Drink?
Back at university I was never like the others. I just didn’t see the point of drinking alcohol, and so I didn’t, and it presented a number of problems which to begin with were actually pretty frustrating. As far as alcohol went it was like this: it tasted OK, but not as good as Ribena, and it made me feel physically sick, which was something that didn’t feel as good as not feeling physically sick. I thought that once I’d left university I’d find that people would understand why I didn’t drink. Actually, it turns out that people in the so called ‘real world’ think I am even stranger. Every time I go out I have to explain to people why I am not drinking. And the same conversation ensues each and every time, even if it is somewhere classly like a val d’isere ski resort–
First of all I try and keep quiet: what’s the point in explaining myself to someone, only to get in to a complex debate that I really can’t be bothered with? But this never works, because the guy in the corner drinking coke all night is just too curious a sight. After some persistence, I start to explain, begrudgingly, my reasons. And that’s when the mocking begins, and I wish I hadn’t bothered.
The truth is this: even in this age of free choice there are still vast numbers of people who believe that not drinking is abnormal. Talking to them about why I don’t drink is as pointless as arguing with a drunk, which is incidentally what I spend a lot of time doing. I don’t know what the answer is: If I keep my mouth shut then there can be a weird, lingering tension; if I open my mouth then the tension is replaced by a strange laughter: the nervous laughter of those confronted with something they don’t know about, and really don’t want to.
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