Member-only story
Alcohol Is The Underground River of Sorrow Beneath This World
Our Society’s Flippant Attitude To This Deadly Drug Needs To Change
The shards of glass from his own broken wine bottle tore his hands, but he was beyond pain. Blood streamed down, but he was beyond pain, anaesthetized by 1.5 Litre bottles of cheap red wine which he chugged, wine staining his beard, and making him look like a vampire.
I want to help this man, but I hardly know this man. Quiet, keeps to himself, except when he is on a bender, which is often. Then there is nothing to do but pick him up off his lawn, convince him to go inside, to go to bed, and sweep up the rest of the glass. Tickets for public intoxication are all over his house, but this is not a policing issue- it is a public health issue. This disease is rampant and has been allowed to run rampant.
Alcohol use is joked about, and that is all harmless for most people. But there is a darker side. All families have secrets. Your friends have secrets. Many of them medicate to get through their days or nights. Many live with alcohol in their bloodstreams. Many structure their lives around where they will get their next drink.
Binge drinking is glamourized. We loved it, me and all the teenagers I knew and hung around, and we grew up fine. Being 16 and…
