With a drink in me, my confidence returned, my direction seemed clear-cut, and I reveled in lofty plans and dreams for the future. Drinking to escape became as important as eating to survive.

I don’t know if I really need a program that deals with addictions—I wouldn’t go that far—but at the same time, just in case, I know that I could do something to learn to manage better, to perhaps train my body to only want a bit—a can of lemon-tinted beer or two, no more—and to not disappoint me with another blackout.

I would take a drink, and then I knew everything was going to be all right. I was going to clean up my act; everything was going to change—you’ll see. It didn’t; nothing changed. I tried so many ways of beating the game: I went to church and took a pledge; I went to a Native sweat lodge; I would do something so I would be put in jail; I vowed to st

But then something would snap, some uncontrollable process would kick in, and all of a sudden it would be two or three hours later and I’d be on my sixth or tenth or God knows what glass of wine, and I’d be plastered. I couldn’t account for it, couldn’t explain it, couldn’t even rationalize it, although I struggled mightily to. I seemed to get drun