I dreamt I had a drink. I don't mean that I dreamt of drinking; in the dream, it had been inadvertent, had already happened. In my fitful sleep I was somewhere on the Southbank, where I've been spending a lot of time, in some concrete cleft, and I had drunk some beer with friends. In the dream, I do not remember ordering it, but merely “coming to” and realising that I'd failed in my resolution not to drink. My first feeling was fear of how my friend, with whom I'd agreed to do this dry month, would feel. My second was about how I would explain the lapse here, in writing.
Last night I saw a dear friend from my teenage years, and her mother whom I had not seen since then. They had finished a ten day cruise, Pisa, Marseilles, Barcelona, Valencia, Seville, are the cities I remember, then they had done three days in Rome, one night only in London, then my friend flew back today to Boston, while her mother stopped in Amsterdam before returning to Cincinnati.
We ate at Brasserie Zedel, that somehow most-authentic, least-authentic gem in the heart of Piccadilly, not far from where they were staying in Mayfair. I got the tube from the Barbican where I'd been working. I love Zedel; it feels not just like another century, but another country, like one might be in nineteenth-century Vienna or Brussels.
Monday morning, lethargic as any. It is interesting to see what is the hangover and what is the sleep schedule, after a sleepless Saturday night, and a typical halfhearted Sunday attempt to half make up for it. The importance of sleep is perpetually hammered into us, and it is hard to say whether alcohol makes sleep better or worse. I've often heard it said that although one falls asleep faster, the quality of sleep is lower. What that means or how it is measured I do not know. Viktor Frankl had some comments on this topic:
After waking late yesterday, I met the friend with whom I am undertaking Dry November. Because we'd not seen each other for ages, the conversation was mostly a life catch-up, about jobs and living situations, though there was some chat about how the dry month was going. I'm lucky in that I have the support of my partner, and most of my friends have been relatively understanding. She's had a bit of a harder time with certain friends considering it a bit of a killjoy thing to do. “Being boring” is the way that she put it, and perhaps at another point “not being fun.” I've worried about this aspect myself at times, but mostly decided that it is an addicted part of my brain trying to rationalise its way into getting alcohol. Having to face it as an explicit accusation must be much harder.
Yesterday I took the easy way out. I don't mean that I drank, for I've done several things to ensure that this way would be hard, telling friends, for example, and committing to writing about it here. What I mean is that I was alone. For me, much as I love the taste of beer or the effects of spirits, I never had the strong temptation to go it alone, to drink alone. I might not be able to resist a good beer in the fridge, but as I rarely replenished them, this never became a habit. I know of people who get into the habit of a glass of wine while cooking, which becomes a bottle or two with dinner. I drew a line in the sand on this point, and only drank in the house on special occasions. Like if the hangover was truly the stuff of nightmares.
Yesterday was the first real challenge, in a way. It came down to the social question, maybe one more unavoidable in London than in other parts of the world: If not drink, what do we do? I met a friend in the afternoon. The stated intention was to discuss philosophy, as he has just finished a dissertation thereon, but our conversation was wide-ranging. If the discussion had focal points they were consciousness and unconsciousness, mastery and ignorance.
First day of Dry November and I'm slightly hungover. Not much, but enough that I woke at 4:37 and 6:37 with some stomach pains and sleeplessness. This happens more as I age; I wake up earlier when I drink, and hangovers are worse. Throughout my twenties everyone in their thirties told me this would happen, but I regarded their warnings with indifferent scepticism. Not that last night was anything mad. I drank three bottles of leftover craft beer at home, figuring I'd have a little clear-out before starting the experiment with my friend. “Drink up baby,” I texted her, thinking of Elliott Smith, “Last chance.” She didn't respond until the morning, and I felt proud when I learned that she hadn't touched a drink since Saturday.