Tim Dowling: I missed the dry January deadline. Wine it is, then
Like a lot of people I usually give up alcohol for the month of January: privation is easier when everybodyâs on the same page.
This year, I didnât bother. At first this was just a question of missing a deadline: 1 January came and went, along with a bottle of red wine left over from Christmas. But a week later, I was congratulating myself on my foresight. As many people are learning, this was the wrong January to give up drinking.
It is a cold winter morning and I am standing in my office shed, hands in my arm pits, nursing a faint lockdown hangover â an unwise extra glass, or two, before bed. The electric heater in the corner has been on for an hour, but my chair is still too cold to sit on.
I am staring back across the garden at the empty kitchen, thinking that this would have been an ideal January to be put under house arrest. Youâd be doing what everybody else was doing anyway, but at the end of the month youâd have something to show for it: time served.
My wife walks into the kitchen with two bags from the supermarket. I cross the garden.
âHow was it?â I say.
âIt was a shitshow,â she says. âThe queue to get in was backed up all the way to the station.â
âI donât really know where the station is,â I say, peering into one of the bags.
âDonât just look,â my wife says. âHelp.â
âDid you buy me wine?â I say, pulling out a bottle of white.
âI noticed youâve just decided to press on,â she says.
âIâll probably give up for February instead,â I say. âItâs shorter.â
âThatâs up to you,â says my wife, who gave up drinking last January and never went back.
âAnd I did October,â I say. âSo, really, itâs a bit soon.â My wife raises no objection â just an eyebrow.
We have lunch together, as we have nearly every day since the pandemic began.
âYou know,â I say, âJanuaryâs not so bad. For the first week itâs new socks every day.â My wife looks up.
âLunch is silent reading only,â she says.
âThen itâs like house arrest, but someone gave you a pasta machine for Christmas.â
âYou know the rules,â she says. âIf you havenât got a book, look at your phone.â
After lunch, I return to my office. The heater is on a timer that is set to shut off for an hour in the afternoons so I donât fall asleep, but today it eventually becomes too cold to sit still. Standing again, I see the oldest one sitting at his computer in the kitchen. I cross the garden.
He doesnât look up when I walk in; he continues to scrutinise his screen. I canât tell if heâs working or not, so I creep silently round him and make myself a coffee.
âYou know what they say,â he says. At first Iâm not sure if heâs talking to me.
âYes,â I say. âOr maybe not.â
âThey say that if you donât have a naked neighbour at the window, then you are the naked neighbour at the window.â I pause to give this aphorism the consideration it deserves.
âI am definitely the naked neighbour at the window,â I say.
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âAre you?â he says.
âYeah,â I say. âThe window is right next to my sock drawer.â
âWho knew?â he says.
âBut the glass is fogged by some damp between the double glazing, so Iâm sort of pixelated.â
âThatâs your story,â he says.
âSome guy was supposed to fix it last year, but the estimate was insane,â I say.
âThis is my Zoom call starting, so⊠,â he says.
I return to my office and override the heaterâs timer, but I can still feel the cold of the floor through my shoes. I stand looking back at the house, coffee in hand. Above the kitchen I see my back bedroom window, which hardly seems fogged at all from this vantage. In fact, I can see deep into the room, aglow with late afternoon sun. Anyone standing at that window would look like an emperor giving a speech. In his new clothes.
âThe light will be different in the mornings,â I whisper, wondering if itâs too early for a drink.