Tag: thanksgiving

sober lifestyle

Thanksgiving

jenwielgusjournalism
Scenes from the past week in my Bucks County, PA neighborhood

I spent about five total hours celebrating Thanksgiving this year — three at the gathering, one in the car each way — but that’s all it took. A short break from routine. A quick scenery change. One step off the beaten path —> a much-needed shift in perspective.

I guess it’s like the iconic Leonard Cohen lyric, about the cracks being where the light gets in? My protective instincts have always worked really hard to seal those cracks, to shut out the unknown/uncontrollable — so, basically the entire outside world — in an attempt to keep me “safe” from pain. If I let them run on autopilot for too long, I can find myself shut away in an airtight vault where sameness passes for certainty, numbness feels like home, and my whole purpose for quitting drinking gets lost in the dark.

Don’t get me wrong; it feels delightful inside the vault; I mean, what sane human really wants to face raw, unadulterated reality — especially (*looks around at America*) right now? Alas, I made the decision to “sign up for life” by saying no to booze, then went and pushed my chips forward into a helping profession, so I’ve got no choice but to snap out of my avoidance utopia if I am going to live/help….and continue to grow.

“Why? I’m so much happier here…” 😵‍💫
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sober lifestyle

Emotion

jenwielgusjournalism

It makes sense that I would cry at the sight of her signature. The encouraging words my great aunt cared enough to scrawl on Hallmark cards and snail-mail from Chicago to Philly have helped keep my blood pumping — at a 0.0% BAC— over the past 4+ years. To see them jumping off the wall on Nov. 14, what would’ve been her 91st birthday, stretched my heartstrings to the breaking point.

“Can’t wait for Christmas” popped a few of them, I think.

I taped my entire collection of recovery support cards to the mirror in my bathroom, as positive affirmations to start each day. Since Auntie Mickey passed away back in July, I’ve found myself staring at her handwriting, and, like Proust’s madeleine, it’s sent me spiraling into an emotional rabbit hole of family memories. Misty red-and-green-colored memories, now that the holidays are here.

“Auntie Mick” was our annual Christmas Eve hostess, as iconic as mom’s patchwork stockings, dad’s retro bubble lights, or the mysterious cookie crumbs that covered the special Santa plate on the most wonderful morning of the year.

I guess it also makes sense that every flippin’ Black Friday commercial on TV or wintry ad on Instagram has been triggering my tear ducts of late. I hear jingle bell sounds on a podcast break or see a flash of twinkle lights in my neighborhood — there was a truck loaded with pre-cut evergreens, riding down the road the other day! — and I’m suddenly all up in my feelings. ’Tis the season for existential distress!

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sober lifestyle

Holiday

jenwielgusjournalism

I’ve started to get a “Twilight Zone”-esque vibe from this blog, where every time I write about being happy about something, it immediately goes all to 💩.

It’s like the classic episode — aren’t they all classic episodes? — where the husband-wife grifter team finds that old instant camera, and when they take a picture in the moment, it shows them what’s going to happen in the future. And most of what the camera foretells, with the (temporary) exception of predicting winners at the horse track, ain’t good.

You thought my 90s references were bad. This TZ episode aired in 1960.

No sooner did I start gushing about my newfound love of running, to the point that I was impulse-blogging from the running trail in a state of exercise-induced euphoria, that my hamstring decided to snap. Just one week after the aforementioned blog outburst, I drove all the way over to Yardley on a beautiful Sunday morning, gulping my usual turbo-charged pre-workout drink as I mentally prepped for a 6-miler, and when I got to the canal path and my feet went to push off toward Washington Crossing…

🏃‍♀️🧨💥☠️

Two weeks later, that hamstring still strenuously objects every time I move. 😩

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sober lifestyle

Seventeen

jenwielgusjournalism

I haven’t been home for Thanksgiving since I moved away, back in the year 2000, but on one relatively recent visit to my parents’ house in suburban Chicago, I snapped the above pic — of another pic that hangs in their basement with a bunch of framed sports memorabilia.

My high school softball glory days aren’t really relevant right now; I post this to call attention to my jersey number.

I always felt a special affinity for 17.

So, having made it through that many months of sobriety (510 days as of today), I’m struggling to come up with anything wise to say, because thinking about that number immediately sends my brain into a Mark Grace rabbit hole.

He was my favorite Cub growing up, which made me just like every other female in about three Midwestern states — and any females elsewhere whose homes got WGN — but the sex appeal wasn’t what really mattered to me. The important thing was that Mark Grace was a Gold Glove first baseman and a .300 hitter who was really cute, and he was basically the captain of my team throughout my teens. He inspired what we all know is a HUGE life decision for a young girl: what number to wear on her back during athletic endeavors.

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