I Don’t Trust People Who Drink

It’s a personal thing, so don’t take offense.

Photo by Cassiano Barletta on Unsplash

This week, my uncle fell off the wagon after nearly four months of sobriety. He went without beer, tequila, or weed for that length of time — but an hour at a bar over the weekend unraveled all that progress.

I’ve never understood the addiction known as alcoholism. Even after ten years of living with it as an outside observer, I still don’t understand. It’s a compulsion I have yet to wrap my head around, for sure.

It’s gotten to the point where I even judge the people who order a beer just for the fun of it while they’re attending a concert or festival. I watch them out of the corner of my eye and wonder when one will be too much.

I know it’s my problem. I know I have a tangled-up stake in it — not only is my uncle an alcoholic but my own father struggled with alcohol overindulgence a few times in my childhood — but a big part of it is that I don’t understand the allure of losing hold of yourself while under an influence of some kind. Why would you want to give up control like that?

I know I can ask questions all day long and still never understand things like alcoholism and drug addiction. Some things can only be lived and experienced before there’s some form of enlightenment.