Digital Diversion 10
The Trident Plan
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Chapter 10 The Reckoning
Jim’s urge to drink spiked. He recognized it, tamed it and remained planted in his chair, while the inner demons walked his imagination to the supermarket for beer and chips, wine and cheese.
He finally saw the truth: the Trident Plan wasn’t recovery, it was camouflage. The MMO was just a digital replacement for the intoxicating liquids and the other behaviors they led to.
Not as bad as drinking and carousing one could argue, but it was just another unhealthy addiction.
He opened a new document file on the PC and started typing.
“I just had one of the worst days of my life and I owe many people an apology for it. I brought this upon myself. You tried to warn me, you gave me support, and I squandered it. All for an alternative addiction.
“My plan to start gaming again counts as a relapse. I isolated myself, neglected healthy choices of living, and what small improvements I made slipped from my fingertips.
“I don’t know if the arts, writing and drawing, are addictive. I never gave them a chance. My suspicion is they are not, thus I was not drawn to them as strongly as the gaming, a moth drawn towards the flame.
“This is about humbling myself, not an appeal for pity, sympathy or empathy. I must start again, bankrupt of moral ground, starving for redemption, accepting of my powerlessness in the face of my addictions.
“I cannot blame anyone for seeing Sisyphus in me, forever trying to start over. I don’t know how many times I have rolled my addiction boulder to the tip of the peak, only to have it roll over me to the bottom once again.
“My greatest error has been taking my addiction with me up the hill. This time I will leave it at the bottom, entrust myself to a higher power and walk up the hill unencumbered.
“I don’t need to defeat my addictions, I need to leave them to rest. They will always exist. I do not possess the power to banish them, but I can avert my eyes and behold the rest of life I’ve been missing “
He made copies and included a personal note for each recipient, Samuel, Marge, the Group.
He thought confession would feel like failure. Instead, it felt like the first real thing he’d said in months.
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