From time to time, we will post short interviews with interesting people about their thoughts and feelings on women and drinking. There is such a wide array of perspectives about this topic, and we are excited to gain insight into as many as possible and to share them with you.

Star Rockers is a musician, writer, and recovering alcoholic who writes a blog called Running High. She also recently started an online community called the Running High Club, a free social network for recovering addicts who use running as a way to stay sober.

When she isn’t running, Star works as a graphic designer for the Seattle literary magazine Crab Creek Review and performs at various coffee houses and music venues in the Northwest. She lives on an island in the Puget Sound with her husband and son.

Drinking Diaries: How old were you when you had your first drink and what was it?

Star Rockers: When I was three, my dad was drinking what looked like a Pepsi, but it was just the Pepsi can with beer inside.  I  suppose it was to hide how much he was drinking.  I took a sip thinking it was going to be Pepsi, and he laughed when I spit the beer out.

How did/does your family of origin treat drinking?

There are those who abstain like it’s their religion and those who drink the same way.  And it’s mostly the men who drink and the women who don’t.  Not many happy marriages in my family, as you can probably guess.

How do you approach alcohol in your everyday life?

We are like old lovers who no longer speak.  I see him out occasionally, but I pretend we never met.

If you have kids, how will you or do you handle the subject of drinking?

I have a two-year-old son. In our community, drinking seems to be a rite of passage for high schoolers, just like it was when I was growing up.  So I will probably spend a lot of time calling him on his bullshit and praying he comes out the other side.

Have you ever had a phase in your life when you drank more or  less?

I got drunk, I got sober, I got drunk, I got sober.  So far, that’s where the story ends.

Has culture or religion influenced your drinking?

Running High: We Run to Get High and Stay Sober

I was raised Catholic, and the relationship between Catholicism and alcohol is complicated.  Growing up, every priest I ever met was an alcoholic.  And we were encouraged to drink wine when we took communion.  It was the blood of Christ, of course, but it tasted a lot like regular old wine.  My father was an usher and he got to stand at the end of the line and drink whatever was left in the cup after everyone had gone ahead.  Even as a child, that seemed to me like a pretty good gig.

Do you have a favorite book, song, or movie about drinking?

Nouvelle Vague covering the Dead Kennedy’s song “Too Drunk to Fuck”.  How can a song that makes drinking sound so pathetic make me want to reconsider eight years of sobriety?  Who knows.  But it does.

Why do, or don’t you, choose to drink?

So maybe the sober me isn’t as cool and rock n’ roll as the drinking me, but at least this person really exists.

I don’t know about you, but after I’ve completed a long run, I feel like I’m entitled to drink anything or eat anything. Hence, the reason I haven’t lost weight when I’ve trained for the two half marathons I’ve run. And I’ll bet that many, many triathletes and marathoners celebrate their finishes with pasta or pizza and beer.

Apparently, I’m not the only one who feels she deserves a treat after exercising. A kind Drinking Diaries reader sent a link to this article, which came to the surprising conclusion that people who drink may exercise more than people who don’t (or who only drink lightly).

And then there are The Boston Hash House Harriers, a group of runners who meet once a week and call themselves, “a drinking club with a running problem.” First, interested runners meet at a pre-determined location, and then they follow a trail, with stops along the way for beer or water breaks. You don’t have to drink alcohol to be a member, but most people, it seems, do, and you have to be 21 to join.

Read below about the “Beer Check(s)”  and the end of the trail (quoted directly from the Boston Hash club’s website):