What a Difference a Year Makes

It doesn't dawn on me until a buddy of mine calls.
A year ago today he and I would attend a birthday party.

I was out on a date with a girl I met at the airport on my way back home.
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What followed was 6 months of complete destruction of my personal life in which I almost lost everything.
I see now why it was all necessary. I was in the last throes of active addiction. I was trying and had tried almost every solution except sobriety.
I still had a few remaining lies and half-truths I could tell myself to avoid admitting I had a problem.
It sounds clichéd, but I'm reminded of Fight Club (the touchstone of the fatherless men of my generation): "it's only when you lost everything that you're free to do anything."

Fast forward a year.
I'm sober. Getting ready to move.
It's just a matter of when and where.
The back-up emergency plan is in place (two to be exact).
By the summer I am leaving regardless of which direction it takes me.
My resume speaks for itself.
My life is far more manageable.

I don't have the breakneck thrills and stomach in my throat moments anymore, but I don't face the crushing depths of fear nor mania-inducing guilt that once followed my forays into the abyss of self-destruction.

It's a trade I'm more than willing to make.
Over a decade on the rollercoaster and I was done.
Props I guess, to those who can ride it longer than I, but speaking for myself, I was finished.

We trade things in life. You can't have it all.
I got married.
That wasn't for me.
I see people with kids and dogs and pets and houses and shit.
That isn't for me.

I'm just getting started.
I look back at the past * months and see the progress I've made without these perpetual burning down phases due to addiction.
I can't even imagine where a year will find me.

I know there will be successes and failures and I welcome it all with open arms and open eyes.

    - Yrs. in Christ