Quitting drinking is a fine idea. It’s destroyed many good people. My sister never knew what hit her, from party drinking in college til the end at age 43, her entire adult life. To encounter people who knew her only as a drunk—by and large a convivial and goodhearted drunk (drinking amplified on her gregarious and animated personality) but a drunk nonetheless...was hard to take. They never knew the thoughtful and engaging and capable person she intrinisically had been before the alcohol made inroads, the memory of which she knew I still was in possession of and clung to. The last words she spoke to me in person were “You know me, I can beat this.” And I answered her, as often before: ”Of course I know you can, I know you have it in you.” And I did know this. Unfortunately time ran out.
I’m just thankful that her kids knew some of that good, something to remember and put in the balance against all the countless memories of binges, hospital trips and DTs etc. She was very susceptible to alcohol from the first; unfairly so, I’d say. And worst, she had a husband who, criminally, kept alcohol always within her reach til the end. Anyway, people call it failure of the will, but for some it’s a whole other order of magnitude. I wish our family had gotten it together to intervene sooner than we did, by which time much of our support was lost on her.
Anyway, you get me on this subject you get digressions like this... I know you don’t have a chronic problem, but best all the same to take a break and step back from it. You do feel better and get more done after all...
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