I wasn’t a regular drinker at home, but I found it quite easy to abstain from alcohol during the months when you couldn’t get out of the house – unless it was for a walk or the supermarket.
Even though the nation decided to get cozy at home from January to April 2021, I hadn’t touched a drop.
The real challenge was then when life started to return to normal – when pubs, bars and social gatherings were back on the agenda.
I wanted to challenge myself, I thought, “How hard can it be to stay away from booze”?
Surprisingly, I found it much easier than I had expected, although the reactions of the people around me were not the most supportive.
It was during this period of tea totalism that British drinking culture became blatantly obvious.
I saw a drunk middle-aged woman fall off a chair outside a pub; his head hit the concrete floor.
He laughed it off and stumbled back up to take another sip of his white wine. I winced.
I may have been sober, on a daytime date a few tables away from the incident, but I’ve been there. Drunk. On the floor.
It’s really eye-opening when you go to late-night spots stone-cold sober.
I’ve seen a lot – people inciting fights for no reason, inappropriate fondling in public spaces, and the confused look in someone’s eyes when they’ve exceeded their drink limit.
Some friends pleaded that they wanted me to engage in drinking “to have fun”; “I can have fun without drinking,” I smiled back.
I was still my outgoing, personable self who loved to socialize – I just didn’t become a mess at the end of the night and left at the right time.
There are too many situations in my past, especially when I was much younger when I was working in a bar in Covent Garden, where I would struggle to get home because I was so drunk.
When asked if I felt different when I didn’t drink, I said, “I don’t feel different, but I’m sure my inner self loves me.”
My skin didn’t clear up and I didn’t lose weight, but I’m sure my liver thanked me and so did my bank balance.
Although the drinking culture is still big, drinking today is more of a choice than a mindless one, which is probably the most fundamental shift in my thinking.
So why am I back to booze? Because I like a good margarita, a decent glass of wine, or a half pint of beer every now and then, but I can still go out sober.
