I Didn’t Like Their Relationship With Alcohol.

“Why did it end?”

Oh so many reasons, I wanted to respond to the question.

It was the resident nosy busy-body of the office. The person who always wanted to know the latest gossip, but had an opinion on something even if they had no context.

Normally, I’d ignore the fuck out of this type of person… Only interacting with them on work-related stuff and skipping the social aspects. But this was someone who I had to work with closely, and needed to have the kind of relationship with in order to actually work successfully with them.

When I am asked questions about my personal life in a non-personal space… I tend to be very straightforward, almost to the point to put them off from asking more questions.

So when they asked me this question, I responded bluntly and truthfully…

“I didn’t like their relationship with alcohol.”

I didn’t elaborate on the details.

Like how I had come to realize that they’d been drinking much more than I noticed. Such as when I thought they were drinking water. Only for me to find later that a new bottle of clear alcohol was three quarters gone.

Secret drinking.

I’m the kind of person – and this is just me – that lets others see and know when I am having alcohol.

Mostly because they won’t be surprised when I don’t finish the drink and they find the glass still half full on a random table or bookcase.

The nosy busy-body’s eyes widened when I gave them my blunt answer.

They should have known I’d be blunt and non-colorful with my response.

I like to throw people off with it. It’s effective at preventing follow-up most of the time.

But don’t think I am a heartless person. I did not end things with someone just because they had what I perceived to be a problem with alcohol. It was all of the things that arose as a result of that.

• The moodiness.
• The rude slights to me and others around them.
• The seeming to need to have alcohol just to get through the evening.
• The expectation that I would pick up the slack on things that were really their responsibility.

And the not wanting to talk about their dependency on the substance.

Not in depth, by any means. Just more an acknowledgement that maybe it was something to self-assess, as it was having an impact on me and others.

But they did’t want to talk about it. And seemed peeved that I brought it up.

And I’m not one for people not wanting to self-analyze.

I do it all the time to myself. Probably too much.

“Get your shit together and figure out why you might be this way,” I say to myself.

And expected him to say to himself.

And the nosy busy-body to say to themselves.

Because that mother fucker annoyed me more than the guy I was in the relationship with.

I didn’t like their relationship to anything living.