I’m kind of a bush league alcoholic. I bring this up because I was thinking about Anthony Bourdain and what it was that might had driven him to suicide. I was a fan, even have an actual autographed copy of Kitchen Confidential. That book provides a clue: “Your body is not a temple, it’s an amusement park. Enjoy the ride.”
That’s a point of view I clearly shared when I was 25 years old and pounding down half a quart of vodka every day. Smoked a little weed, sometimes, and cigarettes. Two packs a day. Good times.
I gave up weed when I joined the ranks of law enforcement. After years of trying, I finally managed to divorce cigarettes. I was 40, give or take. And liquor? Meet my little friend.
Most days now, I have 3 or 4 drinks a day. I almost never drink before 6:00 pm. Four drinks are not enough to get me truly drunk; just enough to let me play loose and aggressive on the play-money poker sites (I presently have $4.5 million on Poker Stars). I’m not likely to come down with cirrhosis but my liver doesn’t love me. My other internal organs are similarly disapproving, but such is the nature of compromise with addiction. When I drink 5 drinks I feel it – I lose at poker, I’m slow-witted in the morning and my tennis game is crap. (It usually is anyway, to be fair.) When I have 3 drinks I feel good in the morning and my tennis game improves, but that worm in my ear promises that I’ll feel MUCH better if I have 4 drinks the next night. And I always listen to the worm.
I’m retired now, but I never missed work because of my drinking. I have the usual amount of depression but if you’re not depressed from time to time you’re not paying attention. Drinking set a bad example for my youngest daughter which I stupidly figured out too late, but what do you expect from a half-hearted alcoholic? I’ve been happily married for 27 years and anyone who knew me 28 years ago (or longer) would have given 9 to 2 odds against that ever happening.
I know this, though – everything I say about my alcoholism is a rationalization. I’m just a not-very-accomplished drunk, which for me is par. I can live with it. I never had any inclination towards really diving into the amusement park, the way Bourdain did. I won’t eat half-cooked entrails or fish fermented in dirt, and I never had any inclination to try drugs that required injection. Tony lived hard and fast and like many others (Hemingway comes to mind) he burned out too soon. I’m guessing so, anyway. I’ll outlast him by 10 years, maybe 15, who knows? In some ways, I win. In some ways, not so much.
