It's the First Drink That Got Me Drunk.

It's the first drink that got me drunk, not the second 12 pack or the 10th shot.

It sounds so obvious, but that bit of wisdom alluded me for a long time.

I thought that if I ate a meal first things would go better. I thought that if I only drank beer that all those bad things that kept happening to me would stop. I thought that if I only drank at home, avoided the bar scene, how could I get in trouble? Some guy even told me that eating a stick of butter before drinking would grease my stomach and I could consume all I wanted without getting sloppy drunk. I never tried that one, but I did try everything I could think of to drink safely. Sometimes something would work for a little while, but eventfully those bad things would start all over again.

Bad things didn't happen to me every time I got drunk, but every time bad things happened to me I was drunk.

I racked my brain to come up with a system that would let me drink without all the associated problems.
The only system that I never considered was not drinking. That just seemed to be too drastic a solution.

The idea that the first drink got me drunk never occurred to me. Ok, maybe it did occur to me once or twice, but I didn't entertain that notion long. There had to be a way to make this thing work. I saw other guys that could drink and bad things didn't happen to them like they happened to me. What were they doing? They would have a couple of drinks and then go home to their family. But for me, after a couple of drinks, I really had a taste for a couple more, and then a couple more, etc, etc. Going home right away wasn't in the game plan.

Pain for me was the great motivator, then I heard that the first drink is the one that gets me drunk. I can't get drunk if I don't drink the first one. What a stunning revelation.


Your friend on this long strange trip,
shadowalker