I invited my sister and her boyfriend over for dinner Thursday night. I chose a pasta recipe that looked hearty and tasty, then I noticed it called for some white wine. Normally I would just leave it out, but it seemed like it would make a difference in this particular recipe. So, I decided to buy some wine. I would use some for the recipe, and my sis and the b-friend could drink the rest of it during dinner. I planned to buy everything for the dinner on Wednesday night. That would mean I would have a bottle of wine sitting in my kitchen overnight.

I thought about it. Was this a big deal? I could imagine people from my Smart Recovery meeting saying it was a big deal, but I didn�t really feel it was. Did I subconsciously choose this recipe to engineer the situation of having wine in my house overnight? I don�t think so. Was I worried that the very presence of the wine would cause some kind of disciplinary breakdown? I�ve seen plenty of alcohol up close since I�ve quit drinking, so, no.

I tried testing myself by considering a similar situation. If I bought some kind of �forbidden� food, say, a box of Bugles, for a houseguest who was arriving the next day, would I be likely to dip into it? Well, yes. Yes, I would, but that doesn�t mean anything. It doesn�t matter if I eat the delicious Bugles. It does matter if I drink.

So I reaffirmed my decision to buy the wine. Then I thought about actually buying it, in the store. Here�s where I hit a more serious yet more ridiculous obstacle. What if someone saw me buying the wine? There are less than five people in this city who know I�ve quit drinking, and they�re not likely to be in the supermarket. But what if they were? How pathetic would I seem -- �I need it for a recipe.� Oh, God.

After I realized I�d spent most of my day worrying about the wine, I called my sister and asked her to buy it and bring it with her when she came over. Whatever! Whatever!

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