I like interviews with people who have become sober when they talk about how they romanticised the drink because that is what I did and it’s nice to know you are not alone. Colin Farrell does it in this Jonathan Ross interview and Anthony Hopkins said in this one ‘it was a very attractive way of life, I thought it was the only way to live’ and Ryan Adams talks about the light in the liquor in his songs – Bar Lights (a celebration of boozing) and Stop (the melancholy opposite). I often wonder why those who got tangled up in the drugs as well like Farrell, Adams and Casablancas talk first and foremost about the drinking and not the drugs. I thought perhaps it was just because of convenience and the legality of drinking but maybe now I think that it is because there is a love for the idea of drinking that is not there with the cocaine. Although it probably is there for heroin. But anyway I think there are the dreamers who have linked alcohol with romance from a young age.
They crave the romance of it, the Rimbaud-esque derangement of the senses, the light in the liquor, some apposite Bukowski quote of which there are many about his motivations. I have always thought that drinking was the most romantic of activities, a way of accessing the poetic soul. Even if it is in our heads, a dream, a fantasy. But a beautiful one. One that even now as I write I want to reach.
When the feeling shifted from the romance to reality though, with the headaches and the mood swings and the substance-tinged imperfect understanding of others intentions, we could not pretend and play nice but allowed the temper, the bleaker aspects of our personalities and base selfishness to show through instead. It did start with no intention of offending but that is often where it led down a path where you want nobody else to see you, you want to disappear into the tiniest atom, or the bottle and be left the fuck alone. That is what the drinkers do, my kind of drinker anyway. They drink for romance first and then to disappear. What others are seeing is some manifestation of that. But that way of behaving offended others because they didn’t know the ups and downs inside, and the conflict of dream and reality, and just think you are behaving like a douche. And then that could lead to an even douchier response and so on.
And now I am sober, I miss the madness. Even the illusion of madness. It is like a colour has gone out of my life, two colours actually – one beautiful and shining and the other a murkier, uglier mix. Those two colours are no longer on the palette and the painting is clearer and prettier but more conventional and without that hint of dark romance I did love so much but had to leave behind.
I am worried about how much I am isolating. I barely speak to anyone these days and feel like it is because I don’t want to although I know longer term that I have to and actually I do want to, but the right people in the right situations. I feel colourless though and not sure at all about what I can give. I need to find a way back. In my own mind first I need to come up with a plan for reengagement with the world. I need to DO something, create something, just get back on the ride and feel the wind in my hair and get out of my head. But I find myself romanticising the isolation now in a not dissimilar way to how I romanticised the drinking. Illusion and reality in conflict again.
Twilight Drinker 
You captured the feelings I have about drinking no longer being a part of my new sober existence exactly with the colors analogy. Very well written.
Thanks. I’m sure being sober has added some new shades as well but the colour scheme has definitely changed. I guess different paintings will ensue if I drag out the analogy even further!
I miss the madness too sometimes, the rush. I hugely romanticized the drink. Still do. It’s like that first kiss or falling in love, that feeling that everything is possible and there is no fear.
But, such an illusion! So much more is possible, sober. It’s a little quieter (okay a lot) but there is something romantic about the peace now. And the adventure that not being hungover every single day is creating.
There is something beautiful about being alone with your thoughts, being quiet. Watching. Feeling things.
I hope that you can find ways to find romance and beauty in being with people, too.
Thanks for this post, it made me feel nice things!
Thanks. Yes I might miss the alleged adventures of drinking but I am also digging the quieter and truer adventures that come with sobriety. I am trying to work on my inner dialogues to make them more positive about myself and my journey. I do get stuck in my head a lot of the time so it’s important that I make it a place that is pleasant to be! I’m going to look at that Tara Brach website you linked to in one of your posts as it seems she has something to say on that topic that looks useful.
I found that particular podcast very helpful to get me unstuck from the negative loop I was in. I hope it is helpful to you too!
Ah, the madness…the passion…and the gnawing guilt and soul-crushing sense of isolation. I keep having to remind myself that the last two always happen, regardless of how I feel in that moment when I take the first (of many, many) drinks. When I drank, I was every poet, writer, and musician I admired. I was sexy as hell. I was God. And then I came down the next morning and couldn’t wait to climb back up again. It finally got to be too much, and I went to rehab. I’m on 93 days of sobriety.
I’m glad to have found your blog, and I look forward to reading more.
Thanks and congrats on your impending day 100. I remember how good it was to be at that point in my sober journey.
I was such an illusionist when drinking and still am. I’ve got a powerful penchant for sad and melancholy music and literature which helped fuel the fire of melancholic but oh so enjoyable and self-indulgent drinking. I did worry when I got sober that I’d have to ditch all these alcoholic and drug-addicted artists but I am glad to say I can still appreciate them and no longer want to be them. Some of them are on the same sober journey as myself so that is also interesting to follow.
Likewise looking forward to reading more from you
THIS.
Brilliantly said. 🙂