month of backpacking in the wilderness. And yes, I realize how fn crazy that is, but oh well.
So proud of you. And you're SO right. Sober time takes SO LONG to pass.
Keep it up, lady. Very proud of you.
It is a really big change, and change is hard no matter how you slice it. My heart is going out to you right now.
I wonder if trying to relieve stress by taking walks in pretty areas, or doing yoga might give you something peaceful to look forward to each day. Something physical for yourself, that brings you peace and comfort, the way drinking used to, might help? Wishing you the best. You are doing a good thing for yourself :)
Again...all I can say is wow....you are one brave lady....not only making these big changes (no smoking AND no drinking) but you are willing to share the whole meal deal in public with well-written honest writing. Change is hard and in my experience making these life altering changes are also about timing. Sometimes you just know the time has come....
When my dad quit alcohol and smoking (at the same friggen time because he is one for torture) he turned to coffee. A lot of coffee. Like 10 pots a day to himself coffee. Maybe if he had potatoes his kidneys would be happier.
I think you will figure out a way to use all your time for something awesome...because you are amazing like that. If not, you've always got potatoes. And coffee. And one very stylish Palinode.
We are all proud of you.
"When you're not drunk, it turns out, your emotions feel sharpened to a fine point. "
That was, still is, the hardest part to deal with.
You're doing awesome :) Do whatever you need to in order to get through - potatoes included!
Go Schmutzie, go!
When I was drinking too much I used to call it "drinking the world interesting" because that's what I was doing. 11pm is a boring time of day, otherwise.
Also, I think you've discovered that each successive day of sobriety is like going down another level into the Inception dream. When you finally feel the kick, though, you'll have caught up to your life.
You can dooooo iiiiiiiiiiit!
You are a strong lady. Soon you will find things to enjoy during all these boring sober hours, and it will feel wonderful.
Go you!
You have a no header header! Interesting.
You use potatoes to calm your anxiety, and I (used to) use gum. (I've been trying to cut gum out.) I suppose you could use your time to create a gluten-free pirogi recipe.
So glad you're still sticking it out. Stay strong.
I don't have anything to say other than "go Schmutzie!" Also, I'm a big fan of the effects of chocolate on mood.
Impressed is the wrong word, I think, sounds weird -- but I am, that you could just make a decision to change, do it, and then experience and share what came next.
This is just one more of the reasons why I think you are such a remarkable person.
Hash browns with all kind of good things stirred in like onions, bell peppers, mushrooms, ham, sausage, bacon, with 2 eggs
Human beings don't do well with the passage of time, in general. That gives me a sort of comfort knowing that my existential crisis is something that affects everyone.
Now that I'm older, and have precious little spare time, I'm really learning to enjoy doing NOTHING and SLOWING DOWN. That's right, no hamster wheel for me. I'm finally getting to the zen of scooping cat turds or spacing out while washing dishes by hand. The older I get, the more I want time to slow to a crawl.
But new sobriety adds a sting of fresh self-awareness and the passage of time. Hang in there, you will adjust to the new normal, and one day take delight in the slow ticking of the second hand.
Just checking in on my potato girl. I wish you all good things. You'll get through this. I have no doubt at all.
Well done! But don't you feel that you are getting up earlier? When I cut down on the drinking, I find that all of a sudden you start getting up at six and lots more gets done!
I do notice that I'm getting up earlier and earlier. It's kind of crazy how much can get done before noon when you're sober and can think straight!
I remember feeling that way through my entire pregnancy. It all just sort of hurt, and for someone who'd had an eating disorder, I felt like I could feel myself gaining those pounds and not being able to do anything about it. Totally different, I realize, but I am identifying with that "every single minute" part.
Then the baby part was an "every single minute" part.
And then one day, I woke up and it was a new normal. I wish this for you. And quickly!
All I have is the belief that you'll kick sobriety's ass and show it all sorts of fantastic new things and my apologies that I've had my head up my own butt and ... my most recent new favorite potato recipe.
Potatoes and coffee and time
is a wonderful poem. The rest of your post gives the context.
I haven't been reading your blog regularly lately, so this is kind of late, but when I was in school we learned that people who have addictions to whatever, spend something like 72 hours a week dedicated to that addiction, on average. Not sure how they came up with that number and what all it includes, but that figure stuck with me because that means that when you give up an addiction, you basically suddenly have 72 more hours a week (that's THREE DAYS) to fill up with stuff. And knowing that, it's really no wonder that quitting the addiction doesn't always stick, in addition to all the other reasons why it's hard to stop.