No Background Music, Choir, or Angels - Just Me on a 25-Year-Old Mountain Bike
If my bike gets stolen, I can replace it for $75 Canadian, plus any tariff
I am 51 years old, and my primary mode of transportation is a 2000 Gary Fisher. That is not a car or a motorcycle. It is a mountain bike, and not even a good one. I bought it refurbished from a guy who fixes up bikes in his basement for a living a few years ago. Yesterday, I took it to Staples, a town over, to the gym, which is about 8 miles away, to the grocery store, and then back home. I was able to fit a couple of packs of chicken wings and a loaf of banana bread in my backpack. My son wanted wings for dinner, and he’ll eat five pieces of banana bread at a time. Following my OUI, the judge told me that if I were to dare drive on a suspended license, I’d be arrested. I believe her.
I am now eyeing up a used Cannondale commuter bike. It is a hybrid with larger wheels and thinner tires than the mountain bike, which translates to faster travel – more miles to the gallon, if you think about it. Today is day 70 without drinking alcohol. Sobriety, on the wagon, or whatever you wanna call not drinking, is life-changing. But despite heartfelt memes, streams, and Facebook Reels about quitting drinking that feature rays of sunlight, blue skies, and inspirational music like "Chariots of Fire," it isn’t that dramatic. In real life, there’s no choir, no angels. Just a guy in his 50s pedaling home, then looking at himself in the mirror, thinking, 'C'mon, man, you’ll get through this. '
Credit to Liberty Addiction Recovery in Bluffdale, Utah. I pulled this from their site. A picture says a thousand words - way to go, whoever you are
It's inspiring to see the before-and-after photos of people who have quit drinking – they're thinner, healthier, and have better skin. The gym selfies, in particular, lead people to believe that giving up drinking is akin to the scenes from Rocky where he finds the determination he needs to train to beat Apollo Creed, Clubber Lang, or Ivan Drago. The fight is won, and the movie is over. Yeah. Well, it isn’t like that. We don’t get to see the influencers in the middle of a craving. We don’t see the one who used alcohol to drown a spirit-crushing anxiety monster, and what it looks like after the kids go to bed and the house is silent. The booze is gone. But the anxiety and the stress linger.
Now that I think about it, I’m not even sure which comes first, the drinking or the anxiety. Did drinking cause the anxiety, or did the anxiety cause the drinking? I don’t know. But what I do know is that the two go hand in hand. They’re bedfellows – inseparable. There’s no faster way to take the edge off a racing heart, a sleepless night, or the invisible pressure of trying to keep everything together than having a few drinks. I’m learning just how many people are out there doing whatever they can – drinking, taking pills, vaping, using weed, or some cocktail of all of it – just trying to quiet the noise for a little while.
Sometimes when I consider what tremendous consequences come from little things…I am tempted to think… there are no little things.
- Bruce Barton, cited in The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
I have no clue who Bruce Barton is, and I didn’t look him up. The OG Covey thought he was worth quoting, and that is good enough for me. Whoever he is, he’s right. There are tremendous consequences from little things. Not drinking is, after all, a small thing, and its consequences include better sleep, genuine presence in conversations, more profound thought, and a deeper understanding of those I love, like my son. I’ve welcomed back the creativity, motivation, and drive that I and others loved about myself.
Weird stuff is happening. My first waking thoughts, pretty much every day since my arrest, are ones of fear over what’s next for me and how I’ll keep things moving in the right direction for my son. During the first week of not drinking, this anxiety made me dry heave. I am sure I’d have tossed my cookies if there had been any food in my stomach. That went away, and it’s hurting less and less. My favorite coffee is coarsely ground and made in a French Press. I've noticed that I can smell the coffee now while scooping the dry grounds to put into the press. When this happened, I froze. Like, dude. What’s going on? Joy is coming quietly and unexpectedly. It isn’t kicking down the door.
An actual image of my French Press
For me, I feel both shame and later pride, then more shame…every day. I look in the mirror and think, ' What an idiot. ' I see my son, and think he’s never, never, ever gonna see me quit. He isn’t going to learn to fight, to overcome, to claw when he has to, if he sees me giving up. Perseverance, I believe, is often discovered through observation. Our kids are watching us. Cycles – the bad ones are either continued or broken by what we do to prevent them from being passed on to our kids.
As I read about the topic and talk to others who are knowledgeable about it…I know…I mean, I know that there are so many people out there who are walking on the edge of the razor, as I was a few short months ago. They have to know that they are not alone – famous people, prolific athletes, some of our world’s most outstanding leaders, and millions upon millions of the common folk have gotten through it. This is what I was thinking about all day yesterday with my winter hat and gloves on, riding my Gary Fisher in 40-degree weather. I am getting through this, and others will too.