I Do Not Drink Alcohol
I committed a social "faux pas" this weekend at a wedding. One of my boyfriend's friends, who I'm somewhat familiar with, has a habit of trying to regulate how much each and every friend is drinking. He sat at our table and would, every now and then, get up, walk around the table, and push people to go back up to the bar and refill their drink if their glass was near empty. It was SO weirdly obsessive! Anyhow, he forgot that he tangled with me once before when trying to get me to drink. While I was drinking water, he singled me out, and asked, "WHAT is that you're drinking?," in a tone suggesting that I'm supposed to be drinking something with alcohol. To which I just blurted (because this funny idea popped into my head and I couldn't let the opportunity go), "It's called boundaries." He made a bee-line out of there, and although my boyfriend thought what I said was funny, he was also a bit ticked that I hurt the guy's feelings. Ugh! Good thing I didn't follow it up with, "It's great! You should try some!" or say "It's called Try-to-get-me-to-drink-and-I'll-rip-your-face-off!"
So I've been looking for socially appropriate ways to EFFECTIVELY put my foot down because I'm tired of repeating "No thank you. I don't drink.," to little avail. Upon finding suggestions such as shown on this site: http://www.wikihow.com/Turn-Down-a-Drink, I can't help but be a LITTLE bit pissed that non-drinkers are advised to tiptoe around the feelings of pushy drinkers (by making up an excuse) when they don't even care if non-drinkers DON'T want to be pushed! I suppose in the future, I'll just have to be more aware of who the alcohol pushers are and where they are at all times, and walk away when I see them coming so that they don't even have the opportunity to say anything to me.
