I only ever drink alcohol when I socialize, and often not even then. I’m drinking less and less as I get older. I had virtually no alcohol from the first week of March, 2020, until mid-May of this year. Then I had a beer, at Julie and my first restaurant dinner.

Abstaining requires no effort on my part. Therefore I don’t claim any virtue for it. I’ve never loved alcoholic beverages. I used to push myself to drink in high school, college, and in my 20s, to be social, but now I don’t do that any more. I have a drink or two or even more when I want to. But usually I don’t want to.

On the other hand, I smoked a LOT of weed in college (we called it “pot” then), but I started worrying about it when I was in my 20s. Also, it stopped feeling good and started feeling bad then. So I haven’t touched any of that in nearly 30 years now. It’s kind of funny that I smoked it when it was illegal and took some effort to get, but now that it’s virtually legal and I can get cannabis as easily as coffee, I don’t bother.