Zero Proof

I grew up following the rules. I was a good, quiet kid who kept to himself, didn’t make waves, and did his best not to disrupt the status quo. Years later, therapy gave me language for this. It wasn’t politeness or maturity. It was survival. I learned how to stay small so I could make it out of small-town Vermont in one piece.

It wasn’t until I moved to New York City that I started testing the waters of living on my own and seeing what kinds of trouble were even available to me. Not the headline-making kind. I wasn’t looking to blow up my life. I had just played the part of the good boy for so long that I was curious what existed on the other side. What it might feel like to bend the rules a little and live to tell about it.

About a month into living in New York, after settling into classes, finding a part-time job, and juggling the rush of new independence, I crossed a line I wouldn’t really look back at until 23 years later.

I got a job as an usher at an Off-Broadway theater, the Variety Arts Theatre in Union Square. I loved it. I got paid to hand people Playbills, walk them to their seats, and watch an Off-Broadway show every night. The show playing when I started was in its final days, and another was waiting in the wings.

That next show was Adult Entertainment, a new play by Elaine May. It followed characters working in the adult industry and centered around a public access program inspired by The Robyn Byrd Show. There were musical interludes, Danny Aiello, Jeannie Berlin, Mary Birdsong, and a sharpness that felt dangerous and thrilling all at once. By opening night, I could recite most of it by heart.

Opening night is where this story really begins.

I was 18 years old, months away from my birthday, and years away from being legally allowed to drink. At the opening night party, there was an open bar. Alcohol had never been much of a presence in my life. My parents didn’t drink while I was growing up, so I didn’t have much exposure to it. But this was my first time in a room where it flowed freely, and instead of turning it down like I’d been taught, I raised a glass and drank red wine.

I couldn’t tell you if it was a cabernet or a pinot noir, but I know it was red. The photos from that night, complete with wine-stained teeth, confirm it.

The stain wasn’t the real effect, though. The real change was who I became once I was drunk.

I wasn’t shy anymore. I wasn’t quiet. I was sociable, overly friendly, and having an incredible time. For the first time, I felt what it was like to lower my guard. To stop being cautious. To forget, even briefly, that I was still in the closet and constantly managing myself.

If this was what freedom felt like, I wanted more of it.

And more came. Round after round, year after year. I rarely turned down a night out in New York. Happy hour turned into bar hopping, which turned into crawling into bed well after two in the morning. There were bartenders I fell in love with, strangers who became MySpace friends, and an endless stream of drunk texts and voicemails left for anyone I thought deserved my late-night thoughts.

I genuinely liked who I was when I was drinking. Even after I came out and no longer felt the need to hide, I think I liked that person even more. He was honest, friendly & carefree. I liked him enough that I built an entire online identity around my favorite cocktail. Cosmopaulitan wasn’t just a name. It was a shorthand for the version of myself I felt most comfortable letting people see.

But as anyone who’s spent time with alcohol knows, it wasn’t always that guy. There were nights I wish I could erase, memories I wish hadn’t happened. Still, if you don’t learn from the missteps, they’re just wreckage without meaning.

When I moved from New York to Los Angeles, I used to joke that I was entering recovery on the West Coast. It was less of a joke than an observation. Drinking in New York was effortless. My favorite gay bar on the Upper East Side was two blocks from my apartment, and the number of times I stumbled home is honestly embarrassing.

Los Angeles didn’t work that way. Public transit wasn’t an option. Ride-share apps were still new and unreliable. Poor choices were made. Consequences followed. Nevertheless, she persisted.

The shift really became visible during the pandemic. Isolation has a way of turning habits into mirrors. Weekends alone with a twelve-pack of Trulys turned into finishing it faster than I wanted to admit. Then it became two twelve-packs over three days. I told myself I didn’t have a problem because I didn’t drink during the workweek. I showed up. I did my job. I was accountable. Surely blowing off steam on the weekend didn’t count.

At the beginning of this year, I started a new workout program with an online trainer, Will Vargas. In preparation, I watched videos and read a stack of PDFs Will provided on the program. This wasn’t just about the gym. It was about restructuring my life. Nutrition was part of it, and the first two weeks were strict. Alcohol had to go. It could come back later, but not yet.

A few days before New Year’s Eve, I finished my last case of Trulys and made a point not to buy more.

Within two weeks, my body changed. Was it the macros, the workouts, the sleep, or the absence of alcohol? Probably all of it. The results were immediate enough that two weeks without drinking turned into Dry January, which quietly turned into a year.

On December 29, I will have gone 365 days without alcohol. I haven’t been able to say that since I was 17.

I don’t have a lesson to hand out. The benefits are exactly what you’d expect. Clearer thinking. Better skin. Fewer apologies to my liver. I was more productive this year than I’ve been in a long time. I woke up without hangovers. Most mornings, I went straight to the gym without hesitation. I skipped maybe three planned workouts all year because I wanted more sleep.

As the months passed, I missed drinking less and less. I still went to bars. I still celebrated with friends. I tried mocktails and NA beers. Sparkling water replaced Trulys. I didn’t crave alcohol except at Folsom Street Fair and Dore Alley, where a beer would have felt nice. I didn’t have one.

When production wrapped on Misguided, our DP Scott brought champagne for the final shot. I declined but raised a seltzer for the toast. There were moments when I thought I could have a drink, but I knew I wouldn’t be able to write this essay if I did.

I wanted to see if I could do it. I wanted to hold myself accountable. When the calendar flips to December 29, I’ll know I made it a full year. A year that the shy, quiet kid from Vermont didn’t disappear. He grew up, lived a life, and is still capable of learning, changing, and shaking up the status quo.

That’s something worth raising a zero-proof glass of champagne to.