Porcelain: A Memoir

by Moby

I worked under the assumption that God was perpetually disappointed in me.

“Well, have fun. Thanks for coming.” He walked off. I stood next to the DJ booth, ostensibly paying attention to Jacques’s terrible mixing, trying to figure out whether I was allowed to look at the swingers in the loft. Finally I worked up my courage and went to find the bathroom. I assumed there were codes of behavior at sex parties, but I had no idea what any of them were. Could I look? What should I say if someone tried to have sex with me? Was I allowed to be straight? Was I going to be chopped into pieces and left in a Dumpster? These all seemed like legitimate questions and concerns.

Either way, there was no romantic tension between us—just unrequited worship on my part.

I claimed that I wasn’t judgmental when it came to drinking and drugs, but I was. I felt evolved and sober. I sat in bars and laughed with my friends, but I was secretly self-satisfied, judging my friends for being sloppy drunks. I selectively forgot the few thousand times pre-sobriety when I’d been the sad drunk in the corner of a bar, listening to Hank Williams and blinking tears into my beer.

Joey went to the bar and got me another beer. In an instant everything had changed. The music sounded better and the filthy bar had become the most interesting place on earth. After only one drink my constant awkwardness abated and I felt like my true self. Sobriety was complicated and difficult and sad. Drinking offered salvation and safety. When I drank, the world felt welcoming and simple, and I was happy.