High Sobriety (35 page)

My first test is an annual get-together of friends, which is traditionally a marathon boozing session. This was the Christmas party that last year started at midday Sunday and rolled on till 5.00 a.m. Monday. This year, festivities start at 5.00 p.m. — we must be getting sensible in our old age. But it's not just about drinking; there's also a feast of food. Each guest (about 25 of us this year) is given prior instruction on what to bring, so the spread is phenomenal: there are platters of canapés; a carvery of roast lamb, pork, and chicken; roasted veggies; prawns; a smorgasbord of salads; and a range of delicious desserts. It's all served on tables joined together to form one huge banquet, decked out in festive paraphernalia and set up in the driveway next to our friends' Northcote townhouse. The evening passes quickly and is heaps of fun. There's one brief moment of panic, when I pick up my glass of Diet Coke and realise a split second before the liquid touches my lips that it is in fact red wine. How devastated I'd be if I inadvertently fell off the wagon just weeks before the end of my alcohol-free year.

I dance so much I get sweaty and require continuous hydration. Usually I'd reach for another beer. This year it's water, and I still feel parched. No wonder I used to get so drunk. I don't really miss booze on this occasion, but I do note that time seems to pass more slowly. Pissed, I floated from person to person, dropping out of one conversation and into the next in a seamless way. Sober, I still mingle, but my movements are more deliberate: there's no gliding from one interaction to another; it's conscious and considered and executed in blunt, staccato moves. It's tiring. What's really interesting is the way Loretta — who this time last year was fresh out of an Indian ashram and bewildered by the drunken shenanigans around her — has re-embraced the group dynamic with gusto. Last year's quiet observer is this year's party girl. I wonder if that will be me a year from now.

I leave just after midnight. I've been to enough parties sober by now to know that from this point on, a time of night I've come to think of as the witching hour, the law of diminishing returns is in play. The longer you stay at a party when everyone's shit-faced and you're sober, the less fulfilling it is; the language of sobriety no longer makes sense to the intoxicated, and vice versa. After nearly a year off the booze, I can pinpoint the exact moment when a night goes awry: I can pick up on the throwaway comment that sparks an argument, the playful nudge that's more of a shove, the lingering look that leads to a morning of regret. The next day, when everyone's puzzling over how a convivial evening turned into a shit-fight, I have the answers. But I've learned to keep them to myself. Some things are best left forgotten.

I leave the party glad that I won't be hung-over tomorrow. There will be no remorseful realisations. But the insecure part of me, even after a year of living without alcohol, worries about being the odd one out. That's something I've been unable to shake — that sense that you're not fully part of the group if you bail early. The next day, over lunch or a pub recovery session, people laugh and swap stories from the tailend of the party and you've got nothing to say. The things you do recall, people would rather not remember.

This is the first party of the season. From here, my Facebook feed starts to fill up with friends posting pictures of themselves wearing Santa hats and drinking champagne. There are endless discussions about aching livers, the horrendousness of hangovers, and the best way to cure them. Australians tend to favour a greasy fry-up and Bloody Marys, whereas my Scottish friends recommend packets of crisps and bottles of Irn-Bru. The Christmas spirit is so abundant, some people have two or three parties in one day. I meet one friend for lunch at the end of a big week, and she's so exhausted she looks like she's hanging on by her fingertips. The festive season is a marathon, not a sprint.

At work, management put out the annual Christmas-party warning, reminding us that the standards of the workplace are to be maintained at all social functions associated with Fairfax Media. I'm not sure when they last visited our newsroom, but they might want to rephrase that — unless they want us all to swear like wharfies and crack jokes that would make a sailor blush. The email also warns that harassment, offensive or inconsiderate behaviour, and excessive alcohol consumption — the hallmarks of any good Christmas party — are all off-limits. It's perhaps understandable that our bosses want to save us from ourselves: December is a month of mayhem. The weather's warming up, work finishes, and holidays begin, making it one of the busiest times of the year for emergency services. The last working day before Christmas marks the start of a huge spike in alcohol-related problems, with a 50 per cent increase in ambulance callouts for alcohol intoxication on that day alone. New Year's Eve is the same. Too much festive spirit can ruin even the best party.

On the day of the
Sunday Age
party, some colleagues ask if I'll drink. They suggest that a big night on the piss would be good for the dramatic arc of my book's narrative, and offer to assist me in my relapse. I can't think of anything more absurd or disappointing than getting this far only to get drunk two weeks before the end. Several colleagues joke that it just won't be the same without the seasonal Starkers outburst. One workmate remarks, ‘You're like a fat comedian who loses lots of weight. You're just not as interesting.'

I vow to challenge this perception at the party and, after a couple of cranberry and sodas, I front my editor, who's been sitting in a corner talking to the same two staff members for an hour, and demand that she mingle. It's a rare chance for her to spend time with our many talented freelancers, and she should get out there and press the flesh. She's surprisingly acquiescent, and starts to work the room.

As the evening progresses, I make more verbal gaffes, blurting out opinions perhaps best kept to myself, and I realise anew that it's not alcohol that makes me tactless; it's just my personality.

But in a sign that she forgives my forthrightness, my editor tells me that she thinks it's an extraordinary achievement to have gone so long without a drink, one that she confesses she doubts she could match. Even Cam, the man who told me my book about not drinking could be titled ‘My Year With No Mates', is full of praise. ‘Well done, Starkers. That's a fucking monster effort,' he says, as he clinks my lemon, lime, and bitters with his beer. I examine the comment for his trademark sarcasm, but find none. It makes me pause to reflect. A whole year without alcohol — it's really something. In recognition of this, in the annual staff awards I receive the Sober as a … Journalist Award for ‘being off the booze for over a year, despite occupational hazard'. It's quite a turnaround from last year's inaugural Jill Stark Drinking Award.

I leave the party at 11.00 p.m., feeling satisfied that I've had a good night but with the niggling sense I might be missing out on some fun. In the morning I wake up feeling ever so slightly hung-over, which is odd, given that I drank soft drinks and water all night. But I have all the signs: a dry mouth and a slight headache, and I'm very tired. Perhaps it was the cigarette smoke at the rooftop bar, or maybe I overdosed on sugary soft drinks. It could be a phantom hangover — the memory of Christmas parties past. Last year, I managed four hours' sleep between leaving the after-party pub session and rocking up to work, and previous years were no different. Maybe my body is so used to waking up in a state of wretched disrepair after this event, it has reacted accordingly. Whatever the reason, it's as if my body's reminding me of what I haven't missed over the last 12 months. Those hangovers, with the exhaustion, the scratchy throat, the craving for carbs, and the heightened feelings of melancholy and lethargy, were so debilitating. I'm not sure the reward I got from a few beers was worth enduring those mornings-after.

I ARRIVE EARLY
and sit at a picnic table in a courtyard near the emergency department. A man wearing shorts and a singlet is smoking a cigarette and shuffling slowly towards the cafe behind me, wheeling a drip beside him. He looks at me and I offer a smile; he casts his eyes to the ground. I wonder what he's in for. It's been six months since I was last here. When I came to meet Jon Currie at St Vincent's for an interview that evolved into a clinical diagnosis, I was wrapped up in a scarf and a thick coat.

A warm breeze gains momentum, picking up napkins and random detritus, and scattering them across the courtyard. My heart flutters in unison. It's taken so long to arrange these brain scans that I thought it would never happen. Part of me was glad. But when I got the email, it became real. I had to read it twice before it sank in. It came from a neuroimaging scientist at St Vincent's Centre for Clinical Neurosciences and Neurological Research. He said the scan would involve ‘high-resolution structural images, along with diffusion-weighted imaging, allowing us to generate 3D images of the white-matter tracts of the brain'. I wasn't entirely sure what it meant, but it sounded serious. Now I'm at the hospital, I'm terrified by what these images will show.

I make my way from the courtyard to the neuroimaging department next door. When I arrive, the front door is locked. It's Saturday. I press a buzzer and tell the voice that answers I'm here for an MRI. Suddenly, I am a sick person.

The MRI centre is in the basement. I can hear machines whirring, and the distant sound of an alarm. Other than that, it's eerily quiet. The reception area is decked out in tinsel and two fake Christmas trees, but nothing about this place feels festive. The receptionist takes an inordinate amount of time to find me on the system. I wonder if I've been filed under a different category from all the genuinely sick people — perhaps there's a separate sub-section for time-wasting binge drinkers.

I sit down on a squeaky blue chair. There are two other women in the waiting room, both in their sixties. When it's my turn, a nurse, Milly, ushers me down a long corridor into the MRI area, and we sit down at a desk. She pulls out a form, recording my weight and allergies. She asks if I could be pregnant, and if I have a pacemaker or any body piercings. No. Then she reels off a list of conditions I must disclose. Diabetes? No. Epilepsy? No. Heart disease? No. Any liver damage? I pause. She looks up, raising one eyebrow. ‘Not that I know of,' I reply in a whisper.

‘So we're scanning your brain today?' she says, the way a hairdresser might discuss options ahead of a cut and colour.

‘Yes, please,' I reply, my tone unintentionally eager.

I'm led into a changing room, where I take off all my clothes except my undies, and put on royal-blue hospital scrubs. As I fold my singlet and skirt and place them neatly in a metal locker, I wonder what Milly thinks of me. Does she know why my brain is about to be scrutinised from every conceivable angle? How many alcoholics does she see here? Or is it mostly people with brain tumours? Oh my God. What if they find a brain tumour? How many patients leave this department with life-changing, or life-ending, news? I close the locker door and lean my head against it. Slow, deep breaths.

When I come out, I'm met by the MRI technician. She tells me her name, and I instantly forget it because at the same moment I spot over her shoulder the machine I'm going to spend the next 45 minutes trapped inside. It's just as imposing as it looks in the hospital shows on television. It screams sickness. I lie down on what I suppose is a bed of sorts, my feet slightly raised. She tells me that she's going to put a cap on my head — it's a bit like a bike helmet. I must lie completely still. If I have an itch, I can't scratch it. She lays a blanket over me and inserts foam earplugs in my ears. ‘The machine is very loud and for one of the scans, it will vibrate quite a bit. Don't worry, that's normal,' she tells me, her voice sounding as if we're underwater.

Lying motionless under my blanket, I feel like a corpse wrapped in a shroud. She moves two padded plates to the side of each temple, securing my head in a gentle vice. The bed moves backwards into the machine as I see her, in the mirror above me, leave the room and take up a position behind a monitor in the viewing area next door. She watches me through the glass.

When it starts, the noise is frightening. A loud and angry buzzer sounds again and again. So much for my plan to meditate my way through this. The next one is lower, like a foghorn, and slower, but just as loud. After a while, I start to get pins and needles in my hands, wrists, and forearms. They're never still for this long. The last noise is the worst. It's a siren, fast-paced, and similar to the sound accompanying the green man on a pedestrian crossing, only two octaves higher and twice the speed.

After a few minutes, the vibrations start. First they're around my head, and then my temples, and then underneath me. They are violent. The machine shudders as if the green man were wielding a pneumatic drill. I really want this to stop, but I lie here. Still.

When it's over, the bed moves out of the machine and I jump up. The blood rushes to my head and I sway. I can only imagine how much more terrifying that experience would be if you knew that the results of the scan could alter the course of your life. I hope that's not the case for me.

The whole experience is finished in just over an hour. As I leave, I go past the waiting room and see a man in a baseball cap and shorts, his limbs limp and wasted. He's slumped forward in one of the blue chairs, snoring loudly. Fellow patients flick through gossip mags and fumble with their phones as though he were no more than an apparition, but I can't stop staring. This emaciated man, whose body has defied him, seems portentous. Is he my Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come?