But some people wight want to try, even if after all is said and done it is impossible.

I’ve drunk for many years, more or less, more or less.

In that time I have taken on board many opinions about why that is, what it is I am doing, and what it ultimately constitutes.

I’ve adopted some of those positions as my own, despite some internal contradiction with how I might feel, I’ve spent many years thinking that I am an alcoholic. The inevitable conclusions that people tend to draw from that are: This is a problem; you must fix it; you can never drink again; you can’t control it; it controls you; nothing good will come from drinking.

But the truth is, that much of what people say is based on generalisations and in fact misconceptions because they do not in any way understand why I drink. People understand why “regular” drinkers drink, and the excuses for “regular” drinking problems are countless. The forgiveness knows know bounds. Ironically the reason a regular person drinks appears to me to be purely for hedonistic reasons. Do I drink purely for hedonistic reasons, sure I do sometimes

I am not a “regular” drinker (I’ve been told many a time, after all, that I am an alcoholic!). At times I drink for the same reasons that regular drinkers do, alcohol is a drug that affects the chemicals in the brain responsible for pleasure. We’re rats in an experiment, of course we choose the vodka laced water from time to time. What I have observed though, is that there are other times where I drink for reasons that – to my knowledge – do not seem to apply to regular drinkers. (And then other times I then have to drink due to the consequences of my ’non-regular drinker’ choices).

If I carry on, people will say, I could be that bum downtown that is slowly dying, scrounging for a few quid to get the next bottle of Aldi vodka to go right back around to the start. Every day, for the rest of their miserable lives. They are miserable of course. You know this, because you compare their life to yours and you are so happy in comparison that they must, unquestionably, be miserable. In fact your happiness depends on it. Yet, imagine for a second a happiness so fragile that it must be built on a foundation of pity for others. Or don’t, I don’t want to scare you.

“If I carry on”, denies the fact that for around 30 years now I have in fact “carried on”.

Compared to the bum, who was probably just unlucky…

I’m just lucky I am married to a woman I love that, mostly (at least) seems to love me, despite my ‘deviance’.
I’m just lucky I have two daughters that, as hurt as they have been at times from my deviance, still on the whole seem to love me.
I’m just lucky I have now run 5 marathons, and countless half marathons.
I’m just lucky that I’m now in my fourth year of a philosophy degree which I have regularly been attaining respectable scores.
I’m just lucky I’ve spent 10 years learning about Bitcoin to the point I’m probably in the top 1% of the population when it comes to knowing about it.
I’m just lucky that I have single handedly written an enterprise portfolio system that is regarded by some as the best in the world.

The world. It’s a big place huh. Think of all the people in it who aren’t “alcoholic” that could have done it better… and yet they didn’t?

All of this luck. The bum could so easily be the one in my position, and me in his. All it takes is to apply the very basic logic that all ‘alcoholics’ basically just the same type of person. A sick person at that. Defined only by their alcoholism. Having no other redeeming features that might distinguish one from another.

I’ve achieved alI have done, not “despite” alcohol, but in fact *because* I am the kind of person that uses alcohol to fuel a fire inside me that — without alcohol — tends to dwindle. Purely my observation though.

There are a number of famous writers that were ‘alcoholics’, not just writers in fact but a number of major historical figures of note. Am I to be a person of historical note, I don’t really care much for whether I am. That’s not the point. The point is it illustrates that there are some people in this world that, seemingly, like me have used alcohol to fuel a fire that burns inside them to do great things.

It would be crass of me not to acknowledge that the fire that I fuel can also sometimes burn those that are close to it. This leaves me in the end with the final challenge. To burn as brightly as I can, without hurting those people closest to me too much. How much is too much, it impossible to know. I am prepared to take on what might be considered an impossible challenge because ultimately, that is who I am. To give up drinking is to give up. I will never give up.

I might fail, but if I fail it wasn’t because I didn’t try.