Consider the following experiment.
1. Don't drink any alcohol for a week.
2. Don't tell anyone why.
3. If someone asks, just say, "I don't want to."
Does that experiment sound easy, impossible, or somewhere in between?
The answer may depend on where you fit in the grey-faced, steadily moulding, and largely miserable mass that is British society – a population which includes those who don't drink at all, those who spew in gutters constantly, and everyone in between.
As for me: I go to the pub a couple times a week, enjoy wine with dinner sometimes, and have even been known in the past to get "lashed". But I've never really considered how central a role alcohol does or doesn't play in my daily life.
So I decided to try to go without alcohol for just one week, to see how hard it could possibly be.
Day One: Well, It's Easy Enough If You're Sitting Around At Home Eating Pretzels By Yourself All Day
There was no opportunity to drink alcohol, giving me a free pass in my Grand Social Experiment. Which made it seem like... not much of a Grand Social Experiment.
A colleague did go to something called "journalism drinks", though, and I don't know what I would have done had I gone to that.
Luckily I wasn't invited.
Day One: Success.
Day Two: The Dinner Party, And The Slight Concern That I Was Not Doing This Experiment Correctly
My boyfriend came round to cook me dinner on Tuesday.
Because it's 2014, amirite ladies?!
Anyway.
I also had a friend (hey Laura!!) coming over to enjoy my boyfriend's cooking, because he's really rather good.
But when someone comes to dinner, they're supposed to provide the wine. So the social contract goes.
My social anxiety at this point surprised me. There I sat, eating really rather good home-cooking with my boyfriend and one of my best friends, completely distracted by worry about what people would think about my not drinking.
Was Laura glancing at my glass, or was I imagining it?
I didn't care that I wasn't drinking. But for some reason, I could not bring myself to simply say, "I don't want to drink."
Instead, I deflected.
I deflected with language, saying, as the wine was passed round, "Oh, I don't want to drink right now." As if I would... just a bit later.
I deflected by keeping my glass filled with a steady stream of fizzy water that I'd stolen from work that day. (Hi, work!)
And once we'd all finished eating, I jumped up to make tea, because as soon as you're drinking a double spearmint herbal tea and going "mmmm lovely", no one expects you to hit the wine anymore.
The assessment: No, I didn't drink that day. And I didn't say why — but only through my trickery and deceit.
Day Three: Really Not Wanting To Appear Rude On Someone's Birthday
A colleague's birthday at the pub on Wednesday evening presented a new problem: the tyranny of rounds.
My solution, again, was to deflect.
This entailed arriving at the pub early, running to the bar alone before anyone could have the gall to offer to buy me a round, and ordering juice.
I drank it quickly enough that no one would think I wasn't occupied in the social act of drinking, but not so quickly that I would run out of juice and get roped into a round of something fermented.
The juice, while sickeningly sweet, was a powerful prop. Instead of saying, "No thank you, I don't want to drink," I could wordlessly point at my drink, like a sugary, sugary coward.
Day Four: No Drinks, And No Opportunities To Drink!
How about a spot of data instead?
Britons consume an average 11.6 litres of pure alcohol per year. One UK unit of alcohol is 10ml of pure alcohol.
That's 1,160 units a year. Or about 580 pints of regular beer per person — an average that includes all the people who don't drink at all. So really, if you're a drinker, it's a lot more.
Now that's some data.
Day Five: The Office Party, i.e. The Greatest Test Of All
I dreaded the Halloween office party all week.
The practice of drinking alcohol has prehistoric and murky origins. However, I believe it was invented by ancient Mesopotamian copper-smelters who hoped to make their office parties less unbearably awkward.
What the hell was I stressing about? My colleagues are great. We hang out, we eat lunch, we brainstorm, we get along.
It just seemed wrong, as a twentysomething, to turn down any prospect of FREE DRINKS, for the economic reasons alone.
When the dreaded day came, could I just announce to all my colleagues, "Hey guys, I'm coming to this party, and even though I've been known to drink in the past, I'm not going to drink tonight"?
Of course not. Because it would be a thing. So again, I deflected.
The interaction at the beginning of the night looked like this:
Friend-slash-colleague: "Shall we get a drink?"
Me: *turns and runs away*
Eventually, I found my way to the drinks table in search of a merciful carton of orange juice. I found the juice, and poured that into my little paper Halloween cup.
Pretty soon, I finished it. Imagining people to be looking at my empty hands (or maybe they weren't?) I went and furtively poured myself some more, praying no one would see me, and feeling ridiculous for feeling ridiculous.
Two things happen when you drink a lot of juice.
Firstly, your teeth develop a horrible, grainy film of sugar, which quickly sets about disintegrating your teeth, like vicious little miners with tiny, sugary little pickaxes.
Secondly, you get a sugar high.
This is what a sugar high looks like.
Being half-American, I didn't want to continue destroying my precious tooth enamel with a plague of juice.
But the thing is, I couldn't just not be holding a cup at an office party.
So at some point in the party I ended up just... holding an empty, soggy, crumpled cup.
And as long as I clutched this life line, no one would make a comment. Or more importantly, I would not worry that anyone would comment.
At some point in the mayhem, this colleague was adamant that I participate in Jager bombs.
I really didn't want one. So I said so. It was the first time all week that I didn't just deflect.
Saying no was — ugh, I'm gonna say it, I'm so sorry, but I have to say it — empowering.
I ended up having a great night. I mingled, I danced, I laughed, I cried. I lost my voice singing TLC and Michelle Branch. Participating in karaoke completely sober had sounded unthinkable a few hours before.
But I had gained some kind of social "cover" by the fact that everyone else was pissed, and assumed that I was too. The fact that I could dance, sing, spin around in desk chairs, and generally lose my mind without the aid of alcohol was a pleasant surprise.
It was my little secret, and I loved it: I'm not drunk, I'm just a weirdo.
When I told my colleagues later that I had been completely sober, they joked that they had been betrayed. They also couldn't quite believe it, having witnessed my interpretive dance that night to Michael Jackson's "Earth Song".
Traitor or not, I sprang out of bed the next morning, as fit as can be. Was it all in my head, or was I feeling healthier than usual?
Healthier except for the long-term effects of sugar juice, that is.
Days Six And Seven: I Do What I Want
The last two days were easygoing, as I had finally gotten the hang of giving no fucks. I simply said I wasn't drinking at two more house parties over the weekend. Some of the partypeople didn't notice, and some of them went, Waaaaaah whhyyyy, and I just said, "Oh, did you not hear, I just said I didn't want to," and then grabbed a fistful of prawn crisps like a strong and confident woman.
At this point, I couldn't quite believe how many opportunities there had been over the course of a single week to drink alcohol. I wouldn't have even noticed them if I hadn't been turning them all down.
By the end of Day Seven, The Grand Social Experiment itself fell victim to my new attitude. Even though it wasn't quite over, I had some nice red wine with dinner. Because it was what I actually wanted, and I do what I want.
It's time for a truth bomb.
I seem to care more about how people perceive my drinking habits than I do about drinking itself.
Again, I can't stress how much I do usually like a pale ale, or a dark stout, or a glass of neat whisky, or raising a flute of sparkling wine and going ,Ohohohoho!
But drinking booze doesn't always feel optional in a normal week of my life.
I have been bullied in the past — especially at university — into drinking at times and in ways that I didn't necessarily want. And I've done the same to others. I have actually shouted the words "DOWWWWWN IT" at people. (Oh god, I'm so sorry.)
I thought, at 25, that I had finally achieved a state of comfortable self-assurance. It turns out that confidence has been missing from areas of my life where I hadn't even thought to check for it.
So why do I drink when I do?
Am I trying to look cool? Am I trying to seem normal and bond with my peers? Am I trying to lubricate social interactions? Or to provide a cover for my sober weirdness?
I may not have an answer to these questions just yet, but there's one thing, at least, that I now know for sure:
Fuck juice.