What it means to turn 5 years sober

Fives years ago today (okay five years and two days ago but let's say today), I showed up at a company party in Austin. I carefully avoided all the people I'd mentioned my sobriety to, and took enough whiskey shots to eventually forget that I cared what they thought. I followed the CEO, who was also my sometimes fuck, from that company party to some bar down what I can only imagine to be 6th Street, or some other famous street in Austin that I'm supposed to know exists because I'm in that demographic of humans that is supposed to know enough intimate details about Austin to prove something. At that second place that night, I watched as my very drunk former lover/sometimes-still-fuck was hit on by other women who also confused fucking powerful men with their own power. At some point he and I both snuck out to assemble at his hotel.

I remember going through the same motions I had gone through in so many cities over so many years, walking to the front desk of the hotel and claiming the ro…