On Mercies that are New and my Journey with Wine

Last month, I turned forty-two. John took me out to dinner the night before, and the day of my birthday the kids came home in the early afternoon and the four of us, including Olive the dog, swam out to the dock in the middle of the lake. We jumped off the diving boards, and laughed at Olive as she jumped in, waiting for John to dive. She circles around and then tries to rescue him. It’s quite the show.

Over these last few weeks, I had the opportunity to preach twice at my favorite Korean church, which was lovely and fun and such an honor. We also had a worship jam in our back yard. Musicians came from all over the area, set up their instruments and played to the sound of children laughing and splashing around in the water. Olive stole more food than is reasonable for a dog her size, and the breeze blew around us in such a gentle way. The clouds came and went and the sun shined down as if giving us a lovely end of summer blessing.

My kiddos started school at the beginning of September, both are in high school now, and time continues to move forward in a way that startles me. It feels as if it’s grabbing me by the collar, shouting, “Notice everything, Tina. Drink it all in. Choose to love well, and open wide your heart.”

Emma is driving, and Lucas is a freshman in high school. How did this happen?

I ask that question far too often, and yet it is what I’m thinking about, what I’m learning. To live every day as if it matters. That the small things in life are the things that make life holy and sacred, important. That all of these ordinary days add up and make life extraordinary. That my neighbor is my sister, my brother. That every person in my life is in my life for a purpose and God is asking me to love them, to treat them with the same respect and kindness I hope people will give me.

Many of you know of, and have stayed near as I’ve written about my long journey with alcohol. It has been a long journey and one that I have mostly decided to live publicly. I am a writer and sometimes the only gift I have is the gift of a few honest words strung together. As it turns out, a few honest words strung together are the very things that help many of us hold ourselves together. We live in a time of more words than ever, but honest, thoughtfully curated words feel more like a treasure than ever.

I’ve wanted to write a few things about my decision to stay dry after my year of no alcohol came and went but I haven’t known exactly what to say.

There is nothing here to suggest that my journey should be anyone else’s journey, so take only what is useful to you. I offer my journey not as a model to be replicated, but as a story that might help you recognize some familiar footholds in your own story and then choose how you want to respond.

Rabbi Heschel wisely says that the first step to self-respect is being able to say no to oneself.

We live in a time of instant self-gratification. We love pleasure and feeling good, and hold in contempt anything that requires we wait more than ten-minutes. We are more medicated now than we have ever been, and while I am a huge advocate of medication, I’m also an advocate of learning to feel our emotions and sit in them, embrace them, and ride them out on their long curvature with our good God. It can be hard to embrace our emotions, particularly if you’re like me, and are filled with mixed, conflicting emotions.

Most of us have read the wise words: “If you want something you’ve never had, you have to do something you’ve never done.” I’m not sure who they belong to, but they’re true. We don’t become anything on accident. Truth be known, when I considered my relationship with alcohol, wine and anxiety were intricately interconnected. It was only when I stopped drinking that I could see the anxiety for what it was and begin to address its cause.

Last spring, when my dry year starting closing in on me, I began to ask myself the question of whether I wanted start drinking again. I even had a couple friends ask if we could go out for a glass of wine when the year was over.

When these invitation came, I started listening to myself and paid attention to the reaction of my body.

What I noticed was that every time I thought about drinking wine again my heart rate would increase, and my stomach would tighten. In other words, just the topic made me nervous. What I’ve realized, over this time of intentional sobriety, is that I like myself better without alcohol. I like how I feel without wine complicating my life.

Yes, sometimes, I miss a glass of red wine at the end of the day, but I don’t miss all the other facets that accompanied that one glass of red wine. Questions such as … Should I have another glass? Am I talking too much? Did I eat enough? Have I had enough water to make sure I’m not going to get dehydrated? Did I embarrass myself last night? What’s one more glass?

As many of you know it took many dry spells to realize that I feel more at home in my own body without alcohol. The dry life is my good life. 

One thing I know: true freedom is being able to say yes when you want to say yes, and no when you need to say no — to yourself and to those around you.

So for now, in order to stay yes to peace and serenity, to a general sense of well-being and a grounded confidence in myself and my own general sense of right and wrong, I’m saying no to alcohol.

It’s just that simple.

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