Nurse Jackie.

I can't get enough of this program and have been gulping down/mowing through/inhaling season one just like a good addict. Not that it isn't hard to watch Nurse Jackie snort and swallow my DOC. In fact, I hate her and want to slap some sense into her thick, foggy head.

All the characters are fabulous, including her daughter. Hello anxious, little OCD girl. That would be me at ten. And there's Jackie, wrapped up in her addiction, fucking around, pretending like nothing's wrong, running all over the people who love her. That would be me at 40.

I highly recommend. (Available through Netflix).

Yep.

I had a lull in work and took a moment to read an essay on one of my favorite sites, The Fix. The writer described sobriety in such a true way:

I’d work hard. I’d drink caffeine all day and sleep not much. I’d feel in control. My emotional range was reduced to the narrow band between “mildly annoyed” and “quite pleased.” I’d go to parties and nights out with low expectations, and leave before eleven. My nights would feel a bit worse than normal. My mornings would feel a bit better.

As I work through my fourth year sober, it's painfully clear that this is the new status quo: dullish. Never having fun again was one of my greatest fears when I first gave up my DOCs (drugs of choice). I still have fun, but it's not like it used to be. It turns out I'm quite conservative in my behaviors without my DOCs. On the other hand, can I call that old kind of crazy fun truthful if it was always/mostly chemically altered?

I am grateful that I no longer have to shoulder mountains of shame and regret, but I also don't get to shake it off in a delirious, wild release. Sometimes I miss it.

"Your life is too empty--try our drugs."

This was the subject line of a spam in my mail box. I had to read it numerous times. My reactions went like this:

What?! How did they know?

My life is too empty. I wonder what kind of drugs they have?

WTF?

When they worked, I loved drugs, and smoking, and alcohol. Put them all together? Hoo boy. Party of one. The problem is they worked for such a short time. That elusive balance where everything was just right--not too full, or sloppy, or agitated--lasted minutes. Life is way too long to deal with that. Now I eat too much and have a closet full of shoes. I could probably wear a new pair every day for three months. (I'm going to go count.) No balance issues there.

Oh, and my other problem--I know things in relationship land must not be hunky dory because I've started that old problem about fantasizing about other men. It goes like this:

Sam (not his real name) is kind of cute. He probably wouldn't eat all the peanut butter and not tell me.

Fred (not his real name) is divorced and has a 9 to 5 job and probably eats dinner at a normal time and can go places on the weekend.

Cue my internal video of me and fantasy man attending art openings and walking through parks holding hands and making dinners together. The light is golden and fuzzy and I am very thin and wearing really nice shoes.

I got myself to a meeting last night. The alcoholism is gone, but the crazy lingers.