Friday, September 19, 2008

Dinner and AA

Yesterday was the birthday of a very close girlfriend of mine, she too just switching over to the over 25 years young group and fabulously single. She is a very strong young woman and incredibly independent. She, like me, is very career oriented and has the mentality of "I am very capable of doing things by myself" attitude most of the time. Girl Power! yeah yeah. Girl power until something seems to be on the verge of breaking in my house...then panic overcomes me and a tasty glass of wine can never be too close by for comfort. But, I can have the comfort of a glass of wine...or even maybe a bottle if absolutely necessary, every now and then, but my friend does not.

I have never had an addictive personality and I have never had the "need" to over-do or try a lot of things my even my closest freinds have ever "gotten in to." Drugs have never had any sort of appeal to me whatsoever and I didn't have my first shot of alcohol until college. Even in college, I didn't go to keg parties regularly, because even if I did go to parties where drugs and alcohol were the only thing going for them, I felt ridiculously out of place. Yet, even though I have been surrounded and offered my fair share of various drugs and binge drinking oppoortunities, I gladly passed every time. And you know what? It was never a big deal. No one ever got offended and no one ever really questioned why I wouldn't take that "hit" or jump in front to do that keg stand. I found that most people quite admired that I never faultered from myself.

So, my birthday friend has recently taken it upon herself to really change her ways. Without going into grave detail, she recently started going to Alcoholics Anonymous (AA)and has been sober for around 90 days...give or take a few days. I am so proud of her and her commitment to better the things she didn't like about her life. I am one of the few people in her life that is not a "drinker" and never needs to go out to bars and clubs to have fun other than her newly found AA buddies. I'd have to say, that I am quite proud of that too. Anywho, her birthday dinner was quite the same and quite different this year in comparison to last year. Last year, her dinner involved its fair share of alcoholic beverages around the table. This year, her dinner involved its fair share of alcoholic anonymous members around the table...with the exception of me and her two sisters...and it was wonderful!

I love new people and I love people commited to the betterment of themselves and those around them.

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