If you know me, you know I love Eminem...but sadly, I have come to notice that I don't particularly enjoy listening to his music :( This honestly breaks my poor little heart. I usually listen to music based on my mood, and with this new found happiness and a lack of anger towards the world, Eminem's songs bring me down and I don't want that to happen! The other day I actually tried really hard to listen to one of them (off his new CD) and I can sometimes relate to his lyrics about being sober and stuff but I just can't find that anger hood rat in myself anymore! I knew this day would come...damn growing up and finding happiness...damn you!
On a totally unrelated note...I read this article yesterday (thanks to the people that sent it to me!) "My Not Drinking Bothers Friends": http://www.cnn.com/2010/LIVING/09/07/tf.quit.drinking.friends/index.html?hpt=C2, and it was awesome and perfect and everything I have ever thought. I really resonated with this section in particular "Anyway, as adults, shouldn't we make decisions based on our own preferences, strengths and weaknesses rather than allowing social norms to dictate our behavior?". I have noticed that people are cool with my decision but view it as sort of a phase and "hope" that one day I will have one drink, just to be normal. I actually heard someone say to me that it's good that I thought maybe one day I could drink again because people that cut it out completely are taking it too far. Now what in the world does that really mean? So if I accept one drink back into my life, one bottle of craptastic Miller Lite, I will be considered normal, but if I decide never to indulge in an "adult beverage" then I am being too rash? I guess it is once again just a rationalization for their behavior, but I just do not see how one drink divides normalcy from extreme weirdness. The article also talks about how the "alcoholic" issue should be reason enough to get people to back off. And it should. For example, if you pushed someone on the Atkins diet to eat a slice of bread, they wouldn't drop dead (not that you should do that, because whether or not you agree with it, they have decided to make a decision that they believe will improve their health and in no way affects you...but I digress...); however, if you push someone who quit drinking to drink they could potentially slip back into old habits and head down the unhealthy/unhappy path they'd be avoiding until you. Why would you do that?? BUT...while the "alcoholic/alcoholism" route should get people to back off, it's not the cop out approach I'd like to take because that is not why I quit and that is not why I have continued to stick with my decision. Why I stuck with my decision is easy (and reiterated at least 450 times in my blog entries haha), and I prefer to be confident in that decision then guilt you into believing that if you push me to drink, you will cause my life to go down in flames.
Now I am not 100% sure where I was going with all this rambling. But I believe my point was that there is no point in one drink (when that one drink could cost you your well-being). There is no normal. "Normal" is something that changes every year and "normal" is based on what you believe and who you surround yourself with. And besides, who wants to be normal? That's just plain boring. :)
An old roommate (who should remain nameless, but lets just call her Messica) told me I wasn't normal because I did not want to inject alcohol into my veins to get blacked out... If that isn't "normal" I don't know what is.
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