Summer days.

I feel like an attempt at sober living in the dead of winter is an especially cruel thing.

So many people in rehab resume their lives by returning to jobs, to their families, to stable normalities and concrete reasons for an attempt at renewed commitments. I tried to pass off my sobriety as a decision, a break from bad choices that left me faltering, careless and cruel. I couldn't see how I had a problem while so many others didn't, so it should be fine for me to go out, be amongst the masses and simply be strong, have my fun while they had theirs and not let myself be affected by this apparent self imposed otherness. I found some of the environs to be dark, seedy, mean-spirited--people choosing to revel in morally bereft dens, exploiting themselves and each other in manipulative games of derision and diversion. I'm no longer one to judge, I just feel saddened and removed. How do I connect?

I think if it were the summer, things would be different. No, check that, if it were the summer, I had a job I liked, a love that loved me, a place I could call my own...

I forced myself to go to an AA youth event at the Tranzac the other night. I walked out of the bitter cold into a small, cramped room; standing room only, shoulder to shoulder in the back. A duo is sharing the makeshift stage: she is playing an electric guitar, the tone muffled and distant, her technique all hacking down strokes, he holds the microphone and sings as one with confidence but no skill. Their vocals come out too loudly, off kilter, some perverted version of Crimson and Clover; the audience sits quietly, polite parents at their children's Christmas pageant. I am embarrassed for all of them. It's an open mic night, fun in sobriety, we are comedians, poets, musicians. A woman is reading from her book of poems, people around me are nodding thoughtfully, one man exalts an enthusiastic "right on!" It is all back slapping support, kind and well-meaning but also disconnected--false camaraderie.

If it were summer, I could sit in the park, maybe watch the dogs.

I'm coping with this sobriety by making a victim of myself. I'm miserable because I choose to be. I look back to my former existence as one where I had nothing but good times, great friends and a carefree approach to my day-to-day. I look forward to the months ahead as more of the same, disconnected loneliness, lack of fun  or understanding. I know I need to change my perspective, but every time I try, I'm slapped in the face by -15 degree winds and slush in my boots.

As I write this, I know I'm making fun of myself. My pre rehab days were nothing exciting, I might have outwardly fit in better, but there was a lot of struggle too. My post rehab days aren't going to be all Crimson and Clover and makeshift community. I've gone through a lot recently and I think real change is going to come slowly. I start a new job soon, I've been writing, reading and drawing more than usual and, looking at things realistically, well, I can't really expect the place of my dreams or a loving embrace this soon anyway. I'm not excited about where I am right now, but I'm going to keep going because going back is just too easy an option.

Being the exact same dork who does all the same things minus the drinking and drugs doesn't really entice me to keep going. It's the unknown, the very thing I've been afraid of, that's going to keep me in this.

I just wish it wasn't so damned cold out.