Dry spells

A friend of mine announced in December that she was pregnant. A few of us were at their house to have a sort of a pod-safe gathering ahead of Christmas when they told us the news. After some cheering and rule-breaking hugging, we talked about what life would be like for them in the year ahead.

This being our biking group, we quickly recognized that the due date was right around the time we were signed up to ride Ramrod in July. The soon-to-be father was obviously out, and the rest of us more or less decided that we would train, but if the baby decided to show up on race day, we would skip the ride to be at the hospital. 

As we continued to chat, the mom-to-be mentioned that she had been filling the fridge with new non-alcoholic beverages to replace the wine and beer she was giving up, and she asked for other drink suggestions. I suggested we all give up drinking for January as a small show of support. 

I have participated in "Dry January", no alcohol for the month, a number of times. It is a reset after the holiday indulgence, and a check-in to make sure that setting drinking aside is as easy as it should be. This time around, even though it followed nine months of sheltering in place where drinking was more of a temptation, it was remarkably easy. 

I did have one slip up mid-month. My brothers and I had found a restaurant with an open outdoor patio, and we got together to discuss Mom's current condition, and I suppose to check in on each other as well. We were about an hour in when I shared that I had given up drinking for January. I said this while taking a sip of my second beer. 

I had just completely spaced, falling into a routine, I suppose highlighting that habits run along in the background unless we consciously make the effort to change them. I wasn't giving into a craving, just drinking without thinking. I added on four or five "dry" days at the beginning of February to offset the slip up. 

Unfortunately, three better habits have also gone dry this year. A slight modification of the grade school three Rs they are Reading, Writing and Running. These three habits are a big part of what keeps me healthy in both body and mind. My writing has obviously been neglected for quite some time, but through the 2020 part of the pandemic, I managed to keep up the other two when the world was turned upside down and making less and less sense. I was able to read 26 books last year, and though I had grander plans, I ran semi-regularly and covered a little over 500 miles. 

2021 has been an absolute struggle on all three fronts, and to be honest I am just plain struggling. I'll pick up on the running dry spell in the next post.