Drying Out

     The second time around, my mother found a drinking partner and married him. Their drinking was not the usual. They got blasted off-the-wall drunk. 

     The family doctor was an alcoholic too. When my step-grandfather died, the doc showed up at the funeral home drunk. Very drunk. And the family said, "Oh he's drunk. Look how much he [the doctor] loved him [dead step-grandfather]."

     It came to pass that my step-father needed a few days in the hospital in order to dry out. In those days, people were not admitted for alcohol withdrawal. The alcoholic family doctor arranged for my step-father's hospitalization under the guise of "heart problems." Step-father dried out and returned home to continue drinking in the manner that he had been drinking. Being an active drunk himself, the family doctor thought this was just fine.

     Years later in a classroom, I asked "An alcoholic can go to the hospital, dry out, and then drink again?" That was the first time that I was told that an alcoholic cannot drink safely.

sapphoq on life

Cracked Ribs

It had snowed. I was in kindergarten. Dad picked me up [he was living in his own apartment then-- the folks had gotten divorced]. I remember a hill and a toboggan. Dad was laying on it. "Jump on," he said. I remember the toboggan starting down the hill. I jumped on. We went down the hill.

I was a thin little mite. Even so, I had succeeded in cracking several of his ribs. Things were a bit painful for Dad for awhile. Coughing. Breathing. Laughing.

sapphoq on life says: It's not the weight we throw around. It's how we throw around our weight.