by Manuel Gonzales

Hangover Blues

A writer without a drink is like a chicken without its head.
-- William Faulkner

What is it with American writers and drinking? Faulkner, Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Steinbeck, London, O'Neill, Cheever, Carver, Dorothy Parker and that whole vicious circle? There are more, I just don't know the list off the top of my head. They drink too much and they don't write enough. Don't write enough that's good. They have their good, strong works. Classics of American Fiction. But before their time, their writing fails them, their talent deserts them, and they drink themselves into literary obscurity. For the most part, they are known, well-known, for their body of work written before the age of 50. With O'Neill and Fitzgerald acting as exceptions (O'Neill because he kicked his habit, and Fitzgerald because his greatest body of work was written while he was in his late twenties). While European writers continue to write well into their sixties and seventies -- writing, even, until they die and writing good, strong works of fiction -- the big hitters of American fiction are petering out in their fifties and sixties. Faulkner's last great novel was Go Down, Moses. How many of you have read Across the River and Into the Trees and liked it? The Garden of Eden anyone? Even The Old Man and the Sea was a sentimental rewrite of the excellent short story "The Undefeated." Carver was never sober enough to write a novel, and Cheever stopped writing long before his time.

And so, I have come to this decision (more, this decision has come to me, battling its way through my pounding head): I'm going cold turkey. Everything, cold turkey.

If it isn't alcohol, then it's something else. That something else I'm giving up, too. No sex, no drugs, no smokes, no liquor. Goodbye cruel world of hangovers and bad highs and one night stands and emphysemic lungs. No more, not for me, no sir. Well, maybe a beer once in a while will be okay. Can't deprive myself of all earthly delights.

So I ask you, my friends, if you see me out and about, please do not offer me any drinks or smokes or tokes, and if in my hands you spy a full, half-full, empty glass of whisky or gin or even a bottle of beer, take it away. You'll be doing us both a favor. And if I come to your house for dinner or for the afternoon, please do not offer me a beer or a glass of wine, for, being the gentleman that I am, I will be unable to refuse your gesture, and, as we all know, one drink will lead to two, and three and four, and so on. And in the end, I will find myself at the nearest Quicky-Mart buying another six-pack or bottle of wine to replace what I've taken from your refrigerator. And if I'm buying you a six-pack, then why not buy myself six-pack? So starts another vicious cycle.

There will, of course, be exceptions. If, for instance, a dear friend invites me to his house to taste a special vintage French Country wine, or if it is somebody's birthday or anniversary or wedding, or any event in which one might make a toast or join a toast, I will put aside my disciplined ways if but for an evening. Or if I am in a great deal of pain, the kind which might be soothed by a beer or two or a small tumbler of whiskey, or if I find myself unable to write, find myself, in fact, butting my head time and again, against that proverbial and inevitable wall of writer's block. Then I would not deprive myself of drink, purely on principle. And if a good friend invites me to have a drink, I shall not disappoint him because of my limitations, for no man or woman should drink alone. And what if one of my characters is a heavy drinker of, say, whiskey? Then a drink or two will not be merely luxury, but neccesity. Else, how could I assume to describe his reactions or even the taste of the drink. We must write about what we know, mustn't we. Or say I publish a short story or win the lottery or finish a well-written article, then I might deserve a drink, as good work should never go unrewarded. In fact, having finished this piece maybe I should have a drink right now.