Tolerance

Vodka. It's pretty good stuff. Good vodka and rocks and a sweaty glass . . . the rapid achievement of elevated mood, the illusion of purity through clear liquid. There was a time when she occupied an honored place in the pantry, roosting above mere food in her own special spot, easily consulted at appropriate times.

The "appropriate times" seemed to come closer and closer together and I found that with practice I could consume ounces and ounces, oodles and oodles of vodka rocks garlic stuffed olive martinis to hell with Vermouth. As I recall morning were not the best, nor was waking in my chair at two in the morning the the remnants of a spilled martini in my crotch with a garnish of sideways glass. The thing about drinking for distance is that hangovers seem to dull as well and I found that a couple tall glasses of water in the morning before coffee and perhaps a couple Tylenol left me fit enough to carry on, particularly as cocktail time came earlier and earlier.

I'm fairly certain I've walked my readers (wake up, you two!) down my own version of the slippery slope a few times in the past. What prompts this is that Friday night I had a couple stiff vodkas - big ones. Spilled one, too. Nothing drastic or awful happened, other than Saturday morning. I woke up when someone began drilling into my forehead with an invisible brace and bit. I woke up with the granddaddy of all dry mouths. I woke up with cotton where my brain used to be and a deeply founded wish for four hours more sleep. I woke with an intestinal tract scored as if by gallons of paint thinner, yelping it's distress and urgency intermittently throughout the ensuing day. It was a stirring reminder.

The photo above is not an image of my coming death, it's an example of the size of the stone shard being driven underneath the top of my eyeballs.

Heavy drinkers do not complain of hangovers. We get up, we drink lots of water, we try to take our Ibuprofen without calling attention to ourselves by too much bottle rattling. If we do the crime, we do our time. After 24 hours, suitably chastised by my own body chemistry, I'm clear on a few things. This morning I feel great, if only by comparison. I remember why I'm not, except by inclination, a heavy drinker these days. I'm on a forced and limited beer diet. I make sure there are days, or two or three, between beers, and although some folks don't have to count and measure these things, I'm resigned that I will always need to manage my intake because I am a Buzz-hound. Loving the righteous buzz as I do, I know that I'm capable of truly impressive consumption, big time chemical tolerance, sloppy and careless excess.

What's particularly notable is that I'm pretty sure I used to consume that amount of vodka nearly every day. Living in supposed harmony with a chemical so simultaneously smooth and corrosive is an art I no longer try to master. A true hangover is a gift from the almighty, routed through perdition via a dry Oklahoma back road to the tune of a jackhammer. It's a tap on the shoulder from a bony insistent finger. It's a long talk, for those who listen, with a lesson already learned - a review session, if we're lucky - prescriptive of a course correction.

Message to hangover: situation noted. There's a kayak trip in the offing, three days with my pals on the Wisconsin River, food exercise, beer iced in little portable coolers, perhaps a bottle of something. I'm going to have some serious fun, assuming the water goes down, the stars stay aligned, and I pay attention. It took some discipline to get my body chemistry back to the point at which I can really appreciate a hangover. I think I'll keep it this way.