A Sober Chance

There are so many things that I wanted to talk about today… the annoyance of pest control, the power of perspective (which may end up being a blog for a different day), how quickly emotions can sneak up on you, and even how hard it is to process things for which you weren’t mentally prepared.

Instead, I want to talk about the excitement of rediscovering your surroundings.

Now, I’ve lived in Lafayette for 16 years, so I feel like I know Lafayette pretty well. I’ve experienced a lot in those years and I know that there’s always something new popping up around the corner.

However, the first half of those 16 years were spent doing a lot of whatever I wanted. I did the club scene. I did the Mardi Gras thing. I did the party thing. I did the Festival International thing. I did the happy-hour after work with co-workers bar thing. I did all of these things, but I always did them with alcohol.

So far, the second half of those years is looking completely different. I quit the club scene long before I came to know Jesus, but everything else that I was still doing involved me drinking. So when I quit drinking, I slowly began to stop doing all of the other things. The reason? I couldn’t see myself enjoying them without alcohol.

But here’s the thing… whether you like to drink or not, Lafayette has so much to offer. Other than your typical outing places like the movies or the bowling alley or the mall, we have so much culture to experience. We have some of the best music, festivals, and food you can find in the world!

Over the past couple of months, I have gone downtown more than I have over the past two years. Because of that, I’ve discovered a few good places to eat, a shop that I really like, and some art galleries that I never even knew existed. I even found out that we have a record shop!

This past Saturday, I experienced the Art Walk for the first time with a friend of mine and I had so much fun. Musicians on the street, various types of art in the museum, and vendors with unique finds that couldn’t be duplicated if you tried. Yes, there were also things going on that I don’t agree with, but there was so much more that I loved!

I felt very reflective on my drive home. I felt like God was showing me a whole new Lafayette.

The friend that I went with texted and thanked me for going because she had fun. But then I had to thank her, because I wouldn’t have gone had it not been for her. She is the one that is almost always willing to get up and go do anything. She’s the one that’s been doing more things downtown and in the community and allowing me to tag along.

We’ve also already got plans to go checkout two Downtown Alive! shows next month. That used to be one of my absolute favorite things to do! I would leave work, go grab a Daiquiri, then head downtown with whoever wanted to go. I didn’t always get drunk, but I always had fun. But that was another thing I stopped doing years ago.

I said before that I felt like God has been revealing more and more things in my heart, allowing me to discover new things about myself that had always been there but I never knew it. Well, it’s like He’s doing that in my social life as well. I feel like God is giving me some time to rediscover all of these things that I used to love to do while drinking. Only this time I’m completely sober. So I’m experiencing everything with a new heart and new eyes. And I guess a new me.