2025: Chapter 11

August 3rd:

The further I’ve removed myself from the so-called good times of drinking and gambling and womanizing, the more clouded my identity has become. I’d hardly call this a crisis, because intrinsically I know sobriety is the righteous thing. I’m rhetorically kind of just asking myself, and thus projecting it out into the wilderness of the Internet: Who am I?

I admit, I used to find a weird sense of comfort in such a never-ending cycle of self-induced toxicity. It was like I wrote the screenplay, acted, and got to direct my own perpetual reclamation project. Where I would get loaded and make bad decisions, and then wake up and have an epiphany and decide enough was enough. That that — finally! — that was it. That was the straw that finally broke the camel’s back.

I wasn’t comforted by how such a cycle made me feel, per se, because the feeling sucked, but rather that it gave structure to my life. Of falling down and getting back up. Of falling again. Of getting up once more. And so on. Sometimes the intervals of falling and getting back up were more frequent — like on a week-to-week basis — and other times they were stretched out over months or even years. But always as long as I was going through the same motions, exhibiting the same behaviors, I would eventually be picking myself up.

Having now been sober for 47 days there is no more falling, and no more getting back up. My life’s rhythms and structures are no longer fluctuating up and down like a teeter-totter. It is merely a straight line, moving ever forward, where the act of self-sabotage seems unacceptable (if not altogether impossible) given how alcohol and gambling are no longer part of my life.

So it isn’t as if I am in a goddamn rush to fuck up all of this progress I have made in the name of restoring my identity. After all, I have written about how empty of an identity it truly was. I’m really just saying that without so many of my most recognizable vices, I still don’t know who I am supposed to be. Beyond the Sober Guy, I mean.

August 4th:

But I know I’m going to find something. That’s the way it has to be. My only issue is that right now I happen to be standing in the center of the universe and it feels to me like I have too many possible directions with which to go. Generally that isn’t the way I operate.

Unrelated, but kinda related: Over the course of my life the work that gave me the most satisfaction was when I was doing work release for the city of San Bernardino CA about a decade ago after I got a DUI. Ironically, I got paid a grand total of zero dollars and zero cents (USD) for the satisfaction I received during those five weekends. And yet every Saturday and Sunday when I was on my drive home from said work release, sunburnt and guzzling whatever water I had on my person, I couldn’t help but think to myself that I would love to do this for a living.

On paper it was such a miserable contract that my lawyer and I agreed to. Five weekends, two days per weekend, ten days in total. I had to wake up at like 5:30 A.M. Pacific Standard Time and be on the so-called job site around 6:30 A.M. We’d stuff eight or nine of us into one of those white Cal-Trans work vans and drive off to god knows where — streets, parks, washes, random alleyways, etc. — and each of us quote-unquote convicted criminals put on a goofy neon green vest and the Cal-Trans employee would open the back of his company van and then we’d all grab rakes and brooms and shovels and garden hoes and get to work.

The first weekend I was so far out of my element and kind of just following what the other men were doing. It was actually pretty comical, understanding just how much of a professional white-collar bullshitter I happen to be, watching me (of all people) put on a vest and yank a garden hoe out of the back of a van with the intention of doing real, actual work. Like, sure, using a tool to break up the earth beneath my feet was something I did all the time!

But as the summer wore on I couldn’t help but to love it. Seeing how dirty and cluttered the areas were to start, and then seeing what they looked like when we were finished. Most of us criminals/workers enjoyed each other’s company, for whatever that was worth, enough to where certain people had nicknames. There was a tall and lanky kid we called Nature Boy because he climbed trees and got to places none of us others could get to. There was a guy known as Bird. I don’t know why we called him that, but he was black so I thought it was cool.

There was real camaraderie amongst us, I think that was my favorite part. That we were all eating shit together — for free — in the hottest months of the calendar year. There was actual relief to be felt when the Cal-Trans guy told us it was lunchtime, and so we would all find some shade and take out our sandwiches and chips and ice-cold cans of Coca-Cola from our lunch pails. And then we would get back to it and finish up.

I feel I became sort of the de facto politician of the group. Literally every other criminal/worker I was with knew I wasn’t one of them, if that makes sense. We all talked, of course, about how many weekends we all had to do. My five weekends were nothing compared to everyone else — and by a long shot. Some had fifty, sixty weekends. Some had already done fifty or sixty weekends and had fifty more to go. They laughed and scoffed at me with envy when I said I had to do only five.

The reason I acted as the politician was because the Cal-Trans workers knew I wasn’t one of them, either. I was also the only white boy out there. I got to know a couple of them pretty well, the Cal-Trans people, and so before or during or after lunch it wasn’t uncommon for me to get into long and drawn out conversations about 401K’s, retirement savings in general, vacation time, the benefits of being in a union (of which Cal-Trans has a nice one), politics, my own job as a casino dealer, etc. In other words, I got dapped up more than a few times by my fellow comrades for stretching our thirty-minute lunches into an hour-plus. I feel that was probably my biggest contribution to the men with whom I was laboring on those summer days.

Somehow I have never forgotten that feeling. Of working with my hands out in the elements. Of starting the day when the sun was coming up, being confronted by a task that appeared at the onset seemingly impossible, and working until the job was finished. I don’t get that sense of fulfillment by dealing cards and dice. I only know what it feels like because I made a mistake and was forced into it via the verdict of The People of San Bernardino v. Eric Reining.

I won’t be able to replicate such a feeling as my means of establishing a new identity, because I will not be leaving my job anytime soon. I’m just saying there are reasonable alternatives. Like I’ve always wanted to do woodwork. Making various items with saws and sandpaper and shit, I mean. Don’t ask me why, since I don’t know. I just think it would be fun. I’d like to travel the country and/or the world but to where I do not know. I’d like to make hiking and exploring a bigger part of my life but it’s a hundred and fifteen goddamn degrees outside right now. That sort of stuff.

Anyway, I’ll figure it out. These are the simple problems of a man who isn’t any longer preoccupied with tangling webs for himself. I can live with those.

August 6th:

Out of everything I didn’t take into account when I began this so-called clean way of living, what is perhaps most noticeable, or the thing that has impressed me most about myself, is that sobriety — or choosing not to drink — has been only one piece of my puzzle. Putting a stop to my gambling was obviously a byproduct. Quitting soda and Gatorade in lieu of green tea became another. Byproduct, that is. But while I can’t exactly quit on women, for it’s in my nature to be a man and want the things a man generally wants, I have been very intentional over these last seven weeks about keeping myself out of harm’s way.

All of these things — drinking, gambling, running around with various women — relate to each other. They each and all contributed to the global sense of my unhappiness and the anxiety that came with it. Going into it I believed not having alcohol in my life would further my unhappiness and anxiety, knowing that I didn’t have a crutch to deliver me any kind of relief for whatever ills arrived during my day-to-day existence.

In time I have learned the opposite to be true, that by eliminating those external factors (or vices) it offered a drama-free simplicity to my life. Without alcohol, I no longer have to worry about waking up after making bad choices the night before. Without gambling, I no longer set myself back for a paycheck or two at a time for the cheap thrill of an hour’s worth of play. Without women whom I know in my heart are a dead-end, I no longer risk their making an emotional investment in me — nor do I have to utilize any brainpower thinking up ways to get rid of them.

So what I’m saying is: being sober hasn’t just been about being sober. It’s also been about everything that comes with it.

I have an earnest desire to eventually spend more of my time on enterprises that constitute more than what I am doing now — which is very little — but when it comes to identity, my identity, that is, what I really aspire to is being a good man. The best man that I can be. I’m not trying to argue that I wasn’t a good man when I was drinking, or that people who drink are inherently less-good than those who don’t. I’m really just speaking for myself, personally. That I couldn’t see my suffering when I was going through it, but now I can. And I want to do better.

August 9th:

After finishing Michael Brown’s The Presence Process, which doesn’t require any thoughtful analysis since it was so vapid, I have begun again reading about the Buddha. It is titled Old Path White Clouds and is written by the same author, Thich Nhat Hanh, who wrote The Heart of the Buddha’s Teaching: Transforming Suffering into Peace, Joy and Liberation.

Like I mentioned going into the first book, I didn’t consult the Buddha as a means to replace my worldview or system of beliefs. I was not actively seeking a couple transformative phrases here, or a few buzzwords there, such that I could have my eureka (!) moment and subsequently convert to a life of practicing Buddhism. It is quite a rigid practice, after all.

But I do have an open mind, and will say that I absorbed more real-life information from the 300 pages or so of The Heart of the Buddha’s Teaching than I ever did in several years of attending a Christian church. Whereas Christianity taught me — and quite arrogantly, if I may say — that they already have all the answers, and that I must live according to them if I aim to secure my place in the kingdom of heaven, there is an inherent humility with Buddhism.

What I mean is, it encourages the individual to appreciate This moment in time. If you are going for a walk, make every step count. If you are washing the dishes or folding your clothes, make it the most important dish that you have ever washed or the neatest folding job you have ever undertaken. It offers purpose to the thoughtless, mundane chores that otherwise aren’t worthy of much consideration.

Christianity, on the other hand, really doesn’t dedicate enough value to the present moment. The benefits to being a good person and/or living an honorable life are merely transactional. That the only reason to be a quote good person is to make it into heaven, which is kind of why I say it cheapens one’s daily experience. I’ve always taken issue with the idea or dangling a carrot as a means to encourage good behavior. Like: what’s the problem with being a good person without needing a reason?

August 10th:

I’m kind of beginning to understand why sobriety and religion go so hand-in-hand, though, because it grants individuals an additional purpose. Alcoholics Anonymous, for example, doesn’t have a religious affiliation but it does for support suggest a ‘higher power.’ Never have I attended an AA meeting, and I imagine one of the biggest contributing factors is directly related to such born-again rhetoric. Another factor is that I’m lazy.

I’ll reiterate that in no way am I shitting on people who need the added support and/or motivation that religion gives them; I’m only speaking for myself, personally. I take pride in the fact that I wasn’t forced into sobriety. I am proud that I’m not doing it to help please a higher power, and that I’m not relying on one to help me through it. I’m doing it simply as a personal choice.

But far be it for me to feign as if I am bigger than this game of sobriety that I am playing. I’m well aware of the relationship between them, sobriety and religion, because the first fucking thing I did when I planned to stop drinking was buy a book that essentially acts as Buddhism For Dummies. Knowing full well that my outlook on life had been forged long ago and was/is more or less set in stone, I still felt I needed a push in a certain spiritual direction.

In other words, what is the difference between a born-again Christian who uses the bible and/or the uppercased God to help in their sobriety and a person like me, who decided to consult the Buddha? It’s the same shit, really. Just different names for the same thing. It was my own way of admitting that I, too, needed help, and that for whatever reason the 35 years of life experience that I had at my back — as if I had a choice — did not deliver me the lessons or the answers that I needed.

Naturally I am in no position to follow the strict standards of real, actual Buddhism. I will not forsake my shoes if and when I go out for a walk. Nor will I go the rest of my life without having a sip of alcohol (probably) or without a cigarette or without the loving embrace of a woman. There are limits to how closely I consume the message(s).

And at this point, in comparison to Hanh’s first book that I read, my sobriety is in a much different place. Old Path White Clouds is similar to the bible in that: it’s fiction. I am not reading it to necessarily absorb the information in hopes of finding a way of incorporating it into my day-to-day life. I’m treating it like a story.

August 11th:

Alas, what the Buddhist philosophy has reinforced to me — aside from things like breathing, and being more mindful of the present moment — is discipline. It’s important. In spite of the discipline I have shown by virtue of now being sober for seven weeks and six days, having not gambled in that time span, having given Sarah $200 per week to save for me for the last 14 weeks, substituting soda and Gatorade for green tea, etc., as far as discipline is concerned I still have a daunting journey in front of me.

What I mean is, I know I am still susceptible to a good time. The minor tragedies in my adult life were less about the expensive emotional and financial acts that transpired within a vacuum, and more about the progress I so often felt I had made, or felt that I was making, disintegrating over and over again. No individual beer or trip to a casino ever crippled me. It was knowing how much better I was in comparison to how I was acting that inevitably did me in, and drove me away, from all the things that offered me my precious momentary happiness.

The real victory of this sobriety, regardless of whether or not it is still in its infancy, is that it has better married my brain to my body. It has brought me closer to the elusive dynamic I just explained, about knowing I am better and making the choice of acting better. For 55 days I have been in the business of these small victories, and that’s fine. I don’t have to be wherever it is I need to get to right this second.

As such, sobriety is and has been the most impactful safeguard I have ever known. It has yet to deliver me to a spot where I’m like batting a thousand — i.e. making the absolute best choice in every conceivable moment — but that’s a pretty lame goal to strive for, anyway. If nothing else, as in if sometime during the not-too-distant-future I am helpless to consume a drink and go to a casino afterwards, I have restricted my daily spending limit to just $500 (down from $2,000). So even I wanted to, I couldn’t do any more damage than that.

August 13th:

Many times before I have offered examples, if not put forth a full-throated endorsement, of the old Fake It Till You Make It cliché. I didn’t mean to say I was fake, or that I was operating in some untoward fashion. Rather I’ve utilized the cliché to overcome my fears of public speaking, approaching women, and virtually anything else I considered outside of my comfort zone. Sometimes one is forced simply to play the part, even if they aren’t sure how.

I only bring up Faking It because in a meaningful way, albeit intangibly, I’ve never felt more like a fraud than I have over these last 57 days of sobriety. It sort of makes sense how introductions in AA — at least insofar as I’ve seen on TV shows and in movies — begin with ‘My name is [so and so], and I’m an alcoholic.’ Because every day that is how I feel. That that’s the real me and this sober version is the phony.

My buddy Spencer and I were talking about it the other day, and I tried to explain that my enlightenment throughout this process has been understanding and acknowledging how far I still need to go. One week and two weeks and one month sober felt to me like such major accomplishments at the time, and yet here at the eight-week mark it seems as if I have barely made a dent. That what I’ve seen is but a very small opening of the true illumination that awaits me.

I assume such a view is what continues carrying me onward. Where my concern doesn’t any longer revolve around the mere act of drinking, but is an all-encompassing manner of living. Ironically I identify much more with being an alcoholic right now, 57 days into sobriety, than I did in all the blogs shortly before and directly after I quit drinking. When I wrote that I didn’t consume that much. Or that it wasn’t as bad as my mom’s alcoholism so it doesn’t count. And so on.

The fact that every day I still must make this choice to be sober is proof that it is true: My name is Eric, and I am an alcoholic. I am faking being sober until I make it — until I no longer have to make the choice to be sober. And I may continue to struggle realizing this new identity of mine, whatever it happens to be or turn into. But what I know is that I really like who I am right now. Even if to me it still feels fake, it’s the realest version of myself I have ever been.