I was eleven or twelve years old, we were on a rare holiday, staying in a remote park.
I spent most of my time on my own—as I did.
There was a kind of common room/laundry as I remember, where in the evenings kids gathered to do what kids do; smoke cigarettes and drink beer they’d stolen off their parents earlier in the day, and mess about.
One evening I was allowed to go there (this was unusual), and so there I sat, at the edge of the group, awkward, gawky, uncomfortable and not knowing what to say or do.
At some point I was offered a beer, which I took and drank two great gulps of; lucky it was warm or the shock of the cold AND the froth would have made me lose it down the front of my shirt.
Anyway, there I sat, still awkward and uncomfortable, but feeling that kind of dizzy magical feeling you get when you’re not used to alcohol but already well on your way to alcoholism.
At one point I blurted something out in response to something one of the other kids said and they all laughed.
Now when I say they all laughed, I mean they probably all laughed AT me, rather than WITH me – but I didn’t notice, or WANT to notice the difference.
I was already intoxicated by a new drug. Popularity.
Well, not even popularity really, just attention.
It didn’t matter what it was based on, whether it was real or imagined—I was hooked.
The rest of the evening was the disaster you can imagine, but it didn’t matter to me. They laughed. They listened.
A girl I liked smiled at me, talked to me. She was older than me and her eyes sparkled (from the beer). I was in love with her from the first smile. I’m sure she thought I was nothing more than a clown.
Last night I went to the Golf Club to attend and perform at the monthly open mic hosted by my friend Richard—who is my friend because he puts up with me.
A lot has happened in the last month (you probably already know so I won’t go over it again) so turning up to play was a slightly surreal experience.
There was a good turnout, a mix of friends, acquaintances and friendly strangers, and my faltering performance was well received.
Now, I decided some time ago to not drink alcohol or take any other drugs which has made it difficult to me to perform ever since, because those things had always been a crutch I used to manage my anxiety about performing and even just being in a social situation.
This is why the most recent two times I’ve attended the Golf Club I’ve very much kept to myself and left as soon as I’d finished playing.
I now realise I wasn’t managing my anxiety so much as simply running away from it.
Last night was different.
I’d finished playing and was heading toward my guitar case when someone stopped me to say they’d enjoyed what I did. This happened a few times.
Eventually I arrived at my guitar case, put the guitar in the case and by the time I’d closed the case the next act had begun.
They were good (everyone was), I stood and listened.
I found that I was standing in the path of people approaching and leaving the bar so I took a step back and ended up perched on one of the stools that were lined up against the back wall.
I felt gawky, awkward, The conversations I had from my perch were quite short because I didn’t know what to say.
I thought several times about having a drink.
I didn’t.
Then after a while I started to feel quite comfortable—well, not comfortable, but sort of ok—about being gawky and awkward and not having anything funny to say.
Then in a flash I was twelve years old, out of my depth, gawky and awkward with nothing (sensible) to say, but not drunk and still kind of ok and kind of even laughing at myself being myself instead of trying to be the me that I thought I should be.
It’s nice when people are kind about things you’ve put time and effort (and a little bit of yourself) into.
It’s nice when you don’t feel as if you have to defend or justify yourself for creating and sharing what you do.
This may all seem too silly for words depending on who you are and your life experience, but it’s all quite real to me.
It’s nice to think I may have made a little progress—towards what, I’m not sure.
The moon was lovely when I arrived home.
