MY BATTLE WITH DRINK
I could tell my story in two words--the two words "I drank." But I wasnot always a drinker. This is the story of my downfall--and of myrise--for through the influence of a good woman, I have, thank Heaven,risen from the depths.
The thing stole upon me gradually, as it does upon so many young men.As a boy, I remember taking a glass of root beer, but it did not gripme then. I can recall that I even disliked the taste. I was a youngman before temptation really came upon me. My downfall began when Ijoined the Yonkers Shorthand and Typewriting College.
It was then that I first made acquaintance with the awful power ofridicule. They were a hard-living set at college--reckless youths.They frequented movie palaces. They thought nothing of winding up anevening with a couple of egg-phosphates and a chocolate fudge. Theylaughed at me when I refused to join them. I was only twenty. Mycharacter was undeveloped. I could not endure their scorn. The nexttime I was offered a drink I accepted. They were pleased, I remember.They called me "Good old Plum!" and a good sport and othercomplimentary names. I was intoxicated with sudden popularity.
How vividly I can recall that day! The shining counter, the placardsadvertising strange mixtures with ice cream as their basis, the busymen behind the counter, the half-cynical, half-pitying eyes of thegirl in the cage where you bought the soda checks. She had seen somany happy, healthy boys through that little hole in the wire netting,so many thoughtless boys all eager for their first soda, clamoring toset their foot on the primrose path that leads to destruction.
It was an apple marshmallow sundae, I recollect. I dug my spoon intoit with an assumption of gaiety which I was far from feeling. Thefirst mouthful almost nauseated me. It was like cold hair-oil. But Istuck to it. I could not break down now. I could not bear to forfeitthe newly-won esteem of my comrades. They were gulping their sundaesdown with the speed and enjoyment of old hands. I set my teeth, andpersevered, and by degrees a strange exhilaration began to steal overme. I felt that I had burnt my boats and bridges; that I had crossedthe Rubicon. I was reckless. I ordered another round. I was the lifeand soul of that party.
The next morning brought remorse. I did not feel well. I had pains,physical and mental. But I could not go back now. I was too weak todispense with my popularity. I was only a boy, and on the previousevening the captain of the Checkers Club, to whom I looked up with analmost worshipping reverence, had slapped me on the back and told methat I was a corker. I felt that nothing could be excessive paymentfor such an honor. That night I gave a party at which orange phosphateflowed like water. It was the turning point.
I had got the habit!
I will pass briefly over the next few years. I continued to sinkdeeper and deeper into the slough. I knew all the drugstore clerks inNew York by their first names, and they called me by mine. I no longereven had to specify the abomination I desired. I simply handed the manmy ten cent check and said: "The usual, Jimmy," and he understood.
At first, considerations of health did not trouble me. I was young andstrong, and my constitution quickly threw off the effects of mydissipation. Then, gradually, I began to feel worse. I was losing mygrip. I found a difficulty in concentrating my attention on my work. Ihad dizzy spells. I became nervous and distrait. Eventually I went toa doctor. He examined me thoroughly, and shook his head.
"If I am to do you any good," he said, "you must tell me all. You musthold no secrets from me."
"Doctor," I said, covering my face with my hands, "I am a confirmedsoda-fiend."
He gave me a long lecture and a longer list of instructions. I musttake air and exercise and I must become a total abstainer from sundaesof all descriptions. I must avoid limeade like the plague, and ifanybody offered me a Bulgarzoon I was to knock him down and shout forthe nearest policeman.
I learned then for the first time what a bitterly hard thing it is fora man in a large and wicked city to keep from soda when once he hasgot the habit. Everything was against me. The old convivial circlebegan to shun me. I could not join in their revels and they began tolook on me as a grouch. In the end, I fell, and in one wild orgy undidall the good of a month's abstinence. I was desperate then. I feltthat nothing could save me, and I might as well give up the struggle.I drank two pin-ap-o-lades, three grapefruit-olas and an egg-zoolak,before pausing to take breath.
And then, the next day, I met May, the girl who effected myreformation. She was a clergyman's daughter who, to support herwidowed mother, had accepted a non-speaking part in a musical comedyproduction entitled "Oh Joy! Oh Pep!" Our acquaintance ripened, andone night I asked her out to supper.
I look on that moment as the happiest of my life. I met her at thestage door, and conducted her to the nearest soda-fountain. We wereinside and I was buying the checks before she realized where she was,and I shall never forget her look of mingled pain and horror.
"And I thought you were a live one!" she murmured.
It seemed that she had been looking forward to a little lobster andchampagne. The idea was absolutely new to me. She quickly convincedme, however, that such was the only refreshment which she wouldconsider, and she recoiled with unconcealed aversion from mysuggestion of a Mocha Malted and an Eva Tanguay. That night I tastedwine for the first time, and my reformation began.
It was hard at first, desperately hard. Something inside me was tryingto pull me back to the sundaes for which I craved, but I resisted theimpulse. Always with her divinely sympathetic encouragement, Igradually acquired a taste for alcohol. And suddenly, one evening,like a flash it came upon me that I had shaken off the cursed yokethat held me down: that I never wanted to see the inside of adrugstore again. Cocktails, at first repellent, have at last becomepalatable to me. I drink highballs for breakfast. I am saved.