Let's Talk: Drinking

Today I overheard someone lament the days of yore when their consumption of alcohol was, apparently, much higher than it is now.  There was moment of pining for the old days, of overconsumption to the point of "blacking out and not remembering it the next day."

Inside my head, I was thinking "That's probably the saddest thing I'm going to hear all day."  Well, right now it's 6:15 in the evening and, so far, it still is.

Now, I don't frown at drinking in general.  I'm mostly a social drinker, I'll have something when other people are having something.  I don't do much in the way of beer or ale, but I like drinks with vodka, rum, gin, and other alcohols in them.  I've mastered some really great techniques for martinis, margaritas, and other mixed drinks, and apparently I make one of the best Tequila Sunrises a few people I know have ever had.

But drinking and I have a weird connection, and I think it's influenced how I've looked at people who do overconsume.



I always get the feeling that it's posts like these that are going to make people angry.  So far, so good.

Let's start out with the basics:  I've never been drunk.  I've never fallen down from being disoriented, I've never slurred my words, I've never awakened the next morning with my head pounding.  I may not remember what I've done every evening for my entire life, but none of that has to do with alcohol, it just has to do with my terrible memory.

My first encounter with alcohol was when I was little, and I'd be fascinated by the adult drinks my parents were having with their friends.  I'd be relegated to milk, juice, or water, and they were pouring drinks from tall bottles, short bottles, or drinking directly from the bottle.  The only drink I had known to that point that you'd drink from the bottle was soda, and that was something I'd only get once in a while, and never straight out of the bottle ("you'll chip a tooth," I was told).  Occasionally my father might let me have a tiny sip of a glass of wine, probably no more than half a teaspoon taste of it, and I was never really fond of it, but I felt more grown-up.

My first real "drink" of alcohol was in Ireland, actually.  I somehow managed to go the entire trip without a single drop to drink.  I had turned twenty-one a few weeks before, and up until that point I just never really felt like having anything.  Nobody I knew in high school ever pressured me into drinking, and my social life was limited enough that I just didn't really have the desire to try it before it became legal.  When I was in Ireland, it still wasn't a "ugh, drinking" mentality so much as "well, I could sit in this bar and drink like a lot of other students on this class trip, or I could go explore that part of the countryside I haven't seen yet, or go walking down the streets of this town, or any number of other activities."

Then I encountered a little old lady at the Duty Free shop on our way back.  She was sweet, like if you took the embodiment of "Grandma" and condensed it so it was just over five feet tall.  She was set up with a table with tiny little paper cups, and behind her was a rack of seltzer water.  I was a bit thirsty, so I figured a tiny drink would sate my thirst.

I don't really remember boarding the plane or flying home.  I just remember the burning.  Apparently I put away a six-pack of Sprite trying to make it stop.

For those who haven't tried grappa, picture all those grape husks that are left after the delicious juice is taken out for wine.  Now, ferment the husks until you get a new liquid out of them.  That's grappa.  I haven't tried it, but I'm pretty sure you can peel paint with it and kill deer ticks by pouring it on them.

From there, I slowly got the nerve back up to drink socially.  I started with screwdrivers at a bowling alley (which just tasted like sour orange juice), and worked my way to martinis, then I started studying other mixed drinks, figuring out what flavors I liked, and how to blend them together to make cocktails.

I'll have a couple drinks per week now, perhaps two in one night if it's been a really long day.  Most days I don't, but that's mostly because I don't want to put in the effort and would be satisfied with a regular drink.

A confession: there's a part of me that wonders if I didn't miss out on something by not being a heavier drinker when I was younger.  There was a story I heard on the radio years ago that the kids in college who get the sickest from drinking too much are the ones who had no experience with it before, and had no idea where their limits were.  I'm not sure where my limits are, so I set my own.

Then again, I remind myself that if I ever reach a point where I have to wonder if I'm near my limit, that's probably a good point to stop anyway.  Plus, I have no idea what kind of "drunk" I'd be.  Maybe I'd be a fun one.  Maybe I'd be a depressing one and I'd just fall apart.  Maybe I'd start to panic as my heart rate changed or things became harder to understand and I'd become manic.

But I listen to people who used to be alcoholics (Chris Hardwick tells a lot of stories on The Nerdist podcast, and his talking to Bob Sagat about their drinking buddy days is pretty eye-opening), and they talk about how the alcohol lied to them by making them think they were having more fun and were better friends when they were drinking, when in fact they weren't.  They talk about their spiral downward, and how they had to hit rock bottom to realize what it was doing to them.

Now, this is NOT to say that the person who said that statement today is an alcoholic.  Not. At. All.  And, I'd like to go on the record by stating that I don't think people who drink a lot at parties or bars are alcoholics.  I'm just stating something that's affected my thinking about alcohol.

Now, maybe someone else can explain it to me, but simply on the level of "I want to drink a lot and get wasted," I always wonder "Why?"  What's so great about it?  What is it about being in that state that makes things more enjoyable than by only having, say, a single drink or two?  Is it a sense of freedom that comes with being intoxicated?  Is there something that happens to a person's mindset that changes when they're drunk that they find either comforting or liberating?  When a person states they want to drink until they "black out," why would anybody want to not be able to account for a chunk of their life?  It doesn't take away the responsibility of what you did during that time in case something goes wrong.

I don't want to come across as sounding like "I'm a good person, you're all bad people for doing this," but I honestly just don't understand it on any kind of level that I think about.  Maybe it's a social thing, where people who consume drinks together are more free and open with each other, which tightens the bonds of friendship.  Perhaps it's a matter of stress relief, where being intoxicated allows a person to simply shed all of their issues for a while and it can act like an "escape."  I'm certainly no stranger to looking for "escapes" when things get stressful, as my extensive time watching television, movies, and video games will prove.

However, I don't think I'll ever stop thinking that it's kind of sad when a person will state that they want to simply get "plastered," as I've heard a few people in my life say.  "Wasted," "bombed," "loaded," "smashed," "tanked," and other words along those lines have reached my ears, and each time I find myself looking at the person and just feeling bad that something is going on in their life that has made them want to be in that state. I want to ask what's wrong, but since it's usually in a group of people I don't want to pull the conversation away from what the others seem to consider a "fun" topic.  Plus, I always get the feeling the person will say "what?  Nothing's wrong.  Why?"

Perhaps it's that, like I stated yesterday (after massive rambling) that I can't ever stop thinking.  Maybe alcohol lets people shut their brains off for a while and simply enjoy life as it comes...the few times I've had enough where I could really feel the fact that I had several, I could feel that I was still thinking just as much as I ever was, and I think that if I ever felt that slow down, I'd start to panic, because thinking about things is what I do.

I'd love to solve this mystery that has puzzled me for years, but even once I know, I somehow suspect it won't change my drinking habits much.  I'll stick to my martinis, my ciders, my "exotic" beers (mmm, raspberry).  I'll drink with you when you're having one, but please don't expect me to match you drink for drink, or toss back shots with you, or do jello shots off a girl's stomach, or hold a tube to my mouth while someone pours a drink into a funnel.  It just doesn't feel like "me."