Giving Up Alcohol For Lent

Late last year, 2022, I met a fantastic author by the name of Charles Bukowski. Physically he is gone now but his spirit and his works lives on.

I met him little by little through his quotes on Facebook pages. Knowing little about him I started to read his works, including reading his biography by Neeli Cherkovski titled "Bukowski, A Life," and his semi-autobiographical movie "Barfly."

What a man, what a life, what talent. I was mesmerized more so knowing that he had great inspiration from his hard life made with equal parts his habit of drinking, creating an imperfect genius.

So for 2023 I paid the full year's Vocal + subscription fee and promised myself that I would enter every writing contest not with the intention of winning anything but more for practice and some of the challenges really get the noggin going.

Now not to be defensive but most of my writing here is me giving my, what, 45% of my ability. I mean most of my challenges entered were written the same day, at times even submitting in the last hour before the deadline closed. Half of the time I was somewhat inebriated. Even now I am not drinking but I did take some good hits of a new cannabis type called Papa Smurf, a sativa dominant strain. It feels like coffee except you aren't crisp in functioning.

I was on a roll entering every contest and had a magnificent story for the "If Walls Could Talk" challenge that I had been writing on my little book I carry. The day it was to be submitted I was invited to some drinks by a friend in the city and I thought "Maybe one or two for some creative flow would do." Instead I ended up drunk, got home late, and had a horrible hangover the following day at work. It's not new but It pained me that I broke a 2023 resolution because of alcohol. Actually, it's the least of the problems alcohol has brought to my life but it was supposed to be a new year.

Reading Bukowski I was further inspired and have gotten more into writing, doing it as much as I can. But this guy is, like they say, is the exception not the rule. I can't do it, I get jaded the following day. Only if I drink like 3-4 beers the following day I feel enlightened. But if you can have that kind of control I would've written a novel or two by now.

So for Lent I've decided to give up alcohol. Even though I was born and raised Catholic, It's not for religious reasons. More as a self-sacrifice, to self discipline, a punishment, and I've had some weird supernatural experiences when I was young, so yes, I also do it for Jesus Christ, not the god but the man.

It's day two and good god It's hard, not so much the will power because I'm working 40-55 hrs per week and when I'm busy I don't find the time to drink. As a social drinker It's more the friends. I announced publicly in all my settings where those who know my lie that I am going to stop drinking for 40 days, they laughed and don't believe me, even mock me. Just two days in I got three texts from friends inviting me for a drink, one even offering to pay for three pitchers of beer If I show up. I got mad at all of them. They know all my lamentations because of it, the issue that I have with it but they persist. It opened my eyes today, it's a sign of disrespect, not caring. That's even knowing that in one large group of friends we lost two friends because of cirrhosis. Also, personally, something they probably don't know, unless I've told them when drunk I've lost three uncles because of alcohol addiction.

Now I'm not an alcoholic because 90% of the time I only drink socially but clearly I am not a functional alcoholic. Now I got high tonight because I am working long hours at a physically demanding job, the stress of these so called friends taunting you to drink, and because it's a natural plant and mainly harmless, compared to this drug that has caused a wreck among my people.

In this 40 days I am going to start writing my book and hopefully by the time I near day 40 I'll find out how productive and what a creative genius I am. I don't know, I've never gone that long without drinking, probably max 7-8 days. Anywho, while I missed the last challenge from Vocal earlier, I like this challenge better. I'll update after I reach day 10 or something. Peace