‘I loved drinking so much because it made me briefly normal’
Sobriety, identity and stillness
When I was six, and had my eyes tested for the very first time, there were three things that I knew about myself. I was a good girl, a confident reader, and at my best when I was working quietly, in my own head. I read all the time, unassisted. When the optician asked me to read the chart, I did. Then he suppressed a smile and said ‘Out loud.’
Thirty one years later, I’m honestly not sure that I know anything about myself. I’m still trying very hard to be a good girl — (I quit drinking, I spend an enormous amount of money on probiotics, and if I wake up at 4AM I’m thinking about how I feel ashamed for not sending you a card when you got your dog.) Some days, I am a confident reader, and some days I worry that I like the wrong things, and don’t understand the right ones. I worry that my taste is objectively bad. And I’ve organised my work in a way that means I mostly work quietly, in my own head. But I get quite lonely.
I think I’ve done most of the things that come up when people say ‘Oh, have you tried…?’ During lockdown, I joined an expensive co-working space, and I hated it. I struggled with the ambient noise and light, everything was too dark, and loud and flickery. It felt like school, all over again. I was surrounded by popular, put-together people…
