My Report on Not Drinking Very Much

The benefits of not drinking very much after having been a person who drank quite a bit are multiple. First off, you lose weight. Second, you sleep way better. Third, you write less stupid stuff. Fourth, you start fewer arguments. I like things in fives, but can’t think of a fifth.

For a while, I swapped out wine for red licorice. I liked this strategy an awful lot but then I started consuming really significant amounts of red licorice. It was always up there on the shelf, you know, wrapped tight in a little bag, waiting for me. The pattern was obvious. The indulgence narcotic.

So, I quit red licorice. Just like that. You cannot come here, red licorice. You cannot come in my house.

I talk about this because I can. I have this platform. And I live in Wisconsin which gives me huge talking rights about drinking. Look us up. We drink more per capita than anywhere. And bad things happen because of all that drinking. Now more evidence is coming out about the causal link between alcohol and cancer, between drinking and brain rot of all types, pick a card, any card. One cannot make an affirmative argument for alcohol.

Today, we went to a Polish market. We bought fresh sausage and two exquisitely made cabbage rolls for dinner. While my husband checked out, I wandered the liquor aisle. There was wine in violin-shaped bottles, Polish vodka and brandy, liqueurs in the most vivid colors, velvet purples and reds. Blood orange in a crystal glass, a fire in the fireplace, candles burning. Everything as if it didn’t matter.

I quit smoking forty years ago. I still miss it like a friend who died without telling me.

That’s not how I feel about alcohol. I don’t know how I feel about that. Meanwhile, I have my five ounces of white wine, like medicine.