Congratulations on Spiraling into Alcoholism In Style!

You always knew you were going to be an alcoholic. Your daddy was an alcoholic, your mammy was an alcoholic and your grand gramps was an alcoholic. Your grandma just huffed boot black, which you’ve come to understand was the depression equivalent of spray paint.

But a man makes his choices and lives with them. He does not wait, frightened, for the demon of drink to take him. He does not cower in churches on Tuesday nights, clutching coffee and day-old doughnuts and praying for guidance from a higher power like some sort of sucker. He embraces fate and, through this embrace, becomes more of a man.

That’s exactly what you’re going to do today when you walk into a liquor store dressed in your finest suit, a pinstripe affair you purchased to attend your sister’s wedding back in 1999. This was before The Sickness took her and she became, as you’re about to become, a toothless hobo. But she did it in her pajamas, stepping out of a Toyota Tercel with a lit cigarette in her mouth. You’re going to redefine hitting rock bottom with your getup.

The liquor store clerk will look you up and down and nod, saying “Damn” as he hands you your bottle of Mad Dog 20/20.

You’ll nod back at him and say “Damn right” as you leave his store, stepping back out into the biting Philadelphia winter. You’ll wrap your stylish scarf around your neck, blow into your hands one last time as a sober man and unscrew the top of that Mad Dog bottle, sucking down as much as you can with your first gulp. It will feel warm going down your throat, smooth, slick even. You’ll lick your lips and think to yourself, it feels like coming home.

Congratulations on Spiraling Into Alcoholism In Style!