We grow up living with the cliches that surround "admitting is the first step" and staying "clean and sober," knowing about an alcoholics reality, but as members of the educated, liberal classes, the thought that our microbrews have a hand in our own personal over consumption, never stretches to anything more serious than how fat these hefty meals-in-a-pint are going to make us. Yep, we love out microbrews- I was ushered into that snobby culture at 17, when beer was previously $2 for 40 ounces and a shoulder tap away. Pre 17, and good beer was judged not on its flavor but on its alcohol content, and something as strong as Steel Reserves was as classy as it got, because damn it got you drunk fast. All it took was one visit to a UW college house for a night of drinking at the beginning of my senior year, when those cultured-college-folk shook a pitying head at my reach for, what was it, maybe a half rack of Coors Light? A shadow of confusion on my part and then Duncan, the crusading liberator of my beer-quality-ignorance, simply pointed to that other QFC beer section, the shelf full of 22 and 24 ounce bottles of pure, bitter, microbrew goodness. In quantity you would never have called me an alcoholic, 1 or 2 of those powerful brews was all I ever needed, but a habit was formed that would be fostered by the 4 following years of tasting and falling for every amber, blond, ipa and pale ale that found itself in my reach.
To that love of microbrews, and the deeply entrenched urban-liberal practice it is to indulge in those local treasures, add the drinking culture that surrounds any sports played beyond high school or college (hello..."my drinking team has a rugby problem????") and before you know it, one would never think that drinking 7 days a week, polishing off a 6 pack of Dead Guy with dinner, making plans to drink at 11 and lasting until the evening, spending money on beer instead of shoes, calling a hangover a regular Sunday morning, or Monday, or Tues..., is anything short of the absolute norm.
Am I driving at the point that I am an alcoholic? No, not necessarily. Am I one of the heavier drinkers in my little world, quick to the bar counter, the pitcher, the group shots, the second, third and fourth helpings of beer, poured with a steadily trained hand to avoid too much head? Yes, yes I am. Have a been able to count a day where alcohol did not enter my system this summer or even this year? No. Is a night off still a night that included 2 or 3 shared 22 ounces of beer indulgence with dinner? Yes.
It is a lot, and last night, a wall was hit. It wasn't just me that hit the wall, but also the company I found myself with at the K&K, a bar I've called home since I was sneaking in to pretend I knew about Stella, Hoegaarden, and Smithwicks at 19. The pithy beach scene they had set up inside was a stark and dismal contrast to the August rain outside, and all I could think was that it was a terrible joke to pretend that we were somewhere warm. Depressing. The three of us, over beers we couldn't drink (myself finally succumbing to just water), sank lower and lower toward the glasses that we couldn't finish, tired of the weather, tired of the bar, tired of drinking.
We left the bar contemplating what we began to think was the reduction of our existence: a bottle, a pint, and memories that grew foggier with each sip. I don't know if any of us explicitly felt that we might call this a "problem," but if 1 or all of us was thinking it, no one was going to say it out loud. "The first step is admitting that you have a problem." In the state of self pity and passing depression that the 3 of us found ourselves in, and the inevitable rugby playing (or softball in 1/3 of our little party) and bar attending years of our 20s that we each had left to weigh our heavy moods against, no one would verbalize the word "problem."
We walked home and talked about the weather.
