I Did Flowers Instead of Doing Alcohol

I Did Flowers Instead of Doing Alcohol

An Independence Experience

July 3, 2024

By A. Rochelle Harper-Boswell

I did flowers instead of doing alcohol.

It wasn’t some grand plan.

It was one small choice.

I’d already experienced what it meant to live āFree (alcohol-free). Beginning July 1, 2021, I spent nearly two years rediscovering myself as alcohol was absent from my everyday life. But in 2023, I returned to old beliefs about alcohol, and before long, I was soaking down my life again.

As I found my way back to living āFree, I began noticing something I hadn’t expected. There was an empty space where alcohol used to live—not just in my body, but in my routines.

I called ahead for dinner and had about fifteen minutes before it would be ready. Normally, I would have found a place to sit with a glass of wine while I waited.

But on July 3, 2024, after nearly a year of questioning my whys and challenging my old beliefs about alcohol, I found myself pulling into our local feed store instead.

I’d been wanting yellow flowers for years but had never planted any since moving to Virginia in 2018.

As I wandered through the garden center, something inside of me became empowered instead of overpowered. Looking for various yellow flowers instead of brands of wine stirred that old feeling of joy from within my own planting ground.

I wasn’t looking for a drink anymore.

I was looking for something that could grow.

I loaded my cart with a sunflower, bright yellow pansies, chrysanthemums, succulents, and a few flowers whose names I didn’t yet know. I grabbed a couple of āFree sodas from the old red Coca-Cola cooler, where Mr. Otis, the black-and-white cat, was peacefully sleeping on top. I smiled all the way back to my Subaru and headed to pick up dinner.

That little stop changed something.

It wasn’t really about the flowers.

It was about choosing myself.

Every time I see yellow flowers, I’m reminded that one small choice can begin changing the landscape of a life.

I’m grateful I did flowers instead of doing alcohol.

It’s the kind of step that flourishes within instead of soaking me down.

I wonder…

What will I choose to plant today?

Have you ever wondered this?

Together; each in our unique way.

Rochelle